Additional Laws, Bans and Good Vibes Won’t Stop School Shootings

17 students were murdered on February 14 and, as expected, many were quick to point to the weapon the shooter used, an AR-15, as the source of all the evil.

The battle cry of the left is "ban assault weapons!" Most of them don’t even know what the AR in AR-15 means. Some of them actually believe it’s an abbreviation for an assault rifle.

A brief lesson on the brand of weapons in question:

The Armalite Rifle Company began production in 1952. The look of the modern AR semi-autos is quite similar to military-style rifles, but its firepower and accuracy is no different than most civilian style models of the same caliber. The ‘scary black rifles’ that so many people have a totally irrational fear of has been around since at least 1960.

I can’t believe I even need to do this, but here’s a bit more education on the ‘scary’ AR series of firearms.

The very popular AR-10 in a .308 Win or 7.62x51 NATO caliber (both are nearly identical rounds, btw), has the same firepower in a semi-auto as it does in a bolt action. The only differences are capacity (in some models) and appearance. A bolt action rifle requires the shooter to manually cycle the weapon to eject a spent cartridge and chamber the next round. The semi-auto does that job for you.

A 150 gr., .308 Win round travels just under 3000 fps, regardless of whether it’s fired from a bolt action rifle or semi-automatic rifle. Fully automatic weapons are not available from any of the usual retailers and there are strict rules for the ownership and possession of these types of firearms. According to Rocket FFL, to purchase and possess a fully automatic weapon manufactured after 1986, the individual must demonstrate that:

…it is in connection with their duties as a government or law enforcement official, or if they have their Federal Firearms License (FFL) and have either made or possess the machine gun for possible sale to government/law enforcement personnel.”

Rocket FFL further states that:

Full-auto machine guns fit into a certain class of firearms called National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA) firearms.  These NFA firearms have extra regulations and controls.  For example, unlike with “standard” firearms, NFA firearms (such as machine guns, silencers, etc.) are registered with the federal government and tracked from lawful owner to lawful owner – permission must be obtained prior to the transfer of these types of firearms and the ATF keeps a log of all currently registered NFA firearms.

The American public is, unfortunately, susceptible to salacious headlines, cherry-picked facts, and outright lies. I blame much of our knee-jerk reactions today on social media and the seemingly endless stream of idiotic memes created by people who have little command of the English language, as is evidenced by their misspellings and misuse of punctuation and tense. A fine example of this comes from the non-profit organization Everytown for Gun Safety, which was co-founded by former New York City Mayor and sworn enemy of firearms and the 44-ounce soda, Michael Bloomberg.

In a Tweet sent out on the afternoon of February 14, just minutes after news of the shooting at a Florida school broke, they stated that “this is the 18^th school shooting of 2018”.  As usual, the numbers are not just misleading but downright false. A suicide that occurred at a school that had been closed down for months; a shooting after a basketball game in a college parking lot, long after students were gone; these are a just a couple of the misleading examples used. So just how do we stop schools from becoming a target-rich area for some low-life thug bent on harming people? The answers are not that complicated.

Let’s start by not continuing this practice of making schools soft targets. The degenerates who commit these horrific crimes know that no one in the building can stop them. They know that they most likely will encounter no resistance. We need trained, armed staff in the schools that can effectively stop or at least slow down the attackers advance and minimize, if not totally eliminate, the loss of life.

Many of our courthouses in Texas have one, single controlled entry point. Everyone passes through a metal detector, no exceptions. If the practice is worth it for your courthouse, is it not worth it for your schoolhouse? Let’s get beyond the idea that we don’t want to make school like a prison. No, we want to make it a more secure place, period.

Let’s upgrade windows and doors on our schools with ballistic glass and doors that cannot be easily breeched. How many schools across this nation are still outfitted with window and door hardware from the 1960’s or 70’s?  How many have locks that don’t work correctly? Let’s invest in upgrading these facilities. If it means my property taxes go up a dollar, so be it. Its money well invested, isn’t it?

And let’s get past this idea that all children are just so special and just want to be loved. No, they aren’t. A tiny minority of them, including this oxygen thief in Florida, don’t give a damn about your love or affection for them. They don’t care about the education some of you so desperately insist they are entitled to. No, a few of them are raging mad about something and determined to take it out on someone. Kick them out and keep them out. And when they are gone, distribute their photo to everyone in the school district and all surrounding districts. Make sure everyone knows who they are, what threats they’ve made and to be on the lookout.

As for tougher gun laws, they are unnecessary and won’t stop any of this. It’s a waste of time. You will never legislate crazy out of existence. Evil people with evil intentions will find a way to carry out their evil actions. If the 19 year-old shooter in Florida had loaded his car with gas and driven it through the front of the school, no one would be calling for a ban on a particular car or gasoline. Removing or limiting the rights of millions of law-abiding citizens won’t stop this. The only thing that will ever stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy (or gal) with a gun. That is a fact.