excellent article

nice work.

Joan Brunwasser, voting integrity ed., OpEdNews 

by Joan Brunwasser (156 articles, 3527 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 624 comments) on Sunday, April 22, 2007 at 8:57:29 AM
 

A few well-placed CHL holders might've made a difference

I don't blame the victims. I blame a university administration that prohibited legal concealed carry permit holders enrolled at the university from carrying their legally concealed weapons on campus as a general rule. A few of them in the right place, at the right time--older undergrads, grad students or a professor--might've reduced the death toll markedly. Cho was in violation of university regulations for 5 months by keeping his Glock 9mm on campus. I guess they can expel him posthumously. Because of a quirk in VA state law, Cho's psychiatric observation at the hospital, because it was deemed "outpatient" rather than in-patient, meant he was able to pass the background check for the firearms purchases. The VA Ledge should probably tighten this state rule.

The professor, the Holocaust survivor who died trying to protect his students was certainly brave, but only marginally effective. If he'd kept a loaded revolver in his desk the story might've turned out very VERY differently.

And there is something to the statement about courage. I don't know that I would've reacted any differently than the students did. Probably not. I'm a selfish person focused mainly on self-preservation...but if I had been able to come to the conclusion that I was already dead no matter what I was about to do (or not do), I might've worked up the courage to charge when the Glock 9mm was being reloaded. I'd still be facing down a loaded Walther P22, and a .22 LR shell in the right place can still kill...but unless he got off a lucky headshot, even if he fatally wounded an attacker by emptying the P22 into him, his attacker still has about 10 seconds of action to close the distance and strike with whatever blunt object is at hand. But it takes uncommon bravery and a real communitarian spirit of placing the lives of your fellow community members on par with your own. Most of us don't do that, sadly. Our Founding Fathers understood that intimately in a way that just isn't commonly understood anymore. There were no organized police forces in their day...defense against criminals, or tyrants, or foreign invaders was a community affair, with every able bodied man expected to bear arms in defense of his community. Even with an organized police force, they can't be everywhere at once. Police forces mainly investigate crimes after the fact and aid in criminal prosecution. Armed frontline defense is STILL a community affair, regardless our modern delusions about personal defense being merely a "private" affair, somehow a little seedy and unseemly.

FYI, A well concealed snub revolver is the best rape-prevention device I know of for women. Read some Massad Ayoob articles sometime.

I'm no Right winger. I consider myself a Leftist, a socialist, a Freethinking atheist, and a Green.

But I'm very pro-2nd Amendment. University regulations didn't stop Cho, but it did possibly stop those who could've stopped him.

by John (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 17 comments) on Sunday, April 22, 2007 at 10:19:36 AM