This site is about security, technology, and solutions to our problems related to these issues. Last week was a horrible one for the US, I need to address this as right now nobody is actually talking about ways to stop these acts in the short-term, only long-term policy changes that will have questionable results. This piece is not about the Second Amendment or a position paper on what gun regulations should be enhanced, created or eliminated. If you believe that guns should be outlawed in the US I totally respect your opinion the same as if you think there should be very little regulation regarding their ownership. I am not trying to debate these issues, I just want to provide a way to allow our children to feel safe in their classrooms once again and deny these inhuman monsters the opportunity to prey on our youth for whatever insane reason they may justify doing so by. I want to dispel a few myths as well in the process. This was adapted from a response to a chain of emails from concerned citizens in my community and I pitched this idea live on the radio hours after the Connecticut atrocity:
First off if you are not a gun owner, have not been through the buying process or been to a gun show in the last decade you are most likely totally wrong when it comes to modifying our laws in an attempt to keep firearms out of non-rational actors and criminals. This is not a mark against you, I applaud your choice to go about your life unarmed, but it took me years of being associated with firearm culture, and the laws associated, with it to get a grip on understanding exactly how they work. Reading a NYT editorial or two is not an education on this matter and often times these writers are simply wrong or are actively supporting their views with false claims and facts. In my opinion the mainline media is almost 100% wrong on any gun related reporting and this sickens me. You would think that a talking head of Fox or CNN who knows they will be talking about guns for months after any of these terrible events would sit down one evening and actually learn a bit about what they are talking about? No, this obviously has not happened. Catch terms chronically used inappropriately like “high-powered” and “fully automatic weapon” have only distorted the public’s ability to actually make changes that will save lives pertaining to these very serious issues. Men like Piers Morgan, who I enjoy watching from time to time for their interviewing talents, fall apart journalistically when discussing firearm related issues because they simply will not educate themselves on the realities of the technology and the industry. Instead they are blinded by pure hatred for inanimate objects and are thus totally bias in their reporting so that they can push their agenda. This hurts discourse in this country and it’s a shame. Both gun advocates and the opposition to their very existence should be upset by this polarizing and inaccurate reporting.
Some things I would like to clear up:
People think commercially available assault rifles and battle rifles (AR-15, AK-47, M-14 etc) are fully automatic “machine guns” like you see in the movies. They are not, you pull the trigger once one round comes out, the same as a handgun. To own a fully automatic weapon, where it shoots a string of bullets as long as you hold down the trigger until the magazine is empty, you need to have a Class III permit issued very strictly (including physical inventory checks) by the ATF or if your state allows it, pay a $200 fee for a NFA stamp, receive a thorough background check and wait up to 6 months for approval. Keep in mind that these weapons cost thousands of dollars and have to be manufactured before 1986. The Class III permits, where you can buy and sell “new” fully automatic weapons as well as pre-ban guns are for big money collectors, firearms manufacturers, and often places where you can shoot something “cool” like a “Tommy Gun” at a controlled range. NONE of the high-profile school shootings that have broken our collective heart over the last decade have been prosecuted by a criminal using a fully automatic weapon that I know of. What makes AR-15s and AK-47s different from a repeating hunting rifle is the available magazine capacity choices, some ergonomic features, and usually a menacing black color and shape, that is all. They all go bang ONCE when you pull the trigger just like a handgun.
On firearm and magazine bans like the Brady Bill:
Banning assault weapons actually means that they just cost more money, $1300 instead of $900, hi-capacity mags go from $20 to $90, and super-hi-capacity drums and beta-mags go from $100 to $250. Over a long period of time these items will become more scarce and thus much more expensive, but once again this is nowhere near immediate. There is no such thing as a “turn in your guns” precedent in this country when it comes to semi-automatic weapons, and even though Connecticut was a very bad event, this country is nowhere near as anti-gun as it was in the mid 1990s. I am not saying that these policies will not help, they very well could, especially in the area of decreasing the body count during such shooting via limiting magazine sizes, but this will happen over many years, not months.
