Until U.S. Understands Police Limitations, Some Will Put Faith in Gun Control
Newtown, Connecticut: twenty children and seven adults are dead at the hands of a madman. Across the nation, police officers are shaking with frustration.
They rage because the facts of the attack — which will continue to develop for many days — are already all too familiar. They think, over and over again, what they might ever do to respond to an active shooter in a school, yet they know there is very little they can do. As in this vile crime, all they’ll be likely to do is to coordinate medical care for the wounded and to deal with the crime scene surrounding the shooter, who in almost every case will have shot himself long before the police could lay gun sights on him.
What can be done to prevent this kind of wanton murder? Security measures such as locks, reinforced doors, security cameras, hardened glass, and a variety of other devices and procedures are useful but ultimately cannot stop a determined attacker armed with tools no more complex and high-tech than a hammer and crowbar.
They can only delay him, and only for a matter of seconds. Run-and-hide policies and drills are useful, but do nothing to deter or stop an active shooter.
There is one thing that can immediately stop an active shooter, and which, if handled properly, may even serve as a deterrent. Unlike most governmental initiatives, it will cost little or nothing, and is undeniably effective. However, until the public understands the reality facing the police — the people they look to for the protection of themselves and their children — that single most effective solution is impossible.
Active duty officers usually cannot tell the whole truth to the public; they’d lose their jobs.
Police administrators won’t tell the whole truth to the public; they have to please the politicians that hired them.
Since I’m no longer serving as a police officer, I can tell the truth — the whole truth — and it’s not encouraging. Remember, above all, this foremost truth: No one is responsible for your personal safety and that of those you love but you.
The Police Want To Help You, but They Don’t Have To Help You
Have no doubt: Police officers love to catch bad guys in the act. They particularly love to catch bad guys who would harm children. Virtually nothing pegs their righteous takedown meter faster than stopping a school shooter, hopefully with blindingly fast and effective overwhelming violence, and before the shooter can harm a single child.
But every competent officer knows the chance of that happening is on the order of being hit by a meteor: virtually nonexistent.
They also know they have no obligation whatever to protect or help any individual, and they cannot be successfully sued for failing to provide such protection. It sounds outrageous, but it’s rational and necessary.
If municipalities and individual officers could be sued for failure to keep each citizen from harm, how could any city afford a police force? Who would become a police officer knowing every dime they ever made would be spent fending off lawsuits for matters about which they had no knowledge?
Police officers won’t refuse to respond to active shooters in schools. However, that is cold comfort to them and to any parent aware of the facts.
There Are A Lot Of Bad Guys Out There
Most Americans would be stunned to learn how few police officers are patrolling the streets of their communities at any time of the day or night.
Police agencies are always undermanned and staff their shifts accordingly, with the largest number of officers when they are most needed, commonly the evening and midnight shifts, and particularly Friday and Saturday nights.
The day shift, the shift coinciding with school hours, is virtually always the most sparsely staffed.
This means that when an active shooter invades a school, there will be very few officers available, fewer than at any other time of the day.
Unfortunately, more and more states and cities are in deep financial trouble, and many have been laying off police officers — or simply not replacing those who retire or leave for other reasons — for years. The San Bernardino, CA city attorney recently took the previously unimaginable step of telling citizens to “Go home, lock your doors, and load your guns,” so desperate has the crime problem become there and so hard-pressed the police force.
Things will be unlikely to improve — anywhere — in the foreseeable future.
The Police Are Less Ready Than You Think
The police did learn from Columbine (April 20, 1999). In those days, active shooters were handled with the belief that time was on the side of the police. Officers were taught never to enter a school, to contain and control the situation, and to call in SWAT. Negotiations would be established, and the kinds of responses commonly portrayed on TV and in the movies would unfold.
Unfortunately, that response model cost lives.
While the police at Columbine waited for hours to enter, people who might have been saved bled out, and the shooters — as is almost always the case — killed themselves long before the first SWAT officer entered the building.
Since that day, the police response model has evolved to require the first officers on the scene to immediately enter the school and to seek out and assault any shooters. Unfortunately, not every police agency has adopted this model, and the quality and quantity of training in the necessary tactics and skills are far from standardized and effective.
Most Americans would be equally stunned to learn that a great many police officers are not good shots.
Many fire their duty handguns only for yearly qualifications on courses of fire with generous passing scores. A great many citizens are far more capable with firearms, and due to military training — most police officers are no longer veterans — and other specialized training widely available to civilians, more tactically adept.
Firearm training and standards vary wildly from agency to agency.
Time Is Not On The Side Of The Good Guys
Response times for emergencies vary enormously from place to place. In some rural or semi-rural areas, emergency response is measured in hours. Even in towns or cities, a five-minute response — from the moment an officer receives the radio call until he arrives in a school parking lot — would be amazingly fast.
Consider, however, that a radio call likely would not have been made until someone at the school realized what was happening and made a call, a call that will take precious seconds — even minutes — to make and to be understood. By the time a radio signal flashes out, a shooter could easily have been shooting for five minutes or more.
And even when that first officer arrives in the parking lot, he will likely not have clear directions. Few police officers have so much as been inside every school in their jurisdiction; fewer know them well. Even if that first officer can hear continuing gunfire, unless by chance he happens to enter the school near the shooter it will take additional minutes to find and stop the shooter. Unless the shooter stops him first.
Every minute is an eternity in a school attack. Every minute costs lives. All competent police officers know this; it’s one of their greatest frustrations. They know that in virtually every imaginable scenario, the real issue is how many will die before they are in a position to do anything.
They also know that if the modern history of school shootings is any guide, the shooter will virtually always have killed himself long before they arrive.
In virtually every American school shooting, the police have had no role in stopping the shooter.
Feel-Good Measures Harm, Not Help
The police are by and large practical people. They do their best to do what works, because anything else can cost lives. They know that gun-free school zones are actually “victim disarmament zones,” areas killers can attack with the assurance no one will be able to resist them. They know people planning the mass murder of children will not be deterred by any law restricting guns.
They also know guns aren’t the only means of causing harm, as was the case recently in Casper, WY, where a teacher was murdered by his son, who fired an arrow into his head and ultimately killed him by stabbing him with a knife. A knife the son then used to kill himself.
The Single Most Effective Solution
In a free society, nothing can stop the deranged from committing crimes. Everything the Connecticut killer did is already as illegal as human beings can make it, which means little to one planning to take his own life.
Additional laws, particularly those disarming the innocent and law-abiding, accomplish nothing. What I’m about to relate, rank and file police officers — the men and women who have to charge into danger — broadly support. Their bosses, by and large, do not.
Because seconds matter in school attacks, only the arming of school staff by means of concealed handguns can possibly deter attacks and save lives.
Millions of Americans, including teachers, already have concealed carry permits issued by the states and form a ready pool of the qualified.
The deterrent effect of concealed carry in schools can be considerable. Any potential attacker, knowing that a given school district allows concealed carry but takes pains to keep the identities and numbers of teachers on a given campus carrying handguns secret, is conferring the benefit of deterrence on every school in that district.
Police officers know criminals fear armed citizens far more than they fear the police.
Only armed and capable school staff, ready to respond to an armed attack when and where it occurs, can possibly save lives – perhaps, even stop an attack before it begins. Even an armed teacher in another hallway when the first shot rings out will be able to stop an attacker far sooner than any police officer still minutes from even receiving a radio call.
“We’ve got to do something!” Indeed we do. And now you know what the police know, and the source of their frustration. It’s time to do the only thing that works against deadly school attacks. All else is wishful thinking.
Thank you, sir.
Rahm Emanuel takes control of the “Muscle”
http://illinoispaytoplay.com/2012/12/17/rahm-emanuel-takes-control-of-the-muscle/
Federal and state government demand and prefer that we send our children to public schools. It is then up to Federal and state governments to protect our childre.
Suggest that our government(s) implement the same systems that the Israelis use to protect their children.
Standing on the corner in Jerusalem. The school pulls up and a bunch of high school kids hop off the bus. About half the young men are carrying fully functional rifles. They carry them all the time during their training, even to school. It’s their job to protect their homes and schools if an attach happens until the army/air force can get there.
I think certain Jews hate the fact that Israeli Jews aren’t easy to exploit.
I’m looking at Soros and other Jews that deserve to be dead.
Back in my high schools days (late 70′s) my high school had a rifle team. The members would carry their rifles on the school buses and keep them in their lockers during the day. The shooting range was located underneath the high school pool, it’s probably a storage area now. Anyway, I never once heard of anyone threatened in any way, shape, or form by any of these rifle toting teens.
We did not have a rifle team, but in my days in HS in Midland, Texas…
There was not one self respecting “kicker” who did not have at least one gun on the rack of the back of his pickup. Which by the way was parked in the school parking lot.
I think doing the same today will get you 20 years.
Really? I’ve never seen this. I’m not doubting you; can you explain further?
We do have gun control in Israel (you need to have a need to carry), and before you enter any establishment you are asked if you are carrying a weapon. (I almost lost my pocketknife when entering a bus station.) I’m not sure if they let you take it in if you have a permit, but I guess the soldiers are allowed to.
What saves us is that there are so many people on active duty, and many are required to carry their weapons at all times. True, they aren’t allowed to use them in most cases, but I doubt many criminals will take that chance.
Sorry, left/liberals (especially when in government) like power but deny responsibility exists. The get the power (guns) and you get to defend yourself with nothing (responsibility). You’ll also likely get prosecuted if you hurt somebody who tries to hurt you or your family because “all violence is wrong” by the same token.
GMTA!
Agree that these points need to be driven home. The problem is that most faculty and administration in public schools would say “not in my job description” to be responsible for security and defense should the unimaginable occur. And they are right…it is too much of a burden to mandate that certain school teachers or principals be trained to shoot, carry a firearm and act as shield and sword against attackers.
Some teachers may volunteer to fill that role- ones already trained and equiped as the article mentions- which could provide a credible deterrent, but I wonder how many would willingly accept such a task.
Maybe just removing the “no firearms allowed” decals from theaters, schools, parks, etc. would give killers pause. It’s obvious they seek locations where they know no one will return fire.
Current teachers may not want to take on this responsibility, but it could be made both a preference for new hires, and be accompanied with increased remuneration for those willing to step up. It might also have the salutary effect of bringing into the schools people who believe in self-reliance, and individual responsibility; in short, people with a conservative bent, rather that the flocks of progressives that currently dominate the ranks of teachers in this country.
I have heard proposals of having armed police in every school, and wonder whether it makes sense to spend the additional billions of dollars a year it would cost to deal with these extremely rare incidents, when the most immediate response could be from the adult in the room.
The flip side is that we would be training and arming the militant communist activist wing of the Democrat party.
The next OWS would be using small unit tactics to engage police in small arms combat.
I think you’ll find the only teachers/school personnel carrying arms are the ones who are constitutionally inclined to start with.
In UT they just started their first teacher’s firearms safety class, albeit an inadequate six-hours, for 200 teachers with and a backlog of those who want to take it.
Note to self:….buy more ammo at Walmart this week
Get there early… the 9mm, .40S&W and .45 ACP (not to mention .223 Rem/5.56 NATO and .308 Win/7.62 NATO) usually disappear right after the truck brings ‘em in.
somebody please explain why its ok to ban automatic weapons but not “semi-”automatic ones.
Only liberals like you believe that banning weapons from law-abiding citizens is a good thing, so it is only liberals like you who should explain why one type of weapon is banned as opposed to another type.
In other words, look into the mirror for your answer.
That can’t be explained within the parameters laid out in our Constitution. Your question should be: Why is it okay to ban the ownership of any firearm? They got away with an unconstitutional law, but that does not mean that it is best to let them pass more unconstitutional laws. What part of the word “infringed” do we not understand? Change the dad gum Constitution and you can have well described rules about what arms are allowable and what arms are not. Until then, I will remain well armed.
Actually, automatic weapons are NOT banned but they are regulated, taxed, and licensed. You have to pay the tax/fee, make the application, and submit to a background check and you can own a fully automatic weapon. Legal automatic weapons are VERY expensive. Or you can buy an illegal one on most any street corner in the big cities or along the border. AK platform fully automatic weapons can be had for $50 – $100 each in much of the Third World. They find their way to the US where they sell on the black market for ten times that or more depending on model and condition. AR platform weapons are fairly rare and much more expensive because they have to be stolen from either the US military or the military of a US client nation. The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have put a number of stolen AR platform weapons on the market and the Mexican government is subject to a lot of theft as well. Even here at home the US military sometimes has trouble with theft of weapons.
