It’s insanity, needing to defend the most essential right of all: the natural right of defense, protected by the Second Amendment.

I can’t fathom why liberals viciously defend other rights yet so vehemently oppose this most fundamental Constitutionally protected right. Democrat John F. Kennedy said, “… we need a nation of Minutemen, citizens who are not only prepared to take arms, but citizens who regard the preservation of freedom as the basic purpose of their daily lives …”

What changed since JFK spoke those words that caused liberals to cease their support of the entire Bill of Rights, and instead defend only those rights they like?

ISU Professor Warren Blumenfeld recently gave us an emotional and irrational argument against concealed carry on school campuses. Reality check time:

On October 1, 1997, Luke Woodham brought a gun to Pearl High School in Mississippi, killed two and wounded seven more. It was Assistant Principle Joel Myrick with his .45 pistol that stopped the shooting.

On April 24, 1998, at a Parker Middle School dance in Pennsylvania, Andrew Wurst killed one and wounded three. It was James Strand, the guy who owned the dance hall, who stopped the killing with his shotgun.

On January 16, 2002, Peter Odighizuwa went to the Appalachian School of Law in Virginia, killed three and wounded three more. It was two students, Tracy Bridges and Mikael Gross, who stopped Odighizuwa with their .357 Magnum and 9mm handguns.

As for the infamous University of Texas shooting that Blumenfeld sorrowfully closes his histrionic plea against carry on campus with, he needs to talk to Austin Police Officer Ramiro Martinez, who killed Charles Whitman. According to Martinez, it was the students who retrieved rifles from their vehicles and laid down suppressive fire that allowed officers and one armed civilian to climb the clock tower and end the massacre.

Twisted anti-gunner logic says these shootings can’t happen because schools are so-called “Gun Free Zones.” Apparently criminals haven’t received that memo. In a breath of fresh air though, Utah has allowed students to carry concealed on campuses since 2006. Guess how many shootings have occurred there? Zero.

It’s usually the shooter himself who decides to stop school shootings, typically by committing suicide. But those stopped prematurely are mostly ended by armed citizens, not cops. Take the notorious Columbine shooting: the school officer fled and SWAT waited outside, listening to the slaughter over an open 911 call. It was only the suicide of the murderers that ended the tragedy.

If you still think the government will protect you, here’s more moments in history: In 1968, nine South Carolina officers killed four and injured 28 South Carolina State University and Wilkinson High School students during a protest. In 1970, the Ohio National Guard killed four and injured nine Kent State students, also during a protest, and a few days later, the Mississippi State Police killed two and injured 12 Jackson State students during another protest.

I’ve worked for two sheriff’s departments prior to coming to ISU and I can tell you that police are almost never there when crap hits the fan. They’re mostly just a clean-up crew to investigate a crime after the fact. And while I cannot name names, I know officers of the ISU Police who support students carrying on campus. Most cops actually believe in the individual right of keeping and bearing arms, even if their talking head politician administrators say otherwise, because they know they can’t be everywhere.

Individual responsibility isn’t a political philosophy, it’s the truth. America’s founders knew that unless we could defend our lives, states and nation, we would never truly be free. If you can’t preserve your life and country, what good are your other rights? What good is your right to free speech when tyrannical government can legislate it away, or you can easily be dominated by force?

The Second Amendment gives all the other rights teeth. Without it the others are just words on paper with meaning only as long as the government allows it. Our rights are a team, backing one another up. You can’t chip away at one and keep the others strong. Violation of the Second Amendment does nothing but diminish all other protected rights.

Perhaps Sigmund Freud was correct when he correlated emotional and sexual immaturity with fear of weapons. It seems this country is full of people who are not only unwilling to defend themselves, but who are determined to keep others from defending themselves as well. Blumenfeld, you have a right to be a pacifist, but you don’t have the right to make anyone else be a pacifist too. It is anti-gun pacifists who have created target-rich “Gun Free Zones” where crazy people know they can slaughter people safely, without resistance. Shame on you!

I’m conservative and I believe in rights; all of them, for everyone. Modern liberals claim they do too, so I am challenging all liberals to put their money where their mouths are and support all the rights protected by the Constitution. Anything short is hypocritical and immoral to the victims of liberal legislative disenfranchisement. Just ask Suzanna Hupp.