Just sat down and read the blogs, and discovered the transcript of Glenn Beck’s discussion with O’Reilly about the Alabama shooting. Beck apparently suggested that “political correctness” might have been one of the pressures that caused the shooter to snap.
What a crock. Thankfully, O’Reilly flatly and publicly disagreed. And Beck deserves to be publicly shamed for hanging this tragedy as a frame on his cause du jour.
Here’s my take on it, in which I think I can guarantee I’ll piss off all sides in this debate – and in doing so, I hope get them to stop and think about their knee jerk reactions for just a bit.
First, most of the reactions to this have been bull***t. The Brady folks have jumped in before the blood has been washed away and waved the victims as tokens in their political game – just as awful as Beck, in my view. Then Instapundit linked to a Reason piece that attempted a fisking of the Brady Campaign by Jacob Sullum at Reason.
I’ve already backhanded the Brady folks as bloodthirsty opportunists; let me take a moment and bust Sullum for being disingenuous.
It’s not clear what Helmke means by “firepower.” The AR-15 fires a small (.223-caliber) cartridge, and the SKS fires an intermediate (.30-caliber) cartridge. The guns identified as “assault weapons” are chosen based on their “military-style” appearance, not the size of their ammunition, and many large-caliber guns were not covered by the federal ban. Maybe Helmke is really talking about magazine capacity, since the federal “assault weapon” law also banned magazines that hold more than 10 rounds. But this has nothing to do with “assault weapons” per se; many guns that don’t fall into that arbitrary category accept large-capacity magazines.
Here, it’s Sullum who’s not being clear or correct. The Wikipedia definition of ‘firepower‘ pretty closely approximates what I’ve been taught:
Fire power is a military capability to direct force at an enemy. It is not to be confused with the concept of rate of fire which describes cycling of the firing mechanism in a weapon system. The concept is taught as one of the key principles of modern warfare wherein the enemy forces are destroyed or have their will to fight negated by sufficient and preferably overwhelming use of force as a result of combat operations.
Look, to suggest that a .223 fires a “small” cartridge is absurd and ignorant – the destructive capability of a .223 is “good enough” in the overall range of ballistics, which is why the Army still uses it. A “small” cartridge is a .22 LR, and a lot of game and people have been killed by .22’s. To handwave, as Sullum does, and claim that “they are all the same” or that firepower is measured by narrowly testing the destructive capabilities of the bullets isn’t true in any meaningful way.
Let’s look in my gun safe, and compare two long guns.
A bolt-action .308 (a Savage Scout), with a detachable 5-round magazine.
A semiautomatic .308 (a Springfield M1A Scout), with a detachable 10-round magazine (note that there are 20- and 30- round magazines widely available for this).
There is no question – ought to be no question – that if I was headed out into combat, I’d pick the Springfield over the Savage. Why? Because it packs more ‘firepower’ – the ability to direct more sustained force downrange because I can shoot it more quickly, reload less often, and reload faster.
Yes, I can buy large-capacity magazines for all kids of weapons…they sell them for Glocks and for 1911’s, as an example. But past a certain point, the gun becomes so unwieldy as to be useless. Trust me, I’ve tried. The reality is that some weapons – the M1A in the case above – are designed to be handled with large-capacity magazines, and so are more effective militarily. And so more dangerous.
Gun-rights advocates need to get past handwaving rationalizations like this. First, because they are dishonest, and the public is smart enough to tell. Second, because they obscure the real point we all should be making, which is the point drummed into me when I first started shooting seriously.
“Guns are damn dangerous. But the ability to manage dangerous tools will make you a better and safer person.” And exactly in parallel, the fact that we live in a society where people can handle dangerous tools makes us – overall – a better and safer society than we would be otherwise.
But it comes at a sad, bloody price. And this month, a lot of people paid it.
If you want to know what I really believe, go read “Stand on Zanzibar” (actually, another Brunner book – “The Sheep Look Up” ought to be on your list as well), and think about muckers. I did a post about them after another shooting back in 2007. And what I said then still holds…“There is something dark and bloody in the human heart.”