To anyone who knows anything about weapons, the whole Fast and Furious thing was an obvious plot to plant US legal semi-automatic weapons in Mexican crime scenes. People who buy cocaine and heroin by the truckload have no trouble having their supplier throw a case of black market automatic weapons on the truck as well. No Mexican bad guy would be caught dead with an expensive gunstore semiautomatic when he can get a fully automatic weapon for much, much less.
In the main correct with a few further details.
Federal law permits the ownership of full auto weapons with registration, transfer fees, and other fairly cumbersome paperwork. The 1986 crime bill forbids ownership of automatic firearms manufactured or imported after that date which has served to inflate the price of weapons currently in the system to incredible values.
Several state laws completely forbid ownership of automatic firearms, so where you live is a critical factor.
So within those caveats ownership of automatic weapons is possible, but neither easy nor cheap.
Actually I can keep my AR15 semi auto and add a slide fire stock that basically turns my AR15 into a full auto and it is ATF approved, it does so by using a technique known as bump firing as can be seen by going to You Tube and entering a search for bump firing but this ATF approved stock known as the SSAR-15 can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gqfApklTPRY I am ordering one just for fun and the cheapness of it, although they are kinda high price like 400 dollars but that is alot less than an M16 full auto in mint condition which the AR15 is really an M16 for civilians in semiauto mode only!
We just bought a slide fire stock this weekend. My hubby had special ordered it from the dealer he likes to use. We picked it up Saturday. The gun show was extremely crowded and the check took longer than it ever has…
Joke question, right?
It is an incremental step. That is how rights are taken away. Incrementalism pacifies the people who have made themselves comfortable with losing their rights because they are either ignorant of history, or incapable of objective thought processes which might foresee the possibility of aggression, or slow-motion-suicidal.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdPot8HgPno&list=PL22729E7D50910895&index=1
This is good thinking. I hadn’t seen it from this perspective before. I like it.
Actually this “thinking” is almost a century old. The incrementalism construct was defined and created by Stalin personally. Circa 1934.
I’m not happy they banned the automatic ones either! So I don’t know what to tell you.
Your premise is wrong. It’s NOT ok to ban automatic weapons. There’s no rational distinction between automatic and semi-automatic (or between a rifle and an “assault” rifle) – so they should ALL be legal to posses.
Why is it OK to severely restrict fully automatic weapons for American Citizens and have Obama sell fully auto weapons to Al Qaeda in Syria?
I’ve been giving this some thought. Libs are all for banning ALL guns and as a free people (?), conservatives are opposed to any limitation on guns restrictions. Perhaps we can explain it to them this way:
You oppose ANY restrictions on abortion . . . . . Limiting any possible law that MIGHT eventually encroach on abortion is verboten.
Guess what, we feel the same way about gun rights. But we have the 2nd amendment to back up our logic.
Things that make you go Hmmmmm.
It is not alright to ban full auto. SCOTUS has only addressed the issue obliquely in US Vrs Miller.
http://www.oyez.org/cases/1901-1939/1938/1938_696
What can be drawn from Miller is that We The People, have a right to own and carry any arm a modern military might issue as individual arms. Not Nuks, not Stinger missiles, but certainly real Assault weapons as the Ak 47and 74 and M-16 as well as a Galil.
And it is foolish, under strict scrutiny … which should apply too the Second, to deny any less a weapon.
Because “Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives” ought to be a convenience store not a government department.
An automatic weapon with finger on trigger fires continuously. They used to be called “machine guns.” I do not believe they have ever been legal in the US. A semi-automatic does not fire automatically; it merely loads the next bullet, ready for the pull of the finger, after the previous one was fired.
1. You didn’t address the question.
2. You are wrong. Fully automatic weapons are legal. There were completely unregulated before 1934. Now there are some restrictions on ownership.
It’s not okay to ban either one.
Its simple. Authomatic weapons fire on “squirt”. You hold the trigger down and it will continue to fire until the magazine is empty. Semi-automatic weapons fire one round per trigger pull. Big difference.
The distinction between full and semi-automatic firearms is completely lost upon newscasters and reporters. They also have no comprehension that the interior mechanism for a semi-automatic “assault” weapon is the same as a traditional looking semi-automatic deer rifle. It is just that the “assault” rifle looks mean and nasty.
Legislators have had a difficult time trying to craft legislation which outlaws “mean and nasty” without, at the same time, prohibiting perfectly legitimate deer rifles. But, the gun control advocates are completely driven by emotions, irrational fear in particular. One hopes that measures which prevent crime will prevail over measures which give false assurances to the fearful.
Why can the internet, TV and radio be banned but the moveable type printing press of the late 1700’s cannot? Answer , neither can be abridged just as neither king of weapon can legally be prohibited per the constitution.
The problem isn’t gun control, it’s criminal control.
What’s going on is that liberals have severed morality from criminal behavior. By that I mean they don’t think a criminal is doing crime because they are evil or perhaps desperate, they think they turn to crime because their mommy didn’t hug them enough or their brain isn’t “normal” or because it is unfair because others have more than the criminal making the criminal justified in stealing. Because they are so wedded to this concept of moral equivalence, they blame the tool instead of the wielder. This is also why we have so much other crime: because liberals keep turning criminals loose for the above reasons and so kids see there is no real penalty to crime so why not get some?
On the other hand, liberals DO still hate some people. They despise those who disagree with them. At the same time, liberals love power and control. They can kill two birds with one stone by taking away guns because that will put the ones they hate at the mercy of their power as represented by the police (another group they normally hate unless the police bust the heads they tell them to).
So here we have the two-faced hoplophobia of the liberals being used to disarm their enemies. Simple as that.
This blogger has been less than six degrees separated from police culture for years. In fact, her familial connection runs through a Homicide Detective First Grade from the NYPD. It doesn’t get closer to the action than that.
And she knows very well the lengths to which Homicide Detectives and beat cops will go to to catch their killer. But the fact of the matter is that the killing has already been executed by the time they arrive on the scene!!
And the stories this blogger can tell, re how many times she has heard – by more than one in the field – how things would have turned out differently, if this or that one had been armed themselves!
And knowing what the left has in store for Americans makes it ever more urgent to get this message across. For before you all know it your guns will be up for grabs -literally. And there will be nothing a law abiding citizen can do to protect themselves from criminals/killers and an out of control leadership.
The leadership has been aiming for America’s guns for years, and the Thug-in-Chief won’t stop until he accomplishes the left’s dream come true – the stuff of your nightmares – http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/12/10/another-bullseye-painted-on-the-backs-of-u-s-military-vets-addendum-to-the-hunt-against-vets-commentary-by-adina-kutnicki/
Watch your backs, your guns too.
Bingo.
It seems that many conservatives are blind to the real danger. That’s aside from their arguing about gun control or licensing. Their argument should be about the end of government gun control and licensing, not about which gun is banned or why it should be banned. iow, they’ve lost the debate and their freedom before the argument even began.
Currently, the left needs an ‘enemy of the people’. The right is that chosen ‘enemy.’ All that remains is the end of The Second Amendment or for teh left to cripple it sifficiently, and to take control of the House. However, taking the House is hardly neccessary for the next step: a declaration of martial law and/or an open tyranny.
To implement that ‘next step’ would merely take the proper sort of rioting, or another huge natural disaster, or any ‘reasonable’ excuse at all.
Yes, we are that close to an open tyranny.
Do you ever actually address real people, or just the straw men in your head?
I’ve studied history and the history of totalitarian regimes throughout known history.
Here’s the conservative pro-gun argument, in a nutshell: ‘
‘We have the inalienable right to own guns, which shall not be infringed. But it’s ok for the government ro regulate and license the ownership and sales of guns, thereby limiting our inalienble rights which shall not be infringed, because it’s perfectly ok for the government to decide who gets to own a gun and who doesn’t.’
The people in power in D.C. have decided that you shouldn’t have any guns at all, because from their perspective, you are quite obviously insane, yourselves.
From the logic of your ‘pro gun’ arguments, I shouldn’t wonder, myself, if they were correct in that assessment. Every tyrant begins by disarming the population, but you’ve abandoned that field, entirely. Now, you’re just arguing over what size chains you wear.
Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offence, I should consider myself guilty of treason towards my country. It is natural to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the government for the last ten years, to justify those hopes with which you have been pleased to comfort yourselves.
I don’t know what parallel universe you live in, but in THIS universe, Mr. Crawford is right on the money. He understands the reality of this issue far better than most “conservatives”.
Of course, it goes without saying that he understands reality far better than liberals.
I live in a universe where the truth and reality are all that matters.
A universe where a Dem srtronghold, Paragould AK, has just started foot patrols, armed with AR-15′s, asking everyone for ID and ‘State your business,citizen’ questions. Where you answer or go to jail.
The real hopeless victims of mental illness are to be found among those who appear to be most normal. Many of them are normal because they are so well adjusted to our mode of existence, because their human voice has been silenced so early in their lives that they do not even struggle or suffer or develop symptoms as the neurotic does. They are normal not in what may be called the absolute sense of the word; they are normal only in relation to a profoundly abnormal society. Their perfect adjustment to that abnormal society is a measure of their mental sickness. These millions of abnormally normal people, living without fuss in a society to which, if they were fully human beings, they ought not to be adjusted.
Warren, you can be assured that many in the NYPD, the most vaunted police force in the US, would agree with my assessment. They understand full well what papa Bloomberg is doing. And this is why he is reviled throughout the city by those who know what is going on under the surface and beneath the subtext.
Bloomberg, and his gang of fellow travelers in Washington,didn’t lose any sleep over the massacre, all their crocodile tears aside. They see it as a crisis which dare not go to waste. And they also know that an armed guard, with an administrator or two similarly trained, would have stopped the carnage too!!
I’ll listen to the hypocrite Bloomberg about gun control when he doesn’t walk around his beloved city with a small army of ARMED guards around him. Security for me and not for thee….
Adina;
How did the Israelis handle arab terrorists that entered schools and murdered as many there as possible?
Are ALL teachers there req’d to have automatic weapons?
What did they do in Israel to solve the problem?
JA, Arab terrorists have NOT entered schools directly, knowing full well that each school has an armed guard and will shoot them on the spot.
The only ones who hesitate, to shoot to kill, are the politicians. As to the security forces and armed guards (almost all of whom are ex IDF)they have NO such reservations. IF you come for the kiddies under their watch you will not walk out. You will be carried out in a body bag.
Simple as that. Works for me and should for everyone who claims to care about the kiddies!
Adina, I am not really worried on this one.
Perhaps the marxist/obama types should heed Isoroku Yamamoto’s advice……..
……..”"You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.”
Molon Labe
Fantom, from your words to G-d’s ears.
I agree 100%. Anyone armed in that school could have stopped the killing almost immediately. My thought is that even though people don’t want guns in schools, at the very least a gun safe set up in the principal’s office and a plan for trained staff to go their first to draw weapons would save many lives. That is not as good as a gun in the hands of a teacher on the scene but would be a lot quicker than waiting for police response.
Back in the olden days when I was in high school, I took Junior ROTC. We drilled with M1 Garand rifles and were taught how to use them along with the then standard issue .45 cal. M-1911A1 handgun. The instructors were retired or reserve Army Staff NCOs and Officers. Were this still in effect and allowing the ROTC staff to have access to ammo for the weapons the students drill with would make anyone think twice about opening fire on that campus. Alas, the last ROTC drill team I saw were “armed” with some very pretty pieces of wood that sort of resembled a rifle.
I remember an issue of my high school newspaper way back in 1974. One of the articles was about the defeat of a proposal to bring ROTC to the school. Number one reason given by the voters: “fear of a police state.”
What those liberals meant was that they didn’t want anyone else trained who might fear, and resist, their proposed police state.
Why do you think the DEMOCRATS during the Truman Regime called the Korean War a ‘Police Action’?
Labels matter
Armed guards and gun safes where teachers go to get weapons are not a functional solution. I taught at a southern California High School of 3000 students located on 40 acres. Very few of the class rooms were right next to the administrative building. By the time guards could respond to the situation or teachers run to the admin building get a gun and run back to their classrooms the situation would be over (lots of dead or seriously wounded students). The only way in that size school to protect the students is by arming the teachers. Even then you will probably lose at least the first class room attacked. Why? Because the shooter walks in and shoots the teacher first then goes after the students. Other classes hearing the shooting would be prepared but you will have lost the first class.