Now lets talk about what can be done to actually end or dramatically decrease these tragedies immediately:If you really want these “active shooter” events to stop happening, especially in our schools, you need to immediately begin fielding armed security persons in schools that are proficient in close quarters battle tactics, otherwise known as “CQB.” Luckily, many of our job hungry and highly decorated soldiers who are returning home with incredible combat experience are fully proficient in this demanding mission set. Much like Air Marshals on airplanes, these folks would be constantly trained, tested and evaluated to keep their position. We must come to terms that there is no door system or passive security measure that will stop a suicidal shooter. Only having a top of the line operator on site, or perceived to be on site, with much better training and equipment will stop this from happening PERIOD.So, politics of the possible here people, I would model a school security program similar to the one used on our airliners everyday, let teachers arm themselves if they wish and train to do so under a special program just like pilots do on our airplanes, and put undercover roving “School Marshals” at our schools so a potential shooter has no clue if one is inside or not. I find it odd that we do all this on our airplanes, that already have multiple screening services and layers of security, down to back-scatter machines, but we leave our schools totally unsecured.
One point that nobody seems to talk about is that all these mutants have one thing in common: they do not want to fight another gunmen even though they are already on a “one way trip.” Almost 100% of these assailants have popped themselves before SWAT/SERT entered the facility to neutralize them. Why don’t they go attack police stations, gun shows or army posts? Simple, something about their thought process does not want a fair fight, it’s all about exerting their “power” over innocents, that is their incredibly sick kick apparently. So harden the target (schools and even malls if they will pay for it) with actual security personnel just there to protect innocent life alone from the criminally insane, not to discipline kids or watch for petty school infractions, and these shooters will stop showing up. Once again, this is not my opinion, it is a wildly peculiar commonality among these freaks that validates the rationale. To summarize again, just like on our airplanes, let teachers, like pilots, pack if they choose and train them well to do so, and immediately launch a School Marshal program based on the good components of the Air Marshal program.
Congress can ban anything they want short of an unprecedented gun grab but it will take 10+ years to really have any sort of real impact on the situation as millions of existing hi-capacity magazines already in circulation will have to become too expensive to afford or just wear out before they stop accompanying these shooters on their horrific one way trips. Waiting periods, deeper mandatory background checks, mandated insurance and training, and so on are all ideas to look at, but they would not have stopped the last two incidents in any way, so let’s get something that can, a well paid, well-trained, decorated ex-US Army Ranger or Marine with a personal defense weapon hidden under his sport coat. Sure this is not cheap, but we have spent TRILLIONS “fighting terrorism” in debatable wars overseas and spent billions on building others nation’s armies and security forces yet the worst kind of terrorism is right here at home. Let’s fight it the only way immediately possible and put this dark decade or so of mass school shootings largely behind us. Once we have secured our schools, then lets talk gun control, our culture of violence, our failing public school system and the inability for the deranged and mentally ill among us to get the mental health care they so desperately need…
Thanks for listening, and just like you, my thoughts are with the families who lost loved ones this last week.
I never ask, but if you like what you just read please pass it on to your friends, family and co-workers, we need this solution put in place ASAP.
-Ty
*For some reason my titles are cached even after they are corrected for spelling or whatever during my read through for mistakes, please excuse the “immediately” error as I cannot fix it retroactively when the post is linked. Calling computer nerd now to figure this out!
I could not agree more. I do not think this sick little coward would have dared enter that school knowing a fully-trained ex-soldier was waiting for him. He intentionally targeted children because they were defenseless, and giving our returning troops highly gratifying, high paying jobs protecting the most innocent among us, using a skill set the U.S. government has already invested heavily in, is a win-win situation. I did not know what to expect when I saw that you decided to tackle this issue, but the aviation analogy is perfect for this situation. As the father of a 3 year old that will be starting school too soon for my comfort, I can only hope the people responsible for securing our schools take their job much more seriously in the future.
