Really Protecting Schools
Another week, another "mass shooting", gives the Democrats more ammo(!) for their decades-long Victim Disarmament campaign. It's become so predictable that one could almost imagine the Dems deliberately nudging known lunatics -- or "Manchurian Candidates", if anybody remembers that one -- to go out and shoot up some public place just to add fuel to the political fire.
Here's what we know. The FBI's original definition of "mass shooting" was "a single incident in which four or more people are shot dead" -- not including the perpetrator himself. Then a few years ago Congress changed the definition to "a single incident in which three or more people are shot". For obvious reasons, this change inflates the number of "mass shootings" tremendously. It helps inflate the numbers that (CDC figures) fully 90% of all gunshot victims recover, 80% of them with no permanent debilitating damage. I can attest to that myself; some 15 years ago a surprised punk burglar shot me through the calf with a .22, hit neither bone nor artery (just muscle), and the wound healed leaving no more than two tiny scars -- one on either side. Had the punk done the same to himself and one other person, within an hour, the media today would call that a "mass shooting", with all the usual hype.
Second, even with the new definition, "mass shooting" falls into limited categories: personal arguments, robberies gone wrong, gang wars, political assassinations (like the cop-shootings inspired by BLM), and the classic lunatic-shoots-up-crowd situation that gets so much press. In fact, it's the last category that gets 90% of the press, even though he vast majority of mass shootings -- or all shootings, for that matter -- fall into the previous four.
Both the media and politicians of a certain stripe offer only one solution to any of these: the reliable old chestnut of "sensible" gun-control laws. Since the more than 23,000 gun-control laws already passed have had no positive effect on gun crimes, as the Department of Justice can attest, we can only wonder why these same politicians want to pass more of them.
Other citizens have come up with better solutions, and are working to put them into practice. These include:
1) "Hardening" the targets. In the case of schools, this means limiting entry -- only the front door opens inward, all the rest open outward and lock as soon as they shut -- putting security cameras in every hallway and classroom, putting bullet-proof panels in doors and desks (and students' backpacks), hiring more professional guards, encouraging teachers (and all other school employees) to obtain Concealed Carry permits and arm themselves, and holding "live shooter" drills as often as fire drills. In short, fortifying our schools as much as our banks. This approach can work for other public places too.
2) Improving the police departments. Instead of defunding the police, expand the police departments and give them more money -- and fierce oversight on how it's spent:
A) Hire more Black cops -- and Latino cops, and Asian and Native American cops, if you can get them -- such that no department will be more than 50% White, and all patrol teams will be racially mixed. This won't prevent accusations of police brutality, but at least this will take the "race card" off the table.
B) Arm the police with the latest in "stun" weaponry: hand-held stun-guns, tasers, stun-batons and stun-shields -- and provide intensive training, and plan tactics, in the use of the same.
C) Also arm the police with fleets of camera-drones, coordinated by and reporting to a computer center where all the videos will be archived.
D) Overhaul police procedures to deal with fast-developing mass-shootings, particularly at schools, and increase regular street patrols.
3) Arm, train, organize and inform the potential victims.
A) Require all schools which receive tax money to teach all students basic gun-safety before the end of 3rd grade, basic gun competence before the end of elementary school, defensive shooting before the end of middle school, and tactical shooting before the end of high school, so that virtually all students can qualify for and obtain a Concealed Carry permit upon graduation.
B) Provide every neighborhood with a dedicated phone line and website so that armed citizens can provide a posse comitatus pool and coordinate with local police in case of any civil emergency. In short, restore the Militia to its original role.
4) Catch the crazies. Restore the institution of the county mental asylum and broaden the circumstances justifying involuntary commitment. Thanks to a Reagan-era ACLU case, we've been allowing people with obvious mental issues and dangerous behavioral patterns to wander around loose, given no treatment except prescriptions for medications and no oversight to make sure they take them. The result has been a lot of preventable slaughters. This must end.
These are techniques that we know will work, because they've been found to work in our past and in other countries. For example, embattled Israel began arming teachers and providing more armed school guards 40 years ago -- and has not had a single case of school shooting in all the years since. Switzerland, which requires its citizens to take a basic tour in the military and then sends them home with their full-auto military guns, is the most peaceable country in the world. The town of Kennesaw, Georgia, more than 30 years ago, required every household to contain at least one working firearm -- and has seen its violent-crime rate drop steadily ever since.
Incidentally, the DoJ estimates that armed civilians in the US use firearms to prevent crimes approximately 2.5 million times per year. Compare that with 19,000 gun homicides per year, and out of a total population of 340 million. Incidentally, the US now has the third largest population in the world -- behind only India and China (which are not renowned for accurate crime reporting).
We know what tactics will actually work to reduce mass shootings and violent crime in general, but how many political pundits have you heard promoting these tactics? Instead they repeat the same old demands for "sensible gun-control laws" that we know won't work. We really have to wonder why.
--Leslie <;)))><
