No Guns in Cuba

     I woke early today.  In time to hear the soft whistle of the train passing by. 
I hate being up before seven but it seems I have some thoughts on guns.  The NRA
clings to their beliefs that our nation has a right to bear arms. I wonder if they
have read the fine print in the Second Amendment (Amendment ll ), which states:

     "A well regulated milita, being necessary to the security of a free state,
       the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."

Adopted on December 15, 1791, this amendment was meant to protect people living in
a time where order was yet to be established and folks took matters into their own hands.
Like the shooter Friday.  He took matters into his own sick and twisted hands when
he blew the brains out of his mother's head and then repeatedly shot six and seven year
olds while they were probably getting ready for morning snack time.  Are the NRA 
supporters proud that they enabled this?  Can they honestly continue to say this right
is relative in today's society, 221 years after the fact?  Do they need me to send them
an email with the definition and understanding of, "well regulated"?  
     People don't really understand Castro but he has the presence of mind to know that
if you put guns into peoples' hands, someone will get shot.  Dead.  So he makes it
illegal for people to keep and bear arms.  Perhaps he understands that the right people will
not keep and bear arms.  The wrong people will buy them and use them to kill their families and 
innocent children.  Surely some will say that Castro doesn't want to be shot himself, hence,
the rigid laws, but I entice you to consider the realm of possibilities when society finally decides to 
talk things out.  Sure, knives are allowed in Cuba and people do get hurt from them.
However, I can't help but wonder how many would be alive this foggy Sunday morning if
that crazed, disturbed twenty year old would have come into Sandy Hook Elementary
school armed with only a knife. 
       Senseless deaths are impossible to comprehend.  They linger on for the rest of time.
Controlling guns?  Easy to understand.  In the words of my nephew,
   "Why? Why did they let that man have a gun?"  
Aren't we as a nation really just infringing on the rights of the innocents?
They aren't having mass killings in Cuba or for that matter, Costa Rica either. 
Many folks in the world don't have many rights but they apparently value to right to breath.
To live.
     Cuba has a host of challenges: long lines for basic food staples, cigarettes and alcohol
everywhere for purchase but rarely a place to purchase fruits or vegetables. 
Free health care that uses X-Ray machines from the 1940's. Doctors assigned to 
neighborhoods with only a small place on the main floor of their assigned houses
to see patients.  Too, too many patients for a new doctor and one nurse to handle.
Still, they know that when they walk in for their appointment, nobody will walk
in after them with a semi-automatic riffle and destroy their lives in sixty seconds or less.
     We can no longer pride ourselves on our great country when the rights of the
children have been infringed.