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As Usual, Nobody Else Had a Gun

Mike

Well-known member
http://www.sierratimes.com/07/04/17/74_60_255_75_95737.htm
AS USUAL, NOBODY HAD A GUN
Carl Worden

So far, 32 people are dead and another 21 wounded in the attack launched by one gunman reportedly armed with two 9mm pistols and extra magazines at the campus of Virginia Tech on 4/16/07.
Virginia is one of the many states with “Shall Issue” concealed gun laws, which means that if a citizen who has not been convicted of a felony or domestic violence, and not judged mentally unstable, the law requires they be issued a concealed gun permit upon request.

But nobody in range of the gunman, other than late-arriving police, had a gun. To make it even more senseless and inexcusable, this is the second recent firearms attack at Virginia Tech.

The gunman in the second incident is dead, and I suspect he got tired of waiting for the cops so he did it himself.

I don’t know the policy at Virginia Tech, but I’ll bet there is a no-gun policy on campus, which means everybody there were just sitting ducks, fleeing for their lives or hiding. It is reported some students jumped from second story windows and ran to safety.

To be certain, there will be yet another call for gun control over this incident, which translates as follows: The citizens who are afraid of guns and don’t want to have them, will try to impose their will on everybody else, making us all sitting ducks for the next gunman to slaughter.

In their mindless quest for non-violence, these well-meaning folks actually envision a nation with such stringent gun bans that nobody will have a gun. But that is never going to happen in the United States, because there are too many guns and there is absolutely no way to vacuum them all up by passing laws to make them go away. We can’t make even the slightest dent in the amount of illegal drugs smuggled into this nation, so there is no way we’ll ever eliminate the availability of guns to people who should not have them.

In the world of reality and clear thinking, the only way to fight fire in the hands of criminals, is to have equal fire to stop them with.

I was recently talking to a Chicago Police Captain on other business, and Chicago, like the District of Columbia and New York City, have virtual bans on possessing handguns. I asked this 25-year veteran Captain if there was any shortage of handguns on Chicago streets, and he laughed at the absurdity of my question. In the case of Chicago, the law-abiding generally don’t have handguns, while the violent criminals mostly do.

The United States District Court, which has jurisdiction in the District of Columbia, recently ruled the D.C. handgun ban unconstitutional on the basis that it clearly violates the citizens’ right to bear arms under Article II of the Bill of Rights. Of course, that decision is being appealed to the full court on the laughable basis that the ruling will increase violent crime. There are few places in the United States that have a higher violent crime rate involving handguns than the District of Columbia, so it is doubtful it could get much worse.

And what excuse does the anti-gun crowd come up with to explain why their gun ban doesn’t work? They blame guns coming in from neighboring states with more liberal gun laws. If the entire United States enacted a strict gun ban, the same people would blame guns being smuggled in from other nations. Again, we can’t seem to stem the flow of illegal drugs into this nation, but these bright thinkers will still insist a complete gun ban would reduce gun violence. It follows the same line of thinking of committed Communists, who insist Communism and Socialism will work, but it just hasn’t been implemented correctly yet.

The problem is human nature, which is and always has been a constant we have to deal with, but these “progressive” thinkers always seem to leave that out of the equation.

So getting back to this tragedy in Virginia in which 22 students died and another 21 were injured, many of those undoubtedly in critical condition, the one thing the anti-gun crowd will never admit is that one student with a concealed handgun in the right place at the right time could have saved some -- or all of them.

But as usual, nobody but the responding cops had guns. The only option the students trapped on that campus could do was run, hide, jump…or get shot. In a state with a liberal concealed handgun law, not one of those students were able to fight back with the same means the killer had, and that is what I find inexcusable.

If you live in a state that has a Shall Issue concealed gun law, and if you have obtained a gun permit, for Heaven’s sake carry the gun! Here in Oregon, we have the same Shall Issue laws on the books, but far too many of those who obtain the permits do not carry the gun on their person. Women carry the guns primarily in their purse, and the men often have the gun concealed out in the glove compartment of their car. In the real world, if you need a gun to defend yourself and others, you’ll need to access it immediately. A gun in your car parked outside is about as useless as a broken leg.

