Well, its definitely a king-hell weird day.
First, and foremost, the shootings in Maryland, well covered by a number of new sources and bloggers today. Check out Dean at Blogs4God, for local details. Theres a lot of discussion on whether this is terrorism, a spree killing, or something else, and obviously there isnt enough information to have an opinion.
For now, Ill call it a mucking and suggest again that everyone go read Stand on Zanzibar. It looks like the bad guy used a rifle from the back of a panel van, possibly with another sick SOB driving. He most likely parked where the back of the van could cover a place where there were a number of pedestrians targets and waited.
I have a hard time imaging how you defend against this with a traditional LEO response; you can pull all the box vans in the area and hope to get lucky, or more likely, someone will get a glimpse of a plate or distinguishing feature, or someone will overhear a plan or remember seeing something odd, a gun store will be able to track the ammunition, and hell be tracked and, hopefully, captured. I hope the arresting officers are careful
And here Ill jump in with a pro-gun point, and compare two events, one indirectly mentioned by Susannah Cornett.
In 1984, in San Ysidro, CA (near San Diego), a nut whose name I wont publicize walked into a McDonalds with three guns, and killed 21 people.
In 2002, at Los Angeles International Airport, another nut whose name I wont publicize walked into a terminal concourse with two guns and killed two people.
The difference?? At LAX, an armed, trained ticket supervisor (with the help of some others who declined the shooter’s offer to be victims) engaged, shot and killed the shooter as soon as he opened fire.
In the event of a low-level (and believe me, to the families involved, this isnt minor, or low-level or anything except apocalyptic
) terrorism, or random acts like this, the police are here to investigate, cleanup the mess, investigate, and when they find the Bad Person, overwhelm and hopefully arrest. This is a good thing. Its just not too useful to the 3rd through 19th people who die, if you know what I mean.
Look, this is an old and tired set of arguments. Lots of folks dont like guns, are horrified that anyone would own one, and firmly believe that incrementally ratcheting down the number of people who own guns is the best way to avoid these kind of tragedies.
In an ideal world, theyre right.
In this world, theyre wrong, as Australia and the U.K. suggest:
The one crime [in the U.K.] that has shown a stubborn unwillingness to fall is assault, especially street robberies. Police have been recording a 20 per cent rise in muggings, yet the BCS suggests there has hardly been a rise at all.
Im not going to weigh in with moral arguments right now. Its been a bad day, and I need to take the weekend and get out of town.
But lets look at this instrumentally.
We have two success stories in dealing with terrorism this go-round. Flight 93 and LAX. Im not suggesting that we arm passengers with handguns (although I do think were crazy not to have immediately allowed pilots to have them). I am suggesting that the only form of defense that is likely to work while there the bodies are still breathing is to involve every one of us as an thoughtful, active observer of our environment, and someone who is willing to act appropriately when it is called for.
In some cases, that will involve larger numbers of people with guns.
They can be officers, standing on streetcorners, costing us tax dollars, and nosing deeper and deeper into our lives, or they can be citizens. Our pilot. The ticket agent. Our neighbors.
Some of then will screw up. Some of them will do bad things.
But the reality is that they screw up and do bad things right now. And as far as I can tell from other folks experience, it doesnt get better as you try and take the guns away.
And it doesnt get worse as you let people have them, either.
Think about it. Think about San Ysidro, and think about LAX. Think about how hard it will be to have a policeman catch the Maryland shooter at just the right time in just the right place.
For those of you repelled by firearms ownership outside the agents of the state think about this: Even if you dont agree with John Lott that crime has gone down in must-issue states (where average citizens who pass background and training requirements can get permits to carry guns), I have seen no evidence that remotely and reasonably suggests that it has gone up.
So if it doesnt effect crime, and it could effect terrorism or mucking, whats the issue?
Think about the 19 lives difference, and wonder whether they could have been saved before you answer.
Date: 10/07/2002 00:00:00 AM
This thread all got started from the comparison of the 21 dead in the San Ysidro massacre with the 2 dead at LAX, with the clear implication that more people carrying guns around McDonalds would have cut down on the death toll. And I’ve been saying that is only very partially true. Even people carrying guns (but who are not armed security guards looking for troublemakers) won’t get the drop on a suicidal lunatic who comes in gun[s] blazing. First they’ll have to put down their Big Macs.You don’t seem to accept this. Hence I am very worried that your faith in the defensive capabilities of firearms is exaggerated.
