As an educator, and as one who has lived through a school shooting incident, I’m not going to sugar-coat anything. What happened in Connecticut (as well as the school district in which I worked) is proof positive that there is evil in the world, and evil will continue to prey on the most vulnerable. The only way to combat this evil is to make the vulnerable less so. If there was an armed teacher or administrator at Sandy Hook Elementary school, there is a great chance that many if not all innocent lives would have been saved. This would have held true in the theater in Aurora, Colorado, and even in Fort Hood, where, ironically, there were strict gun control laws. To deny this is not only foolish, it continues to place our children (and other innocent, law-abiding citizens) in harm’s way.
A “No Guns Allowed” sign is nothing but an invitation for any low-life scumbag psycho-killer to enter what promises to be a target-rich environment.
Victims, no more. It’s high time we stop ignoring the dangers and put an abrupt stop to this madness.
Blogs For Victory 
Yeah, more guns will definitely put an end to this madness.
unpatriot
Oh yeah…I hear fork and spoon sales are way up…..we can expect an explosion of obesity.
We ALL know obesity kills MILLIONS more than guns….WE NEED to BAN THEM……NOW!!!!!!!!!
p-daddy——-who said anything about MORE guns?
“If there was an armed teacher or administrator at Sandy Hook Elementary school, there is a great chance that many if not all innocent lives would have been saved”…Leo
—————————————————————————————-
Tengrain asks a few questions about this idea, Leo. Perhaps you could address his concerns:-
“Let’s think this through. What calibre do you suggest? What model? Automatic or manual? Rifle, hand gun, something else? If you are going to propose this, you need to have a standard gun issued, so what will it be?”
Do the staff shoot to kill or just to wound? What if the target is one of the students, does that change things? Will teachers have immunity from prosecution for shooting their students or other people on the campus?
You want to train Teacher Union members how to shoot guns? What will be the certification process to prove that they’re good shots. What about the substitute teachers? Will teachers get better guns as they go up the pay scale? What happens if a good teacher is a poor shot? What if the teacher doesn’t want to shoot anyone? Do you fire him or her? What happens when the teachers go on strike? Do you train the scabs?
Who is going to pay for the guns, the ammo, the training? What’s the insurance policy going to cost to cover accidents, or stolen guns being used in other crimes? How often do you replace the ammo to keep it fresh? How do you budget yearly ammo? How do you account for it at the end of the year? What happens if some ammo goes missing?
How much ammo should schools have on hand? Where will these weapons be stored? How will they be stored? Where will the ammo be stored? Where will this stuff go during the summer and when school in not in session?
I think tengrain is setting up a false dichotomy here. Most of these points are irrelevant. If all we did was to do away with this gun free zone nonsense, and allow the teachers, administrators and parents the same right at school to protect themselves and others that they have in other places, these incidents would become rare.
Look at Israel, where there is hardly a shortage of hostiles that could target a school. I saw a picture of a line of schoolchildren entering the building followed by a woman with an “evil black rifle” slung over her shoulder. The last elementary school shooting there was apparently in 1974.
Why the gun free zone, anyway? Because we “don’t want guns around our children”? Why not? Is the inanimate tool going to go on a rampage, or is there some presumption that its owner will? I would take that as an insult, personally, but obviously someone with bad intentions will consider the restriction only in the context of opportunity.
As I see it, the gun free school zone is a sick fantasy that only encourages this sort of tragedy. Don’t try to substitute one set of requirements for another; some of us are actually capable of determining our own interests.
kanuckUnobservent
“Let’s think this through.
OBVIOUSLY you didnt.
CO, you are so funny. You present this litany of nonsense as if it has any validity at all, and then suggest it represents actual “concerns” and that it be “addressed”.
OK. maybe it’s NOT so funny, that you actually take this seriously, and actually think it represents legitimate questions about whether or not to allow teachers to be armed in schools. Now that I think about it, it’s really more sad than funny.
I don’t know when I have seen a more stupid, clueless, and generally worthless list of so-called “questions”.
“If you are going to propose this, you need to have a standard gun issued,”
Who said anything about ISSUING guns? Much less PROPOSED issuing guns?
