Ma’am, a fan of yours for your common sense stances on issues = especially national security. This is one of them. This is a threat to national security and we are now faced with a plethora of threats that are combining into a perfect storm. Further, it is one where emotions run deep, politics even deeper, and the ability to take a measured common sense legal solution very hard to accomplish.

I am sure your PSMs have done in depth analysis — this is more for the audience — but first all have to admit and acknowledge that the threat is here and it is internal.

Second, because it is internal, it will unfortunately often look like the familiar or put another way, they could be fellow citizens.

As many will point out, there are millions of Muslims, but a very small percentage of them are radical terrorist and we have to be careful not to paint all with the same brush — in exactly the same thought process there are thousands of law abiding gun owners and only an isolated few commit mass murder — so we have to avoid abridging the rights of all law abiding gun owners for the actions of a few. Of course this argument could be made for any product and unfortunately has been in the past where we as a society have tried to prevent crime before it happened based on the actions of a few — lost to memory of the current living, but prohibition is a prime example. It not only created a black market of unregulated sales, but also unregulated quality and high criminal activity and exploitation.

Ironically this is also an instance that causes people to not trust government — in a dark part of history, the government actually poisoned alcohol and wound up killing hundreds of people. That brings us to the first real major issue, a lot of the law abiding citizens who would be affected by the targeted legislation are already somewhat untrusting of the government, so any legislation should have some reassurance to that lack of trust. The expedited review for appeals and costs to the government is a good first step, but then you have to show that the appeal (although classed as expedited) is truly timely and complete, not a paper drill or some bureaucratic morass that says a year is timely. The down side is that as soon as a citizen is notified that they are on the list — well, if they are bad guys that will tip them off that they are under observation and could crash an intel op. Then there is the credibility of the intel that put one on the list on the first place — again, there is a lingering mistrust, and not without some basis, because afterall we have had numerous issues of intel failures both in catching and identifying that make the public record…this is not to say that I don’t respect the heck out of the law enforcement agencies but lets face it they are overworked and woefully under resourced.

Obviously a good thing to have would be to clear up misconceptions and misunderstandings but I fear that the politics of the situation has caused that to be irreparable. Political bent has put the fallacy of incorrect data into both sides and neither is willing or even able to be educated properly…or admit to being under a factual fallacy-I, personally, still am confused on how outlawing a semi auto rifle will make us safer from mass shooting because I am still unsure how anyone can walk into a public area with a LONG and BIG weapon and not trigger a security response and probable panic BEFORE they start shooting — vs walking into a place with semi automatic pistols…but I digress.

I am glad you are doing SOMETHING constructive vs helpless handwringing or trotting out proven unsuccessful and nonviable proposals for a showboating camera moment only.

Ultimately, I believe most law abiding citizens who truly want substantive fixes know that another law won’t really inhibit a person already committed to breaking the most illegal act — killing another human being. Nor are the mass shooting murderers concerned about the penalty because they are committed to suicide in the act.

Perhaps you can get your peers to grant and fund more resources for community police forces (this could result in multiple paybacks — the cop on the beat who knows a community may be able to get better intel for a better overall picture vs the FBI agent in DC trying to do the same via technical means. There would be a more immediate and robust response when the next event happens to mitigate the horror (because unless the US is ready to convict people for criminal thought, we have to wait for an action for an actual crime to have occurred), further lower crime results in a more productive business opportunity for communities which means more jobs and tax revenues — which will also decrease the potential angst that feeds those who become terrorists…it might also — and I know this is an elephant in the room — reassure those that are increasingly losing confidence in the ability of government and police to keep them safe and are buying weapons after each one of these events in record numbers…

Anyway, enough speechafying….God bless you and continue to help craft workable solutions!