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- Nov 29, 2017
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Like all of us in this firearm-friendly community, I am broken up over the school shooting in FL. In fact, I led a prayer service for the victims and their families the day it happened, and they are still in my daily prayers.
Some lib-tards are crying that prayer is not enough. I believe prayer is THE MOST powerful action a human can take; however, it is seldom the ONLY action we should take. Below is a article by Newt in which he recommends the very action I have advocated for nearly a decade.
By the way, I have something like personal experience in a school shooting situation. I was teaching a college class one evening when a series of shots thundered over my lecture. It was a spring semester evening class; thus, it was about 7 PM, still light out, but the only people on campus were me and my students, one other professor and his students, a low-level administrator, and our security agent, who was armed only with a radio.
The shots kept hammering the silence. The administrator opened my door in a panic. His eyes were like dinner plates stuck to his face. He said, "We have an active shooter situation! Follow the training! Have the students huddle in a safe corner! Lock and barricade the door! Turn off the lights!"
Then he scurried away. I did what he said because it was the best plan in that situation. WHAT TOTALLY SUCKED WAS THAT because I am a law-abiding citizen and gun owner, MY FAITHFUL 1911 that was my carry weapon at the time WAS LOCKED IN MY GLOVE BOX IN MY CAR!
We were SITTING DUCKS! My students were terrified. Most were crying and texting. I was frightened, but I was also PISSED! I knew that if my faithful 1911 had been in my possession, then I could have killed the SOB shooter the second he entered my classroom and before he got off a shot!
But my 1911 was in my car because of the !@#%&*$ law! And now, I and my students might die because I obeyed the law. I was far more PISSED than frightened, but I had plenty of both emotions running through my veins.
After 17 super-tense minutes with shots ringing out all around us, multiple police cars arrived. We knew it because the flashing blue lights flashed even through the drawn shades in the room. The shooting stopped. We waited what seemed like hours for some sort of news. Finally, the administrator knocked on the door and identified himself in a loud voice. He announced that the police had apprehended 2 boys who were shooting their rifles on the adjacent lot.
In hindsight, we were in no danger. But I lived through an active shooter lock-down, and it felt as real as it gets!
That day I decided that despite all the concerns over which teachers should be allowed to carry and what might go wrong if teachers carry, THIS professor was in favor of teachers carrying in the classroom!
I plead the 5th regarding whether or not I now carry illegally as necessary, but...
Please read, respond, and make constructive criticisms on the ideas in the article below.
Newt Gingrich: After the Florida shootings, here's a practical proposal to protect our children
Wednesday’s tragic attack at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida is a deeply painful reminder of how much we have failed to honestly confront the problem of school shootings in America.
Putting up “Gun-Free Zone” signs is not a solution. It is an act of self-deception. By definition, the determined killers carry their guns past the signs. They are not slowed down for one second by community sentiment.
The current strategies of responding to a violent threat by either freezing students in place or accelerating student evacuation both carry seeds of disaster. Freezing the students in place simply sets them up to be killed methodically by a brutal, evil or mentally ill person. Having them flee may lead them to run right into the path of the killer.
In “Day of Wrath,” a novel by Bill Forstchen, there is a vivid description of how dangerous our current school policies are in setting up the innocent to be killed. In this stunning depiction of a methodical radical Islamist assault targeting American schools, the moral and intellectual dead-end of the current policies is made clear.
America is not going to become gun-free. Firearm-specific bans, such as bans on semi-automatic rifles, won’t have an impact because the majority of mass shootings in the United States are committed with semi-automatic handguns.
In fact, the deadliest school shooting in our history, in April 2007 at Virginia Tech, was committed with handguns. Therefore, the danger of evil, insane or politically-religiously motivated people killing the innocent will remain.
Mental health-focused “solutions” are incompatible with civil liberties. America is not going to adopt laws to apprehend or restrict every person who might become dangerous. That would trap hundreds or even thousands of innocent people to try to stop the few truly deranged, dangerous people. Each killer’s threat is much more obvious after the killings.