–
You are some what missing the point the 7.62×39 cartridge of the SKS is a more powerful cartridge than the .223 of the AR-15, it makes a bigger hole with a heavier bullet. The AR-15 is firing a comparative smaller less powerful round than the SKS on a bullet per bullet basis. There are all sorts of technical reasons why the military went with the .223 over the the 7.69×39, there is no definitional answer to that question. But if I had to chose which round to get hit with, all other things being equal. The .223 would be what to choose. I will note that if I get to choose a long enough range then the .223 becomes worse choice for the nitpickers, but that is like 100+ yards.
But here is the point, the SKS wasn’t banned under the “assault rifle” because it lacks the scary features (pistol grip, flash hider, collapsible stock, that law focused on. Helmke lied, (again). And you M-1A has both a yet more powerful cartridge than the SKS, and a removable magazine, was also not banned “Assault Rifle” law.
Helmke, is not interested in banning especially dangerous guns with any logic or rational. He is interested in banning any guns he can, if he can create enough fear to get them banned. And when he is done with one category of weapon to ban, he will come up with another category. To accept his logic as if it had any meaning is to play into his hand, as he merely uses it as o cover for his fear mongering.
Joe, with due respect, it doesn’t matter; the terminal ballistics is essentially irrelevant in a situation like this.
Yes, Helmke is using this to ban any guns he can – that’s why I criticize him.
Marc
AL’s point is that when someone goes around with an AR-15 and shoots a few people, pointing out that it’s just a poodle-shooter is wrong and misguided. If anything, you’re playing right into the gun-grabber’s hands… if this gun is so wimpy, how come this guy killed so many people with it? Maybe all those other guns really are that scary…
Some arguments aren’t helpful, and just do your own cause damage. Political correctness doesn’t drive people to multiple murders, and “it’s only a .223 rifle” ain’t much consolation to the dead.
Marc,
I’ll agree on both points, the thread is boring and Beck is a world class A-hole!
I’m, from ancient history, you may remember?, a Conservative,and believe the Beck/O’Reilly duo only look good compared to the really dick heads, Olberman/Matthews!
I, too, am a Conservative, and believe the Beck/O’Reilly duo doesn’t even look good when compared to the real dick heads, Olberman/Matthews! Which, by the way, is no mean feat.
Thank you for a chance to reply.
Trying to reply to a nonsensical argument, like the Brady group is making is always difficult. Imposing logic on a illogical argument is fraught with the opportunity to get wrapped up side points that are unenlightening. If I have done that I am sorry.
Brady claims that some guns are more dangerous than others, but then they ban based on cosmetic features. If you want a “safe gun” get a BB gun oh wait those are treated just like the real gun in New Jersey. Best get yourself a stick, just don’t let any one catch you pointing it.
>Sullum (and you) are – as Avatar points out –
> damaging the pro-gun case. Your technical
>claim doesn’t hold up – ask someone who’s
>not on rec.guns to discuss the merits if you
>don’t want to take my claims seriously. But
>let me point out that police cars don’t have
>5-round hunting rifles, they have AR15’s. My
>son isn’t being given a semiauto hunting
>rifle, he’s been issued a M-4 carbine. Can
>we assume they do it for a reason?
A.L.,
Have you ever watched the opening scene from the old Western TV Series “The Rifleman?”
I had a long and heated debates with Californian Tom Holsinger of the point *you think* you are making.
In a situation where you are dealing with an unarmed and surprised crowd of civilians, often with children, _there is no functional difference down range from a damaged mind whether he has a lever action 30-30 or an AR-15._
Both have a high enough rate of engagement to inflict mass casualties and shock.
Both can kill.
The difference in firepower due to reloading makes a difference in *combat between armed opponents, _not in a situation where you have an armed man and unarmed victims._*
The issue here is controlling the body attached to the damaged mind, not controlling guns or amunition to the law abiding.
Your insistance that any sort of gun control would make a difference damaged your credibility with the law abiding gun owner.
The price in blood we are paying is for *_liberal policies in controling the mentally ill,_* not controlling guns.
On this subject, Glenn Beck is right and you are wrong.
People fixated on gun magazines are people fixated on removing American freedom under the 2nd Amendment.
“liberal policies in controling the mentally ill”
OK, Micahel McLendon had no history of mental illness or crimes. I’m frankly more disturbed by taking away people’s rights because of an undiagnosed medical condition than arbitrary defintitions of what is a semi automatic.