Am I the only one who is not comforted by constantly seeing more and more law enforcement officers decked out like storm troopers – complete with full automatic firearms, body armor, and loads of other “tactical” equipment.
In my self defense training class, the instructor who is a police officer stressed that law enforcement does not carry firearms to protect the general public, but rather themselves. The old adage that says, “when seconds count, the police are only minutes away,” is absolutely true. Their primary role is to investigate crime – after the fact. Rhetorically speaking then, who do you rely on for that first line of defense? I know what my answer is.
On the overwhelming firepower that the police now seem to “need,” I’ll let other posters ponder that troubling question.
Skeet Shooter,
I worked for a company that installed the radios and lights on emergency vehicles. Our County Sheriff came to us happily with a request to install equipment on a “tank” he had just purchased. Turned out to be a smaller armored personnel carrier. I have no idea what he needed it for and neither did he but he sure was proud that he had it. It seems he had received a grant from the Feds to purchase equipment and went overboard with the extra money he had at his disposal.
I can understand the need for a SWAT team and believe body armor,(AKA bullet proof vests) are vital but why do our local law enforcement people need their own army decked out better than most Military Special Forces? Any idiot dressed like a wannabe ninja, armed to the teeth, breaks into my house they are going to get fired upon.
Yes.
It bothers me greatly that our police departments have purchased weapon systems that are completely beyond their charter. It stemmed from a confrontation in Southern California in which the bank robbers were far better armed than the responding police, who took casualties. Thereafter there was a national effort, particularly after 9 – 11 to procure military weapons and millions of rounds of ammo, for domestic police forces. Supposedly the need is for practice ammo.
It also bothers me that Office Terry was murdered with weapons supplied via Fast and Furious, while he was ordered to load non lethal rounds, bean bags, in his weapon.
And it bothers me that in the recent shoot out in Manhattan, at point blank range, most of the police rounds missed a stationary target, and went somewhere. The NYPD weapons training is a sick joke; the citizens would be better informed of reality if the police carried bricks in their holsters.
A close friend, ex cop, and former US Police pistol champion, told me that there is no longer any incentive for a cop to become highly trained with weapons. It might even be held against you in promotion list development. As a result few cops are skilled with weapons.
And he said that, after a generation of investigating gun fire combat events, that the first round normally settled the out come.
Reviewing the cards, we need better class of mayors, legislators, and citizens who live in the real world, personally capable of defending babies from a killer, doctors who weed out the insane, and cops who can shoot.
My prayers are with the cops who had to police the Connecticut slaughter; they too are victims. We live in a culture of death, in part, due to our poor decisions. Summarized it is: How much latent force do we permit in society in order to resist violent crime within seconds of the first gun shot?
I have zero sympathy for Connicticut Law Enforcement….
After they let the Petit Women get slaughtered in Cheshire in 2007…AFTER Mrs Petit alerted them to the situation…they proved themselves utterly worthless. They are just as responsible for those girls being burned alive as the perps, and those bastards will never see the Executioner thanks to the limp-wristed Eastern Blue State Governmental Machinery of States like Connictuicut
Cops generally, just plain suck.
They will never be there when you need them, and if you ever act to protect yourself in their absense, they WILL come down on you hard for making them look bad, and encouraging others in the community to also believe they can act like Responsible Free People.
Expect the all the Connecticut PD’s to jump on the anti-gun bandwagon now.
Useless bastards.
Apparently, you’ve never needed a cop to rescue you. To save your life.
I have. I didn’t react to the situation by mulling over the flaws of law enforcement response times. Nor would you, or any of the whiners bravely complaining from behind fake names here.
The next time someone’s threatening your life, or your daughter’s life, or your wife’s life, or your mother’s life, make sure you apologize for this letter when the cops show up.
Most of the complainers here wouldn’t last a week in that job. We dump everything on cops, and expect superhuman responses. They were the ones who had to go into that classroom and deal with those children’s bodies. Not bloggers. Not politicians. Not journalists. Not Obama. Not you. Jesus wept.
Ms. Trent, whether or not he’s had the police protect him is beside the point that you cannot rely on them to protect you in the first place.
There has been legal precedent established from numerous court cases, including from the Supreme Court, that says the police have no obligation to protect nor are they liable for failure to protect.
In other words, it is not their job to look after you, and it is EXACTLY because of what the cops have to go through that they are absolved of any responsibility to that end. They cannot be everywhere at once and it’s probable that they will require several minutes to respond to your call.
The only job of the police is to enforce the law for the purpose of upholding public order; individual protection is merely a side effect to that end at the very best, and it’s one you can’t rely on since it’s your basically gambling your life and those you care about by relying solely on the police for your protection.
Now yes, you should call the cops if you need help. But, between the time you summon them and the time they arrive, you are on your own in what may very well be a life threatening situation for you. Therefore, it makes sense to be prepared by getting armed and trained in case the bad guys get to you before the cops are able to get to them.
“To serve and protect” is merely a slogan, not a policy.
Talking about the accuracy of police shooting, have you ever seen this video?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bl3MgW8y0jo
This is a shoot-out at POINT-BLANK RANGE, nobody gets hit, and the crooks drive away. (They do get caught, later)
In my area, the SWAT teams are known mostly for raiding the wrong house and shooting people’s dogs. But hey – you can never be too careful, right?
Known mostly for? You’re lying. The existence of SWAT teams points to the existence of criminals.
I am eternally amazed by quivering anonymouses who feel so brazen in their defense of thugs. Projection, maybe. They should try living in the sorts of places where grandmas have to live behind barred windows.
It isn’t because of the police. And with the exception of a few professional political activist types who profit from attacking police, and the entire progressive wing of the Democratic Party, most of the people I know in dangerous neighborhoods would like more police presence, not less. The exceedingly liberal hipsters who moved into my old Atlanta neighborhood probably own as many guns among them as rural folks, and they are gratifyingly quick to appreciate and defend police.
Meanwhile, members of loud anti-police groups are always first in line to demand police protection of their own property and interests. They’re the real pigs. It’s almost always a self-referential term.
http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/08/07/mayor.warrant/index.html
We have some very timid cops around here. They feel threatened by dogs and old ladies. No wonder they like to go in heavy. Might run into a toddler armed with a dirty diaper or something.
And for what it’s worth, Tina – if I may dignify your rude reply – I was referring specifically to SWAT tactics, not to police in general. My neighborhood has declined considerably since I moved there, so I feel better when I see police cruising around and occasionally busting the local low lifes. That doesn’t mean I want them busting down my door and terrorizing me and my wife or shooting my cat because they “feel threatened.”
Bugs, you’re illustrating my point perfectly.
When you attack groups of people from behind a fake name, don’t whine when someone calls you on it.
Grow a spine. And a real name. And then we can talk.
Also, nobody’s after you and your wife and cat. Don’t self-aggrandize. And if you want to be pissy about your circumstances, blame a thug and hug a cop, not the other way around.
“The existence of SWAT teams points to the existence of criminals”
No.
It points to nothing more than the availability of funds.
There are more SWAT Teams here in Suburban Bucks County than the “crime” situation could possibly justify.
Its all about Money, Toys, and Overtime.
And BTW, can just ONE of these Robocops actually LOOK physically fit? Maybe learn to BLOUSE THEIR BOOTS…So much money spent on this motely crew of Soldier-wannabes, why do they all have to look like FAT SLOBS?
SWAT in my area killed the Mayor’s dog because criminals used his house address to send boxes of drugs. The mayor didn’t know this – he was at work. They would ship the boxes to his address and wait until they were delivered and go and pick up the boxes off the porch. SWAT knew about it and ambushed an empty house and killed the dog that was in the front yard – leashed.
The Mayor isn’t the only person to have his dog killed in my area – which is Northern Virginia.
Ah, so you’re familiar with the situation! See my comment above.
Seriously – I could see maybe shooting a vicious attack dog that’s actually coming after you. But these idiots are shooting anything that barks. It is, as you say, a pattern in our area. Either they’re teaching cops some BS at the academy or there’s a contest going on behind the blue wall to see who can kill the most pets.
Or, God help us, we have cops who are actually afraid of dogs.
Maybe?!?!? There’s no “maybe” there! Of COURSE a cop should shoot an attacking dog!
But, as you say, we have idiots in uniform shooting anything that barks, and even some that just wag their tails.
Overall, cops are out of control, especially where liberals are in charge of the local politics.
SWAT teams shoot any animal that might make noise. It might tip off the victims, er, the “suspects”.
It bothers me a lot. I noticed, beginning with the Clinton administration, that the military became more like the police, and the police became more like the military.
The author alludes to the fact that Police are under no duty or obligation to protect individual citizens. The courts and even the Supreme Court (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/28/politics/28scotus.html) in 2005 have ruled that, essentially, you are responsible to protect yourself so long as the laws in your locality permit you to do so.
thank you
A short time from now, you will be silenced for saying something that so disagrees with one of our Rulers edicts.
A friend asked me if I had heard about the mass murder in Connecticut; my reply was to ask him what could we expect in an atheist nation?
One of God’s Commandments is “Thou Shalt Not Kill”.This Rule is Supreme; if obeyed trumps and gun control law.
The Left has placed so many Leftist lawyers in our courts, and they have even banned the posting of the Ten Commandments. Kids are raised with no moral values, but violent computer games, TV and movies.
Kids are taught “moral relativism”, the dangerously psychologically troubled are turned loose on society since we closed the mental institutions.
And lastly, with each violent crime, the Left advocates tighter gun control (disarming) for decent citizens to leave us even more helpless at the bloody hands of criminals.
Yes, police will do their best to protect and serve…if they can get there in time…
In the original Hebrew it’s thou shalt not commit murder.
That is correct…
Even the Bible acknowledges their are plenty of Scumbags that need a Just and Proper killing.
Connecticut…the Petit Home Invasion Killers…now coddled and protected by The State that will never execute them…the very SAME State that sat by and allowed the crime to occur under their “Surveillance”
Watch as Connecticut AGAIN fails its citizens, and promotes crime, by calling for more “gun control” to cover their useless ass.
Thank you Joseph. You took the words out of my mouth. Especially the statnement about America being an atheist nation. Remove God & His presence is instantly replaced with evil. Evil is to blame for Friday’s events in CT, not guns.
I have never shot a gun and would probably shoot my best friend if I were in the midst of a crowd armed with guns. I see absolutely no need for automatic weapons or to tolerate the people who find shooting a great hobby. I can understand keeping guns for protection in the event of being over run with invaders. Supposedly, the mother of this particular shooter thought taking her sons to target practice would help her “bond” with them. That thought would never occur to me. Too bad she didn’t channel their interests in a different direction….like reading or painting
You don’t make any sense. But I find that most people have an irrational fear of guns. I fI don’t practice with my gun, how am I going to protect you with it if need be. Not wanting any part of firearms is a luxury you think you have, even after reading this article about the reality out there. I submit that you are benefiting from the fact that lots of your neighbors are armed and that lots of criminals are aware of it and that you do need to learn tolerance for these same neighbors when they feel the need to practice with their guns. Face the fact that the schools being “gun free zones” has more to do with the lessening safety of your children while they are at school, than any other factor. Most of these shooters are man-children who would never consider this type of crime if they feared they would get shot before they got to do any shooting. These are crazy people we are talking about here, not powerful villains.
It’s called, “hoplophobia”.
Blaming inanimate objects for the actions of sentient beings is certainly irrational.
It’s of of many interesting inconsistencies about liberals. Most liberals pride themselves on being scientific (as opposed to being “religious”), yet they are a remarkably superstitious bunch, imputing all kinds of miraculous powers to inanimate objects. Why, to hear them tell it, the mere presence of a gun can turn ordinary people into mass murderers, such is their power over the human mind. They also show a remarkable ability to fire themselves; sometimes at random, other times with deadly premeditation.
They truly are evil objects.
But liberals worship science, and abhor superstition.
I thought libs were supposed to be tolerant of others?
If you haven’t already noticed, Leftist Liberals are as tolerant and compassionate as Charles Manson.
Donna,
Full Auto weapons are really not much good for anything in every day use except to run through a bunch of ammo fast but they sure are fun. Of course they would be a great help in your scenario of being overrun by invaders.
As to taking her sons to target practice to “bond”,I agree that that is part of it but not all. The main purpose for most is to teach them safety and, in the case of younger children, to take the mystery out of shooting. Children see guns every day on TV. They see people get shot and then they see these same people again on the next show shooting someone else. They get the idea guns are just toys and can’t figure out why their parents would hide them from them. By taking them out and showing them what they do and how they work and explaining the damage they can do, parents remove the mystery and the temptation to find their parents gun and play with it.
