(Dissociated Press) Following the horror in Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, Liberals across the country have been quietly soul-searching.
Sam Lansing, director of the California advocacy group "Liberals Who Just Say No to Guns Especially if They're Scary-looking", explained his qualms to this reporter:
Lansing looked up, his eyes shining.
Sam Lansing, director of the California advocacy group "Liberals Who Just Say No to Guns Especially if They're Scary-looking", explained his qualms to this reporter:
"This is not an easy time for us" said Lansing, gazing out his window overlooking San Francisco Bay. "We Liberals have always prided ourselves on pointless policies that make us feel good."
Lansing looked up, his eyes shining.
"We are concerned that this tragedy might bring even Liberals to act against mass shootings in a way that would be effective. Like providing security for our school children, like we provide security for our legislatures and our elites. But we Liberals must remember who we are, remember our heritage."
"We Liberals have always asked ourselves, when deciding on a policy-- 'is it futile enough?'"Lansing paused, and continued.
"The whole proud history of Liberal advocacy for the past half-century can be summed up in one word:
Abject futility.
We Liberals fought crime in the 60's and 70's by freeing criminals and handcuffing law enforcement and judges. It made us feel good about ourselves."
"We fought poor housing by razing traditional and reasonably safe neighborhoods and erecting massive concrete crime-infested housing projects. We were so concerned, so socially engaged..."
"We fought poverty by paying poor but intact families welfare checks if and only if no one in the family worked and the fathers abandoned the family. We destroyed tens of millions of poor but stable families. But we felt so good about ourselves..."
Now we are faced with a horrendous tragedy In Connecticut. If we are to keep to Liberalism's proud tradition, we must ask ourselves: is the solution we propose futile enough? Is it pointless and self-serving? Will it make us feel good, irrespective of its effect on the victims? Will our solutions do for gun violence what our solutions did for crime and bad housing and poverty?"Whether or not Liberals can maintain their unblemished record of social devastation through policy futility, Lansing emphasized that Liberalism is the only choice for smart people who are nice.
"We Liberals gave America its inner cities-- Detroit, and D.C. and New Orleans and Newark. We gave you the South Side of Chicago and Watts. America's inner cities are the fruit of Liberal governance. You've trusted us to stop gun violence for the past 50 years."
"Why not trust us now?"
pointless policies that make us feel good
ReplyDeleteCongratulations - that's a perfect description of your proposal to put armed security guards in every school. Except yours would cost billions of dollars.
I see. The government can take control and run the healthcare system of the United States, and it can run all of the public schools in the US. but it can't manage to put security guards in schools.
DeleteSelective incompetence.
Hopefully, it won't cost the federal government billions. Why?
DeleteAllow me to provide some vital public safety information. Those "officers" you see in airports? You know, the ones who fondle the breasts and genitals of attractive young women?
Here are the requirements for the job, taken directly from TSA Management Directive No. 1900.8 (.pdf):
1. HS education (which can be waived)
2. 40 hours classroom computer-based training
3. Passing all written and practical multiple-choice examinations
4. Completing a minimum of 60 hours of OJT
5. Not missing more than 10% of the total time of any scheduled course (but you can make it up).
For those who fail to get over this high qualification bar (remember, the lives of children are at stake), remedial training is, of course, provided.
The Department of Homeland Security currently recruits, in part, by advertising on pizza boxes in DC.
Hopefully, school security will be handled on the local level. As it is, in fact, today, as we speak, by highly trained deputy sheriffs paid by county property taxes, in my county.
George: I agree that it can be done much better locally. But armed school security is the only thing we can do (in the near term) to stop school shootings.
DeleteThere's no doubt we need armed school security. A deputy sheriff's presence in our violence-prone schools has damped down not just gun crime but also bullying and gang recruitment on school property.
DeleteBut let the Feds get involved with personnel and you'll get unionized TSA rent-a-cops complete with embroidered badge, a swagger, and a federal cocoon.
In my opinion, school security personnel need to be well-trained and locally accountable. Teachers and principals should be be the first line of defense, but if that's not politically possible, local law enforcement.
"The latest data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show that 3,184 children and teens died from gunfire in the United States in 2006 - a 6 percent increase from 2005.
ReplyDeleteThis means one young life lost every two hours and 45 minutes, almost nine every day, 61 every week. The number of children and teens in America killed by guns in 2006 would fill more than 127 public school classrooms of 25 students each. More preschoolers (63) were killed by firearms than law enforcement officers (48) killed in the line of duty. Since 1979, gun violence has ended the lives of 107,603 children and teens in America."
What does this tell us? More kids are killed by one-off shootings by people carrying guns than are killed by mass killers like Lanza. The more people that carry guns, the more kids will get shot.
