The United States Secret Service long has a pretty good reputation with the American public. I mean, these are guys who are paid to jump in front of a bullet meant for the president. Even if you don't like the guy in the Oval Office, that's kind of worthy of admiration.

While we can't really say none of the agents present in Butler would have jumped in front of the bullet--it's not like they knew it was coming, after all, and they did react by putting their bodies between Trump and danger, so hand it to them there--we do know that there were a plethora of screw-ups with security. Especially when the gentle slope of the building the shooter was perched on didn't have an agent on it due to supposed safety concerns.

There's reason to be concerned, especially since we need to understand how and why this happened so we can never see it happen again.

But at least one op-ed writer seems a bit put out that we're talking about it at all instead of just banning guns.

It started with the headline: "We're talking about Secret Service after Trump shooting. Why aren't we talking about guns?"

It doesn't get any better.

The shooting at Trump's reelection campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where a person was killed and two were wounded, is a tragedy and a huge failure on the part of law enforcement. It is something that we should all find despicable, no matter your political alignment.

We now know that the 20-year-old gunman even flew a drone over the rally area two hours before Trump’s speech. The assassination attempt was such a security failure that Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle resigned. 

The conversation and congressional hearings over the security failure started happening days after the shooting, a part of conversation that was needed.

And yet, I have seen very few elected officials actually talk about gun violence and the need for more legal intervention despite the weapon used at the Trump rally being a favorite among mass shooters. You would think an assassination attempt would force the country to take gun violence seriously. You'd be wrong.

Of course, the author then decided to talk to David Hogg, that expert on presidential security and how not to start a pillow company, which means they really shouldn't be taken seriously. Assuming, of course, you were inclined to do so.

The truth is that no one is talking about guns because there's nothing to talk about. If you maintain that guns aren't the problem, as most Republicans do, then why would you suddenly decide guns are the problem? A person was still responsible. An individual decided that human life didn't matter and sought to take it. Removing a particular type of gun from the equation wouldn't have changed anything.

But the Secret Service's failure that day is something we can and should address.

Why did security only go out 200 yards when there are plenty of firearms capable of hitting targets from well beyond that range?

Why was a roof with a gentle slope left unsecured, particularly when it had a clear line of sight of where the protectee would be standing?

More importantly, how can we make sure nothing like this ever happens again?

Guns aren't responsible for the assassination attempt. They never have been and never will be. The fact that the would-be assassin had an explosive device in his car is illustrative of the fact that he was determined to kill. Take the AR-15 out of his hands and he'd use a hunting rifle, possibly with more accuracy. Take all the guns out of his hands and he'd have used the bomb that was already illegal in every way imaginable.

But if the Secret Service hadn't blown it in whatever ways they did, none of that would matter.

Taking guns out of the hands of good people isn't the answer because the bad guy in this case was too determined to be deterred by pesky things like laws. Having sufficient security so he never got the chance, though? That's what matters, and that's why so many of us value our gun rights. We don't have a Secret Service detail looking out for us. We have to do it ourselves.

Disarming us because of what a would-be assassin tried is like removing everyone's teeth because someone else is a biter.