Ballots, not bullets

A great editorial from the Courier-Journal:

Rand Paul, the junior senator from Kentucky and speculative Republican presidential candidate, is capable of talking a good game and making sense, as he did Monday in Louisville when he discussed a variety of issues. But sooner or later, the fringe starts to show, as it must. He cannot help revealing his truest self — and that’s the one to which voters should pay attention.

It happened again with the Louisville audience, in which he talked about getting rid of mandatory minimum sentences and restoring voting rights to convicted felons who complete their sentences. Common sense consensus can and does form around these issues.

But on the very day that another mass shooting took the lives of another 12 innocent bystanders, as well as that of the gunman who mowed them down, Sen. Paul included in his magnanimous remarks his support for restoring gun ownership rights to felons who had served their sentences.