Carl F. Worden
 

passin thru

Well-known member
The Virginia General Assembly failed to act on House Bill 1572. The citizens of Virginia are permitted to carry concealed weapons if they get a proper permit from the state government --- unless you are on a college campus. This bill would have allowed college students and employees to carry handguns on campus --- with appropriate permits, of course. It died in subcommittee. After the bill was thrown out up steps Larry Hincker, a spokesman for Virginia Tech, the site of the carnage, who says "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus."
 

the chief

Well-known member
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?
 

passin thru

Well-known member
I am insulted by your remarks. You have just spit on the graves of the 32 innnocent people who lost their lives to this lunatic. You lumped them and their behavior with this lunatic. How dare you insult them and their families. You should apolgize at the very least.
 

passin thru

Well-known member
You are never going to get the guns out of the hands of those who want to use them for carnage. Never ever. There has never been one single gun control plan presented that would take the guns out of the hands of criminals. Never ever.

What about people with concealed carry permits. Do you think they're dangerous? Do you think they're just wandering around ready to pull their gun and start shooting at the slightest provocation? I challenge you.............. check the statistics. People with concealed carry permits are among the most law abiding people in the nation

It literally amazes me these people who say "I don't want anyone else to have a gun! They might try to shoot the killer and innocent people might get caught in the crossfire!" Well you can try to find a rational basis for that argument from now until cows fly, and you will fail. There is no rationality in that argument. It's an argument based in mindless hysteria.
__________________________________________




Why You Should Own a Gun
By Alan Caruba
CNSNews.com Commentary from the National Anxiety Center
April 17, 2007

The murders on the Virginia Tech campus, the worst such rampage in our history, might have been mitigated if just one member of the faculty or a student had the means to return fire.

I have owned guns for decades. On rare occasions, I have had to "show" one of my guns to people with bad intentions. Not surprisingly, they changed their plans to take my money and do me some harm. The Virginia Tech murders confirm the value of empowering ordinary citizens to carry a concealed weapon.

On March 9 I learned of a ruling in the case of Parker v. District of Columbia in which Senior Judge Lawrence H. Silberman wrote an opinion, with Judge Thomas B. Griffith concurring, that restored the Second Amendment to the citizens of the District and, by extension, to every citizen of these United States. Not since 1976, had residents of the District had the right to defend themselves with force of arms.

Judge Silberman wrote, "In sum, the phrase 'the right of the people', when read intratextually and in light of Supreme Court precedent, leads us to conclude that the right in question is individual."

As Alan Gottlieb, founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, noted succinctly, "The right of self-preservation was understood as the right to defend oneself against attacks by lawless individuals, or, if absolutely necessary, to resist and throw off a tyrannical government."

That is precisely why the Second Amendment says, "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Many States refused to ratify the proposed U.S. Constitution until this amendment and nine others were included. As Judge Silberman noted in his decision, the Second Amendment acknowledges "a right that pre-existed the Constitution" in the same way as freedom of speech.

Barely a week later in the Greenwich Village area of New York, David Garvin, carrying two semi-automatic firearms and a bag with 100 rounds of ammunition killed Alfredo Romero, a pizzeria employee, firing 15 rounds into him. Confronted by unarmed auxiliary police officers, Nicholas Todd Pekearo and Eugene Marshalik, he killed them as well. They were volunteer civilians who wear uniforms nearly identical to regular police. Finally, Garvin-a man with no psychiatric history-was shot dead by full-time police officers.

This is why police officers are always armed. I could not help wondering how that event would have been altered if any of his victims had been able to shoot back.

The Second Amendment Foundation notes that firearms are used defensively an estimated 2.5 million times every year, four times more than criminal uses. This represents some 2,575 lives protected and saved for every life lost to a gun. According to the national Safety Council, the loss of life to accidental firearm death is at its lowest point since records were begun nearly a hundred years ago.

In a nation where the rights conferred on individual Americans by the Second Amendment were just reaffirmed by the U.S. Court of Appeals in the District of Columbia, it's worth considering that, as of November 1997, there were an estimated 129 million privately owned firearms in the nation.

Guess what? After September 11, 2001, the one thing a lot of people did was to go out and buy a gun. If a bunch of fanatical Muslims could hijack four commercial airlines, destroy the World Trade Center towers, fly one into the Pentagon, and intended to fly the other possibly into the White House or the Capitol building, a lot of people decided that being able to shoot people with similar intentions was a very good idea.

Since then we have seen numerous incidents of "instant Jihad syndrome" where some Islamist decided to kill infidels who were just out for an hour at the local mall or otherwise peacefully going about their lives. And, yes, there are still criminals who use firearms. Now, however, Americans are not bound by some gun-banning law to be nothing more than victims.

Responsible gun ownership is a good idea. And if this is the first time you have heard about the recent decision of the Court of Appeals, that's because this story got buried by most mainline newspapers and by virtually all of the broadcast news media. No doubt this case will go to the Supreme Court at some point.

