Right on the edge

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HAPPY NEW YEAR! Don’t Shoot The Messenger

And so here we are, already inside the first day of the New Year! As each one passes, I marvel at how much I’ve learned in the passing 365 days and wonder what lies ahead for the next 365 days. OK, truth be told, the first one hasn’t actually happened as I am writing this to meet deadline obligations and it is still 2013. That’s the way it works in the newspaper print business. Competing with instant news shouting to you from local network and cable television or local radio news updates is impossible. However, in case you caught only portions of what the headline news brought you, we can certainly reiterate the theme or subject matter to you so everyone has a chance to understand what the facts were or why it may or may not be something of importance you might decide to keep tucked away in your memory banks.

One such subject that has gone by the wayside recently is the subject of protecting our local schools from a possible crack pot who decides to take a gun into one of our local schools creating mayhem and loss of life.

Admittedly, it is hard for me to imagine that happening within our community as it is for most of us. However, I’m sure no one in any of the other schools this horrible type of tragedy has happened felt any differently than we do in the F/M area regarding the protection of our children, school officials and teachers.

With that in mind, please consider what the reporter from one of our local television stations was trying to impress upon the viewers she planned on reporting this information to once she completed her report.

Yes, there have been several talk show hosts who have gone off on their own tangents and felt severe charges should be brought against the reporter because she trespassed and broke “rules” in an effort to make everyone realize exactly how easy it would be for ANYONE to ignore the signs and stated regulations regarding entering any school in Fargo, Moorhead and West Fargo schools without permission or even knowledge of school officials within each of the schools!

I’m betting that was the entire intent of the investigating reporter’s piece! So after listening to a lot of conversation from the public and talking to a few officials — off the record because no one seems to want to be quoted on a flaming topic such as this — I get the impression what this young reporter did was a favor to our communities — by WAKING EVERYONE UP! And after all, isn’t that her job?

People think! Does anyone believe for one nano second a wacko or otherwise malcontent bent on shooting someone or multiple people in a setting such as a school, that only has signs demanding “anyone entering the building” needs to “report” to the administration office is actually going to follow that? Seriously? Of course you don’t! No one in this day and age when anyone is able to go out and find a gun anywhere at any time would believe that.

Our communities of Fargo, Moorhead and West Fargo are all strong supporters of the 2nd Amendment: the right to bear arms. That’s just fine and dandy. I have no objection to that — to a degree. The “degree” stops at not forcing each and every vendor, public and private, in behaving as responsible citizens by ensuring each and every gun is REGISTERED and that each and every person buying anything more lethal than a BB gun needs to have a background check done that they pass prior to their being able to walk out of a store or garage sale with a weapon intended for one purpose: to shoot and presumably wound or kill whatever their aim hits.

The bottom line on this entire fiasco is she was doing her job as an investigative reporter so that you, Joe-Q Public, have the facts and are able to discern whether the security, as it is, within each school district is actually safe or at least safe “enough.” Or, perhaps systems need to be re-evaluated and, if necessary, changed for the benefit of our children, our teachers and our community at large.

Like it or not, that’s what investigative reporters are expected to do in order to get the facts of a story and tell it as honestly as possible.

Don’t shoot the messenger simply because the message isn’t what everyone wants to hear or find out or because she broke a rule that certainly would not make any difference at all should someone with a gun enter any of the area schools with malice on their agenda.

The point is: are the schools within the F/M area safe from someone easily entering who definitely should not?

Got a question or comment? Great SEND IT TO US IN AN EDITORIAL LETTER!!

Send it to: tfinney@NCPPUB.com or to me at sooasheim@aol.com. We will print your letters regardless your subject, just make sure you sign them!

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