Where I live, it's a regular segment on the evening news--the tale of innocent children gunned down. A "hail of deadly bullets" on the sidewalk. Grief-stricken mothers. Tearful aunts and cousins facing the video camera. Often it's the lead story, before the traffic accidents, political scandals and new liposuction techniques.

And what's our response? We blame our political enemies.

Lately my Democratic friends have been raging at Republicans for letting the assault-weapons ban expire. More generally, they excoriate the Neo-Cons for driving the inner cities toward greater and greater desperation, for cynical abandonment of the poor and cocksucking of the rich, etc. and so forth.

Accurate as these charges may be, I've grown tired of the complaints. After years of Bushery, what do we have to show for our principled opposition? A bunch of people eager to move to Canada? Nostalgia for Jimmy Carter?

I'm inclining more and more to the approach of the Democratic Leadership Council and the New Democrat Network--those who look for practical proposals that cross political boundaries. Face it, liberals, we can't outvote the moralized majority so we ought to work with them. In essence, we need our own form of compassionate conservatism, because we sure can't expect the people who mouth that slogan to live up to it.

In this vein, my current proposal offers a realistic way to curb the urban violence on our nightly news. It's a broad-based approach designed to win the support of both progressives and reactionaries, bleeding hearts and Second Amendment fanatics, police officers and thugs, Charlton Hestonites and Bruce Springsteeners.

I call it FAT, which stands for Firearms Adaptive Training.

Let's begin with a frank analysis of the tragedy involved in the mowing down of schoolchildren on a street corner. Typically the perpetrators are one or two young men settling a grudge against another young man, often concerning the local drug distribution system: a dispute about rights to a profitable territory, for instance, or about the appropriate level of reimbursement.

In such cases, true compassionate conservatism demands that we be conservative with our compassion. So let's not lavish it about. Let's admit that most people, however broadminded in their convictions, don't much care when one drug dealer massacres another; that's hardly grist for a three-minute news item. What mobilizes the reporters, and then agitates our stomachs when we see the video, is the death of innocent bystanders. In other words, it's not the shooting that horrifies us; it's the damned inaccuracy. As a nation of shooters we’re much like our Olympic basketball team, which had trouble hitting the backboard.

FAT addresses this problem in the most direct way possible: public funding of firearms lessons. At an early age, all youths would become eligible for six weeks of training with assault weapons.

Your child will quickly move to the head of the class with this perfect holiday gift, the IMI SR99* semi-automatic. *Optical device sold separately

The federal government would provide the instructors, arms, ammunition and shooting galleries. To adapt these lessons to the urban environment the targets would feature moving objects designed to resemble youths slinking into doorways, hiding behind parked cars or ducking behind schoolchildren on a crowded sidewalk. Upon completion of the course, each participant would receive a certificate signed by the President, an autographed photo of Charlton Heston and two months' supply of shells.

Some of my expert consultants suggest enrolling students in FAT at age 13. I would argue for an even earlier start, however. Age 8 is about right. By the time they become adept at video-game assassinations our youths should be equally skilled in the use of genuine semiautomatics.

Support for FAT comes from statistical estimates prepared by the Institute for Civic Karma in Santa Barbara, California. According to ICK, collateral damage from street gunplay will decline by 71.3% within two years of FAT's enactment. Other predicted benefits include the following:

• Return of congressional civility as the rival parties share credit for the program's success.
• Fewer total news items on the nightly news, allowing more time for sports and commercials.
• Long-term reduction in drug abuse, since improved firearms accuracy will allow the dealers to eliminate each other with greater efficiency.

There are also significant advantages for our military forces and foreign policy:

• Gainful employment for U.S. sharpshooters once they finish exterminating terrorism in Iraq. After years of hunting insurgents door-to-door in ruined Iraqi cities, our nation's finest may be unaccustomed to ordinary civilian life, but they will make ideal urban firearms instructors.
• Well-trained recruits for our armies of the future. In the next decade, after finishing Iraq, we will need to exterminate terrorism and establish democracy in Iran, Syria, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Rwanda, Congo, Sudan, Chechnya, Ukraine, Haiti and possibly other places as yet unspecified. Imagine the advantage if our recruits have been using assault weapons since the age of 8. Those little terrorist scumbags will get wiped up in no time.

The political appeal of FAT is obvious. The NRA will rally behind this proposal and so will all liberals with a practical mindset or a strong desire to remain in office. Even Arlen Specter should hop on the bandwagon because he can sit on both sides at once.

My liberal friends, it's time to stop mewling about the hardheaded heartlessness of the Right. Let's show that we on the Left, though gentle at heart, can be equally hard in the head.