Illegal Arms Trafficking

March 15, 2012

Dear Mr. President,                                                                                                          

My name is Corey. I am a student at Parkway West Middle School, and I am writing you today to share my thoughts about illegal arms trafficking. What really brought my attention to this issue is when I found out that there are 500,000 illegal arms in the world, and there are 500,000 deaths by illegal guns. That is one death for every gun! I think this is ridiculous; it must be stopped!

First of all, did you know that only 59% of small arms in America are registered and legal? That's a bit scary because who knows where the other 41% is. Often, that 41% is in the hands of people who are unstable and can't handle the responsibility of a weapon. Just take the Gabriel Gifford's shooting in Arizona for example. The gunman was found to be mentally unstable, so where did he get the gun? Clearly, we must do more to stop the illegal arms trade.

Another example is the "Blackhawk down" incident in Somalia. Two Blackhawk helicopters were shot down by terrorists in Somalia with an over the shoulder missile launcher. I'm sure that they didn't get these from the local Wal-Mart. The weapon smuggling and black market in America and around the world is getting out of hand. We need to stop this madness before more people are killed.

Mr. President, I think we need to control our guns better. We need to require more ID when selling weapons and monitor all guns leaving or being sold in the country. We could control our borders better and monitor other countries that could sell those weapons. All in all, we need to end this.

Thank you for taking your time to read this letter, and hopefully you will act on it. I'm sure we can end the madness. All we need is time, effort, and patience. Thank you again for your time.

Sincerely,
Corey
Parkway West Middle
St. Louis, MO

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