One Nation, Under the Gun.

Sunday, January 2, 2011, a 46 year old mother lost her life to a single bullet wound to the head. She was found dead in her Ohio home, face down on her living room floor. The weapon that killed her was a .22 caliber rifle that had been given as a Christmas gift to the perpetrator.

The person that fired the gun?

Her ten year old son, who reportedly went to a neighbor's house where he admitted he killed his own mother.

Apparently the victim's 15 year old daughter was in the home at the time of the shooting, and claims the motive was that her ten year old brother did not want to bring firewood inside the home. Apparently the mother and son quarreled until the boy went into his bedroom, retrieved his gun, brought it out into the living room and shot his mom.

The lawyer has entered a "denial" plea on behalf of the boy, which is the juvenile equivalent of "not guilty" from adult court.

The lawyer says that boy understands the possible consequences of these actions "as best as any 10-year-old boy can."

There are so many things so tragically wrong with this story it's hard to enumerate them, but the hardest pill for me to swallow personally is that this child was given a weapon at such a tender age.

According to reports, this had been a Christmas gift from his late grandfather, but the exact Christmas it was given remains in question. Since the grandfather has now passed away, it is very possible the gun belonged to the boy as early as last year, when he was no more than nine.

I've never had a gun, never fired a gun, but if one bullet managed to find its bullseye I'm even more convinced this is a weapon this child had for more than a few weeks and definitely fired prior to this tragic event.

In Ohio where this family lives it is illegal to provide a firearm to a person under the age of 18, but that didn't prevent this boy from having access to one, which was armed, when he was TEN YEARS OLD.

In good ol Ah-merica, guns and kids go hand in hand in a family tradition.

Ironically, though he was allowed to own a gun and fire a gun without society blinking an eye, the legal system will treat him like what he really is - a child. He will not be charged with murder, like an adult would have been. He instead will be charged with delinquency, being a delinquent child by reason of having committed intentional murder.

The legal system seems to understand that this child is not old enough to understand the repercussions of his actions like an adult would be able to do.

WHICH IS WHY YOU MUST BE AN ADULT TO OWN A GUN.

Our culture did this to this family, folks... and this child is going to pay the price for our impudence.

We live in a pro-gun, pro-violence society that teaches our children we have the distinctly American right to kill, and we have a right to do it from childhood.

It's our legacy.

Just say no to sex, but give Billy a WEAPON to celebrate the birth of our Lord, because Jesus knows there's a squirrel or wild turkey out there that would like mighty good on the wall.

Living in Texas my kids have been exposed to guns by their peers. They've shot guns, they've gone hunting.

But never EVER would either of them been allowed to own a gun, especially when they were still children who did not properly understand impulse control.

Hell, they can't have a gun in the house NOW, even though both are of a legal age to do it.

These are the rules I set because I'm ever mindful of the risk that comes with these weapons. I'm the one who has to make these rules, because I'm the adult who understands the implications of having access to a loaded gun.

The Facts About Kids and Guns:

# Every day, about 75 American children are shot. Most recover — 15 do not.

# The majority of fatal accidents involving a firearm occur in the home.

# Gunshot wounds are the single most common cause of death for women in the home, accounting for nearly half of all homicides and 42 percent of suicides.

# An adolescent is twice as likely to commit suicide if a gun is kept in the home.

# More teenage boys in America die from gunfire than from car accidents.

# Gunshot wounds are now the leading cause of death for teenage boys in America (white, African-American, urban, and suburban).

Read more on FamilyEducation: http://life.familyeducation.com/school-safety-month/violence/29712.html#ixzz1A9WRm5eI

Despite all this, it's reported that nearly 30% of teenage boys own at least one firearm.

And despite THAT... when something happens like this tragedy in Ohio, we have the audacity to be surprised.

We created this reality by this idea that Guns, God and America are some kind of holy trinity. Gun laws interfere with gun rights; which somehow get skirted on a regular basis for there to be these kind of statistics in the first place. It's illegal to give a child under 18 a firearm, but that is how at least one American family celebrated Christmas.

But God forbid anyone openly criticize our country's dependence on guns and what it's doing to our children.

God forbid we try to level any kind of accountability on our society for these tragic events, one that created an atmosphere where a child could impulsively kill his mom just because he didn't want to do a chore.

These are our American rights, by God, and we must defend them at all cost.

Tell that to a child whose youth has been ripped away from him for one moment he can't ever take back.

Tell that to the family whose world was blown open with the sound of a gunshot.

More importantly, tell that to the next 9 year old who tells his grandpa all he really wants is a shotgun for Christmas.

When's it going to end?

When is it going to be enough?

When is one life lost one too many?

Only we can answer those questions... as parents, as a society... as Americans.

Don't let this happen again.