I don’t see a problem with this, and based on where I work, that should count for something. However, I also don’t see a problem with a school resource officer at the high school level. The kids here like our SRO, and he is a role model, and he likes his guns.
The one catch you have forgotten is that gun-toting vets are on the domestic terrorist watch list. I doubt they would pass the background check to be able to work in a school. Not kidding.
Okay, this ‘could’ solve the situation in schools, but this will not solve it everywhere else where the shooter could have gone say a daycare, a hospital, the mall etc.
Unless you want to start having an armed soldier at every single place in America then I don’t see this happening, we would be in a sense a “police state”. Only way to get rid of this, is to have the media stop talking about it. Tell me this guy was not “spot” on with this video. How many other shootings have taken place right after the CT shooting? 3 or 4 I think in the past 2 days?
Park Dietz (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Park_Dietz) is the psychiatrist at 1:40.
Agree re the d&$kheads’ power trip picking on innocents… totally disagree with the disarmament thing. It was done in Australia after a similar massacre and short of stopping bike gangs getting hold of pistols, has been VERY effective. There are still hunters and they have and get what they need. The thought of armed security everywhere would not impress me – it seems to me to be the path the South African society went down… not a great outcome for the USA, IMHO – and like the previous commenter, where would that stop – hospitals, day-care centres, movie theatres? In the meantime, thanks for the article and may the people impacted know they are in the thoughts of people across the planet.
That’s quite a price to put a combat specialist in every American school, I propose a tax on all firearm purchases and firearm owners to pay for it.
I’m looking at this with an eye on the recent Marijuana law changes; I would propose the same deal for pot enthusiasts. You can do it, but you will have to pay for the unintended consequences of your hobby.
Dave, thanks for the kind words, bold thinkers get big results, small thinkers get nowhere. We need to innovate. Congrats on your youngster hitting the books soon!
RBBailey- Resource officer is busy with many other things and is the biggest target in the school. Either attack when he is not there or just take him out first. Sad but true. Ex-veterans work all over the US in sensitive security roles, many which require security clearance etc, this is not an issue for distinguished operators. Good input, you would know how this would play if anyone when it comes to educators.
Joe- So what? These are private institutions not public schools. Because we cannot save everyone we save noone? Obstructive thinking. I don’t think asking for a School Marshal program is opening the door to a police state, you can use this logic for almost any security measure enacted in public places. We have lost too many kids and the psychological toll on our already embattled school system is unacceptable. Should we also pull air marshals off planes because of the police state factor? Laughable. If malls think patrons would go there knowing well trained armed security are present than good for them. I am talking about our schools here as you can tell in the piece.
Nick- Once again, deploying school marshals is now “armed guards everywhere?” I am not following you. Do you complain when you walk into the Hart Senate Building and get scanned, looked over, ID’d while surrounded by armed guards? What about a county court house? Roving School Marshals is like nothing compared to this. Once again if the free market sees it fit to put guards in hospitals, daycares and cinemas go free market! Those would be private contractors, not government employees.
Todd- See Air Marshal program, not necessarily everywhere. But lets just say we want to have a Marshal per every two public schools (about 100k in US). And we are going to pay them lets just say 130K average with benefits for their commitment, that is $6.5B a year, or ONE MONTH of our operations in Afghanistan. That is for a massive footprint of an officer per every two schools! Even if they tax guns or ammo to make it happen, I am happy to pay that tax to end this insane BS (here comes the slippery slope arguments and quivering lips). I think it’s hilarious when people start going off about costs pertaining fixing something that is destroying the soul of our country, but boy we need those 2500 F-35s at $140M a copy or else! The crap we spend money on but this is not worthwhile? Guess what folks (upcoming post, beware) the top national security threats to the US are our financial degradation and our failing school system, not China or Russia or some loser terrorist living in a mud hut in Afghanistan. Wake up.
I thank you all for your comments, excuse my robust replies but I really, really want this solved. I am done hearing about a child that could one day cure cancer being shot to death by some outcast kid for no real reason, in their own classrooms no less. Our kids deserve much, much better than this. If that means we guard them physically and neutralize any freak who attempts another school house mass killing (they won’t) then so be it.