After each wave of killings, we wring our hands, say strong words and do little.
The fact is, evil people with guns must be stopped by good people with guns.
Furthermore, the faster good people can respond, the fewer innocent people will be killed.
Every school in America should have several teachers and administrators trained in firearms who are permitted to carry concealed weapons. The number of these “protectors of the innocent” in each school should be determined by the number of students.
Agreeing to serve in this role might be encouraged with an appropriate monthly stipend. After all, in Georgia, teachers who agree to serve as coaches are paid stipends ranging from $150 to as much as $400 (and sometimes more for large football programs). Surely, we can afford to provide this type of incentive to people who want to help protect our children.
Because these protectors would have concealed weapons and not be in uniform, would-be killers would have no idea who might be capable of ending their threat by ending them.
This idea is the same principle behind the Federal Air Marshal Service, which was rapidly expanded after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The marshals provide countervailing force to stop terrorists.
Furthermore, because air marshals are unidentifiable (they wear plain clothes and their weapons are concealed), would-be terrorists don’t have a target to attack first.
If we are really serious about protecting our children, we must have trained and equipped protectors prepared to handle this type of situation whenever there are school activities. The Parkland school had an armed officer assigned to the campus, but the officer never encountered the shooter and was not able to respond in time.
Dramatically increasing the presence of uniformed, visibly-armed security guards, however, might create an environment ill-suited for learning.
Instead, teachers and administrators serving as protectors could complement and support the dedicated officer or security personnel who are already serving in many schools.
This combination of using uniformed police officers to handle standard school security challenges – while also having responsible adult protectors who are already going to be working in the school prepared to provide additional force in the case of a catastrophic emergency, like a mass shooting – is the most effective and practical way to protect our children.
Newt Gingrich is a Fox News contributor. A Republican, he was speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999. Follow him on Twitter @NewtGingrich. His latest book is "Understanding Trump."
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2018...actical-proposal-to-protect-our-children.html (accessed 2/19/18).
Some lib-tards are crying that prayer is not enough. I believe prayer is THE MOST powerful action a human can take; however, it is seldom the ONLY action we should take. Below is a article by Newt in which he recommends the very action I have advocated for nearly a decade.
By the way, I have something like personal experience in a school shooting situation. I was teaching a college class one evening when a series of shots thundered over my lecture. It was a spring semester evening class; thus, it was about 7 PM, still light out, but the only people on campus were me and my students, one other professor and his students, a low-level administrator, and our security agent, who was armed only with a radio.
The shots kept hammering the silence. The administrator opened my door in a panic. His eyes were like dinner plates stuck to his face. He said, "We have an active shooter situation! Follow the training! Have the students huddle in a safe corner! Lock and barricade the door! Turn off the lights!"
Then he scurried away. I did what he said because it was the best plan in that situation. WHAT TOTALLY SUCKED WAS THAT because I am a law-abiding citizen and gun owner, MY FAITHFUL 1911 that was my carry weapon at the time WAS LOCKED IN MY GLOVE BOX IN MY CAR!
We were SITTING DUCKS! My students were terrified. Most were crying and texting. I was frightened, but I was also PISSED! I knew that if my faithful 1911 had been in my possession, then I could have killed the SOB shooter the second he entered my classroom and before he got off a shot!
But my 1911 was in my car because of the !@#%&*$ law! And now, I and my students might die because I obeyed the law. I was far more PISSED than frightened, but I had plenty of both emotions running through my veins.
After 17 super-tense minutes with shots ringing out all around us, multiple police cars arrived. We knew it because the flashing blue lights flashed even through the drawn shades in the room. The shooting stopped. We waited what seemed like hours for some sort of news. Finally, the administrator knocked on the door and identified himself in a loud voice. He announced that the police had apprehended 2 boys who were shooting their rifles on the adjacent lot.
