Fred,

Having played a key role in "our media" for a good part of my professional life, I take extreme exception to your comment about the media. The media does not cause a gun to go off, does not allow a gun to be in reach of youthful hands, does not get drunk or angry and resort to pulling the trigger. All these things are done by gun owners. As you said in an earlier comment, a gun is an inanimate object. It's the person behind the gun who commits the mistake ... or the crime.

Will park visitation drop off if the gun regulations are rewritten to make weapons more available in the parks? That's a good question, one that needs to be thought through extremely carefully by the folks at Interior. But I fear they are driven too much by politics to think clearly. Personally, I don't worry too greatly about it because I head to the backcountry where relatively few others do. But if I was heading to a campground, where folks sit around campfires and drink, where kids get into things when their parents aren't watching, yeah, I'd probably think twice about it.

Too, if you've read many of the comments that have been directed at me over this issue the past 2-plus years, you'd be rightfully concerned about the stability and focus of quite a few of the so-called good and law-abiding gun owners.

And what about the young adults who might have just obtained their CCW permit and head everywhere they go with their firearm? What if they're hiking down a trail, figure they're far away from civilization and rangers, and decide to take some target practice? What if they miss their target and hit a hiker coming the other way that they didn't see?

What about bluffing grizzlies? Many times they'll charge you to intimidate. Will a gun owner resort to pulling the trigger rather than taking more appropriate action and either wound or completely miss the bear and end up worse for it?

Why are ranger groups and police groups opposed to expansion of CCW regulations? Is it because they're macho organizations that want to consolidate firepower, or do they have legitimate concerns over the frightening array of loosely written CCW laws and the increasing availability of weapons?

I don't question that the majority of gun owners no doubt are responsible and conscientious. It's the minority that worry me.