Jared Golden is wrong on guns

The BDN Opinion section operates independently and does not set news policies or contribute to reporting or editing articles elsewhere in the newspaper or on bangordailynews.com
Laura Whitcomb is a registered nurse, a small-business owner and the president of Gun Owners of Maine.
When I read the opinion column last week by Craig Poulin regarding U.S. Rep. Jared Golden’s “bravery” in “changing his mind on assault weapons” after the Lewiston shooting, frankly, it made me angry.
Yes, I am the president of Gun Owners of Maine, but the column didn’t bother me because of my gun rights advocacy. It bothered me as a human being.
I have spent my entire adult life as a registered nurse, the majority of that time being spent in hospice and private care in people’s homes. I love and value life. I find fulfillment in supporting other human beings in their journey through life. I believe that life is worth defending.
What happened in Lewiston was horrific — a loss of life like Maine has never seen before. My heart aches for those who lost people they loved and cared for. I often wonder if those sentiments get muddied when I speak about gun rights. I wonder if people hear love or just see me, and others like me, as uncaring.
I read Poulin’s opinion that Golden is courageous for changing his mind. He used words like “honesty” and “integrity” to describe a diametric shift in opinion that came so shortly after the shootings occurred that it left a bad taste in many mouths.
I believe Golden stuck his proverbial finger in the wind, using the tragedy in Lewiston as a pawn in his political games. A game that may not be playing out quite like he thought.
Poulin is a former policeman, so he knows that, left alone, firearms can do no harm. It is only when they are picked up and used by human beings that they can become dangerous. In the wrong hands, we know this to be a fact, and I won’t shy away from that.
I also won’t shy away from the fundamental premise that the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun, is a good one.
Good men and women all over Maine take up arms, in defense of themselves, their families, their property — and sometimes in defense of the lives of strangers. Golden should know, he has said that he owns one of the many arms he now says he wants to ban.
As a mother, a wife, and a nurse, I want a safe state. I’m not going to tell anyone how to vote. Personally, I voted for Austin Theriault because I believe he is a candidate who better understands that people in Maine deserve the right to defend themselves and that trying to ban commonly owned firearms will do nothing to make our state safer.