Todd, misread you comment, saw it as opposing the idea, re-read and now I see where you are coming from. Yes I agree with your thinking, if making this revenue neutral via a tax than fine, no more school shooting galleries.
Behind the scenes side-note: What is strange is that I got three separate emails from apparent readers telling me NOT to address this issue as it will “detract from my credibility in the aerospace community.” What the hell is that? If the ideas I talk about are polarizing maybe or if they are stupid, but I find it funny folks would take the time to tell me what NOT to talk about? My solution actually had an aviation model to go with it, who knew. Just a funny enigma I guess…
Who said anything about air marshals? Anyways, what also makes air marshals job 120% easier? Metal detectors, so you would also have to install those in every school entrance/exits also if that’s what you’re trying to imply scanning everyone and there supplies they bring. It would be a different picture without those eh?
If some dumbfuck was dedicated to do something like this again, they can with or without this “security guard” and with/without gun laws and you for sure know that it’s only an obstacle for them to overcome. You also have to imply a lot of things on what the shooter will and will not do which quite frankly you just don’t know and only covering a few scenarios in public schools is not really that helpful, there are thousands of possible scenarios in public schools and millions in this county alone. why single out this scenario when in reality it the problem is way bigger. You have to look at why they do it and they know they are not going to make it out alive. Do you know why they do it? We should try to solve the problem as a whole, it won’t be easy and I don’t think it will be for awhile with how our country operates. Past couple days there were 3?4? not sure, other shootings trying to get attention also. I’m glad the media didn’t really report it as much as the one in CT. Coincidences? Or what is to blame?
After the Dark Knight Rises shooting, there was someone with security guard at the entrance while you walked in a couple days after when I went to go see it. That really doesn’t solve the problem, the same exact thing could have happened inside the theater. What I’m trying to say is that you can always try to play catch up with the problem and make it look like you fixed it, but people need to get to the root of it. I’m pretty sure that video I posted explains it pretty well.
I’m all for getting these vets jobs, but I don’t truly feel this could be the answer to solve it.
Yes, I realize the holistic approach will only “solve this problem” but that is a lot of hope placed in actual remediation of all the subjective issues that go along with it, but we choose to nothing in the mean time, and these are not “security guards” we are talking about here. I Disagree completely with waiting to do something via more tinkering with the gun code that will take decades to have any robust effect and slowly improving the mental health system etc. Also, my idea is not not a jobs program for vets, they are combat proven and many have training in these tactics and have proven their ability to maintain composure in actual combat etc. We have already invested many thousands in their training therefore they should be looked at first for these positions. You have zero answer here, maybe because you do not believe there really is one. That is fine, but we can do something NOW without getting into a 2nd amendment debate clusterf&*k, I would rather choose to harden the target against such attacks then sit back and wait for the next one to come without any sort of change in defensive posture. Also, you think that all these guys really see it as all about fame and recognition when they choose to go down this ridiculous path? I doubt that very much. “Stop saying their names,” well they lost too, a rational person understands that, but people with this view would rather muffle free speech to keep the next wacko from doing the same thing (potentially) but School Marshals and more strict gun laws are a waste of time. 99.999% see these shooters as foolish and tragic figures who are dead in the ground and thus who cares, good riddance. But to think that megalomania is the root cause of these massacres is ridiculous, then why don’t they go down shooting in big spectacle? I saw a Doctor from NYU after Virginia Tech go into her research on this phenomenon and it was much more complicated than wanting their names to live on for their wicked deeds.
Question: When we were attacked on September 11 were you against resulting operation in Afghanistan?
As usual you bring passion tempered with reason to the subject at hand. Your energy and attention to detail is impressive. Your responsiveness to readers sets an example that people who run websites should set as a standard.