“Do the staff shoot to kill or just to wound”
This kind of utter stupidity impresses you? But wait—it gets dumber by the “question”.
Whoever this “Tengrain” moron is, he or she clearly doesn’t have both oars in the water, as every one of these so-called questions (which so impressed YOU that you had to scurry here to regurgitate them and ask that they be taken seriously) is based upon a fantasy and fed by ignorance.
Now that I think of, I can see why this would impress you, being in your wheelhouse and all.
Tell you what—you do a little research on the difference between ALLOWING people who have been properly certified by professionals to carry their own weapons when they teach, and your cockamamie fantasy where schools hand out weapons to untrained and uncertified people just because they are teachers and mandate that they carry weapons chosen and owned by the school.
And then you get back to us, m’kay?
I support the author 100% and have to laugh at Canadian’s post referencing Tengrain’s childish questions. It’s on par with CNN Soledad O’Brien’s contention yesterday that the Sandy Hook gunman was in violation of the law by having a gun on school grounds. Thankfully logic like this is in the minority.
The fact is that children, and people, are much safer in an environment where responsible, law abiding adults are armed, rather than in an environment where there is a government issued sign. And anyone with an ounce of intelligence understands that.
I have posted articles from many sources that ALL these shooters had mental problems and were on mind altering drugs.
but hey it just has to be the Eeeeeeeevil guns.
More looove from the DANGEROUS looney left……..
HOUSTON DEM PRECINCT CHAIR: STOP GUN VIOLENCE BY SHOOTING NRA MEMBERS
breitbart ^ | december 17, 2012 | awr hawkins
Over the weekend, Houston Democrat Precinct Chair John Cobarruvias tweeted, “Can we now shoot the #NRA and everyone who defends them?”
This, apparently, is part of what he calls “hard-hitting political commentary” on his blog “Bay Area Houston.”
Prior to the asinine tweet broaching the subject of shooting NRA members as a solution to gun violence, Cobarruvias had spent some of his “hard-hitting political commentary” mocking conservatives — or as Cobarruvias himself put it, by “laughing and puking on GOP Tea Baggers.”
or as Cobarruvias himself put it, by “laughing and puking on GOP Tea Baggers.”
Neo,
As I said a couple days ago, it appears it’s time to just keep our powder dry and let the Left go over the cliff. Comments like Cobarruvias’ indicate they’re dangerously close to the edge.
I’ve got to (can’t believe I’m saying this) agree to an extent with CO. It makes much more sense to me to have armed and trained security guards at every school. They could be paid by the teacher’s union out of funds that are normally given to Democrat politicians. Surely the safety of teachers, administrators and students is more important than bribing politicians with union dues.
“The fact is that children, and people, are much safer in an environment where responsible, law abiding adults are armed”…Cluster
————————————————————————————
Yes, until a child gets hold of one of those firearms owned by responsible, law abiding adults and ends up on a slab at the morgue. It would be interesting to know just how many children have perished in those so-called safe armed environments.
So many questions, so few brain cells. Right Canadian? Tell you what, how about if you do some research on that and find out for yourself. You will eventually reach the conclusion that more people are killed in gun free zones than not. But that fact will only contradict your agenda, which will kill even more of those brain cells that you have so few of.
Kanuckunobserver
Yes, until a child gets hold of one of those firearms owned by responsible, law abiding adults and ends up on a slab at the morgue. It would be interesting to know just how many children have perished in those so-called safe armed environments.
THOUSANDS LESS than drown in those eeeevil swimming pools…..
Gee, CO, why don’t you do your own research and tell us just how many children are killed by playing with guns OWNED BY PEOPLE TRAINED AND CERTIFIED FOR CONCEALED CARRY.
As usual, you are utterly clueless, but quite willing to strut your ignorance where all can see.
Because, you see, not all gun owners have gone through the training to be certified for concealed carry permits, and I’ll bet you a buck that most of the gun accidents in homes involve guns owned by people without this training and certification.
So when you have found out how many children have been killed by playing with guns they found in their homes, and then broken this figure down into guns owned by trained and certified concealed carry permit holders, you can keep up your research momentum and find out how many children have died from OTHER accidents in the home. Let’s see—-there is the problem of children drowning in home swimming pools, as neo pointed out, and there are the children who get run over in their driveways, and there are electrocutions and poisonings and falls from upper story windows and…..
