Hail to the Chief!

General Discussion
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@Bing,

Having undergone active shooter training (for unarmed civilians), I can tell you that responding to an active shooter involves more than just locking the door. You lock the door, turn off the lights, and make it look like nobody is in the room. If you can, you barricade the door to make it more difficult for the shooter to get in.

Active shooters have very little time to operate (the one at Sandy Hook had 10 minutes), and they look for easy targets. Even if an active shooter knows you’re in the locked and barricaded room, he’d likely rather keep moving looking for easy targets than waste time trying to get into that room.

(BTW, if a future active shooter were to read about this plan and modify his plan because of it, he would waste time looking in empty rooms and hiding places, and that would slow him down from finding easy targets, so I think there is minimal risk in sharing this info. )

The key to surviving an active shooter like this isn’t necessarily just making yourself hard to find, it’s also making yourself a difficult target so the shooter faces the difficult choice of spending time and energy trying to get to you or moving on to find an easy target.

I’m not one of the people you mention who are terrified of guns and are ignorant of the technical issues. I’ve handled guns and undergone training in how to use them, yet I will be the first to recognize that I don’t have the necessary training and experience to handle an active shooter. First responders undergo intensive training in how to handle those situations. They conduct supervised simulations, evaluate their performance in those simulations, and retrain repeatedly. Few civilians have that level of training, and any civilian who doesn’t have that training has no business messing things up for first responders, who might mistake such a civilian for an active shooter or an accomplice.

When you look at the few cases in American history where armed civilians had a role in taking down an active shooter, they were either off duty police officers, retired police officers, or retired military officers, and many of them chased down and apprehended the shooter after the damage was already done.

Oh, and everyone, let’s not forget that we regulate automobiles. In fact, I can’t think of a single consumer product that isn’t regulated in some way, with the sole exception of guns. Guns are the only consumer product I can think of that we don’t regulate.

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I find it curious that so many have become so emotionally attached to the Republican party based on single issues, weapons being one of the most significant. The true “rulers” of the GOP are not concerned with firearms, only the votes of the gun crowd. But to bolster the gun owner voter constituency all manner of media rallying is done and done quite successfully. O’Reilly, Hannety, Larson, et al, are always ready with some scripted remark to support gun fanatics and denounce any plea for sensible gun legislation. Those radio shuck and jive men don’t really care about the issue either. They are professional pitch men. They would be peddling snake oil at county fairs if not for radio. The GOP uses the radio hucksters to put rings in the noses of various voter constituencies. And the hucksters are well paid to feign a sincere interest in whatever issue they are told. They laugh at gun fanatics and pro-lifers all the way to the bank.

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In today’s paper…several towns in NH are looking to waiver the ban on guns carried by municipal workers in schools (i.e schools). Just what we need MORE guns in schools carried by people who are NOT properly trained. It’s an accident waiting to happen.

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The guest huckster on Glen Beck’s show is so tightly wound into the pro gun script that he sounds like a 3d grader explaining the science fair project his father made for him. He is clueless. If not for the engineers managing the calls the right wing shows would be laughable to everyone. They are laughable to a great many, regardless.

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Well Whitey,I like your post a lot of sense there,but we do regulate our guns at least a little dont we?-Kevin

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In a hostile situation law enforcement would consider anyone with a weapon as a threat. All too often a cop is killed or wounded from “friendly(?)” fire. The proliferation of self appointed Texas Rangers with concealed carry permits worries me, Whitey. They might add confusion and compound the bedlam.

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Done lost count maybe I’ve already mentioned this@ No.54 or55,would be to repeal or eliminate capital gains and luxury taxes-Kevin

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If you look at the list of things that will disqualify you from purchasing a gun, it includes people with a dishonorable discharge, had a felony, mental issues, etc. Unfortunately this system does not seem to be enforced very well. Living in Minnesota, I can’t even sell my BIL in South Dakota my shotgun for $5 legally. Seems to me just using the laws we already have would go a long way and I would be in favor of closing the gun show loop hole.