The Army studied Vietnam era combat and discovered that a well trained rifleman using aimed semiautomatic fire will defeat troops firing in full auto virtually every time. The M-1 Garand, a battle rifle introduced in 1936, remains the “sin quo non” of infantry rifles. It can sustain a higher rate fire than an AR based weapon and fires a far more potent round that the NATO 5.56. It lives on as the M-14. Every rifle squad now has a “designated marksman” who carries the M-14 as his primary weapon. He is the modern BARman.
There are few situations that call for fully automatic fire — combat in the urban environment. The first two soldiers in the stack will kick down the door and spray the room. Everybody else enters a shoots single shots. During WWII we used the BAR and or a 45 caliber submachinegun to accomplish this task.
Please. We must make decisions based on reality; we must learn truth, facts, to form valid positions. This Conn. horror brings myths back to life, like zombies.
I would honor a national Constitutional vote on the Second Amendment, but I scorn those who warp our basic law by regulation, litigation and feel good laws that are worthless (e.g. the Assault weapons ban.) Fact: There is no real meaning to “Assault Weapon”. A bunch of Congressional lawyers poured over gun catalogs and picked out the ugly ones, and made a list of models. The result was new model numbers, created the week after the ban took effect. There was no effect on crime, during the ban or afterwards. Fact: the term,”Saturday night special” is a politician’s spin; it means nothing. All weapons are dual use, military/ civilian, or offense/ defense. Their purpose is to kill.
After two generations of hot air, let’s focus on the real problem: crazies with guns. Supposedly they can be identified long before the slaughter. This debate would be fruitful.
Yes, You can identify these people before they do things like this. They almost always have 2 hands and 2 feet. A dead giveaway.
You disqualified yourself from taking part in an intelligent discussion on the subject with your first two sentences. The reason we need to guard our right to self defense is that people such as you will end up deciding what is best for everyone. If you do not want to own a weapon, that’s fine…nobody will make you. But just who do you think you are to tell anyone else they cannot have the tools with which to defend themselves and their families?
Wow, “donna” — at least you’re aware of your bigotry. Pity you feel the need to embrace and celebrate it, rather than get over it.
“I see absolutely no need for automatic weapons or to tolerate the people who find shooting a great hobby”
Well, thank you Sire, for Proclaiming The Law which God Himself appointed YOU to wield over us lesser subjects.
A Thousand Pardons for my intollerable hobby, which so offends you.
Please accept my Bow as Recognition of your Supremecy over my small pathetic life, and direct me to such activities that better meet Your Hignesses Approval….
Because its all about YOU, Sire.
I “see no need” for “reading and painting” either so we should definitely ban those too.
Her two sons are actually a good case that evil actually exists. Her bonding with her son’s by teaching them to shoot didn’t turn them into monsters. The older son is an accountant for goodness sakes. You can’t get more bland than an accountant. The other son was turning into a monster despite her influence.
Was it because of the broken home? Who knows? But what we do know is he was burning himself with a lighter a week before this happened. We also know this woman retired from her job to be home with this young man and that she saw a definate downgrade in his personality that she feared she couldn’t control. She was right and since we can’t institutionalize people anymore they are allowed to walk around with the rest of us.
Who cares what a fascist as yourself cares for or will tolerate. I do not.
Donna, you profess ignorance and yet you have decided that you won’t tolerate such interests. And yet you consider that there might be a need for such guns. I read a great deal of confusion in your words.
As one who instructs shooting sports to youth, allow me to share a few reasons why Nancy Lanza might have thought this was a good idea:
First, they’re trained with the most conservative, safe, proven methods. There is NO horseplay of any kind. Such kids are sent away immediately. This is VERY structured training.
Second, whatever they’re shooting, be it a rifle, a bow, or a pistol, these kids learn to meditate in a very practical sense. Their stance, their breathing, and their focus is all about the target. The actual shot is almost a surprise. In shotgun sports such as trap or skeet, these students drill in posture, clay target tracking and body position. These sports are as much a practical challenge in meditation as they are a physical one (and they are quite physical too).
Third, the kids are encouraged to socialize with each other to improve scores, teach each other to stay safe, and how to communicate effectively in case something goes wrong (such as a hang-fire).
As a result, shooting sports are among the very safest sports out there. This is on par with canoeing, camping, and bowling. Hunting is only slightly less safe because of falls from tree stands (there are approximately ten times more tree stand injuries than from actual shooting accidents). In contrast, team sports such as baseball, football and basketball have horrifying injury statistics, yet nobody denigrates them.
I think there are important life lessons to be learned in shooting sports, not the least of which is how to use a dangerous tool safely. We shouldn’t bubble wrap our kids until age 16 and then magically expect them to know how to act safely behind the wheel of a car.
And finally, as for automatic weapons, do note that the statistics for crimes while using them are ridiculously low. Personally, I see them as analogous to street-legal high performance cars in the gun world. I’m not sure why someone would want to own one, but they do; and they seem to enjoy spending fabulous sums of money on ammunition. Who are we to say they’re wrong?
You must not have read the article.
I worked very briefly in law enforcement, and I’ve served in two branches of the armed forces. I’m a decorated combat vet. I can tell you this: most cops are very well-intentioned, but law enforcement has no department of precrime. Police don’t prevent crime. They do the best they can to clean up the mess afterward, which doesn’t help victims much. The fact is, there are some sick, sick people out there. The only way to protect citizens is to empower them to protect themselves. Next to situational awareness and a habit of knowing who’s near you, a firearm is highly effective at deterring crime. And when it doesn’t deter crime, it’s effective at protecting the innocents trained in the use thereof. Maybe you should be channeling YOUR energy into teaching your kids a realistic understanding of the world around them and giving them the tools to survive.
My son is a police officer and from our conversations I would say that this officer’s opinion accurately reflects those of my son and a very large percentage of police officers.. Nearly to a man, they will tell you that it is easier to sort out the good guys from the villains than it is to clean up the mess if there were no good guys on hand.
Unfortunately, the law doesn’t recognize good guys and bad guys. The law doesn’t want ANYONE to shoot ANYONE for ANY reason, EVER.
In the law’s eyes, the guy on the ground bleeding to death is a victim. The guy standing over him with a smoking pistol is, at the very least, a disturber of the peace. He made a scene. He caused a ruckus. He frightened people. He poked a hole in the fiction that our town/city/state is a nice, safe place to live. And he killed somebody. He will be punished, one way or another. The law will NEVER be on his side.
Something to think about before you pull the trigger…
What horrid place do you live? In most parts of the US, self-defense is a valid cause for using your firearm.
I know of a case in Ohio where a guy shot someone twice at point-blank range and there were NO charges filed. The shooter was seated in his car; the guy who got shot was leaning into the car throwing punches.
Plenty of anecdotal evidence either way, I guess. Depends on the jurisdiction. Where I live, they take a dim view of gunplay, no matter who’s in the right. There’s always a lawyer or two who can turn self-defense into an unjustified attack on an innocent bystander. I don’t live in Ohio.
It’s not just a question of what the letter of the law says. The real question is, how much sh*t is the legal system going to put you through before you’re allowed to walk away? You may be not be in jail, but your life will very different – and not in a good way.
Beats being dead, though.
“The law doesn’t want ANYONE to shoot ANYONE for ANY reason, EVER”
Wrong.
They encourage gang activities and refuse to procecute Federal Laws on 17, 18, 19 and 20 year old Gangstas who they regularly “catch and release” catch carrying HANDGUNS when Federal Law requires you be 21.
Gun crime is GOOD for government, it means lots of Administration Costs and Continuous Propaganda Material to fund and enact new “solutions” to the the problems they’ve (purposely) created.
The governemnt WANTS people to get shot….as long as its not us Good Guys killing the Criminal Vermin…they cant STAND when that happens.
THATS when they’ll “crack down” and not a minute sooner.
When a cop responds to a shooting, all he knows is that a shooting occurred. He sees one down and one standing. The one standing has a firearm.
First, if the one holding the firearm is shaken up, he probably has his finger on the trigger. This is what is known as “not a good thing”. Very good idea to get him to drop the gun (it’s less likely to go off by accident from being dropped than by being holstered or put down).
Second, the cop has no real way of being sure that the one standing is really the good guy. Being mistaken about this can get the wife annoyed about bullet holes in your shirt. Rookies can make mistakes of this sort very easily, so they are taught to err on the side of safety.
People sometimes mistake these (very sensible, IMO) precautions as attacks on them. Not intended as such.
Not to say there are no idiots and wannabe SS types in uniform or in the DA office.
Religion and police have nothing to do with it. Look at Norway and Japan. The hardest part of this mess is making leftists appreciate that freedom is worth dying for. By utilitarian rationalism, they are “right”, but they need to learn to tolerate some dangerous liberty, bittersweet but worth it!
Some data to consider.
Information compiled from the Safe School Initiative Report, United States Secret Service and Department of Education, (2002); School Violence Threat Management, Dr. Kris Mohandie, (2000); The School Shooter: A Threat Assessment Perspective, CIRG/NCAVC, (1999).
There is not a “profile” of a school shooter-instead the students who carried out the attacks differed from one another in numerous ways. School shootings are rarely impulsive acts. They are typically thought out and planned in advance. Prior to most school shootings other students knew the shooting was going to occur but failed to notify an adult. Very few of the attackers ever directed threats to their targets before the attack. The most common goal was retribution. The justifications and excuses offered indicated this stemmed not from an absence of values but from a well-developed value system in which violence was acceptable. In many cases, other students were involved in the attack in some capacity. Many offenders experienced a significant personal loss in the months leading up to the attack, such as a death, breakup, or divorce in the family. Many offenders engaged in repetitive viewing of violent media and were often fascinated with previous school shootings. Repeated viewing of movies depicting school shootings, such as “Zero Day” and “Elephant,” may indicate a fascination with campus attacks. Be aware of the subject’s online videos, blogs, and social networking activities.
27% of attackers exhibited interest in violent movies.
37% of attackers exhibited interest in violence in their own writings, poems, essays, and journal entries.
59% of attacks occurred during the school day.
63% of attackers had a known history of weapons use.
68% acquired the weapon used from their own home or that of a relative.
93% of attackers engaged in some behavior prior to the attack that caused others to be concerned.
93% of attackers planned out the attack in advance.
95% of attackers were current students.
Odds are one in 1 million that a student will die at school as a result of a violent act.
24% motivated by desire for attention or recognition.
27% motivated by suicide or desperation.
34% motivated by attempt to solve a problem.
54% had multiple motives.
61% motivated by desire for revenge.
75% felt bullied/persecuted/threatened by others.
These statistics are a weirdly muddled picture. Fascination with violent movies isn’t prevalent, then. Mostly they point to a sense of being aggrieved and feeling victimized.
There is some worry now that repetitive, dramatic, intervention-oriented emphasis on suicide as being a risk for gay teens has actually raised rates of gay teen suicide. Obsessive classroom emphasis on “bullying prevention” that casts the bullied as special victims of horrific injustice may be increasing the sense of victimization among other groups as well.
And if statistics tell us anything that meshes neatly with what we already know about criminal behavior, it is that offenders are highly motivated to blame other people for their actions and be motivated by grievance.
I’m beginning to view these dramatically staged murder-suicides as a product of the very rituals invented to prevent them. The Columbine killers set out to murder hundreds of people and failed only because of a Bill Ayers-style incompetence with explosives. Yet they were immediately validated as victims of bullying and a narrative was invented depicting them as seeking to only harm their “tormenters.” None of this was true, but bullying prevention professionals took home the biggest payday from the donations made to the town of Columbine after the killings– more than surviving victims with medical bills.
Then again, the president can’t “rescue” us from a random evil act, so there must be a narrative that empowers the bureaucratic savior classes.
It’s also worth nothing that the killers at Columbine would not have been free to carry out their crimes if they had actually been punished for prior offenses. But they got suspended sentences and approbation from at least one teacher for “surviving” the trauma of being arrested by the evil oppressive police when caught stealing a car. Perhaps a clearer sense of consequences for lesser crimes would have prevented the greater one.
Nothing else did, but we are going to do it all again.
“It’s also worth nothing that the killers at Columbine would not have been free to carry out their crimes if they had actually been punished for prior offenses.”
Same for Loughner.