What I would call into question, only as an aside, is the question “Why don’t they go attack police stations, gun shows or army posts?” I get your drift but Fort Hood kind of sticks out. Yes, Fort Hood is or was,believe it or not, a gun free zone. Just like a school or a shopping mall, unless I’m mistaken it was left to civilian law enforcement to bring the shooter to heel.
What is disgusting about that episode among other things is that this administration is in a plexed-out vapor lock about whether Fort Hood was a work place “whatever” or an act of terrorism. Doesn’t real leadership require correctly identifying the real problems (but that ship has sailed.)
Finally, all I want to say that our legislative efforts should be directed on the state level to eradicate gun free zones. Those states that are not held hostage to Federal Medicade block grants or Federal highway matching funds or whatever which may be about 2 or 3 states that may have a chance of reclaiming their notion of public safety.
Hey,how about hiring General Petraeus to do counterinsurgency planning in blue states.
I’m from Europe so I don’t know how it works in the USA, can you clarify to me if there is some psychological evaluation by a doctor before you get your permit to buy a gun?
I think it would also help to be required by every gun owner to have a safe place in his home where the guns are always locked when they are not using them. If you don’t own a safe “armory” you won’t be eligible to have weapons, because it may be your right in the US but you have to be responsible at the same time.
(sorry if i have misused some words but English, it’s not my first language..)
Dear Nick,
I would suggest that you consult the laws of Norway, Israel or Switzerland as they as are more culturally and geographically proximate to you.
There are more guns per capita in those countries than in the USA. There are no laws requuiring gun ownership in the USA there are in other countries
America is deeply divided. Pro weapons vs No weapons, republicans vs democrats, rich vs poor, black vs white vs latin vs asian…
The word compromise is unknown and respect for other opinions is zero.
This nation can not even unite over the death of 20 children and the President is showing some fake tears for US children while he triggers the bombs on his drones killing children in Afghanistan or Pakistan.
I don’t know where America is heading but one thing is sure. 50% of your people won’t like it. Lot’s of angry people in the US and unfortunately the angry American man is armed to the teeth.
Im from eu and have never understood how it can be so easy to obtain weapons in US. Especially assault rifles and stuff like that. What purpose have a citizen with an assault rifle? I understand its a hobby and fun, but come on, its so damn risky having normal and crazy people have access to this.
Putting out guards at school is great, but then what, the crazy man just hits the school bus instead or the local mall/cinema.
Purpose weapons, like hunting weapons or sports gun should only be obtainable in my opinion, becuase the general citizen have a purpose for them. Where i live you also need to buy an expensive safe to store the gun in. Aswell as hunting license training that takes some time to get or to be active in a sport shooting club. You cant just go in and buy a gun without first getting a license gun safe or said training.
Hmmmm…Why doesn’t anyone ever consider that the source of this “problem” is not the availability of weapons? It is the apparent human capability for horror. It may be aberrant behavior, but it is too common. OK, a restriction on magazine sizes for firearms makes it less efficient at horror. A more efficient way of killing innocents would be to drive a pickup truck through the organized two-by-two arrangement of children in the parking lot as they wait for the buses at the end of the day, or crash an airliner into a skyscraper. All I am saying is that there should be a call for tasking the mental health professionals for answers that is as loud as the anti-gun voices. Constitutional rights are probably at stake there too, so let’s discuss. While we are at it, can we ask whether the media had a psychological role to play in sensationalizing the horror attacks, encouraging more mental illness? Personally, I resist assigning blame for one of these incidents on firearms, racism, homophobia, bullying, climate change, illegal immigration, right wing extremism, left wing extremism, talk radio or what have you. When it is the evil work of a single individual, blame the individual. Don’t make the rest of society pay for it. Inevitably, a tyrannical organization emerges that demands a tighter and tighter grip.
Amicus Curiae in your argument you have to take in consideration that a mentally unstable person with a 30 rounds mag is far more deadly than one armed with a knife. I don’t say that the availabity of firearms is the only thing responsible but it plays a major role in my opinion.
So you want to put an armed guard in every school? Riiight. This in a nation that is already deep in debt, that can’t afford 3/4 of what it is spending already?