But you know what is developing here? Why, it’s a pattern, not of the inherent dangers of water or windows or driveways or Windex but of parental malpractice.
You are an obtuse little angle, aren’t you? I’ve been around quite a few small children, and none has ever even attempted to, say, steal my wallet, although they could safely assume I have one. My concealed pistol is just that, concealed. I wouldn’t even notify them of its existence. Nobody, even an adult, would be taking it from me without me taking action to stop them. What do you think, I’m just going to lay it on my desk and wander off? Heck, around properly trained children, even that wouldn’t be a problem.
” My concealed pistol is just that, concealed”…mrevilwrench
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It is a relief to know that you are one of the responsible gun owners, mrevilwrench. Just think how many innocent lives would be saved if every gun owner held to the same standard. Tragically,, as law enforcement and ER personnel can attest, little hands have gained access to fire arms that were not concealed. There seems to be no way to keep irresponsible folks from legally purchasing firearms just as there is no way to keep the mentally incapacitated and criminal element from obtaining lethal weapons by whatever means available.
Do you, as a responsible gun owner, have a solution for this problem?
co: “Do you, as a responsible gun owner, have a solution for this problem?”
It’s called training, education and common sense.
Somethings that are very alien to proggies.
“It’s called training, education and common sense”…tiredoflibbs
———————————————————————————–
How do you propose introducing training, education and common sense to mass murders, tired? .
CO, pull your head out of your heinie and decide what you are talking about.
You start off whining about the poor children finding guns left around by irresponsible adults–with the implication that the solution to this problem is to make sure the adults just don’t have guns in the first place.
When it is pointed out to you that child deaths due to finding guns in the household are fewer than those of drowning, falls,etc. and that all of them come to back to parental irresponsibility, you ignore the reality of more deaths due to other forms of parental malpractice and cling to your anti-gun complaint, plaintively wailing “Do you, as a responsible gun owner, have a solution for this problem?”
Again, back to the whine that guns are the problem, not the same kind of bad parenting that leaves swimming pools unprotected or upstairs windows open or oven cleaner sitting on the counter.
And then you veer off into the weeds, with the bizarre “How do you propose introducing training, education and common sense to mass murders, tired? .”
??????????????
Are you whimpering about children with irresponsible parents, or are you carrying on about mass murderers?
As for the first, unfortunately there is little we can do to protect children from bad parenting. All we can do is restrain from lurching into hysteria when something happens. When we hear of a fire killing a whole family, caused by a child playing with fire, we don’t see you and your kind rallying to ban matches. When a drunk driver kills a few people, we don’t have Libs like you writing to blogs about the need to keep cars out of the hands of law abiding people.
Sure, if I could wave a magic wand, I would remove guns from homes where the adults don’t take proper care to keep them from children. While I was at it, I’d get children out of homes where meth is being cooked, drugs are being sold, children are being beaten or abused or starved, or children are not given the love and attention and care they deserve and need.
Why don’t you stop sticking your nose in where it doesn’t belong and look at how well gun control has worked in your own country?
On the other hand, CO, I am sure everyone is as happy as I to learn that you are “relieved” by what mrevilrench said. The very idea of you continuing to feel distress over something that is none of your business was in itself distressful, and it was kind of you to let us know that at least to some extent you were comforted.
“Are you whimpering about children with irresponsible parents, or are you carrying on about mass murderers?:…Amazona
——————————————————————————–
Irresponsible parents or mass murders; it doesn’t really matter; Amazona, as the result is always the same. Innocent children are fatally injured by gun fire.
And the Canadian “observer” comes back with a response so typical of a Lib it is almost a stereotype of what passes for thinking on the far Left:
“Irresponsible parents or mass murders; it doesn’t really matter; Amazona, as the result is always the same. Innocent children are fatally injured by gun fire.”
And I suppose the “solution” is always the same, too, eh? Just wave that magic wand and all the guns will just go away.
Yet nearly all of those innocent children fatally injured by gunfire are shot by criminals, shooting at other criminals, in drug and gang wars in our inner cities. So how does CO think the real problem should be addressed?