Date: 10/06/2002 00:00:00 AM
Hartin: I find your analysis simplistic. There are societies that are highly armed that are relatively safe against personal crime, and ones that are terribly dangerous. There are societies that are lightly armed that are safe and I suppose there are ones that are dangerous, although, frankly, I’m having a hard time thinking of one. I’ve spent about 2 months in the UK over the last 5 years, and believe me I wasn’t walking around scared. What bothers me the most about your argument, however, is that it appears to me to be based on symbolic or ritualistic thinking. In other words, the UK and Australia are going to have high crime because they’ve gotten on the wrong side of the Gun God and the right to self-defense. Sometimes you look like you’re writing a statistical argument (one which I suspect is false: Australia is a safe country), sometimes you seem to believe that a philosophical/historical argument compels the desired statistical results. I don’t think so.I’ve decided that some gun control groups have indeed missed the target: the target is gun crime (and I suppose gun accidents), not gun ownership. But your metaphysical arguments don’t sway me.
Date: 10/06/2002 00:00:00 AM
Mr. Lazarus, its not that I missed your point, its just that I reject the notion that just because a person chooses to carry a firearm they also acquire, or previously suffer from, profoundly negative psychological effects such as the delusions you reference in your reply: “citizens who think their superhuman reflexes…”. While I’m sure some people think a firearm makes them invincible, this is an error and most see that in the event of an assault they would be better able to defend themselves if equipped with something a little more immediate than a call to 911. I agree your average Bubba could probably not be as effective in stopping maniacal carnage as a El Al guard, but given the ratio of El Al guards to Bubbas around here, I think Bubba’s got a better chance to limit the malefactor’s success. And on a positive note, I live in an area of the USA where we do have a lot of gun-toting honest citizens and the frenzied crossfire you fear, like the hypothetical dead milkmen and paperboys, has yet to materialize.
Date: 10/06/2002 00:00:00 AM
Thinking about the never ending gun control arguments, I had a possibly original idea:Carrying/not carrying a gun is controversial because of the message it sends, not because of the effects of the guns themselves.Guns are tools for doing harm to people, but outside of video fantasies, someone carrying a firearm is highly unlikely to use it during any given day — or year. What makes the gun so controversial is that the gun carrier is sending a message: ‘I think we live in a violent world, where we might be attacked at any time, and if it happens, I’m going to deal out some violence too.’The principled non-carrier is also sending a message: ‘I think we may live in a society where violence could occur at any moment, but I refuse to be part of the culture of violence. By refusing in advance to prepare for violence, I will help stamp it out.’In short, one says “I’m dangerous, watch out for me,”, the other “Give peace a chance.” What’s really at stake is a question of how people ought to live.No wonder the issue is so highly charged!
Date: 10/06/2002 00:00:00 AM
Mr. Lazarus is in denial about reality, unfortunately. Armed self-defense by an individual is, and always has been, everywhere and always, the primary source of personal safety. The Brits (and to a lesser extent the Aussies) are confirming this right now using their own populace as guinea pigs. They have significantly abrogated the right of self-defense, and their people are much less safe. Sorry, but them’s the facts. This thesis is also borne out less graphically by the experience in the U.S. with concealed carry laws.How dangerous a given society is (that is, how likely it is to harbor people who engage in violent aggression) is largely a matter of culture. How safe a given individual is in that society is largely a matter of how capable they are of defending themselves.As for hiding in your basement – you are much less likely to need to do so in states that have shall-issue concealed carry, because their crime rates are lower and concealed carry holders are the most law-abiding group in creation. Or course, if you get a little thrill out of being afraid, no one can stop you . . . but there is no good reason to fear your neighbors being able to defend themselves, and you, if need be.
Date: 10/06/2002 00:00:00 AM
T Hartin’s post is an example of exactly the kind of thing I object to. He believes, and would have us believe, that England and Australia are terribly dangerous places. That’s false. I know that there are some statistics floating around, but I know people who have lived in both places.He believes, and would have us believe, that armed self-defense has always been the primary source of personal safety. That’s false too — the rule of law works a lot better. St. Onge says that someone carrying a gun is unlikely to use it in any given year. Sure, but a statistically small number of uses can be pretty awful.If “concealed carry” is by permit, it is a form of gun control. And if carriers are screened, I don’t have a big problems with that. Most second amendment guys don’t want any regulation or registration at all, though.Note that both St. Onge and Hartin are totally passive about the “causes of violence”. We’re just a violent country, nothing can be done about it, gun ownership isn’t the cause, and since we’re a violent place we should all arm ourselves. Somehow the fact gets lost that, even after arming ourselves, we’re still less safe than people in a lot of other countries.If I have a gun, I can protect myself against fists, clubs, and knives. Against guns, only maybe. The initial advantage is lost, especially because an evildoer with a gun has the initiative. Nobody took up what I said about the third-world places where every man is armed and armed self-defense really is the only safety you have. Those are NOT safe places.
