The horrific incident in Newtown has greatly affected us all. The innocent lives lost was both tragic and very disturbing. It is timely and encouraging that there now seems to be a more focused attempt to find ways to keep firearms out of the hands of those mentally unfit and to find better ways of caring for such people, in general. However, societal decisions should be based on cause and effect, not on our own personal likes, dislikes or agendas.

In 2011, there were 9,878 DWI-related deaths, many of which involved innocent adults and children, while there were 8,552 murders involving firearms. There is cuurently no emotionally charged challenge to ban alcohol even though 1,323 more people died from DWI-related accidents. Many more people drink alcohol than own firearms, so there is no concerted effort to ban alcohol. Why? Because we all tacitly consider these DWI-related deaths as "acceptable levels of death." Were we to visit the grave sites from the Newtown incident alongside the same number of innocents/young children whot lost their lives to DWI-related accidents, they should elicit the same exact horror and sadness. If one-third of the DWI-related deaths were innocents/children, there would be 2,961 more grave sites each year as those from Newtown.

"If I could save just one life..." sounds noble, but evidently our "likes" trump our "dislikes."

Ken Mason

Bellingham