That’s a lot of figures that don’t say a lot.
A great many kids will fall into one or many of those categories but will never do anything. That’s a large number of people to put under watch. Resources would likely better spent cracking down on the ones who actually do cause problems, like the bullies for example. Their behavior is quite clear and dangerous, much more so than someone who just talks and such.
Thank you for this article. Funny how things that should be self evident need to be put into print and then will be ignored because it doesn’t fit the agenda. Although after some recent news events such as the Michigan right to work law and the Chicago teachers strike I’m not sure I want these people armed.
To some extent blame for the Connecticut shooting can be laid on the left and their feel good solutions in regards to mental health and the fact that psychiatry an psychology are still at the level of using leeches and bleeding people.
So how did that 911 call go—
How did that teacher with no weapon do, trying to stop the madman—
So tell me, if a madman is shooting at people, do you want to try dialing 911 or do you want to pull out a weapon and take the madman down. The response time to a shot fired at the madman is split seconds, the time of police response can be as the author stated, measured in how many more dead there will be.
And then in the idiocy of our times, a letter writer exposed the ignorance of so many by saying he had never heard of a single case where a person at home with a gun deterred a problem. Takes about 3 seconds to get the 12 year old that saved herself, the man in the florida cyber cafe, the woman in her store in Cal, and the studies that Larry Elder cites.
But ignorance of the facts is no reason to ignore the facts and being ignorant is no way to design what works.
How many killings have been prevented by laws? How many suicides have been prevented by laws? Let’s see, if I kill myself, my family will not get my insurance payment so I’ll think of something else.. Yup, that must go on constantly..
Why not ask convicted killers why the laws did not stop them from killing? Of course all of them are innocent so forget that survey.. they’ll all tell you ‘The gun just went off..’..
Watch 48hours and see what they say under questioning.. it just ‘WENT OFF, ALL BY ITSELF!!’.
Damn, just like ‘She lowered her panties for me, ALL BY HERSELF!! so then she needed an obama abortion..’.. but heck, that’s paid for by tax payers now..
I predict the government will require anyone over 65 to own a gun and 1 round of ammo.. to be that final ‘pill’ for when their disease becomes unbearable and the pain meds run out.
School environment is geared for reaction after the fact. Preventive measures are in reality not there. I agree concealed weapons and training for teachers to keep a heads up for students acting out of the ordinary are the way to go. It will never completely stop these things from happening. But might lesson the damage. Mind you i don’t own a gun but as a teacher I’m starting to see the value in people knowing that somebody on campus just might have a concealed weapon. A deterrent? might be.
My humbe attempt to add something to this discussion is historical.
Trivia question: Can anyone correctly name the incident in which the most school children were killed at school, here in the United States? Hint, the killer had a lever action Winchester and a whole bunch of explosives…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bath_School_disaster
At least in my opinion, this pretty much trumps all gun control arguments. The guy used mostly explosives (and they were no doubt primitive, given that this was 1927) and a single shot from a rifle to kill more people than any of these mass school shooters who are armed with modern automatic rifles and pistols.
I read someone yesterday saying that whenever something like this happens, there’s always someone calling for collective punishment of the rest of us, via disamrmament. Here we go again…
On the contrary, that’s the exception that proves the rule.
You had to go back over 80 years to find a mass slaying of this magnitude that didn’t involve firearms as lethal as the rifle that Lanza had.
Meanwhile, we now seem to have mass slayings with guns taking place every few *months*.
Your sense of time is horribly distorted. You should perhaps try to gather some facts rather than trying to run everyone else’s lives off your knee-jerk, emotional, distorted reality.
I think you’re half right. In 1927, dynamite was cheap and easy to buy. Farmers used it for clearing stumps. Today, it’s illegal (or at least extremely difficult) for most of us to buy or possess high explosives. That’s probably one reason McVeigh had to cobble up a fertilizer bomb. No telling what the Unabomber might have gotten into if he’d been able to order a case of dynamite from the Sears catalog. And the Columbine shooters had to make do with amateur-hour devices made from propane tanks. So maybe making high explosives mostly illegal has saved some lives.
However, in 1927 it was perfectly legal throughout much of the country to purchase and carry any kind of weapon available. Private citizens could own Thompson submachine guns, BARs, army surplus Springfields, Colt 1911s, even sawed-off shotguns. The Firearms Act of 1934 established registration and heavy taxation for certain types of “gangster” weapons. The Gun Control Act of 1968 imposed even tighter restrictions and regulations, as did the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990, the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993, and the (now expired) Federal Assault Weapons Ban of 1994.
So even thought it’s become much increasingly difficult to acquire firearms since 1934, incidents of mass gun violence not related to organized crime have not decreased. In fact, they may have increased since the 1980s.
Would gun crime today be much worse if not for all the restrictions? I believe so. Would banning guns like we ban explosives help? Certainly. If you don’t mind taking a short cut around the Constitution, that is. The trouble with that approach is it sets a precedent. If we can just bypass the Second Amendment, why not bypass the First, or the Fourteenth, or any other Amendment that feels inconvenient? Once you start, you can’t go back.
Frankly, I think culture has more to do with it than guns. Kids in 1927 did not swipe Dad’s Tommy gun and slaughter their schoolmates. Kids in 2012 do steal Mom’s Bushmaster and slaughter kindergarten students.
So the real question is: what’s happened to our kids?
“So the real question is: what’s happened to our kids?”
The answer is Two Words:
Liberal. Indoctrination.
We lost control of the schools and the media.
This is what an immoral Leftist culture brings.
The Petit Women burned alive in Connecticut while the Police stood by and did nothing…and their killers will never be executed, because Connecticut has an entrenched Liberal Mindset.
The Root of all Evil
Actually, according to AP mass killings are on the decline:
http://www.debatepolitics.com/breaking-news-non-msm/146188-mass-killings-decline.html
Good. And if true, is the decrease due to gun control or to other factors?
Number one, it’s not clear yet whether Lanza even used the Bushmaster .223 rifle. Some reports say it was found in the trunk of his car after the tragedy. Second, why this impulse to distinguish some firearms as more deadly than others? They’re all fatal. It’s the person holding it who should be scrutinized.
Well, that was just stupid. On 9-11 commercial jets were used to mass murder 2997 people.
Given that one in ten Americans has mental health issues, and that seven in ten Americans have easy access to firearms, it’s amazing that we don’t have a massacre every day. Wonder if the coming economic disaster is going to tip a LOT more people over the edge…
“The guy used mostly explosives (and they were no doubt primitive, given that this was 1927)”
TNT (aka Dynamite) was very perfected by that time. Gawd, the ignorance.
yes, I know there is a ‘difference’
but only in scientific terms… I should have reversed the ‘aka’
they are like brothers from the same Nitro mother.
Given that Connecticut is a liberal state (Obama beat Romney by 17 points there), it’s a safe bet that 75% or more of the teachers and principals are liberals there.
They’re not going to take up arms in kindergarten classrooms. They’ll fight that tooth and nail.
So we’re not going to get armed teachers in most Blue States.
So come up with some other suggestion that is more likely to be accepted in states like Connecticut, California, etc..
So they’ll fight to avoid taking responsibility for their own safety?
Weird. And you say they’re adults?
And why the entire nation has to suffer because Connecticut has that problem?
So they let their kids die. That is their choice I guess. Liberals kill more babies every day than did the Sandy Hook shooter… and in a more vile manner. Meh, probably helps the gene pool in the long run.
Now about reality. Something you should read.
http://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2012/12/17/lets-have-that-conversation-about-guns-n1468596
I’ve been teaching for 8 years at a suburban Chicagoland high school. Anyway a few years ago we had a “training” held at our school during an institute day, some national honors society students played “victims” and an off duty officer played the “shooter” loose in the building.
An announcement was made starting the drill and I watched from my second floor room as dozens of police, paramedics, and even a command truck rolled into the parking lot (they gave the shooter a 5 min head start, in my opinion very generous considering the amount of police that responded and our schools location). The police swept the hallways, the paramedics looked after “victims” (they each held cards detailing their injuries), and the building went into a “lock down”. Eventually an all clear annoucement was made 10-15 minutes after the drill to let us know everything was going back to normal in the building.
In the debriefing after the drill the teachers met with local law enforcement in the school auditorium to go over the days events. One officer said something many of the teachers found shocking… “we are not stopping for the dying or injured students, we are going for the shooter”… as caring teachers I can understand their lack of comprehension of this concept, but it is the reality. Additionally when a teacher asked “is there anything more we can do to make our building or lock down procedure better” … the cop said “if someone wants to get in and hurt people there is very little that can be done to stop them”
I am active in the schools group that helped develop some of our lock down procedures, they are far from perfect. But what we do (and many of the nearby schools have as well) have is a police lesion officer in our building… in uniform, bullet proof vest, and armed. That is the best protection you can ask for currently available in my opinion (I know it costs the district, not sure how much).
If you are a concerned parent I would suggest you call your son/daughters school and educate yourself on what the current plan of action in their school is.
With today’s technology, it makes more sense to get rid of schools. Instruction could take place over the internet, sent to each individual child, with standardized tests to monitor progress.
Why make it easier for the insanely violent by gathering masses of children together at clearly marked locations?
But …. But … I like wishful thinking. It makes meeee feeel goood. About myself.
It always frustrates me to hear politicians, who want to push through their latest vote buying schemes, holding police funding hostage in order to force voters into complying with their out of control spending.
By the time the SWAT team shows up, the damage is already done. The only effective preventative is an armed presence, in the school, all day, every day, that can respond immediately.
Lets see. Hmm – doesn’t Illinois – and Chicago in particular – have some of the most onerous gun control laws on the books? Lets see how thats working out for these Democrats – they are ‘in control’ of all of Chicago – and a goodly part of Illinois too:
(From a recent email)
CHICAGO!
Perhaps the U.S. should pull out of Chicago?
Body count: In the last six months 292 killed (murdered) in Chicago ;
221 killed in Iraq AND Chicago has one of the strictest gun laws in the entire US.
Does THAT tell you anything?
Barack Hussein Obama
Senator: Dick Durbin
House Representative: Jesse Jackson Jr.
Governor: Pat Quinn
House leader: Mike Madigan
Atty. Gen.: Lisa Madigan (daughter of Mike)
Mayor: Rahm Emanuel
The leadership in Illinois – all Democrats.
Thank you for the combat zone in Chicago.
Of course, they are all blaming each other.
They can not blame Republicans; there are not any!
Chicago school system rated one of the worst in the country – teachers highest paid.
State pension fund $78 Billion in debt, worst in country.
Cook County (Chicago) sales tax 10.25% highest in country. (Look ‘em up if you want).
This is the political culture that Obama comes from in Illinois .
And…… he was gonna ‘fix’ Washington politics for us?
Soooo. Hows that gun control working out for you lefties in Chicago??? Not very well in my estimation. Do not try to foist this bad idea upon the rest of us – we do not want to live like those in Chicago.
There’s certainly nothing wrong with concealed hand guns—I carry one myself whenever I leave the house—but if I were a school principal or administrator who spends most of his time in his office, I’d also like to have a shotgun or rifle available.
Hand guns are much more portable and readily accessible; long guns are much more effective at stopping criminals right this instant and more accurate in most hands. There being, apparently, naught like a shortage of killers who target children, I believe the wider the range of protective weapons available, the better.
Yes to that. Also, every classroom could be outfitted with a wall safe that the Teacher(if so inclined) could place their personal carry handgun. Cannot use a purse/holster… kids.
It can be secured from children, yet still accessible for this kind of situation.
In a safe? No way. Use a shoulder holster. Concealed and under the direct control of the guard.
DOJ: Murders of School-Age Children Down 42%; Only 1% Take Place at School By Terence P. Jeffrey December 17, 2012
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/doj-murders-school-age-children-down-42-only-1-take-place-school
Never let a good crisis go to waste. Democrats will move – and fast – to get something – anything passed. Doesn’t matter to them – the long term goal is for a total ban – the second amendment be damned.
You are absolutely correct. This is why we have to watch the children close in D.C.. They are always playing games! The adults must make sure they honor their oath! OR else!
Newtown…the Sandy Hook School.
A tragedy and a terrible loss of innocent life in what was supposed to be a “safe place.” …what could have been done to prevent it?
Blame violent video games and movies/TV? Censor them? Yeah…like that’s going to ever happen…violence, like porn, is likely to continue to be everywhere…do they influence behavior?
