Huh? DDN's Doug Page says ''Carry law benefits marginal''

We're not sure from the title OR from the article, but we think this is a pro-concealed carry article. If so, it'd likely be a first for the Dayton Daily News.

By Doug Page
Dayton Daily News

February 11, 2004

More than 200 people gathered in Xenia last week to find out how to carry a concealed firearm. More were turned away from the door for fear the fire marshal might close the crowded meeting room.

I attended out of curiosity. After reading some newspaper columnists, I wondered if the armed Vandals were descending on Ohio. Big city columnists tend to get in a tizzy over an armed citizenry.

I also attended because of a vested interest. I've stared down the barrel of several armed citizens, though I'm sure none of them would qualify for a concealed carry permit.

It is surprising that when staring down the barrel of a cheap .32-caliber weapon, its muzzle grows to the size of a 50-gallon barrel — as I told the officer who answered the call at my convenience store.

Click on the "Read More..." link below for more.

After my first brush with an armed citizen, I called my dad, an Iwo Jima Marine, and asked his advice. I'd grown up in a house with plenty of firearms. They were tools used to harvest ducks, pheasants and deer. I wondered about deterrence or defense.

"Give 'em the money, Bub. Let the cops deal with the bad guys," was his advice. "And seriously consider getting another job."

Getting another job wasn't really a financial option at the time, so I stuck around and got robbed three more times over the next 10 months.

The cops started staking out the market during the day and parking their cruisers in the front during the night when they stopped for coffee. Free coffee to any police officer was my dad's most valuable advice.

On New Year's Eve, a K-9 officer stopped by with his retired partner. The partner, an 8-year-old, 110-pound German shepherd, slept behind the counter.

Every time a customer entered, the shepherd would arise from its bed, put its front paws on the counter and watch the customer until the purchase was complete and the customer was out the door.

Several gentlemen entered, saw the dog and left. They must have been cat lovers. The dog and I toasted the New Year with a Milk Bone and coffee.

I heard a lot of people express fear last week of going about their daily business unarmed. The more impassioned saw the passage of the 144-page concealed carry law as the salvation of civilization. The tone of their harangues sounded much like those big city columnists who saw the concealed carry law as a return to Dodge City.

I figure if a fellow or lady wants to strap 32 ounces of iron to their body to feel safer, that's fine by me. I'm willing to bet that after six months of hauling around the iron, fewer than 5 percent will be toting a gun. It's too much of a hassle.

But society will be marginally safer with all those loaded guns about. It's the unloaded guns that can kill you quickest. Observed Mark Twain:

"Never meddle with old unloaded firearms; they are the most deadly and unerring things that ever have been created by man. . . . A youth, who can't hit a cathedral at 30 yards with a cannon in three-quarters of an hour, can take up an old empty musket and bag his grandmother every time at a hundred."

Contact Doug Page, editor of the Greene County edition of the Dayton Daily News, by e-mail at [email protected], call him at 335-3838 or write to him at 25 S. Plum St., Troy, OH 45373.

Reply to Mr. Page, written by OFCC's Larry S. Moore:

I take exceptions with most of your statements, beginning with the title.

A little research into the facts and you would have learned that the benefits experienced by the 38 or so other states that permit concealed carry have been above marginal. In fact Michigan is experiencing a 10% drop in crime. Reading your own newspaper and local televised newscasts it does appear that we have been descended upon by armed thugs. You should check with Mary McCarty about her neighborhood. Headlines in the DDN clearly reported bold armed invaders. Tony Gordon was shot and killed in a car jacking. A DDN delivery person was shot in the leg. Two Dayton cops where shot at behind the Pine Club and the list goes on seemingly without end.

I attended, and participated in the meeting, because I have a vested interest. I have a vested interest in taking responsibility for the protection of myself and my family. I have a vested interest in my personal safety. You are correct that about 5% of the population will probably carry. Statistics from other states indicate about that number of active permits; although it is impossible to determine who is actually carrying on any given day. That is part of the beauty of concealed carry. Criminals can't determine who is carrying, who is an easy mark and who is prepared to fight back.

You seem to confuse .32 caliber with 32 ounces. Most firearms for concealed carry uses weigh less than 32 ounces. It appears rather obvious that you have had neither training or personal experience with carrying firearms. Your personal experience is a rather rambling explanation. I am not sure of the point that you are attempting to make. Perhaps it is to leave protection to the police. However, law enforcement has no responsibility to protect individual citizens, only society in general. So has ruled the highest court in our land. As mentioned by one of the officers in the Greene County seminar, the cops can not be every place at once. By the way my copy of the law is 141 pages, not 144 pages.

While your father's advice was free coffee for the police, my father instilled in me a deep sense of personal freedom, responsibility for my family, and self-reliance. I take a number of precautions for my safety including motion detector lights at my home; a security system; I wear my seatbelt because statistics indicate that is how I am safest in any accident; I carry auto insurance to replace my property if in an accident; and I plan to carry a concealed firearm as much as this flawed law will permit. It is simply another insurance policy. Like all the other measures, I pray that I never have to use it. I have used a firearm once to defend my home against burglars. I hope that is the limit.

I would welcome the opportunity to have equal space to print the facts of concealed carry.

Thank you,

Larry S. Moore
Jamestown, OH