And why just focus on GUNS? Let’s take a look at just two recent years in the U.S.
1,347 children ages 14 and younger died as occupants in car accidents in 2008. Of those deaths, 216 (approx 16%) were the direct result of drunk drivers.
Yes, I understand that this will have to be explained to you. Try to follow along.
In one year, 2008, 216 children 14 and younger were placed in harm’s way and then killed by the actions of adults who drove drunk with the children in the vehicles. Two hundred and sixteen children killed due to irresponsibility of adults.
From the Center for Disease Control and Prevention:
• In 2010, 10,228 people were killed in alcohol-impaired driving crashes, accounting for nearly one-third (31%) of all traffic-related deaths in the United States.
• Of the 1,210 traffic deaths among children ages 0 to 14 years in 2010, 211 (17%) involved an alcohol-impaired driver.
• Of the 211 child passengers ages 14 and younger who died in alcohol-impaired driving crashes in 2010, over half (131) were riding in the vehicle with the alcohol-impaired driver.
In 2010, 211 children died as the result of drunk driving, and more than half of those were riding in the car driven by the impaired driver.
Clearly, cars kill children. Not drunk drivers, but cars.
According to the U.S. Fire Administration, “each year in this country, fires set by children are responsible for more than 100 fire deathsnearly 1,000 painful burn injuries, and hundreds of millions of dollars in property loss.”
EACH YEAR
MORE THAN 100 FIRE DEATHS
EACH YEAR
Irresponsible parents or arson; it doesn’t really matter; as the result is always the same. Innocent children are fatally injured by fire.
Amazona
December 19, 2012 at 11:15 am
——————————————————————————–
By all means, why not add death by bullet to the horrendous loss of innocent lives by irresponsible adults. Whether they perish by fire arms, the actions of drunk drivers or the unconscionable neglect of their parents it is all the same in the end. I would think, Amazona, if there were someway of preventing the slaughter of children you would embrace it, not make excuses or try to deflect the blame elsewhere, you being pro-life and all.
co with the old bait and switch:“It’s called training, education and common sense”…tiredoflibbs
———————————————————————————–
How do you propose introducing training, education and common sense to mass murders, tired? .”
Are you now calling lawful, responsible gun owners “mass murderers”?
I see you are also of the typical proggy variety! Lacing in common sense and, of course, honesty. You asked the question of how to do this of RESPONSIBLE GUN OWNERS, then you cowardly change it to mass murderers.
Pathetic, yet oh so typically stupid and deceitful.
CO, you are so full of it you reek. You make one utterly stupid argument after another, ranging from the idiotic quote from Tengrain to the bizarre comment of “…Irresponsible parents or mass murders; it doesn’t really matter..” and all you can do is frantically try to skip from one position to another.
Now you are trying to shift the entire discourse onto my position that determining the inherent value of human life based on age is somehow morally equivalent to — well, as usual, it’s hard to tell just what the hell you are yammering on about.
You seem to be trying to say that if I really care about saving the lives of innocent children I would be for banning guns, cars and matches. But again, it’s difficult to make sense of your nonsense.
What you are REALLY trying to do is accuse me of indifference to the lives of children while calling me a hypocrite because I advocate the right to be born but do not agree with violating our Constitution.
As usual for a Lib, the argument is ridiculous, hyperemotional without a scintilla of actual reason behind it, and indicative of a desire on your part to smear a conservative position without offering an actual idea or solution of your own.
As I said, a typical RRL post.
But, more children die from abortion than accidental shootings, of course in co’s proggy world that is acceptable.
BTW, CO, I do “embrace” the goal of preventing the slaughter of children, ranging from promoting gun safety through training, as advocated by the NRA, to abandoning the goofball Lib attitude that children belong with their parents no matter how bad the parents are to stiffer penalties for drunk driving, etc.
And I actively support all measures directed at limiting abortion with the hopes it will eventually be made illegal.
I notice what while you are whimpering about gun deaths of children who did, somehow, manage to make it through pregnancy, you seem quite sanguine about the MILLIONS destroyed every year, not through carelessness or irresponsibility but through callous disregard for the value of human life, and because of the pathological selfishness of female gestational creatures who refuse to take any responsibility for the lives they have created.
