You can have a gun in your house for self-defense, sport, or if you are a collector or amateur gunsmith or licensed dealer. That right disappears when you step out your door.

If you possess a hunting license you can have a registered firearm in a designated hunting area, or at the shooting range or at your gunsmith's, or dismantled in the trunk of your car when transporting. But that's it. We have a right to own and use firearms, we do not have a right to inflict them on our neighbors without their consent, and certainly not concealed from their view.

There should be zero tolerance for guns in public places, except for individuals with a good reason to carry one, like people transporting large sums of cash or valuable merchandise, and they should be vetted and licensed. Military firearms should be banned from public ownership. If you want to defend the country from domestic tyrants, foreign armies, alien invasion, or zombies, join a well-regulated militia.

All commercial transactions with guns should be controlled and regulated. And individuals who have their guns stolen from them by criminals should be responsible for introducing contraband into the community. If my dog gets loose and kills your kid I should at least have to give it up and pay a fine, and maybe lose my privilege to own a pet. If it applies to pit bulls, it should apply to guns. We are responsible for our guns, not just for how we use them.

Will this be hard and expensive to administer? Sure. Will it stop all gun crime and violence? No. Will it be an inconvenience to a lot of good people who present no threat to anyone? Probably, but so what? It will save a lot of lives, which trumps all the other NRA excuses. A gun gives you the power of the gods, the ability to kill anyone at a distance by simply pointing at them. It is not a toy to be indulged in by adult little boys who want to play soldier or cowboy--or cops and robbers. We should pay a heavy price for having and exercising that power.