Date: 10/05/2002 00:00:00 AM
I tend to avoid gun control arguments. They tend to be a waste of time, if not scary. AL’s forum is pretty civil, though.We may end up getting to the point in this country where self-defense by armed individuals is the only safety there is. I don’t think we’re there yet, and hope we don’t get there. There are parts of the world, mostly in the third world, where every man has to have a gun. If been told by people with first-hand knowledge that Yemen, Colombia, and Afghanistan (even before the Soviet invasion and other disasters) were such places. Other places could easily be added. The individual who gets a gun is safer in places like this, but these are not safe places. One sort of pro-gun argument either assumes that we’ve already sunk to that level, or else hopes that we do (the real Road Warrior loonies, who are not a figment of my imagination). I am not really anti-gun and have no problems with individual choices to buy one for self-defense. I have major problems with the idea that the safest society is the one in which everyone is armed, because that idea is simply not true.
Date: 10/05/2002 00:00:00 AM
Possession of a weapon unfortunately does not convey ‘spidey-sense’, what it does provide the possessor is an ability to respond to deadly force in kind. As for the fear that “They’re gonna be shooting up mailmen and paperboys” that is voiced whenever carrying weapons is discussed; it just doesn’t materialize.
Date: 10/05/2002 00:00:00 AM
Steve L., I think you missed my point. I think that the significant difference between the McDonalds shooting and the LAX shooting is that at El Al check-in counters worldwide, there are armed, alert security personnel whose full-time job is protection. I think it’s a dangerous fantasy to believe that armed fellow passengers in line could have done a better job of stopping this suicide attack. In fact, I put that right up there with dreaming that you’re Spiderman. A surprise attack where the terrorist just wants carnage and doesn’t intend to survive and there isn’t already someone on guard is going to be “successful”, maybe not as successful as the 21 victims in the McDonalds but a lot more than the two victims at LAX.If we really have a lot of gun-toting honest citizens who think their superhuman reflexes are going to head off unexpected, unprovoked terrorist attacks by other gun-toting malevolent citizens, I think I’ll stay in the basement until the crossfire dies down.
Date: 10/04/2002 00:00:00 AM
I didn’t follow your reference to Australia. Care to clarify?
Date: 10/04/2002 00:00:00 AM
Thanks for the link. And thanks for your discussion on a topic I’ve been agonizing over. For some time now, the thought of my wife and daughter at home without a reasonable means of defense was on the back of my mind from time to time.Now it is an obsession. I think to myself, “what if the murder[s] need a house to hole up?” I mean he/they had to drive by MY HOUSE 2 to 3 TIMES to get to or away from a couple of the slaughters. Yeah, I know, raging paranoia, but 40 years in a safe neighborhood instantly turned into shooting gallery makes me think … what if I saw the muzzle of a gun out of the back of a step-van … what could I do, throw my keys at his eyes across the parking lot? Yeah, I know, we don’t want vigilantes. Trust me, I’m not one of them. Its like a friend said to me when discussing whether or not to arm the pilots. “It’s a shame that the most well armed individual is someone who’s smuggled onto a plane a pair of nail clippers …” My friend also lives here in the middle of the danger zone.Thanks for the link. And the discussion.I’m putting in for my 7 days this afternoon.
Date: 10/04/2002 00:00:00 AM
My views on gun control aren’t as strong as they used to be, but I just gotta point out: at the airport, we’re dealing with armed f/t security prepared for the worst. (In several European airports, police patrol El Al baggage claim holding automatic weapons.) Unless we’re going to have armed guards right at the entrance to McDonalds (which they have in Israel now), a suicidal shooter is going to get off more rounds there than at the airport. Maybe not 21, OK. But some.I get kinda worried by people who think a gun permit conveys Spidey-Sense, too. They’re gonna be shooting up mailmen and paperboys. Maybe even themselves.
I won’t go as far as saying arming everyone will make the world safer, it won’t, but you can bet, that someone with a degree of sanity about them will think twice about harming others if there is a possibility that other folks are armed, I don’t deny that this does not apply to the deranged looney, but there is a good possibility that had one of the McDonalds patrons been armed, it is possible that more lives could ahve been saved.
I also believe that the McDonalds killer had several life events happen to him and lost it, I recently had my share of life events happen too, but some people can handle themselves better than others under pressure, apparently, he had reached his breaking point