However, short of the RRL positions on Thought Police and intrusion into the private lives of citizens, short of a police state, I don’t see a legitimate way of knowing if a parent is or is not responsible. What do YOU advocate?
Are you now calling lawful, responsible gun owners “mass murderers”?…tiredoflibbs
————————————————————————————
No, tired, I’m calling those criminals who shoot their way into elementary schools, high schools and crowded movie theaters and mow down innocent victims, mass murderers.
“I notice what while you are whimpering about gun deaths of children who did, somehow, manage to make it through pregnancy, you seem quite sanguine about the MILLIONS destroyed every year, not through carelessness or irresponsibility but through callous disregard for the value of human life”,..Amazona
———————————————————————————–
Until the law is changed, Amazona, abortion is still a legal procedure and although I do not endorse it across the board, ie. as a form of birth control, there are circumstances, for example, where the mother’s life is in danger, where it may be necessary to perform one.
And, as expected, you try to change the subject again. YOU brought up the subject of being pro-life, and of protecting children from slaughter. Whether or not that slaughter is legal or not is irrelevant. To paraphrase you, “..legal or not, it doesn’t really matter; as the result is always the same. Innocent children are killed by abortion.”
And the argument made by you Libs falls back on the “life of the mother” when you have nothing else to say. With modern medicine, it is very very rare to make the taking of the life of the unborn child necessary to save the life of the mother, and besides, none of you are willing to limit abortion to that so why do you keep dragging it in?
So abortion, with a nearly 100% fatality rate for the innocents subjected to it, is OK because it is legal, even though it results in MILLIONS of state-sanctioned deaths a year, but guns, which are also legal, are NOT OK even though the number of deaths of children due to guns is under a thousand a year, almost all of which are accidents.
And your moral equivalency is glaring, as you squeal about guns but are quite OK with abortion—which was my point.
“… I’m calling those criminals who shoot their way into elementary schools, high schools and crowded movie theaters and mow down innocent victims, mass murderers.”
Well, good for you. You now acknowledge that these people are criminals, and not just your average law abiding gun owner.
So now we can move on to the next step, which is the definition of “criminal”—that is, someone who breaks the law.
Why is it that you giddy Libs are so convinced that people who break the law, even going so far as to murder dozens of innocent people, are going to suddenly decide to OBEY a law restricting gun ownership?
After all, they ignore the “gun-free zone” signs.
And while you are whimpering about those big bad guns that go out and kill people, and imply that SOMETHING MUST BE DONE, you have no solution to the problem, and you ignore the fact that gun control laws in your own country were followed by a huge increase in violent crime.
” you have no solution to the problem, and you ignore the fact that gun control laws in your own country were followed by a huge increase in violent crime”…Amazona
——————————————————————-
I’ll take your word that there has been a “huge” increase in violent crimes in Canada and you no doubt can provide the statistics to back it up, Amazona, but I still feel more secure living in a country that does have strict gun laws in place than in a country where any Tom, Dick or Harry can attend a gun show and come out with an arsenal, without any criminal or mental health background check being done..
I must admit that It puts my mind at ease to know that when Americans do cross our borders they are forced to turn in their weapons and are obliged to come into our territory unarmed.
zeroKanuckobservant
BS, BS and MORE BS
I apologize—I was thinking of the huge increases in violent crime in the UK and Australia after more restrictions were imposed on gun ownership.
( “Between 1995 and 2007, Australia saw a 31.9 percent decrease; without a gun ban, America’s rate dropped 31.7 percent.
During the same time period, all other violent crime indices increased in Australia: assault rose 49.2 percent and robbery 6.2 percent.
Sexual assault — Australia’s equivalent term for rape — increased 29.9 percent.
Overall, Australia’s violent crime rate rose 42.2 percent.
At the same time, U.S. violent crime decreased 31.8 percent: rape dropped 19.2 percent; robbery decreased 33.2 percent; aggravated assault dropped 32.2 percent.
Australian women are now raped over three times as often as American women.
