Guns have blazed a bloody path through the news in recent weeks. A TV reporter and cameraman killed on live TV in Virginia. A Texas sheriff's deputy shot 15 times at a gas station. A state trooper in Louisiana and a policeman in Illinois fatally shot in the line of duty. In Raleigh, a gunman went on a rampage, killing a pawn shop owner, raping a 15-year-old girl and shooting and robbing a man entering a New Bern Avenue hotel.

For many gun rights supporters the answer to such mayhem is more guns, though in these cases the pawn shop owner, the deputy and the officer were armed. They say guns in the classroom could have stopped the Virginia Tech massacre or the mass killing in the Colorado movie theater. That’s why we need guns in bars, restaurants, schools, playgrounds and national parks.

Their line is that if guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns. But an Associated Press story that ran the day before the shooting on live TV raised a starkly different point. It said most guns used in crimes are stolen, but not from gun shops or pawn shops. They’re stolen from homes and cars.

The growing number of law-abiding Americans who feel compelled to arm themselves is feeding the flow to criminals. Perhaps the phrase should be revised: If guns are outlawed, outlaws would have a harder time finding and affording guns.

http://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/ned-barnett/article34121007.html