The writers of the U.S. Constitution understood the necessity for an armed citizenry. When only the government has guns, everyone else is just a slave. Gun-banners who would turn everyone's life and liberty over to the care of an all-powerful, central government, don't understand and don't agree with that.

As gun law expert, John M. Synder, put it, "Gun rights are human rights. Gun rights equate with the right to defend life and, therefore, with the very right to life itself."

(Alan Caruba writes "Warning Signs," a weekly column posted at the Internet site of The National Anxiety Center.)

Copyright 2007, Alan Caruba
 

P Joe

Well-known member
the chief said:
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?

I don't see the harm in allowing students with concealed weapons permits to have them concealed in their rooms.

However, I don't agree with letting every tom, dick and harry to have a gun cabinet full of rifles either.

It's a real gray area.
 

passin thru

Well-known member
When my son lived in the dorm, he and many others had guns in their rooms. They just told the head of the dorm.

And guess what ......................no one got shot.
 

Mike

Well-known member
P Joe said:
the chief said:
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?

I don't see the harm in allowing students with concealed weapons permits to have them concealed in their rooms.

However, I don't agree with letting every tom, dick and harry to have a gun cabinet full of rifles either.

It's a real gray area.

There is nothing gray about it. If a student (or anyone else, for that matter) decided to kill numerous people with a gun.........where would he go to do it?

WHERE NO ONE ELSE HAS GUNS!

Where would that be?

AT A SCHOOL!
 

Juan

Well-known member
Mike said:
P Joe said:
the chief said:
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?

I don't see the harm in allowing students with concealed weapons permits to have them concealed in their rooms.

However, I don't agree with letting every tom, dick and harry to have a gun cabinet full of rifles either.

It's a real gray area.

There is nothing gray about it. If a student (or anyone else, for that matter) decided to kill numerous people with a gun.........where would he go to do it?

WHERE NO ONE ELSE HAS GUNS!

Where would that be?

AT A SCHOOL!

RIGHT ON MIKE :clap:
 

the chief

Well-known member
passin thru said:
I am insulted by your remarks. You have just spit on the graves of the 32 innnocent people who lost their lives to this lunatic. You lumped them and their behavior with this lunatic. How dare you insult them and their families. You should apolgize at the very least.

No I did NOT lump them together. I described the TYPICAL college student. But you are so RIGHTEOUS that you cannot stand it when someone disagrees with your beliefs.

I really get a kick out of the radio talk show hosts who criticize people for talking about gun control while we should be grieving, then they put on Ted Nugent to spout his beliefs.

Do I mourn for these kids. Of course! My youngest is in college and my oldest is a teacher in a middle school. Would I want them or anyone on their floor to possess a gun. No way. One of my daughters friends tried alcohol for the first time recently and immediately became a violent, scary , abusive drunk. I would not be comfortable with her carrying a concealed weapon in that condition.

What if one of the students had a "legal" concealed weapon on him and pulled it out just as the police broke into the room. Police see this young man with the gun and they take him out. Then what? Are the police at fault?

I'm glad you have your beliefs. BUt you cannot force me to accept them.
Nor can you bully me into thinking that I disrespected anyone.
 

Red Robin

Well-known member
P Joe said:
the chief said:
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?

I don't see the harm in allowing students with concealed weapons permits to have them concealed in their rooms.

However, I don't agree with letting every tom, dick and harry to have a gun cabinet full of rifles either.

It's a real gray area.
It's not a grey area, it's guaranteed by the constitution.
 

P Joe

Well-known member
ok, let me rephrase. A school setting is not a place for a gun collection.

However, I believe it to be ok if you have a concealed weapon with a permit, or you have your shotgun or rifle or target rifle in your room because you use them.
 

passin thru

Well-known member
passin thru said:
What about people with concealed carry permits. Do you think they're dangerous? Do you think they're just wandering around ready to pull their gun and start shooting at the slightest provocation? I challenge you.............. check the statistics. People with concealed carry permits are among the most law abiding people in the nation


passin thru said:
It literally amazes me these people who say "I don't want anyone else to have a gun! They might try to shoot the killer and innocent people might get caught in the crossfire!" Well you can try to find a rational basis for that argument from now until cows fly, and you will fail. There is no rationality in that argument. It's an argument based in mindless hysteria.


passin thru said:
The Virginia General Assembly failed to act on House Bill 1572. The citizens of Virginia are permitted to carry concealed weapons if they get a proper permit from the state government --- unless you are on a college campus. This bill would have allowed college students and employees to carry handguns on campus --- with appropriate permits, of course. It died in subcommittee. After the bill was thrown out up steps Larry Hincker, a spokesman for Virginia Tech, the site of the carnage, who says "I'm sure the university community is appreciative of the General Assembly's actions because this will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus."