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@kmccune, now that Congress passed a law saying gun makers can’t be sued, and now that the Supreme Court has overturned Washington, DC’s and Chicago’s gun regulations, there are very few gun regulations being enforced.

We now have the technology to make guns that can only be fired by their owners, like in the latest James Bond movie, but gun makers have no interest in the technology. Guns could be made safer, just like cars, but there is no will in the industry to do so, and until recently, there was no push for such regulation. The push to fix the Ford Pinto happened as the result of law suits. Since gun makers can’t be sued, there will be no similar push.

After the Aurora, CO shooting in the movie theater, I was shocked at how many people said they wished they had been there with their guns. Seriously, if you think you could have returned fire and known the difference between other civilians with guns, the active shooter, and responding S.W.A.T. police officers in a dark theater filled with teargas, you’re suffering from delusions of grandeur, and if any of these people had been there with their guns, the death toll would most likely be higher than it was. There is a reason the S.W.A.T. team waited until they had gas masks to enter the theater, and everyone who knows anything about tactical training knows waiting for the gas masks was the right thing to do.

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The murderer in CO. was ready for people to shoot back at him. He had time to prepare for it and planned it out in advance.

I’m sure there are gun stores that won’t sell to someone based on how they act in the store. If you’re waving the gun around, pointing it at people and/or acting all gung-ho Rambo with it, they’re likely to kick you out of the store. If they’re lucky, that’s all that would happen. Who knows what might happen if a customer walks into the store and sees a guy waving a gun around.
My neighbor is an example of someone who probably shouldn’t own a gun, based on what I seen him do, but I won’t tell him he can’t buy one. Money is an issue for him right now, so it’ll be awhile before he can afford one. And if he does, his house is concrete block, so that should help.

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When I worked in the steel mill, there was a little old man that was a bookie. He never carried a weapon. He said that if he did, he would one day use it, and he didn’t want to do that. You can be sure that if teachers, administrators, or staff workers carried a firearm, there would be several times a year when they are used. Maybe it is worth the risk. But we need to think carefully about it.

There are about 63,000 public schools in the USA. Let’s say that all of them have at least one person with firearms on staff. If even one tenth on one percent have incidents where they shoot at someone, then there will be 63 weapons fired in schools each year. Are you jiggy with that?

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Our state has very strict gun control laws that limit the number of rounds a gun can hold. It essentially outlaws high capacity magazines which can significantly increase the killing capacity of weapons. Our state reognizes that and all those who use these weapons recognize it to and the compliance is nearly 100%. So, you naysyers are wrong ! The killing has dropped substantially since this law was enacted and strictly enforced !

The problem ? In our state it only applies if you are hunting animals. It seems in our state, we value the right to life of animals more then humans. Why ? Hunting can be a big money maker and making money takes precedence.

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I think the kids going to school might be more worried about school feeling like prison than school. Armed guard(s), metal detectors, video cameras everywhere, being buzzed in to school, signing/badging in for attendance, in some schools you can’t even touch another kid; not even for a high-five, zero tolerance policies. Maybe we better put up a tall fence, with barbed wire all over the top, to keep the rif-raf out, too.

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detectors, video cameras everywhere, being buzzed in to school, signing/badging in for attendance, in some schools you can't even touch another kid; not even for a high-five, zero tolerance policies.

I don’t know how you can equate kids not being allowed to high-five someone with metal detectors to keep guns and knifes out of the school.

My nephews go to a public school in NY… They have metal detectors and 1500 video cameras. And about 5 times a year the police bring in drug sniffing dogs. Your FIRST priority in school should be to learn…NOT trying not to get shot or knifed between classes. I’m all for metal detectors and video cameras. Video cameras may not be needed in grammar schools…but high-schools is good idea.

The high-five…I have no idea where that school is…or it even exists. And has NOTHING to do with making schools safer.

