For years, America has been enmeshed in a “gun debate.” The right to bear arms is a ticklish, vexing subject. I don’t intend to get into it today — except maybe indirectly. Mainly, I’d like to say that I found this Associated Press report out of Pakistan quite moving.

Let me quote the opening:

When Pakistani Taliban militants stormed a Peshawar school and massacred 150 children and teachers, nobody could fight back. Shabnam Tabinda and some of her fellow teachers want to change that — and are practicing how to shoot terrorists.

There are teachers and others who are appalled by this, of course. They think teachers have no business packing heat. But

for teachers like 37-year-old Tabinda, going to work unarmed no longer feels like an option. She and 10 other female teachers at the Frontier College for Women are taking pride in their newfound marksmanship with handguns, and plan to carry them to help protect their students aged 16 to 21.
Asked whether she felt confident of killing a terrorist at her school, Tabinda was emphatic in reply: “Yes. Whoever kills innocents, God willing I will shoot them.”

You might argue that the job of protecting students and teachers should be left to the police, or the military. But listen to this:

Mushtuq Ghani, the higher education minister in the Khyber Paktunkhwa provincial government based in Peshawar, says its Cabinet supports the arming of teachers as a logical measure given the reality that the region’s 65,000 police are stretched too thin to provide a first line of defense to nearly 50,000 schools.

Moreover,

terrorists need to know that schools aren’t defenseless, and armed teachers could potentially hold off gunmen and buy time for police reinforcements to arrive, [Ghani] said.

The minister added, “We’re at war.”

An opponent of teachers with guns — the head of a teachers union — said, “Pens belong in our hands, not guns.” I agree with him. But terrorists are coming in and opening fire on students and teachers. Are innocents to do no more than sit there and be victims?

If I had my way, there would be no need for guns. Or police. Or militaries. Or locks on doors. But, annoyingly, I don’t get my way.

The AP report ends this way:

When she fired her first shot at a paper target, Tabinda said her police instructor was impressed that she hit the bull’s-eye, depicting the chest of a human target. Tabinda said she was visualizing the Taliban killers behind December’s school slaughter as she fired.
“I hit them right in their hearts,” she said.

When I started to read this article, I figured it was just another news report, but then I found I was reading something very moving, with a direct bearing on gun debates everywhere.

‐Stubbornly, President Obama and his team refuse to call the Taliban a “terrorist” outfit or movement. Frankly, I don’t care what they call these terrorists, as long as they beat them (or do their best to beat them). Also, foreign policy sometimes requires lexical shadings.

But an inability to talk straight often indicates an inability to think straight and act straight.

‐In Nigeria, the Islamist group Boko Haram tried to take over a major city, Maiduguri, the capital of Borno State. The army repelled the Islamists — which is a rare piece of good news from Nigeria.

A couple of weeks before, Boko Haram had succeeded in murdering a cool 2,000 people. This news tended to be drowned out by the atrocities in Paris — the murder of cartoonists, policemen, Jewish shoppers, and others.

If Boko Haram is to be subdued, it will take a lot more than “hashtag campaigns,” in which the American first lady holds up a sign saying #BringBackOurGirls and looks sad.

(Mona Charen put it better than that, a few weeks ago: She said that Mrs. Obama had “put on her pouty face.”)

‐Well, the Castro brothers have their work cut out for them. Indeed, they have a goal for 2016. Are they running for president, in the United States? No, but they might not fare badly in the Democratic primaries.

They are ranked No. 2 in the Index of Economic Freedom. That is, they have the second-least-free economy in the world. The index is an annual list put out by the Wall Street Journal and the Heritage Foundation. Cuba ranks 177th out of 178. That final spot is taken by North Korea. So, the Kims are No. 1 (in addition to No. 178), and the Castros are No. 2.

The two families have long enjoyed warm relations. (I wrote about these relations last fall, here.) But maybe Communist pride will spur the Castros to overtake their friends next year. Who wants to be No. 2?

As we capitalists have always pointed out, competition is vital.

‐I’d like to make a point about Tiger Woods. I was thinking about him the other day. Many years ago, Bob Rotella, the famous sports psychologist, published a book called “Golf Is a Game of Confidence.” I sort of bridled: The title, and the slogan, and the thought, seemed so pat. So glib. Golf is a game of confidence. A stitch in time saves nine. Whatever.

But you know? Golf is a game of confidence. And it may be that Tiger’s confidence is shot (for now).

I have a feeling that if Tiger had some of the faith of the Bible-thumpers on Tour, he would be more unstoppable than ever. (N.B.: I use the phrase “Bible-thumpers” with great affection.)

‐I was thinking about golf in connection with the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 2. This is a tremendously difficult piece, played by very few, because it is so hard. In Carnegie Hall the other night, Denis Matsuev played it ferociously, splendidly, and conqueringly. I thought, “He brought this monster to its knees.”

That’s what Ben Hogan said, when he shot 3-under in the final round of the U.S. Open in 1951, at Oakland Hills, in Michigan: “I’m glad I brought this course — this monster — to its knees.”

‐Want to stick with music, if not golf? For a review of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in Carnegie Hall, go here. James Levine was the conductor, Anna Netrebko the soprano soloist. For a review of Matthew Polenzani, the American tenor, in recital, go here. The accompanist was Julius Drake. (As I say in my review, I’m the last of the Mohicans in not considering “accompanist” a pejorative term. The PC term today is “collaborative pianist” or, much worse, “collaborative artist.”)

‐I was talking to an eight-year-old girl. She had on a coat that said “Patagonia.” I said, “Do you know where Patagonia is?” I was thinking of the region in South America. She said, “Near the Natural History Museum?” She was thinking of the store (on the Upper West Side of Manhattan). Quite right.

See you!