I get it, you are smart enough to handle a gun but no one else is. I am sure there are 32 people who wish someone would of had a gun in order to at least minimize the carnage. Or even a chance to minimize the carnage.

And yes I still believe this even if your are living in your own little Utopia
passin thru said:
You lumped them and their behavior with this lunatic.
 

jodywy

Well-known member
The Trolly Suqare shooting in Salt Lake, probally came to a quicker end and less people shot just because a off dudy cop from another town was carrying!!!!
 

Steve

Well-known member
Early this morning it seemed the question was..."Will Virginia finally do something about it's gun problems"....

the gun wasn't the problem.....a system that doesn't allow intervention with an obviously disturbed person "unless" they break the law first..is more of the "problem"...

Thank you ACLU for another "untreated disturbed person."
 

kolanuraven

Well-known member
As a past victim of a stalker/threat/whatever term you want to use, a REAL one,the laws /systems really do favor the person who is the threat.

It's really a shame but it's the way the system works.
 

aplusmnt

Well-known member
the chief said:
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?

Lots of kids the same age carrying M16 protecting your Freedom's in Iraq and abroad. Do not underestimate the good young adults of America just because you categorize them all as the murder in this incident.

One thing that is common on all these shootings, Columbine, VT, Amish children. They were all GUN Banned areas. Kind of funny that the Libs want to do something about the Gun problem when in reality the common denominator of all these type of shootings is that Guns are Banned at them.

There has been many cases recently or in past years, where gunmen where stopped by people that had fast access to their guns. There was the off duty cop, but I believe in past a couple teens got rifles out of truck to stop a shooting.

Libs just do not make a big deal about the times that a persons right to bear arms actually saved lives. They concentrate on the times that people were forced to be gun less and got shot because of it.

I would have much rather my daughter reached in her purse to pull a cancelled gun, than put her head between her legs hiding in some corner waiting to be shot. :mad:
 

Mike

Well-known member
Flashback to Pearl, Misssissippi.......1998:

Luke would be Luke Woodham, the 16-year-old who is charged with slashing his mother to death with a butcher knife and then opening fire on his classmates with a rifle. He is accused of killing Lydia Dew, 17, and his former girlfriend, Christina Menefee, and wounding seven other students, leaving them bleeding on the polished floor of the school cafeteria.

Roy Balentine, the principal, dashed out of his office when he heard the first shots.

"I ran out to see if something possibly malfunctioned," he said. "I was hoping that's what it was, but I knew it sounded like gunshots."

He saw Woodham, about 15 or 20 feet away, wearing a big, blue coat and holding a rifle. Balentine dangled both arms to show how Woodham held the rifle low out in front of him.

Fearing Woodham would come for him next, Balentine ran to his office to call the police. As he dialed, more shots rang out. More students fell.

Minutes later, Assistant Principal Joel Myrick chased Woodham down outside the school, held him at bay with a .45-caliber automatic pistol he kept in his truck in the school parking lot. He forced Woodham to the ground and put his foot on the youth's neck.
 

Soapweed

Well-known member
the chief said:
Good idea! Let's allow teenagers in college to carry guns. Who better than kids who are running on little sleep, having feelings of depression and being overwhelmed of being away from home and drinking beer.

My goodness, we have a plan to protect our children. But who will protect everyone else from these kids. Oh yeah, the gunman was a student who was depressed and overwhelmed with emotions. AND he had a gun.

Hmmmm?

We must remember that "chiefs" think more along the lines of bows and arrows instead of guns. :???: :?
 

IL Rancher

Well-known member
Sad.. I don't kjnow how I would have felt about guns being on the campus I was on although their were rumours of a few teachers who carried, illegaly mind you, because of one time threats on their lives. .. There are teachers who say they don't want to carry guns but I have a feeling there were a few that might at least enjoy having the option. I think their is probably a happy medium, depending on the state the conceal and carry laws can be as easy as a simple test to having to take a course.. The campuses could in theory teach one of these and perhaps monitor those who do carry a bit closer.. For example, a kid refered to student health as making a death threat shouldn't be carrying in a classroom.

The thing I wonder is, they interviewd some of this kids roomates from last year and they said he was a bit nutsy and suppossedly spent a couple nights under observation to see if he was a danger to himself or others.. I haven't bought a gun in about... Oh.. 7-8 years but seem to remember that question.. I have to wonder if the background check they ran on him when he bought the gun raised any red flags for that hospitalization.. Or is it that since the docs cleared him of being a problem (Guessing, sicne he only spent two nights) that it was never reported?
 
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