State Sen. Bob Beers is a likable guy. I enjoy spending time with him and hearing his views. He's articulate, witty and media-savvy, and even if we don't agree, it's usually a good discussion.

But his latest idea of letting teachers carry weapons while they are in schools left me shaking my head in bewilderment. He thinks if teachers train in firearms and gun safety, they should be allowed to pack.

Shooting is not about being able to shoot accurately, it's about judgment. Just ask all the police officers who end up shooting and killing people. It's not a question of how to shoot; it's a question of when to shoot. A firearms safety class doesn't tell someone when they should yank out a gun and use it. There's a difference between trying to outgun a robber and using weapons in a crowded classroom.

After Sept. 11, 2001, when GOP Congressman Jim Gibbons, a former airline pilot, was asked about whether pilots should be armed, the now governor-elect quite sensibly said no. The pilot's priority should be flying the plane, rather than turning into a gunslinger swaggering down the aisle of a jumbo jet. Gibbons, with his military background, is better trained than most, and he didn't like the idea for pilots. He hasn't taken a position on teachers.

I'd like to hear from any teacher who thinks this is a good idea, and would like to be weapons trained, anyone who wants the additional responsibility in the classroom, anyone who doesn't worry about shooting a kid because he or she might mistake a toy gun for a real one and blow a kid's head off, anyone who doesn't worry the gun would be wrestled away.

Please, if you're so confident that your aim would be sure and certain in a crowded classroom and you wouldn't accidentally hit an innocent kid, please get in touch with me. If you are a teacher who thinks there would be no chance that a responding police officer might misunderstand that you're the good guy and blow your head off, tell me why you are so positive. If you are so confident in your sharpshooter abilities, are you willing to go through the litigation that inevitably follows, even if your judgment was right? I want to hear from such teachers.

Sometimes I wonder whether Bob Beers really believes these ideas or whether he's just tossing them out because he enjoys the publicity. This one was a softball. Everyone has an instant opinion. A lot of people think it's brilliant, a lot think he's an idiot for proposing it. But they're talking about Bob Beers and his idea.

A Wisconsin state assemblyman made the same suggestion recently. Utah law allows people to carry guns on campus if they have a concealed-weapons permit and leaves it up to the individual school districts to set policies and restrictions. Some districts have made it clear teachers would be acting on their own and not as school employees once they draw their weapons.

It would be so easy to say Beers is just tossing this idea out to keep himself in the news, something for which the former radio announcer has a natural affinity.

Then I remember it was Beers' idea to give a tax rebate during the 2005 Legislature. Gov. Kenny Guinn at first pooh-poohed it, then ran with it, making it his own. Not all Beers' ideas are as doomed as this one.

Just because he knows how to pick a populist idea and run with it, doesn't make him a bad guy.

But I will say this: Never gonna happen.

Incoming Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley won't let it happen. It's just not a bill that's going to make it out of the Democratic Assembly. And based on Gibbons' views on arming pilots, I'm not sure he would sign such a bill. This may be a case where the Republican governor is more in sync with the Democratic speaker than Beers.

So we can enjoy the sound and fury of the discussion, and the story will have legs as both sides argue back and forth. But when all is said and done, Beers' bill won't survive. It will be shot out from underneath the cowboy from Summerlin.

Jane Ann Morrison's column appears Monday, Thursday and Saturday. E-mail her at Jane@reviewjournal.com or call 383-0275.