In hindsight, we were in no danger. But I lived through an active shooter lock-down, and it felt as real as it gets!
That day I decided that despite all the concerns over which teachers should be allowed to carry and what might go wrong if teachers carry, THIS professor was in favor of teachers carrying in the classroom!
I plead the 5th regarding whether or not I now carry illegally as necessary, but...
Please read, respond, and make constructive criticisms on the ideas in the article below.
Newt Gingrich: After the Florida shootings, here's a practical proposal to protect our children
Wednesday’s tragic attack at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida is a deeply painful reminder of how much we have failed to honestly confront the problem of school shootings in America.
Putting up “Gun-Free Zone” signs is not a solution. It is an act of self-deception. By definition, the determined killers carry their guns past the signs. They are not slowed down for one second by community sentiment.
The current strategies of responding to a violent threat by either freezing students in place or accelerating student evacuation both carry seeds of disaster. Freezing the students in place simply sets them up to be killed methodically by a brutal, evil or mentally ill person. Having them flee may lead them to run right into the path of the killer.
In “Day of Wrath,” a novel by Bill Forstchen, there is a vivid description of how dangerous our current school policies are in setting up the innocent to be killed. In this stunning depiction of a methodical radical Islamist assault targeting American schools, the moral and intellectual dead-end of the current policies is made clear.
America is not going to become gun-free. Firearm-specific bans, such as bans on semi-automatic rifles, won’t have an impact because the majority of mass shootings in the United States are committed with semi-automatic handguns.
In fact, the deadliest school shooting in our history, in April 2007 at Virginia Tech, was committed with handguns. Therefore, the danger of evil, insane or politically-religiously motivated people killing the innocent will remain.
Mental health-focused “solutions” are incompatible with civil liberties. America is not going to adopt laws to apprehend or restrict every person who might become dangerous. That would trap hundreds or even thousands of innocent people to try to stop the few truly deranged, dangerous people. Each killer’s threat is much more obvious after the killings.
After each wave of killings, we wring our hands, say strong words and do little.
The fact is, evil people with guns must be stopped by good people with guns.
Furthermore, the faster good people can respond, the fewer innocent people will be killed.
Every school in America should have several teachers and administrators trained in firearms who are permitted to carry concealed weapons. The number of these “protectors of the innocent” in each school should be determined by the number of students.
Agreeing to serve in this role might be encouraged with an appropriate monthly stipend. After all, in Georgia, teachers who agree to serve as coaches are paid stipends ranging from $150 to as much as $400 (and sometimes more for large football programs). Surely, we can afford to provide this type of incentive to people who want to help protect our children.
Because these protectors would have concealed weapons and not be in uniform, would-be killers would have no idea who might be capable of ending their threat by ending them.
This idea is the same principle behind the Federal Air Marshal Service, which was rapidly expanded after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. The marshals provide countervailing force to stop terrorists.
Furthermore, because air marshals are unidentifiable (they wear plain clothes and their weapons are concealed), would-be terrorists don’t have a target to attack first.
If we are really serious about protecting our children, we must have trained and equipped protectors prepared to handle this type of situation whenever there are school activities. The Parkland school had an armed officer assigned to the campus, but the officer never encountered the shooter and was not able to respond in time.
Dramatically increasing the presence of uniformed, visibly-armed security guards, however, might create an environment ill-suited for learning.
Instead, teachers and administrators serving as protectors could complement and support the dedicated officer or security personnel who are already serving in many schools.
This combination of using uniformed police officers to handle standard school security challenges – while also having responsible adult protectors who are already going to be working in the school prepared to provide additional force in the case of a catastrophic emergency, like a mass shooting – is the most effective and practical way to protect our children.
Newt Gingrich is a Fox News contributor. A Republican, he was speaker of the United States House of Representatives from 1995 to 1999. Follow him on Twitter @NewtGingrich. His latest book is "Understanding Trump."
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2018...actical-proposal-to-protect-our-children.html (accessed 2/19/18).
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