Howard Dean on gun control from last night:

Here's my position on guns. I support the assault weapons ban. And I fought the renewal of the assault weapons ban. I do not support the elimination of liability for gun owners. I support background checks. And I support background checks for people who buy guns at gun shows.

However, I come from a rural state where people hunt. We have the lowest homicide rate in America. So my attitude is, let's have those federal laws. Let's enforce every single one of them. And then let's every state make additional gun control, as they see fit.

New Jersey and California are going to want a lot more gun control. Let them have it. We need a base of federal laws that make sense. And then we need to make additional laws, as states think they need it. And I think that makes a lot of sense for every state in the country.

What he says here is exactly why the founding fathers gave so much control to the states -- every community is different and has different requirements. Republicans make a lot of claims about state control and criticize Democrats for wanting to enlarge the federal government. Dean's statement here is not only about gun control (and I agree with his assessment) but about the structure of our nation and how it should be operated. Everyone deserves a fair shake, but that shake doesn't take the exact same form for every community.