You can start ending school shootings, and other shootings (Cho in Va Tech, the theater shooter, the Giffords shooter) by improving the mental health system, which was gutted by Ronald Reagan; every conservative’s hero.
Banning the sale of semi auto’s would also help. You don’t need one to hunt. Right wing fantasies of revolution are just that, fantasies. Are you going to stop a predator drone from blasting you with a hellfire missile with your AR? No? Didn’t think so.
Ty,
This isn’t bold thinking and it’s not addressing the root of the problem; it’s a shame you think the measure you’re proposing is bold thinking.
In the age of 24-hour news, internet, and the ability to function in society with very little face-to-face social activity (something that was much more difficult to do 25, 50, 100 years ago), people who might be slightly unstable can quickly become very unstable because they don’t need that interaction like they did in previous generations. If they aren’t interacting, no one knows they are acting strange and therefore no one offers help. On top of this, ‘help’ for psychological, or potentially psychological, disorders is not popular and possibly taboo – people don’t want help and don’t want to help other people.
I agree with you wholeheartedly on the armed security guards. Two models I think should be considered for Nation wide schools is the New York City Police Department School Safety Division & The Los Angeles School Police Department. Both have Law enforcement powers and both fall under the jurisdiction of the Police dept and under the command of the Police chief.
@cbyhm Re: ” Are you going to stop a predator drone from blasting you with a hellfire missile with your AR? No? Didn’t think so.”
You have exposed yourself as a potential tyrant. Apparently it is your fantasy to enforce government policy against disagreeable citizens with hi-tech military weapons. Fear of that kind of tyranny is the reason the Second Amendment exists. I’ll keep my weapons because I am afraid of YOU.
What I was referring to was the supposed reason for keeping assault weapons –
defending yourself from a tyrannical government,
or engaging in a rebellion or civil war against the government, which is
usually a subject of right wing fantasies.
While there is zero chance of that ever happening, even if it did,
you believe you’re going to join the fray? Fight alongside
the M1 tanks and Apache helicopters against more M1s and such?
Your AR and hoarded ammo going to make the difference in the revolt?
A hero of the New Confederacy? Nonsense, all of it.
Meanwhile there’s NO mechanism in place to prevent the VERY REAL and sadly
too frequent situation where a mentally ill person
gets a hold of firearms and goes on a rampage.
The only real solution is to either prevent people from owning assault rifles
entirely, or conduct extensive background checks
to ensure that the persons owning them are 1) stable themselves and 2) in such
a position where unstable people cannot access them.
If anything, I’ve exposed myself as someone who understands that reasonable
restrictions might have saved the lives of children from a murderous madman.
You’ve exposed yourself as someone who thinks that those deaths were
somehow inevitable.
NRA pushes armed security guards in schools. Fools to not have come up with an actual idea of what a program like this would look like and cost before throwing it out there.
http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/21/us/connecticut-school-shooting/index.html?hpt=hp_t2
after Columbine, my city police department, started putting a uniformed officer with a squad car out front in every school whenever they are in session… it
1- creates a visible deterrent,
2- not only deters crazies but the kids who occasionally can get out of hand, esp in high schools
3- increases a force by about 10% giving vets jobs
4- is easy for city councils, mayors and the public to swallow
since it started in our urban city a decade ago, I have never seen a significant instance of violence at a school…. and a crazy is faced with probably getting into a real firefight with a capable adversary inside of a couple of minutes making it unlikely he will accomplish what he wants.
so, like the idea, but think it should be implemented through an existing, easy to swallow force… the police…
While I like AviationIntel’s idea, and personally believe that a ban on five-hundred round magazines and semi-automatic assault rifles should be part of the equation. Look how the mainstream press @#$%!! all over the N.R.A. after they stated there should be at least one armed guard at public schools (no mention of using Veterans but I think thats a good idea), see http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/12/18/1171692/-The-picture-posted-on-FB-by-an-NRA-friend-that-set-me-off?detail=email