The second amendment gives us the right to keep and bear arms.  In today's world  law abiding citizens that want to carry weapons to protect themselves must be allowed to do so.

Currently, the laws of NC are so restrictive that law abiding citizens are prevented from carrying legal weapons in many places such as; landfills, parking lots of publics buildings, restaurants or any place where state or county employees are present. 

We must relax the law and allow  law abiding citizens to carry concealed handguns. We must make it legal for law abiding citizens to carry in restaurants.  When we take our families and friends out to dinner we want to afford them protection when we walk to and from our car.  We would like to have a weapon in our car when we go to the landfill, not that we need protection at the landfill but we should not have to remove our weapons from the car just to take out the trash.

I get a kick out of the television commercial that shows a criminal breaking down the door of a home.  The alarm goes off and the Brinks guy comes on the phone and asks, "are you OK?"   The customer tells him "no," and Brinks operator tells them he is sending help.  Let's get real by the time the help arrives the wife and kids could be dead, these situations require an immediate response and we the homeowners must be allowed to protect those in our homes.  In Rocky Mount two women were shot in the head as they prepared meals for the elderly, they caught the criminals but this is little comfort to the families of those that are dead.  In Wake county,  just  this last week,  in a home invasion two more were shot execution style.  It is your choice if you want to call 911 and wait until the police arrive, but many don't want to wait and beome a victim.  This is our right as a Americans.

I want to be very clear our young men and women of the police and sheriffs departments do an outstanding job, they are some of the finest of our citizens giving of themselves to help keep us safe, but they can't be everywhere.  Even if they have a response time of 3 minutes that will be too late. 

I also want to be very clear this means law abiding citizens should be allowed to own weapons, this does not mean convicted felons and drug dealers.  There are over 70,000 concealed carry license holders in NC.  These law abiding citizens commit less than one-tenth of one percent  of crimes.  In fact the crime rate of concealed carry permit holders is less than law enforcement personnel. 

I also support a much quicker time to approve  concealed carry permits, currently the law allows 90 days to get approval.  We can get instant background checks done to obtain permission to buy weapons and we should be able to more quickly approve persons to carry a concealed weapon..   In our modern age of computers the criminal background check of a person take only a few seconds.  In many other states, concealed carry permits are approved in a matter of minutes or at least within 15 days.

I propose the time required for approval of concealed carry permits be reduced to no more than 15 days.

If you have any more ideas how we can better allow law abiding citizens to protect themselves and their families please email me your suggestions.

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