Possibly, to some degree…but if the deaths of 20 children is a terrible tragedy (and it truly is)…why do we not care as a nation that the total of US abortions since 1973 (Roe v. Wade) through 2011 was 54,559,615 based on state government health organization data & the Guttmacher Institute data…Planned Parenthood alone performed 329,445 in 2010. Those children were no less innocent than the ones at Sandy Hook, and were in what is supposed to be a safer place…the womb. Does the attitude that bearing children to term is a matter of the mother’s choice and convenience, also influence behavior? But I digress…
What concrete steps can we take to prevent all future Sandy Hook type killings?
Pass a law declaring that schools and the surrounding area are gun-free? Zero tolerance for guns in schools?
…check…uh…nope, didn’t prevent it…prevented anyone from stopping or deterring the gunman until he shot himself or the police arrived.
Pass a law that guns can’t be bought without a criminal background check that includes mental health data?
…check…uh…nope, he wasn’t identified as “dangerous” by his doctor, mother or friends, and it’s pretty hard to commit someone without clear evidence of danger, so he might have passed the background check for a firearm purchase…but he wasn’t willing to try it or to accept the mandatory waiting period for firearm purchase…so he went and stole his mother’s guns.
Pass a law that guns be stored under lock and key when not in the possession of their rightful owner, a responsible adult who passed a background check?
…check…that one’s on the books…didn’t prevent him from finding his mother’s keys and looting the gunlocker…
Pass a law that certain guns that look different (scary black “assault weapons”) may not be made or sold? There are millions of magazine fed semi-automatic rifles in the marketplace and already in lawful owners hands, …and the way a gun looks doesn’t determine how it functions, there are semi auto hunting rifles with shiny walnut stocks and stainless steel barrels that shoot the same caliber bullets as the “assault rifles” and are just as legitimately used for hunting, home defense and target practice.
Ban all guns?…punish and disarm 100 Million law-abiding citizens for the actions of a very few sick individuals or one twisted man?…..and you can’t un-invent the gun. In Pakistan in the Khyber pass area they make working copies of every kind of gun imaginable, including full automatic weapons, with a hacksaw, a file, and a drill press. Any machine shop or automotive garage is capable of making guns. Guns are not going away…that genie is not going back in the bottle.
Disarming an entire population? Tell me how that worked out for Germany, the Soviet Union, and China…millions dead at the hands of their own governments…
Safety is a wonderful goal but it’s also magical thinking to believe that anyone, anywhere is absolutely 100% safe at all times…even in prison, under full time guard, people get assaulted, killed or injured. No one wants to live under constant armed supervision in order to be safer…Think about having an armed guard outside your house who watches you come and go…outside your workplace, outside your grocery store, outside and inside every school …and even then, even with the best of intentions, some fraction of the trusted “guards” who are supposed to keep us “safe” would take advantage of the situation. And what would such guards cost?
Parenting is not a spectator sport…you can’t assume, whether at home, at school, or on an outing to the mall, that you or your children are absolutely positively 100% safe…part of responsible parenting is being prepared, willing and able to protect and defend your own family and yourself…it’s a truism that “when seconds count, the police are minutes away”, and will be delighted to arrest the perpetrator after there’s a crime…if they can figure out who did it.
…if you’re not mentally and physically prepared to protect and defend your own family, are you being a responsible adult and parent?
My question is, if our children are indeed most precious to us, and they are, ….why was no one there at the school prepared to guard them? One teacher there had the wits to ignore the official rules (herd everyone into one corner of the classroom…how convenient, a compact single target for rapid fire) and hide her children in scattered locations in cabinets and tell the gunman they were in the gymnasium…God bless her, she saved their lives…though she lost her own life.
Why were none of the responsible school staff, teachers or administrators armed and trained to defend those precious children? It has worked well in Israeli schools under high threat from terrorists…adults are trained and armed. Why would you entrust your most precious children to a school protected only by magical thinking and breakable glass windows?
Why would anyone think that creating a “gun-free” zone, posting signs and passing regulations to that effect, would deter anyone except the law-abiding?
If the shooter was willing to steal guns and kill his own mother…isn’t it magical thinking to believe that, having already broken those laws and fully intending to commit more murders, violating the “gun free” zone at the school would matter to him in the least?
Gun sales have soared. Murder rates have fallen. Mass shootings are in the news, but are 100s of times less likely to kill you than a lightning strike…
In states where lawful citizens can carry concealed weapons, those criminals who are rational have to consider that what looks like a helpless victim may in fact be fully able to defend himself/herself. Twisted individuals who are not behaving rationally or not capable of understanding right and wrong may or may not weigh that possibility, but if you disarm the law-abiding, each incident after that becomes like Newtown…the gunman knows he has free reign within the building for at least some period of time until the police respond.
Whether the threat is terrorists, criminals, or twisted murderous sick individuals, responsible adults need to be prepared and have the means to protect and defend themselves, their families, and in the case of schools, protect and defend the children in their charge.
A lot has been said and written since the terrible shooting at Newtown, and much of it is interesting and informative. What I gather from it all is that the issue, and the solution to it, is composed of two parts. One is the vulnerability of innocents in a society where gratuitous violence is entertainment and where powerful weapons are easily available. The other is the lack of mental health infrastructure and legal framework for dealing with mentally sick people. I raised an “at risk” child and can say that there was darn little in the way of pulbic support when crises had to be dealt with, and what was available to us then is no longer available due to withdrawal of funding. As for the security issue, the need to protect our innocent ones at school, why is it that we will spend money for a teacher’s aide in every classroom, elaborate sports programs, etc, but not fund a police presence in the schools. Concealed carry for teachers can be further debated, but may constitute jumping from the frying pan into the fire the first time a troubled teacher “goes postal.” What really worries me though is that once again this discussion will devolve into another useless arguement between the NRA and the “Brady Bunch,” because no one will want to spend the money for a real solution.
Well, you do not have to throw money at this problem. The solution is essentially free.
Constitutional Carry, and secure storage lockers in every classroom.
Add this as a plus.
http://www.ignatius-piazza-front-sight.com/2012/12/14/front-sight-special-blog-when-will-we-wake-up/
A policeman, whose career and training are in pulic safty, and whose responsibility on the job is security and nothing else, would be far more effective than a teacher who is untrained and who cannot respond until he hears the first shots fired somewhere in the building, and whose first responsibility is to the students in his or her own classroom. Said cop could also be effective in countering gang violence, drug sales, extortion and other crime problems in high schools. Teachers and administrators could then devote their time and energy to what they do best.
I doubt a policeman would be more effective in any of those pursuits Bigfoot. Everyone has an opinion and you are certainly due yours, mine is I do not want a Stasi State. Likely the teachers would be more in tune with any gang issues or others. This is a separate consideration from the immediate issue.
As the Policeman who wrote this article we post about in comments understands. First, that policeman canot respond any faster than he hears the first shot on campus, many times they shoot far worse than us. Do you really want spray and pray?
Sorry but this does not instil a lot of confidence.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/08/25/justice/new-york-empire-state-shooting/index.html
False. Civilians who make the decision to carry on a regular basis are superior marksman that your average patrolman. A typical NYPD uniformed officer shoots 100 rounds a year and only has to score 40% on target. A typical CHL holder shoots thousands of rounds a year. Many civilians have had military training. Civilians will also be more discriminating since they will go to jail if they shoot 9 innocent people in a DGU.
As concerns a teacher going postal. Like it would be better if the non-postal teachers could only die throwing their bodies in front of the postal teacher? Like what happened at Sandy Hook … with a citizen going postal who was not allowed there?
Get real, the Teachers would likely know who, in their midst was “postal”. Just like the community in Sandy Hook just knew it was lovable .. whatever the bastards name was.
The solution is two fold… armed carry, and pre-postal intervention.. I.E. institutionalization when so many, or few, SEE IT comming.
fathers and homeschooling, the end of these kind of problems and a whole bunch more, for the vast majority. nuff said.
Interesting tidbit I heard from John Lot (author of More Guns, Less Crime) on the radio the other day:
“With a single exception, every multiple-victim public shooting in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed since at least 1950 has taken place where citizens are not allowed to carry their own firearms.” (full article here: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/concealed-weapons-save-lives-article-1.1121161). Based on this, allowing teachers to carry guns in schools would pretty much eliminate school shootings. Period.
On top of that, every time I see one of mass shootings, I start looking for another little fact that never seems to be mentioned in the first few articles: That the shooter is on psychiatric medication. They almost always are. Fortunately, people are starting to wake up and realize that psychiatric “care”, and anti-depressants specifically, aren’t the cure but a huge part of the cause.
Thirdly, the Powers that Be have other agendas than our safety. Consider the following 60 minutes interview with Madeline Albright, former Secretary of State: ” ‘Lesley Stahl on U.S. sanctions against Iraq: We have heard that a half million children have died. I mean, that’s more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?’ Secretary of State Madeleine Albright: ‘I think this is a very hard choice, but the price–we think the price is worth it.’ ” This, mind you, was just sanctions that were killing children, not an actual war which could have had some justification. And was she shunned, ostracized or otherwise drummed out of Washington for saying that it’s worth it to kill half a million children? For not being more “sensitive”? Nope. In fact, Barrack Obama awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.
So, as the politicians run around wringing their hands and shedding crocodile tears, and touting more more of the same sort of gun laws that haven’t worked and better psychiatric care, please keep in mind that they have another agenda, and it’s NOT the safety of your children, or you, or anything else you care about. It’s all about keeping their power. There have been a few exceptions, but not many. Don’t think so? I’ll leave you with David Axelrod: “Never let a good crisis go to waste.” And why would people that have that sort of philosophy do anything effective about something that is such a continual source of crisis?
Please re-examine your reasoning re psychiatric medication. It would seem to follow from what you wrote that psychiatric problems should not be treated with medication. I believe you are trying to say that the medication causes the problem. It’s like saying a patient has pneumonia because they are giving him him antibiotics.
I believe people with psychiatric ailments should be treated effectively. The overwhelming evidence, if you look at it, is that most of them make things worse. But then, I don’t believe psychiatry to be a “medical” practice either. It’s a scam. Check out http:\\www.cchr.org. Or search YouTube for any of numerous videos on psychiatric drugs and children.
DOJ: Murders of School-Age Children Down 42%; Only 1% Take Place at School By Terence P. Jeffrey December 17, 2012
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/doj-murders-school-age-children-down-42-only-1-take-place-school
As a retired teacher I hear you. One is really muzzled during his public service career when it comes to saying what he really thinks. Thank you for your great article. When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.
In support of common sense:
“Real gun-free zones are a wonderful idea, but they are only real if they are created by metal detectors backed up by armed guards. Pretend gun-free zones, where law-abiding adults (who pass a fingerprint-based background check and a safety training class) are still disarmed, are magnets for evildoers who know they will be able to murder at will with little threat of being fired upon.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323723104578185271857424036.html
A guy posted a blog article a couple of weeks ago looking at the results of 29 mass shootings. Turns out that when the shooting ended after police arrived, the average death count was 14.3 people. When the shooting ended before police arrived (e.g. a civilian stopped the gunman), the average death count was 2.3. Bottom line, if you have to wait for the police to get there, you’re going to have a lot more dead kids. It’s all about response time. The civilians are already there, zero response time. The cops have to travel, and their cars only go so fast.
The question of what we can afford (ie can we afford guards) isn’t an objective question, it’s a matter of priorities.
For instance the Japanese pay teachers much higher salaries than we do, but it’s Americans who complain about the costs.
One main question about teachers or guards being armed is “are they well enough trained to do a good job?”
Having a few well trained guards on duty at all times might well be safer than having a bunch of untrained teachers with guns.
Also a school could combine models. If a few teachers are known to be well trained and good with guns, then you could reduce the number of guards on duty AT THE TIMES THAT THOSE TEACHERS ARE PRESENT.
Yeah, current guards might not be that well trained, but that could be changed.
Personally, I’m not wedded to any particular model of security, either heavily restricting guns or guards or whatever. Just putting a few thoughts out. I asked someone the other day “what interpretation has the supreme court placed on the second amendment – ie what sorts of laws can be written?”
I was told that the interpretation has been left up to the states, and I was flabbergasted. I can’t think of any other issue where the supreme court has said “oh, this means whatever you want it to mean!”
But the amendment seems to me to be a self contradictory sentence: “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
Militias are “the people”?
Are they?
If they are then it doesn’t actually sanction private ownership.