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@bscar2

We had an armed police faculty member at our school for ten years before I left. We also instituted all these drills before it became the norm. The kids and the faculty really liked the police there as a adjunct to their teaching/ student relationship. Things like dealing with vandalism, bullying, drug counciling, harassment, etc. we’re all areas that were well served. After a federal grant instituted the program it was up to the town to pick up the expense. Overwhelmingly, the student body, faculty and tax payers thought it was so worthwhile, one citizen at a town budget meeting made the comment that our cop was one of our MOST valuable faculty members and he sooner see athletics cut before we lost him.

The kids really liked the security for in house problems. The gun carrying by a professional is a total non issue. There were several kids over the years that were so inspired by the presence of this relationship, they applied to our state academy for police training after graduation. They cited this relationship as one of the major factors in their decision. Ours was typical of other schools in the area that adopted the program. Obviously it depends upon the people you get. We had some really good guys who were young fathers themselves. One lived in the community, one lived outside. Both routinely got applause well in excess of any other faculty members during assemblys. The kids that previously were most at risk, usually lead the applause and were the first to support his presence. All other fears are completely unfounded IMO.

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I can’t speak for other communities, but in this state over the pass twenty years, small nieghborhood schools are becoming a thing of the past as consolidations have increased the size of schools to many hundreds if not thousands of students. For this factor alone, it’s worth increasing security measures. Some people put a price tag on everything as an excuse not to pay higher taxes. Their shortsightedness always results in higher expenses later where when their ounce of prevention is lost to their pound of cure.

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Maybe it’s because I was in a county school and didn’t get a taste of city schooling until I went to a vocational school my junior and senior year of high school. It wasn’t that big of a deal if someone left a shotgun in their truck/car(remember gun racks in pick up trucks?), they were hunters that hunted before or after school, and no one gave it another thought, and nothing ever happened.
My first drug search wasn’t until I went to the vocational school and someone called into the police that someone had drugs on them. Searched our bookbags, lined us up outside the classroom and let the dog(s) sniff us as it walked by. They kept us in our classrooms until the search was done, couldn’t even go to the bathroom no matter how bad you had to go.

I can see the need, but I can’t really agree with the idea. Can I offer a different or better solution, no, and that’s what bugs me

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I gotta a feeling that anything the NRA says will be discounted by some. We have school resource officers in the High and Middle schools. They are Police Officers and are armed, but they work with the kids. Doors are locked except for the public area which is monitored, etc. No one has any problem with it. The only problem I have is that monitor areas are set back too far so they don’t have a good view of the door. With a PA system everyone can go into lockdown mode in a flash and five drills a year are required. It can be a drain on resources but what do ya think a law costs in resources.

20 or so years ago we went through the same thing at work. The building was wide open to the public. We had a theft problem not a gun problem though. Finally we just had enough and put doors in with key card locks everywhere, created a monitored public area, and put some cameras in. No one unauthorized could get any further than the lobby. It took awhile but everyone warmed up to it an it became the standard in all the buildings after that. No armed guard though except with a hightened threat level from the public or someone getting fired.

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bscar2,there is no solution.Civilization works only because we agree to play by the rules and some people with no conscience or morals dont care about others and only worry about thier own misery are essentially uncontrollable,if you dont respect yourself ,chances are you wont respect others.
Thats were Bootcamp would come in,teach these aimless ones that thier lives and the lives of others are valuable.My Mentors were not always the best(at least they always had a plan) but at least I was taught not to lie and have respect for others,there is more to say of course,but dont expect much improvement soon.Somehow, someway there will be options put in place,they wont be perfect,perhaps they will stave off the end longer,People dont talk now,Neighbors dont talk only anger and jealousy(keep up with the Joneses,etc;) seems the better we have it the less we can deal with it,I can only hope that people will start looking out for others besides No.1.
If we can stop arguing about what we believe and let the other have his beliefs and not want to control and truly tolerate others,I believe we may be headed in the right direction.Since recorded history free thinkers have realized that others have the right to think as they will and have the right to happiness and thier own possesions and property(we hold these truths to be self evident) so everybody crank up thier Mark 1000’s and let others live,remember the same fate awaits us all-Kevin