So, if the USA follows Australia’s lead in banning guns, it should expect a 42 percent increase in violent crime, a higher percentage of murders committed with a gun, and three times more rape." )
I am so happy that you find comfort in knowing that no Americans can bring guns into your country. Two years ago my brother was planning a month long car trip to Alaska, camping along the way and while he was in Alaska. He looked up the laws for carrying a gun through Canada, and followed them to the letter, with a locked gun box, ammunition locked in a separate box, all his registration paperwork, etc.
At the border he was told none of the information given out by the government was correct, and he could not take his gun with him. Naturally, he was not going to camp in the wilds of Canada and Alaska without protection, so he just turned around and drove home. I am sure you slept much better at night knowing this weapon was turned back at the border.
Of course, your bigoted concept of life in armed America is as accurate as mine might be of Canadians if I were to base my perception on Trailer Park Boys, but you seem quite content with your silly stereotyping.
But then, isn’t that the basic definition of an RRL lemming? Basing decisions on silly stereotypes and general lies? That’s certainly the way it is down here…………..
Not having to live in Canada, to experience a once proud and independent nation melting into a puddle of limp-wristed political correctness, all I can say is, its new conversion to wimpiness seems to make it a lot more comfy for our Canadian non-observer. I can see how he would have been uncomfortable with a more assertive, shall we say virile, Canada, the Canada which sent soldiers to storm Juno Beach, the Canada whose armed forces won the admiration and respect of the world. Now that Canadians have knuckled under to the pressures of the Left, which depends so much on an unarmed populace, he has to feel all warm and fuzzy about it all.
Now he can snuggle into his footie jammies and sleep soundly, not worrying about those big mean Americans storming Canada with those scary noisy guns.
By all accounts, Adam Lanza had enough ammo with him to kill every person in the school. He stopped and shot himself when he heard the police sirens. As the guy who is subbing for Glenn Beck this week just said, “imagine if the police were already there” (as in some kind of armed presence at the school).
In Fla we have armed deputy sheriffs in every school.
they are called “resource officers”.
You’ll notice that none of these guys suit up, grab the gun and head to police head quarters, or Camp Pendelton. These people want victims and lots of them, so the head to places where there are sure to be lots of people and just as certainly few or no guns. Plenty of third party actions bear moral culpability for this crime, but none perhaps more than whomever it was first thought up the “gun free zone”.
Mark, I heard on a local radio station that the movie killer passed by several large movie theaters in favor of the one that stated no firearms were allowed.
In a slightly similar vein, I am close to a Lib who spends hours listening to the likes of Ed Schultz, hates conservatives, etc. but whose response to the airline banning of all cutting instruments was that in his opinion, every airline should issue a knife to every passenger boarding and then have them dropped in a box on the way off the plane.
Knowing his Lib tendencies, this really took me by surprise, but the more I thought about it, the more I liked the underlying idea—that the knowledge that your opponent is armed will have a very limiting effect on what you decide to do.
Somehow the subject of airline security procedures came up one night when I was checking into a hotel, and I told the clerk about this knife idea. The man behind me was quite prissily offended and said “Well, just think how you would feel if you were a Muslim on one of those flights.”
???????????????
The clerk and I just looked at him, and later commented on the bizarre impression that the only thing that stops Americans from ganging up on Muslims is the lack of multiple knives. AS IF a plane full of people would look around, say as a group “There’s a Muslim, we have knives, let’s get him.”
But the RRL has such an inherent distrust of humanity unrestrained by powerful government, they seem convinced that only government stands between chaos and order. So this “Tengrain” person has some cockamamie vision of schools in which the teachers run amok, wielding guns issued to them by administration, untrained and reckless, with bullets flying and without concern for liability if innocents get shot. It’s a bizarre vision, but evidently one shared by the RRL.
It’s one of the things I don’t understand about the Left—they have no faith in the individual, to handle weapons responsibly or to be trusted with the spending of their own money or to make their own decisions about things like health care and retirement, yet they turn around and happily place vast amounts and degrees of power and authority in the hands of a few officials in government. The Right, on the other hand, respects the ability and right of the individual to make his own decisions and guide his own destiny, but chooses to distribute power among many, and mitigate its use through processes, such as the amendment process to the Constitution and distributing government authority among the three branches of government, to keep power from accumulating in the hands of a few.