On the other hand, as problematic as private ownership is, having, say, non-governmental militias is the hallmark of a failed state. It’s the way you have Lebanon where the south is controlled by Hezbollah/Iran and neither the police nor the army can go there. And there is no rule of law, except Hezbollah’s law.
Well, lay to rest one of your concerns.
SCOTUS has ruled that The Right Of The People To Keep And Bear Arms is an individual Right. Strange how they figure The People that way… I was sure it meant that obama had the only Right to be armed.
http://www.oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2007/2007_07_290
Bummer huh?
“On the other hand, as problematic as private ownership is, having, say, non-governmental militias is the hallmark of a failed state.”
Not even slightly true. Non-government militias which do not supplant the state are the hallmark of the very best, most civilized government, for example, this government and nation prior to permitting the unorganized militia to lie fallow, ca. 1918 and on.
It’s when the militia supplants the state instead of complimenting it that the state has failed.
And for that matter, if the militia supplants the state, it may well be because the state has failed and the militia is doing one of it’s jobs, restarting government from the most organic level of the law, the people. All legitimacy flows from the people up. You kind of sound like someone who thinks it appears from nowhere at the top and is imposed downwards.
“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
These are different sentences divided by a comma. The can exist and be interpreted separately, and they are.
No,
It is not two sentences divided by a comma, it is a single statement that CONTAINS a comma to clearly and incontrovertably explain the “how” and the “why”.
They cannot exist or be (honestly) interpreted seperately.
It is entirely necesarry for the people to be sufficiently armed with modern weaponry (A “well regulated” Militia) to maintain a secure state of freedom for themselves and deter a tyrannical government from oppressing them. To that end, NO infingement upon their RIGHT to maintain their own private arms will be tolerable.
It is a is a rather simple theory clearly explained in the single sentence of The Second Amendment.
Calling it “two sentences” and thus imagining there is some “confusion” to its meaning is mere word-trick, an “it depends on what the meaning of “is” is” level of dishonesty.
Thank You sincerely, Mike. I’ve been sending this around, and unlike the talking heads, this explains the gun-free zones better than anything I have seen on the web.
Walt, for one thing “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state” doesn’t make a complete sentence. For another, it’s a dependent clause, and, finally, commas don’t separate sentences.
Forgive the perhaps poor choice of words, considering the situation, but
I believe this is a teachable moment. Consider the facts. A standard bullet will have a velocity of between 1000 and 3000 feet per second. A police car will have a max speed between 100 – 150 feet per second.
A shooter enters a gun free zone. What is the best solution to this problem:
A) Call 911
B) Have immediate access to your own firearm
C) Bend over and kiss your @ss goodbye
D) Ask the shooter to vent their feelings in an encounter group
E) Everybody hold hands and sing Kumbaya
You have exactly 1 sec to finish this exam. Go…..
We must outlaw crap. Otherwise, there will be another Tom McVeigh, and company who murder 168 people 19 of which where children.
I write we outlaw crap. Then, outlaw illegal aliens who drink and drive murdering Americans. Then, booze. Because booze kills.
Had just one teacher been armed, snd the media did not make the shooter into a house hold name, none of this may have happened. Now, someone is thinking how to up one on this.
To outlaw crap you have to outlaw Janet(The Butcher of Waco) Reno and Ruby Ridge as well.
How about this? Parents should arm themselves and guard the perimeter (right outside the lines) of the schools on a volunteer basis. And just like jury duty, volunteer days should be paid time off… Attach some RESPONSIBILITY to the RIGHT to carry. I wouldn’t mind volunteering for guard duty twice a year to keep my CCW license. CCW licensees goes through FBI background check. AND an ATF background check every time a gun is purchased. Then the school does background checks for child endangerment/domestic violence etc… these parents would be clean as a whistle.
some thoughts:
taking people’s guns away will create in society at large the same situation that sadly existed at this school. only the good guys and the bad guys will have guns, and the good guys ain’t here.
the children must be protected. everybody agrees on that at least.
on protecting them in school – the ideas i have heard so far:
1. weapons trained security guards/teachers in the school, with guns made available to same when necessary.
security part is easy for the weapons themselves when not being used. i just bought myself a new safe. should have done it years ago – security (guns and valuables) and peace of mind with grandchildren about. good.
this idea puts some people to work (like returning highly trained vet’s) doing honorable, much needed work. very good.
2. try going against the 2nd amendment, attempting to take people’s guns and very much risk a civil war.
putting it mildly, there is a very large percentage of the population that doesn’t trust that gun running so called prez. out of their sight. – very bad.
see – fast & furious (selling thousands of untracked weapons to murderous drug cartels). – very bad.
see – president claiming executive privilege to keep Americans from knowing how he was pumping up the numbers of u.s. guns in mexico to pave the way for hitlery’s ‘small arms treaty’ she was pushing in the u.n. – very bad.
isn’t this treaty sitting before congress now waiting for the chance to quietly slip it into law? they really started pushing this treaty once it became public his intentions to grab our guns.
3. i’m sure there are ways of protecting our children in the schools, and elsewhere. this punk would never have had the guts to go up against trained
professionals. few will i’m thinking. didn’t i hear he killed himself when he heard sirens? as we get more experienced at it, better ways will naturally evolve.
bottom line: this prez. has already shown his true colors where our guns are concerned. with only a little research one can see he has done some very bad things involving guns and can’t be trusted to honor the constitution. his political aspirations do not gel w/ our God given rights. and when questioned about fast & furious and benghazi he has been anything but honorable toward the American people. the list here is long in that regard.
btw, isn’t it odd how the president’s tears and empathy is demonstrated here, where he is again trying to take our guns, and yet strangely couldn’t be seen in places like fast & furious (hundreds dead). those u.s. families would have loved to hear obozo tell them in person why he sold thousands of untracked guns to murderers.
its good to have the old rotten media in your pocket. the country never gets to hear the nuts and bolts truth.
Nope, then only the Bad guys and the worst Bad guys will have guns. I’ll leave it up too you to decide which is worse… armed criminals or The Stazi.
I think we are coming to a point when the word “militia” gets a new and good meaning.
“Militia” are all of us, armed and responsible citizen who care about our community and its safety.
I am not afraid of a man with open-carry because I know that he is not afraid of me.
When I grew up essentially everybody had rifles in their houses. We went hunting.
Nobodies dad ever had to say now johnny remember not to go to school and murdered dozens of children.
I know thats absurd. Buts its what I think when i hear about these kinds of shootings. Nor were we at all nice. Certainly there was a share of people cut up, and even shot in the kinds of bars my mom called buckets of blood.
What the hell has happened. Its like people are missing entire sections of their brains.
I asked why the perp couldn’t have driven to the school in his moms car while driving through a red light or stop sign to be pulled over by the police. Imagine his demeanor with four loaded guns and extra magazines hidden in the car? I think an experienced cop would have noticed something strange and might have wanted to have a look around.
Given what we now know about the event it seems this might have been the only hope these people might have had. Sadly, that didn’t happen.
Listening to Piers Morgan and a panel on CNN. I’m afraid the libs are going to win this argument, at least with the pulic. “We only want reasonable gun laws. We don’t want hunting weapons. We just want military arms out of private hands. Oh, and registration, and…etc.”
And old Piers says all us gun folks ought to stop talking about our rights- with a sneer whenhe says “rights”.
We now live in a country in which the power of firearms is glorified all out of proportion to their actual effectiveness, in the movies and on tv, while at the same time fewer and fewer people have actually fired any weapon, much less done any serious shooting. It’s easy to demonize guns and shooters, hard to argue rights to a population educated to judge by their feelings rather than with facts and logic, and in the short term anti-gun feelings are going to be fed and encouraged beyond all reason. The left is in high dudgeon and will press this favorite prejudice just as far and fast as they can.
Logic is not going to help, sheer bible, gun-clinging stubbornness must hold the line until everyone settles down.
ONe last point, the author of this article is absolutely correct, there need to be armed defenders on site in “gun free zones”. Personally I think armed, dedicated security personnel are the answer. Too few teachers would carry, I doubt if they’d keep the weapons secure, or would keep up with the training and practice necessary to be effective. We can hire some retired cops and military vets and take the money out of the teachers unions’ budgets.
Listening to Piers Morgan and a panel on CNN…
Oh hell, if you listen to CNN, the libs win every argument. Quit watching that idiotic crap, and make fun of anybody who does.
Would somebody who solidly supports the slaughter of 1.2 million newly born and unborn babies a year be a believable spokesman on the subject of saving children’s lives?
Would somebody who gave thousands of automatic rifles away to drug cartels which resulted in countless deaths of innocent people be in favor of gun control?
Would somebody who failed to send a rescue mission to save four Americans under attack by terrorists in Benghazi be a credible source for thoughts on saving American lives?
Would somebody use the horrific murder of children at the Sandy Hook Elementary School for purely political purposes; in a very real sense, attempting to raise his poll numbers on the backs of dead six and seven year olds?
You know the answers.
We need a President like B. Hussein like we need a hole in the head.
I have researched the law on police legal responsibility a bit, and the officer is absolutely right. Courts have consistently held that the police are responsible for protecting the public, not individuals.
The NRA is taking and has taken a lot of heat for the occurrence of mass murders. I have never been a member of the NRA, but I know that they have some of the best firearms safety, training, and home defense courses in the country. Police departments use them all the time.
Has anyone done any research to determine what percentage of mass murderers are NRA members? Not many, I suspect.
Best,
Richard
You misread the research then.
Cops are not legally responsible to protect ANYBODY. Not “the public”, not anybody.
It’s not the guns my friends, it’s the mentally ill behind them. We use to lock the mentally ill up for their safety and ours. Now the anti social are given a bottle of meds and sent home in hopes that they will take them. Since the early 70′s when mental hospitals started closing and the approach of caring for the mentally ill changed from institutional help to a outpatient type care is when these shooting began and have been getting worse as our mental heath care has. We have had semi auto multi shooting weapons since WW1 and never seen these shootings until the mental health care changed 30 years ago. We have armed guards at our banks, in our airports, our court houses, our government buildings, on our borders, with our political leaders, everywhere except for the protection of our children. And school shootings have been going on now for 30 years and getting worse. We leave our children to be protected by a locked glass doors and good intentions. Guns are not to blame, it’s what we have let our culture become. We have taken religion out of our schools and lives and left our children to gain direction on their own through violent video games and TV. The mentally ill and criminals don’t care about any gun law that is made. If they did, we wouldn’t be talking about this now.
This now goes out to all the neo-neo-nazis:
Here’s the long & short of it.
Schizophrenia is the mental illness most associated with violence.
Out of 100 schizophrenics. 8 of them will commit a violent crime.
Out of 100 perfectly “normal” people. 5 of them will commit a violent crime.
Thus, the association of schizophrenia or other mental illness, with violent crime is FALSE. It is believed by many, based on the SPOTLIGHT fallacy.
Hypothetically (assuming 100 to be the total number), if you permanently confined all schizophrenics, you would sentence 92 innocent people to LIFE IMPRISONMENT to prevent 8 violent crimes.
By the same token, if you permanently confined all “sane” people, you would sentence 95 innocent people to Life imprisonment, to prevent 5 violent crimes.
Your justification for the PERMANENT IMPRISONMENT OF 92 INNOCENT people, is those THREE additional crimes prevented. And you call the schizophrenics “crazy”?!
So, to prevent 8 violent crimes, all you have to do is sentence 92 innocent people to LIFE IMPRISONMENT WITHOUT PAROLE; WITHOUT TRIAL; WITHOUT APPEAL; WITHOUT DEFENSE; WITHOUT CHARGE.
Why not, then, prevent ALL violent crime by putting everyone in prison? (after all, everybody knows there’s no violence IN prison)
What’s that? You don’t want to confine ALL schizophrenics? Just the one’s with “violent tendencies”? Such as assault? Aren’t they already confined when they commit a crime?
You’re not talking about schizophrenics with a history of ACTUAL violence. Such violence is ALREADY criminal. ALREADY requires confinement. (p.s. just in case you don’t know, violent THREATS are criminal …. tortious, too.)
By “violent tendencies”, you mean non-violent acts and speech indicative of violent thought. How many “sane” people say “violent” things? How many have ranted and raved when angry? How many do it, DAILY, on the internet? How many “sane” people have ever taken out their anger on an inanimate object? Are they given LIFE in prison? Should they be?
What is being advocated is the permanent confinement for Schizophrenics who SAY (but don’t DO) “violent” things, but not for “sane” people who do the same.
