GUN CONTROL

This is undoubtedly the worst school shooting, high school, college or otherwise, in the history of our country. There are some facts, however, about some of these school shootings of which you probably are not aware. Do you know, for instance, that at least three shootings in high schools were stopped by civilians with guns? Civilians, not law enforcement. In one case a civilian was traveling past a school when he saw children running from the building. One told him that there was a student inside shooting people. The civilian pulled his gun, ran in side, and confronted the student. The student put down the gun and surrendered. In another case a high school vice-principal heard that there was a student in the hallways with a gun. He sprinted a half-mile to his car. He had a gun in his car so he had to park off campus. He then sprinted back with the gun to confront the student. Lives saved.

There have been many other cases where civilians with guns have prevented further carnage at the hands of killers. The media isn't fond of reporting these episodes because they don't contribute to the cause of gun control.

The point here is that you are never ever going to get the guns out of the hands of those who want to use them for carnage. Never. In all the years of press releases and statements from the Brady anti-gun organization there has never been one single gun control plan presented that would take the guns out of the hands of criminals. This is the oddity of gun control. Only law abiding people are going to abide by gun control laws. Criminals are not. The anti-gun lobby, and that includes much of the media, will never give any fair coverage at all to the people who use guns to save their own lives, or the lives of others.

Now here's something that I have yet to see reported in the mainstream media. Earlier this year 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 today's 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."

So .. how safe did these students and faculty in Norris Hall feel yesterday?

Now nobody can say for certain, but If it had been legal for students, employees or faculty members with permits to carry guns on the campus, is it at all possible that there might be some students alive today who didn't make it through the carnage? Do you think the actions of the Virginia General Assembly stopped the gunman from getting his guns and carrying them to the campus? Of course not. Reports are that the guns had their serial numbers scratched off. The were acquired outside of the normal channels of commerce and illegally carried to the Virginia Tech campus. The law meant nothing to the shooter. It meant something to the victims though, and perhaps that's why there wasn't one person anywhere near the shooter with a gun that might .. just might have been used for self defense.

There are those out there who think that allowing people to carry a concealed weapon on a college campus is an absurd idea. Why so? Just how is a college campus that much different than our society as a whole? Diverse people living together in common environment pursuing different goals. Where's the big difference? What is so special about a college campus that students should not be allowed to own firearms? What if some student in the dormitory had a gun? What if he heard the argument in an adjoining room and had accompanied the student advisor when he went to quell the disturbance? Could that student with a gun have stopped this carnage before it even began? We'll never know. But is there anyone out there who can say for a certainty that the day might have played out quite differently?

Some of the less educated will come forth with lines of thought like "We don't want to return to the wild, wild west." Why not? What research have you put into your clever little "wild wild west" line? Do you know anything about the actual crime rates in the so-called wild west? Would you be surprised to learn that the crime rate in what we now refer to as the "wild wild west" was actually lower than it is in most American cities now? And why would that be? Because people were armed, for one thing. People were armed, and the bad guys knew that people were armed. Tell me ... just what chance do you think a lone gunman would have had in those days in lining up people against a wall and then calmly picking them off one by one. No ... I'll tell you. Slim to none. Oh he might get off a shot or two, but by then he would be the object of some rather intensive target practice.

And let's talk 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? Again .. check the statistics. People with concealed carry permits are among the most law abiding people in the nation. Oops ... another little preconception shot to hell, so to speak.

Let me ask you another question. In fact, let's set up a hypothetical situation. You're in a class full of people at a university. Let's say that there are 30 people in that room. A predator with a gun walks through the door. He shoots the professor, kills him. He then takes the remainder of the people in the room and lines them up against a wall. He then walks up to the first person and shots them in the head. Now ... let me allow you to change the scenario. We can freeze-frame this situation while you make a decision. Your decision is this: You can put a gun into the hands of one student or a professor in that room, or you can leave things exactly the way they are. What are you going to do? Come on now, let's have it. Which way do you want it? Do you want the predator to be the only one in the room with a gun? Or would you like to have at least the fighting chance that would result if one, maybe two of your classmates had a firearm.

Now believe it or not, there are people out there (we generally call them liberals) who would say; "Oh no, 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 pigs fly, and you will fail. There is no rationality in that argument. It's an argument based in mindless hysteria.

Let's couch the argument a bit differently. Let's say you are the parent of a college student. You get a call from the campus police saying that your child is being held hostage in a classroom on the campus. The hostage-taker has a gun and has already shot one student. The police tell you that they have developed a plan whereby they are going to be able to sneak a gun into the hands of one of the students in the classroom, a student known to the police to be proficient in the use of a handgun. Before the police can take this step they need the unanimous consent of the parents of the students in that class. While you're thinking it over the hostage-taker executes another student. OK ... your decision. What do you say? Are you going to say "No, I don't want any of those students to be armed. I don't care how qualified they are with a gun." Or are you going to allow the gun to be passed to the student.

Now if your answer is that you would allow the gun to be passed to the student, they please explain your rational for the position that the student in question should not have been permitted to have a gun in the first place with a concealed carry permit? You may have difficulty in understanding this, but it really is rather difficult to arm these students after the fact. And insofar as the shooter is concerned ...you do understand that there is no way in hell to have prevented him to come on to that campus with guns once he made up his mind to do so, don't you?

Here's another question for you to ponder. What if the Virginia legislature had passed HB 1572 and it had been signed into law? Then the shooter would have known that there was a strong likelihood that there would be some students, professors and administrators on the campus with a gun. Is there any chance at all that this might have caused the shooter to set aside his plans for carnage? Can you say for a certainty that things would have played out as they did?