Should have known this one was coming: Archie Bunker on Airline Safety;
Spook, I made a similar point after reading the link posted by Cluster, about a man who pulled a gun on a shooter in a shopping mall. When the shooter saw the armed man, he killed himself without harming any more people.
As I said in my post, I think this shows that the real issue for these people is control. There is no greater control over others than to control whether they live or die, and no greater control over one’s own fate than to take his own life before it falls into the control of others.
They choose venues where no one will challenge that control, and it seems that when they see this control threatened, they bail out. So they are much less likely to choose venues where there are armed adults present, or even where there MIGHT be armed adults present.
There is no greater control over others than to control whether they live or die, and no greater control over one’s own fate than to take his own life before it falls into the control of others.
Amazona, that is an excellent point that I have not heard made by anyone else in the wake of this and previous instances of mass shootings. My hope is that this tragedy will open up a national discussion on all factors that lead to events such as this, not just a knee-jerk call for more gun control.
That, right there, is an amazing insight, and it just clarified the entire issue for me. Insecure person, feels controlled, seeks control of his own, finds a way to exert such control. Everything just lines up. Thank you.
As long as we remember that an armed teacher is only a bandage – it isn’t a cure. The cure comes from societal change.
Surely the safety of teachers, administrators and students is more important than bribing politicians with union dues. – Spook
That’s hilarious.
Re: armed presence in our schools – surely if the principal is qualified and vetted to oversee the entire school including staff, students and facilities, they can be trusted with weaponry and trained to use that weaponry.
Here’s a shooting we haven’t heard mentioned. I remember it because I had driven through Killeen, Texas, earlier that day, so it resonated with me. (emphasis mine)
wikipedia
“On October 16, 1991, 35-year-old George “Jo Jo” Pierre Hennard, an unemployed merchant seaman who was described by others as angry and withdrawn, with a dislike of women, drove his blue 1987 Ford Ranger pickup truck through the front window of a Luby’s cafeteria at 1705 East Central Texas Expressway in Killeen. Yelling “This is what Bell County did to me!”, Hennard then opened fire on its patrons and staff with a Glock 17 pistol and, later, a Ruger P89. He stalked, shot, and killed 23 people while wounding another 20 before committing suicide. At least 80 people were in the restaurant at the time.
The first victim was local veterinarian Michael Griffith, 48, who ran to the driver’s side of the pickup truck to offer assistance to the driver after the truck crashed through the window. Hennard also approached 32-year-old Suzanna Hupp and her parents. Hupp reached for her .38 revolver in her purse, only to realize she had left it in her vehicle. Her father Al, 71, rushed at Hennard in an attempt to subdue him but was fatally shot in the chest. A short time later, as Hupp was escaping, her mother Ursula, 67, was shot in the head and killed as she cradled her wounded husband.
During the massacre, Hennard allowed a woman and her four-year-old child to leave. Another patron, Tommy Vaughn, threw himself through a plate-glass window, sustaining injuries, but by doing so he created an escape route for himself and other customers.
Hennard reloaded several times and still had ammunition remaining when he committed suicide by shooting himself in the head after exchanging shots with, and being wounded by a responding police officer.”
BTW, neither weapon was an “assault rifle” or anything like it.
is my 18 shot .22 semi automatic rifle i have had for over 50 years an “assault rifle”
I was WAY before my time and only 16 yo…..WOW!!
Hey……fiscal cliff? guns?
WHO CARES??
Four days to go until the Mayan Doomsday… 😦
I think we should BAN THESE………..
Illegal aliens murder 12 Americans daily
Death toll in 2006 far overshadows total U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq, Afghanistan
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2006/11/39031/#TaCHclG9DKSYgUuI.99
When the Littleton massacre at Columbine High occurred I was teaching at a Southern California high school which had been identified as being identical in profile to Columbine. “Experts” in teenage violence and security along with behavioral psychologists were brought in to address the faculty on warning signs and run through emergency procedures with us.
At one of the first meetings with these experts one of the teachers (I regret that it wasn’t me) asked if we wouldn’t be better served with firearms of our own, or at least armed security on campus.
If I live to 100 I’ll never forget the answer … with a heavy sigh, and a glance at his shoes the psychologist said, to the nodding approval of the educators in the room
Classic liberalism. Did he go on to suggest that you should force hug the perpetrator?