Trent:
If someone is crazy enough to shoot 17 people, “political correctness” doesn’t drive them to do it (which is essentially what Beck is saying). It’s worth noting that most of these school shootings occur at the late teenage to early adult years: when serious mental disorders start showing up.
A good friend of mine was diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic at the age of 20. At the onset of this mental disease, he had sudden violent mood swings (though no violence occurred). Now he’s medicated, and has returned to his normal self. He is prevented from owning a gun (thankfully)
Additionally, mental illness is often missed, or only noticed after a tragic event. Even for those who are not allowed to carry ‘legally’, he could still probably get a gun at a gun show, or in a “under the counter sale”. Many shooting accidents have been ‘stolen’ from the family. There is no law that’s going to prevent every ‘unsuitable individual’ from getting access to a gun.
However, if we limit the destructiveness of the weapons on the market, hopefully we can limit the damage of such an event. I believe that’s what AL is trying get at.
Oops, AL isn’t necessarily making that statement at all. he’s Just saying some guns are more dangerous, not that they should be off the street.
I guess I was just saying why _I think_ some guns should be banned.
Alchemist sez:
>he’s Just saying some guns are more
>dangerous,
And I am saying Armed Liberal is wrong on that.
The man holding the gun matters far more than the iron he his holding.
People kill.
Guns are a killer’s tool.
Magazines matter for a gun as a _tool of war._
They matter far less as *_a tool of murder._*
Again, in a situation where you are dealing with an unarmed and surprised crowd of civilians, often with children, there is no functional difference down range from a damaged mind whether he has a lever action 30-30 or an AR-15.
Returning to the them of “The Rifleman” and a review from the IMDB site:
bq. _The opening sequence to every episode was exciting enough to suck any of us into the TV screen, with the camera dollying backwards in sinc *with Connors moving forward repeatedly shooting/cocking his modified, cut-down rifle. No music yet. Nothing but bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam…* `The Rifleman’ the seriously over-concerned voice-over would announce. We were hooked, and the western styled orchestral music would begin to play._
bq. _What is most striking as I vividly remember this shot now almost 40 years later, is the utter smoothness of Connor’s walk and steady gaze as he moved forward step by slow step. I realize it is the exact same style of strong, silent type walk which Clint Eastwood was making a trademark. Funny to think that Connors, not a highly respected actor in circles, was doing this bit just as well as Eastwood did so many times later._
Why is it 1950’s Westerns recognize the basic fact that it is the person that kills with a gun as his tool, not the gun that kills with the person as its tool.
The answer that I keep getting is that it is all about seizing power from free men and not “Protecting the >Fill in the blank<. Talking about preventing the mentally ill from hurting theselves or others with guns just does fit the liberal world view issue frame that wants to ban them. PD Shaw sez: >OK, Micahel McLendon had no history of
>mental illness or crimes. I’m frankly more
>disturbed by taking away people’s rights
>because of an undiagnosed medical condition
>than arbitrary defintitions of what is a
>semi automatic.
People might be inclined to take your statement seriously if many of the mass killers we are talking about didn’t fit the following profile:
“Armed And Dangerous
Law Bans Sale Of Firearms To People With A History Of Severe Mental Illness”:http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/27/60minutes/main2735294.shtml
bq. _As the smoke clears from the massacre at Virginia Tech, a couple of things have become apparent. First, the gunman, who had a history of mental illness, should have been prohibited under federal law from buying the guns he used in the attack, and second, as horrific as the tragedy was, *it is not that uncommon.*_
bq. _It is estimated that *every year in the U.S., 1,000 homicides are committed by people with mental illness.* It’s not supposed to be that way._
bq. _As correspondent Steve Kroft reports, the first federal gun control law ever passed in the U.S., way back in 1968, banned the sale of firearms to people with a history of severe mental illness, *but the law has never been properly enforced.* Seung-Hui Cho is but the latest deranged gunman to shoot up a school or a church or an office for no logical reason._
See also:
“Cho’s Mental Illness Should Have Blocked Gun Sale – New York Times”:http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/20/us/20cnd-guns.html?ex=1334721600&en=c17c6f5750a6084d&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss/
Directing blame on “liberal policies in controling the mentally ill” in a post arising from the Alamaba shooting is the same kind of game the Brady people play whenever there is a shooting, they have the same answers regardless of the facts.