Things are not improved by reliance on the post hoc and circular argument that someone is “crazy” BECAUSE they committed a certain crime. This type of argument is FALLACIOUS. That is, the entire premise of the argument to confine the mentally ill to prevent more “Newtown’s” is logically flawed.
Still, “spotlighting” certain events, and begging the question after the fact will convince many “sane” people to agree to permanently confine the mentally ill. If their support for permanently confining the mentally ill is based on faulty logic; then it is — by definition — IRRATIONAL.
Now who’s crazy?
Nevertheless, “SOMETHING MUST be done”, right?
Well, let me add that there is a much stronger correlation between schizophrenia and violence when substance abuse is added to the mix.
Additionally, there is a very strong correlation between “sane” people and violence when substance abuse is involved.
I have a solution which is more consistent with both fact and logic than the permanent confinement of all mentally ill persons. Permanently confine everyone who EVER drinks alcohol or uses any “recreational” drug. That’s right, LIFE IMPRISONMENT WITHOUT PAROLE; WITHOUT TRIAL; WITHOUT APPEAL; WITHOUT DEFENSE; WITHOUT CHARGE.
(No, I’m not serious; it’s a valid reductio. But even as a serious argument, it’s sounder than your’s.)
There is a crime in this country — and THIS country particularly — that is worse than all others. Worse than murder. Worse than rape. It is the imprisonment, by the State, of an innocent man.
And you propose to do it multiple times over, in perpetuity.
Frankly, even if 99 of 100 schizophrenics committed violent crimes; what you suggest would still be evil, as it would permanently imprison one innocent man.
NOTE: I didn’t even broach the subject of race as it relates to percentage of violent crime committed; but you should be aware that if this illogical and EVIL argument succeeds, it will set the precedent — logically, and INEVITABLY — for the imprisonment of all black people. This is why there is a VALID Slippery Slope argument to be made against this push to “Institutionalize”. Go on, say it. Say, “That could never happen here”.
I have a cousin with schizophrenia, and he’s as harmless as human beings come. Far less dangerous than most allegedly “sane” people I’ve met.
God help the person who comes to imprison my cousin, because I’ll be there with him … waiting for you.
Note to liberals: You sleep soundly at night because of the rough men who guard the gates at night. Those rough men and women include your neighbors who own the firearms that make hot burglaries and home invasions rare in the United States. Someone may want to steal your goods but few will do it while you are home out of fear of getting shot by the homeowner.
If guns are the problem why is the worst neighborhood in Arlington, Alexandria, Falls Church or Fairfax County Virginia where gun ownership is widespread safer than the safest neighborhood in New York City where guns are banned?
Thank you for providing this. I gave up the firearms before marriage.
For several years now, my wife and I have gone back and forth on home protection – her opinion of no guns in the house winning out because of the safety threat to children and future grandchildren. I’ve complied while pleading and grumbling to keep the peace and because I love her.
I’ve contended the police are overwhelmed and the only immediate protection is me, and the only reason the house safe because Joe criminal doesn’t know what is in store behind that front door for him. Unfortunately, I am not much of a threat to an armed opponent no matter how tough my wife may find me.
She will read this article this evening.
You need to either man up or drop the “Tex” moniker.
You also need to get educated about gun safety and children.
Then you need to learn to shoot.
And I don’t mean punching paper at the range. That’s a good place to start, but it’s not anywhere near enough.
Did you miss the before marriage or are your reading skills that poor, rube? I would have zero problem holding one to your temple if I find my aim too far off.
As far as names, Mark V sounds like a rotten automobile with a little, old lady behind the wheel. Find something tougher sounding if you’re going to give me advice to warrant fear. Your gun talk ain’t cutting it. I do it out of practicality and to even the odds. Worms like you do it out of necessity because you’re a skirt without one.
Wow, that was really manning up!
Yes, I thought you might enjoy that. I have no problem “manning up” when necessary. Don’t mistake the lack of a gun in my house with the fact (1) Of not knowing how to use one; (2) Not having the gonads to pull the trigger numerous times.
If I find out they voted for Obama, I’ll reload.
The safest place for a handgun, is in a holster on the owner’s person. The fastest way to put a firearm in action, is to draw it, not pull it out of a drawer or safe. There is just no way for some kid to pull granpa’s handgun out of a shoulder holster without him noticing something. No way for a handgun in a holster to go off.
Good luck trying to get some sense in her head. Can’t use logic to get someone out of a position they did not use logic to reach.
Excuse me, Mr. McDaniel, but cops ARE civilians. You are part of the CIVIL authority, you are not part of the military.
The militarization of our civil police agencies is a huge threat to our liberty.
Oh, and the Military is answerable to civilians as well.
We are the Gorverment. We are the Military.
We secure and govern ourselves, we merely “hire out” certain services as is convenient for us.
ALL of the guns belong to US.
NONE of the guns belong to the Government.
I spent 12 years in The Corps and guess how many times I decided, of my own volition, when and where to carry arms, load magazines, or chamber a round?
Never. Not one single time. I followed orders, lawful orders from our citizenry, that controlled every aspect of my weapons protocal.
It was NOT my rifle. It was the Peoples Rifle.
It had been entrusted to me, through their authority, to execute their needs.
End of story.
Well said.
Dear Mark v:
While you are technically correct, please understand that the police in many please commonly refer to non-police officer as “civilians,” when they’re not referring to them in more colorful language. I use the term only in that context.
Did you never feel the need, or ever hear any police officer express to their colleagues in your presence, the fact that they are also civilians?
YOU are responsible for the safety of you and your family. YOU. That’s it. Everyone else–police, neighbors, friends–will either give lip service to it or openly admit they don’t give a damn. Do you REALLY want to entrust your most sacred obligation–defending the lives and honor of your wife and children–to someone who gets just as much money for eating donuts as he does for facing an armed and dangerous criminal? If you do, you don’t know much about the motivations that guide government employees.
Long story short: get a gun, learn to use it, practice as much as you can, be prepared. When it comes to self-defense, you’re really on your own. The reality is that you always have been but have been conditioned to think someone else was looking out for you. They never have been, they aren’t now and they’re even less likely to be in the future. Protect yourself or become a victim. Those are your two choices. Your life, and the lives of your famly members, are the stakes at risk.
Choose wisely.
Let’s start with the good news: American schools, especially elementary schools, are extremely safe places. The overwhelming majority of them did not have a shooting on Friday and never will.
The bad news is, short of turning elementary schools into prisons and turning the country into a repressive police state (which we probably can’t afford even if we wanted to)…there is no way to make schools 100% safe. A determined nutcase can do an amazing amount of damage in a short amount of time. It’s the price we pay for living in a free society.
You can have armed personnel on site…eventually one of them will make a mistake and have an accident. (or, God forbid, be the guy who goes wack).
You can ban weapons.
You can lock up all the oddballs.
You can ban news media from covering these events.
You can lock up a school like it’s Fort Knox.
But the fact is that a determined individual who is set on committing a henious act and doesn’t plan to survive is almost impossible to stop.
By all means, lets have a national conversation about this stuff, but if we are going to make law, lets do it rationally with a clear assessment of the costs and downsides…not just get railroaded by an emotional desire to DO SOMETHING!!!
But … if there weren’t any guns, no one could be killed with a gun!!!
All the reasoned argument in the world comes down to that retort. Gun control proponents don’t want to hear that guns can’t be effectively banned and confiscated. They truly believe that guns are an evil genie that can be stuffed back into the bottle.
Mr. McDaniel: You wrote “In virtually every American school shooting, the police have had no role in stopping the shooter.”
I’m just curious, do you have any research or list of school shootings that shows this? I’d love to use this fact in speaking with a friend who is anti-gun, but I’d want to see the data to back it up before I do so.
Mike,
I am a police Sergeant with 30 yeras on the job. While I agree with most of what you wrote here, I am not so inclined to believe we should arm school teachers. I think it would be unfair to require a school teacher to have to obtain military/law enforcement type firearms training. I am not saying I am totally against the idea of an educator volunteering to take on this task, but I believe armed Police Officers in schools would be a much better idea. Many schools already have SRO’s. My department trains for this scenario a couple of times a year and we conduct lockdown drills about 4 times a year .
Dear Jay Are:
Thanks for your comment. I do not for a moment advocate requiring anyone to carry a concealed weapon. However, there is no reason those who want to take the time to get a CCW license, and/or undergo additional training, should not be allowed to protect themselves and their charges. After all, does the value of the life of a teacher who can carry a concealed weapon off school grounds suddenly lessen when he steps onto school grounds? If your child was in a school under attack, would you truly not want capable and interested teachers able to protect their lives? And as I wrote, one of the benefits of this policy is deterrence. Even if not a single person on a given campus was carrying a handgun, the bad guys would have no way to know that and would have to assume some were.
As far as having liaison officers in schools, I’m all for it. But we both know that in the current economic climate, when police agencies can’t afford to fully staff patrol shifts, liaison officers are a low priority. It is also impossible to put even one officer in every school, and even if it was possible, that officer would have to have the occasional vacation, sick day, court day, and would be out of the building for a wide variety of other reasons.
As I wrote, the truth is, we can’t rely on the police to protect us or those we love. There just aren’t enough of them, and there are far too many bad guys.
“lock down drills”?? Training for “scenarios”?
So what?
How soon can you get there, and how many will be dead before you even know it’s happening, let alone arrive on scene?
Jay:
The lockdown SOP is the worst thing you can do in an active shooter scenario. It just fixes the maximum number victims in place. Given five minutes, an assailant armed with a revolver with a few speed loaders can easily kill 20 people before the police arrive if his victims are locked in place. The only way that lockdown can work is if someone can respond with armed force when the bad guy knocks down the door.
The recommended SOP turns everybody into a helpless victim. The proper response to an active shooter is to move toward safety and away from the gunfire. If that isn’t an option then find cover (that’s something that can stop a bullet) or concealment. The locked room is only a last ditch effort and is likely to fail.
In 20 minutes a “well-regulated” Revolutionary War-era militiaman could fire 60-80 aimed shots from his “military-style” musket. A weapon that even the most ardent modern gun banners would have to agree meets the most limited reading of the 2nd Amendment.
If 3 unarmed victims tried to stop him while reloading, they would quickly be seen off by his bayonet.
Then as now, the only realistic way to end that scenario with fewer lives lost would be for one or more of the victims to have a pistol in their waistcoat.
In general, no force or police or laws are necessary among free citizens who can govern themselves, while the opposite is: no amount of force or police or laws are enough for a people who CANNOT govern themselves.
First link in story is no good
Make me obummer I dare you, you rotten anti-American scum. Who the hell does the feds think they are, GODS? These government idiot nazis did not write the Constitution nor any part of this country’s founding.. which they hate as it gets in their way.. We need to GET RID OF THE GOVERNMENT traitors and replace it with real American patriots.. Drop dead Washington D.C. it is a disgusting insult to our First REAL President for that rotten scum laden city to bear his name.. It is really the District of Criminals.
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
It doesn’t state: Shall not be infringed, except for…
For those of you who have taken an Oath of Office, whether politician, military, cop or other, remember your Oaths.
The first part of the Oath is to The Constitution. Everything else is secondary. If you don’t think so, you’re an Oath breaker and a liar. iow, you can’t be trusted.
Period. End of discussion.
Of course these idiots are panicking, they have no idea, never had any idea nor will they ever have any idea what to do! All their answers have been wrong, and now WE can see it too! First of all, anyone nutty enough to kill their own mother is beyond help. From what I can read, she made two mistakes. 1st, was no trigger-lock. 2nd, store ammo separate and locked. This makes an immediately ready defense weapon impossible, but safe. If you are rich, they have safes with bio-metric scanners that read retina and finger prints. Fast and no key. I’ve made mistakes over the years. But by following as many safety rules as I could, my mistakes stayed mistakes, and not tragedies.
There really isn’t a guaranteed way to protect against an enemy in your own camp. That’s tough.
Right. Your firearms will be safe. And absolutely useless if you need one.
IMHO: Probably the first mistake she made was letting an angry, bitter 24-year-old live in her house. He should have been out on his own if he couldn’t get along with his mother, and shouldn’t have had a front door key.
There is a way to safely secure a loaded weapon. It’s called home carry. You keep your ready weapon on your person at all times. I explain to people that I don’t think anybody is about to come after me but if they did I would have immediate access and could respond. Keeping a loaded weapon outside of your control is never a good idea. It’s not safe and you may not have access to it when you need it.
When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.