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"In his first publication on the subject, in 1986, Kellermann studied all gunshot related deaths in Seattle over six years, and found that
- 54% of firearm-related deaths occurred in the home where the gun was kept
- 70.5% of these (firearm-related deaths in the home where the gun was kept) involved handguns
- 0.5% of these (firearm-related deaths in the home where the gun was kept) involved an intruder shot while attempting entry
- 1.8% of these (firearm-related deaths in the home where the gun was kept) were judged by police as self-defense
- there were 1.3 times as many accidental firearm-related deaths in the home where the gun was kept as self-protection shootings
- there were 4.6 times as many criminal firearm-related homicides in the home where the gun was kept as self-protection shootings
- there were 37 times as many suicides in the home where the gun was kept as self-protection shootings."
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"In 1988, Kellermann published a study comparing robberies, burglaries, assaults, and homicides in Seattle, Washington and Vancouver, British Columbia, a city "similar to Seattle in many ways" that had "adopted a more restrictive approach to the regulation of handguns." The study found that both cities had similar rates of burglary and robbery
- in Seattle, the total rate of assaults with any weapon was modestly higher than that in Vancouver
- rates of homicide by means other than guns were not substantially different in the two study communities
- the rate of assaults involving firearms was seven times higher in Seattle than in Vancouver
- the rate of being murdered by a handgun was 4.8 times higher in Seattle than in Vancouver."
Criticism of Kellermann's work: he didn't include incidents where criminals were frightened away by a homeowner with a gun. Response: cases where a household member was threatened with a gun were also excluded.
It is absolute fantasy to claim that more guns in the hands of more citizens will mean fewer innocent gun deaths.
It may feel really good to see some grandma pull out a gun and shoot a mugger. But it does not in fact make us safer. Putting guns into teachers' desks and pocketbooks makes no more sense than putting guns in student backpacks.
And changing the subject to abortion will not change any of the above facts. Fewer handguns and fewer high-magazine rifles in the hands of citizens means fewer guns in the hands of criminals and fewer guns in the hands of angry or depressed people. And this means fewer bullets in kindergartners.
Rates of gun-ownership world-side don't correlate with gun crime.
DeleteYou ignore straightforward data.
And I point out that the vast majority of the children injured and killed by gunfire in the US (which of course includes teen gang-bangers in inner cities) are killed in jurisdictions with extremely tight gun-control policies. And they're killed in jurisdictions largely governed by the same liberal democrats who whine about gun violence.
How about this: why don't you asshole libs stop gun violence in the cities you govern, and then lecture the rest of us about how to do it?
"How about this: why don't you asshole libs stop gun violence in the cities you govern, and then lecture the rest of us about how to do it?"
ReplyDeleteBecause we have open borders and can't bar the flow of guns from the lenient states. If we block them at borders that are actually maintained and controlled (national borders), we'd have a chance to reduce the number of high speed projectiles striking our children.
As for data, I just presented straightforward data - it is you who just ignored it. Stop projecting your sins on others.
As for international comparisons, would you now like to discuss Switzerland? Sure, I'm happy if every gun owner in the United States first went through 18 weeks of bootcamp and annual national service and training.
Finally, with respect to the term "assholes", temper temper Michael. It is in everybody's interest that you keep your cool because you are so well armed. Breathe deep and remember you're arguing against someone who is passionately advocating a safer world for our children - mine AND yours.
[Because we have open borders and can't bar the flow of guns from the lenient states.]
DeleteColt and Remington make their guns in deep blue gun control paradises New York and Connecticut. Sig Sauer is in Germany, Glock in Austria.
But all states have borders. Why are Republican areas so much more effective at blocking guns than Democrat areas? It surely doesn't have anything to do with differences in demand for guns to commit crime, does it?
So you don't think that the cultural differences between Republicans in Salt Lake City and Democrats in Chicago may have something to do with gun violence? It's just a matter of different permeability of borders?
If Democrats can't control borders, why trust them to control guns?
"If we block [guns] at borders that are actually maintained and controlled (national borders), we'd have a chance to reduce the number of high speed projectiles striking our children."
DeleteRight. Like we've been able to block the import of hundreds of tons of cocaine.
Do you have any idea how many containers come through the ports of Seattle, Long Beach, Houston, Mobile, Savannah, Charleston, Hampton Roads, New York, and Boston? We're talking billions of tons of imports. Who's going to inspect that?
Just one hour ago, a local AL Fox affiliate reported this: "A search of the home found 30 guns, including an assault rifle, as well as grenades and blasting caps stolen from the Anniston Army Depot, according to the station."
Was the Mexican government able to block the illegal guns the US Department of Justice allowed across the border?
You're dreaming.
Push gun sales into the black market and you will build a powerful illegal weapon crime cartel, and then there will be zero regulation. I can guarantee it, because it happens every time with prohibition.
We need Gun Prohibition and a War on Guns.
DeleteIt worked great for alcohol and drugs.
The solution is clearly MORE guns, not LESS.
DeleteNo Left Turns