Of course, crazy people are involved in these killings, but they don’t walk around with numbers tatood on their forehead. And I disagree with the NY Times reporting on Cho. Cho was reported to be acting strange by a class mate, a therpaist said that there was “probable cause”:http://i.a.cnn.net/cnn/2007/images/04/18/cho.pdf that he might be a danger to himself, sufficient to justify 24 hours of observation. Cho denied everything and was released after 24 hours with directions to go see a therapist, that he ignored. He was never adjudicated mentally ill.
When Trent responds, I do hope he proves that it is liberal attitudes towards the mentally ill that results in weak enforcement of the prohibition against their purchasing firearms. I am thinking of alternative explanations that I find at least as compelling. One is bureaucratic incompetence. Another is reluctance to enforce any prospective gun laws in places where there is fear that all such laws are part of a slippery slope.
Just a quick reminder that a man in Germany killed more people with a 9mm handgun than this guy did with 2 ‘assault rifles’. A nation with very strict gun laws. A guy in Japan killed 7 people with a knife in the street, another killed 8 school kids. A man in China also killed 8 kids in a school. A maniac in Belgium killed 5 in a nursery. England started making “school uniforms”:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-475244/Stab-proof-school-uniforms-sale-protect-pupils-knife-attacks.html stab proof.
The world is a screwed up place with screwed up people in it. I see no evidence that any amount of gun control will make the slightest bit of difference. Its about the will to do it. Finding a way isn’t a big deal.
>Trent, I’m going to tell you what I tell my
>wife when she marvels at the fact that the
>hero can always get a parking place – “it’s
>a movie”. Please, please do not confuse
>cinematic skill with blank-firing firearms
>on a stage with reality.
Place sick/suicidal gunman on the end of a playground full of kids with an AR-15/Mini-14 et al.
Replace said weapon with a 30-30 lever action rifle.
End result, the number of dead kids is a strictly a function of the following;
1) The shooters accuracy,
2) The available time between the first shot and the initial reaction to run and,
3) The counter veiling actions by the public and 1st responders to reduces that killer’s time to kill the wounded at his first attack or seek other victims at other locations,
not the hardware of the shooter.
That example with the AR-15, BTW, is from a 1990’s mass playground shooting in Califoria.
It was the arguement I used to shut down Tom on idea the assault weapons ban/magazine limitations strictly feel good symbols that meant nothing.
People who believed such things as “assault weapons bans” on the law abiding meant something in terms of saving kids from criminals of the insane were simply marks whose fears were being used by those out to repeal the 2nd Amendment.
Tom really didn’t like my pointing out that he had his parental protective instincts used, but at least he recognized that they were.
Now, as for a real world example of counter veiling action, this is from the Alabama shooting that kicked off your post:
“Alabama Welder Hailed as Hero For Trying to Stop Mass Murderer”:http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,509188,00.html/
bq. _Friday , March 13, 2009_
bq. _SAMSON, Ala. —_
bq. _Many around Samson knew Bruce Maloy as their town’s comedian, a goodhearted, wiry little jokester who was always boasting about hitting it big someday._
bq. _In life, he never really got the spotlight he was seeking. But in the days following the massacre that shattered their small Alabama community, some have dropped the comedian label and replaced it with another: Hero._
bq. _On Friday, witnesses and authorities said Maloy, the 10th and final victim of Tuesday’s shooting rampage by Michael McLendon, single-handedly tried to end the violence with his beat-up old pickup truck._
bq. _With gunshots still echoing through downtown Samson and the killer headed toward a bigger city 12 miles away, *Maloy chased McLendon’s dark red Mitsubishi out of town, ramming the vehicle at least once.*_
bq. _Maloy slowed down the killer briefly, and he may have given police and state troopers time to catch up to McLendon, said Geneva County Chief Deputy Tony Helms. But it cost him his life._
People like Bruce Maloy and the folks on Flight 93 show America is a nation of shepards.
People like you who want to restrict American’s 2nd Amendment rights are those who want the American people to be sheep.
After all, that is what modern Liberals do.
P.S.
This wasn’t a movie and you can tell your wife that *_the hero had a parking spot._*