“…what kind of message is that?”
Well, it could be the message that “You are safe here and I will do whatever is needed to protect you.”
“Message” was bad enough, I was struggling to get my head around “escalation of violence” in stopping a murderous rampage.
I wondered if he envisioned a Bruce Willis movie with dozens of bad guys shooting from behind trash cans while envisioned one final shot then silence.
That should read while I envisioned one final shot then silence.
As Ted Nugent said, those children did not die because of what was in the shooter’s hands, but because of what was in his heart.
Millions of people handle guns every day, without going on murderous rampages. But when one person does snap, and chooses guns as his tools of choice to exhibit his anger or to dominate others to create a sense of power and control in an otherwise empty and impotent life, the brainless blame the tools and not the mental state of the person wielding them.
The problem is not guns. The problem is far more complex that that, which is why the simple-minded prefer to avoid the real issues and focus on the superficial.
When someone grows up in a society where life itself is nothing but a “choice” to be made by whoever will benefit by the death of another, if the age of the doomed falls into a certain category, the subliminal message is that life has no inherent value other than what someone else attaches to it.
When someone grows up being drugged to control his inconvenient energy, to make it easier for parents and teachers to deal with it, he is likely to process emotions and information differently than most people.
When someone grows up indolent, without much in the way of physical activity to burn off energy and generate natural endorphins, his brain chemistry is altered, even without psychotropic drugs that exacerbate this imbalance.
When someone grows up without the discipline of family and school and church and community to establish and enforce social, moral and spiritual boundaries, it will be harder to know how to establish those boundaries on his own, or to establish boundaries that are relevant to society. For centuries, possibly for the entire history of mankind, people have understood that the emotional and chemical turbulence of adolescence require pretty rigid boundaries, enforced by society in general, till these elements settle down into maturity, but in a culture which refuses to establish or enforce such boundaries, emotional and psychological chaos are bound to occur more often.
When someone grows up without a sense of accomplishment and competence in some area, without the confidence that accomplishment and competence convey, he is more likely to look for ways to feel that there is some area in his life where he can exert control
When someone grows up in a culture in which violence is celebrated, admired and cheered and even encouraged through “games”, it is hard for those without clear emotional and social and spiritual boundaries to know what is imaginary and what is real.
There is no one single thing that can reasonably be identified as THE cause of something like what we saw last week, but to ignore the many contributing factors to the mental state that led to a young man killing his own mother and then slaughtering tiny children and those who tried to protect them and simply howl about the means he used to exhibit his pain and rage and frustration and general mental imbalance is simply stupid.
But, to people like CO, immensely gratifying.
I am sure there are ways to make schools safer.
Many homes now have “safe rooms” where people can hide till help comes.
It seems like a fairly simple modification to many schools to first design doors that cannot easily be breached—steel doors in steel frames, with bulletproof glass if windows are desired. This simple modification, along with a panic switch the teacher can hit from her desk or even in a transmitter clipped to her clothing that would instantly lock the door, would keep an intruder out of the classroom. It would not be hard to accompany this locking mechanism with an automatic shutter on the window, so no one could see into the room.
If further measures are desired, each classroom could have an additional safe room, or one shared by two back-to-back classrooms, in which classes could take shelter. As in home shelters, a dedicated phone line, even just an always-charged cell phone, and possibly a CCTV link, would let people on the outside know what was happening inside.
The ability to isolate an armed intruder in a specific section of hallway, unable to leave or enter a classroom, would be a fairly simple modification to many existing schools and easy to build into new ones.
My mother used to live in a high-rise assisted-living building, where the elderly residents were always burning toast or something, and the very sensitive fire alarms would go off all the time. When this happened, several fire doors on each floor closed automatically. It’s not a very high-tech ability. Trap a gunman in a 50′ foot section of hallway, without the ability to leave or enter any room, and you can do what you want with him.
As for me, I would pipe in Celine Dion songs till he shot himself.
As for me, I would pipe in Celine Dion songs till he shot himself.
LOL!!
Woke up, scrolled to the bottom of the thread, this was the first line I read. My day is complete. Absolutely hilarious.
Cluster,
It was the last line I read before I went to bed last night — same effect.