I know our first instinct is "We must find a way to stop this" but (as pessimistic as this is going to sound), I don't see any way to prevent this type of incident. You can lock all the doors, place an armed guard at the door, etc. It won't stop someone from shooting that guard first, then breaking a window to get inside.

There are a lot more precautions in place than there used to be. Schools do lockdown drills regularly. There is more security in place in most places than there was before Columbine.

I looked up some statistics, and an average of six children die daily in traffic accidents. Yes, things like Columbine and Sandy Hook are tragic. My heart hurts for the parents, siblings, grandparents and especially the children. I'm not minimizing how awful this was. But it is a rare event. Thank goodness it is a rare event, but it is a rare event. And we probably can't prevent it, without turning schools into prison like environments.

I completely agree. However, if criminals knew that schools had security guards or something of the like, maybe it would stop them from trying to shoot up schools. Criminals pick security free zones to commit crimes because everyone is defenseless.

I just came across this "how to help Newtown" page on abc7. Sharing for anyone who's interested.
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?se...rbs&id=8923497

Most of the criminals in school shootings have been active students with an ax to grind. We don't know why the Newtown shooter did this. I read that he destroyed all of the computers in the house so they have forensics specialists retrieving data to see if there is any clue to motive there. We may never know, but I suspect strongly, in this case, if there had been a security guard, the guard just would have been the first one shot.

This is pretty sombering but I found this list:

http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0777958.html

Thank you so much for sharing this.

The following was posted by Pema Chodron, quoting her own teacher Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche, in response to Sandy Hook:

Dear friends - I'm deeply saddened by the recent tragedy in Connecticut. My teacher Dzigar Kongtrul Rinpoche expressed my own sentiments perfectly, so I'd like to share them with you:

"This is the most incomprehensible tragedy of insanity. There is no way to even begin to understand what has happened. We can only sit with the overwhelming sadness and loss of the innocent. The guardian of humanity could not have to face anything more grave than losing the young unopened buds that were on their way to bloom. We pray that some relief may come in this time of loss and to the broken hearts of the parents, family members, and our countrymen and women. This kind of tragedy is happening way too often in our country, where only a few miles away in Canada, it is a rare occurrence. I join my palms in prayer for America to find a positive resolution to this problem."

Another great article along with suggestions as to how to make it more difficult for these mass murders to occur without revoking the 2nd amendment:

http://www.sfgate.com/opinion/openfo...es-4125553.php

Would you be willing to tell every school in the country to trade one teacher for a security guard and just make it work?

It's not as if suddenly schools are going to get free money to make something like that happen, so such a thing would come at the cost of fewer teachers or cuts elsewhere and it's really questionable whether a security guard would be an effective deterrent.

The media is in hysterics about this thing. These sorts of shootings are actually on a very steep decline. Go look at the statistics, school shootings are about half as common as they were 20 years go.

Not much of an article really, just a BS emotional appeal from someone who was shot by a total sociopath. Of course there's not one single thing he proposed which would have prevented that crazy SOB from walking up that driveway and shooting him and his wife and his friend.

I hate that we're all still seriously talking about this "need" of reform. We don't need to do jack squat. At least not immediately. Laws made directly in the wake of emotional events typically aren't well thought out or even needed.

These types of shootings are becoming more rare, not more common and saying that the NRA has blood on its hands is just silly.

Those of you on the East and West coast probably don't really understand. You call 911 and typically, if it's a real emergency, you don't have to wait very long for the police to arrive.

Out here in the sticks, it's quite a bit different. Even if you live in a fairly dense place like Oklahoma County, if you live in an unincorporated part of the county or in a town which doesn't have the money for its own police station (we have those) a sheriff could be a good couple of hours away--more if he's otherwise occupied when you call. That's not much comfort when someone is trying to kick in your back door and your nearest neighbor is a half-mile away.

Moving away from the Gun Control debate for a moment to reflect back on the victims and survivors, and how their Greek affiliations are working to support them at this time.

Lauren Rousseau, a substitute teach at Sandy Hook, was a member of Pi Beta Phi (Connecticut Alpha chapter). A scholarship has been set up in her name through Pi Beta Phi Foundation. Donate here.

Kappa Kappa Gamma was affected in several ways. First, a Kappa lost a son in the tragedy. In addition, a surviving teacher at Sandy Hook is a Kappa. Finally, one of the teachers that was killed is the cousin of a Kappa husband. Kappa is collecting condolence cards for these families, info here.

Finally, a member of Beta Theta Pi lost his precious 6 year old daughter, Caroline. His chapter brothers are working to raise $100,000 to endow a Beta scholarship in little Caroline's name. Info here.

There may be more Greek connections than just these three, and my apologies for any unintended omissions. I learned of these through T_witter.

One of my husband's coworkers is a Newtown native. He drove home Friday night, feeling the need to be home. He shares his thoughts in today's paper: http://thetimes-tribune.com/news/com...ries-1.1418060

Delta Chi alumnus Dean Pinto's son Jack was killed as well. Jack idolized NY Giant Victor Cruz who put Jack's name on his cleats and gloves: http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/12/17/...ewtown-victim/

Press release from University of New Haven: http://www.newhaven.edu/485194/

That may be our first instinct, but it's the wrong question, I think. You're right that we can never "stop" things like this. The better question is "are we doing all we can to prevent these incidents from happening."

I don't know about that. I think history just might support the idea that sometimes those emotional events are what prompt people in power into actually doing something. The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory was a direct catalyst for workplace safety laws. The Selma to Montgomery marches, and particularly the violence in Selma, was a catalyst for the passage of the Voting Rights Act (which LBJ sent to Congress just ten days after Selma).

I agree that haste isn't advisable. But the truth is that there is a window in which discussion are more likely to happen. Strike will the iron is hot and all.

What this means may be a matter of perspective. I agree that the evidence seems to show that mass killings overall have been in decline in recent years. But just in 2012, we've had Aurora, Oak Creek, WI, Minneapolis and now Newtown. To me, that means (1) they're not rare enough and (2) we're not doing all we can to reduce them more.

It's a matter of perspective, but comparing the Shirtwaist Factory or the incidents in the South during the civil rights era isn't a very apt comparison. Consider that while not routine, school shootings are something which have reoccurred many times going back to colonial times (of course these days, our deaths are not usually caused by marauding native war bands). While tragic, this has happened before many many times and regardless of what laws you pass, it'll happen again.

If you're going to consider new legislation, there needs to be a weighing of cost vs. benefit. There's a strong argument to be made that finding any benefit whatsoever is tricky to impossible.

Exploiting tragedy to score political points.

It's not disputable that 2012 has been an exceptionally bad year, but it is nowhere close to what we used to see 20 years ago. We passed gun legislation back then. How many deaths were prevented by the Clinton "assault weapons" ban?

Sometimes. Sometimes, it's responding to events by doing the right thing, doing what's in society's best interests. Sometimes it's saying "Enough already! We can't stop them all, but we'll stop the ones we can."

Actually, the figures I have seen put the number of incidents just a little lower than where it was 20 years ago, with the spike being about 10 years ago, and with the number of victims being about the same if not a little higher than 20 years ago.

As for the assualt weapons ban, it's true things were no better when it was in place. Was that because a ban by nature is ineffective, or was it because that ban was riddled with holes and exceptions and perhaps targeted the wrong things (the weapons themselves rather than the ammunition)? Experts can and do disagree on that.

In any event, I think most of us in this thread have been pretty clear that we don't think "banning guns" is the answer, and that the discussion and action we think needs to happen involves a whole lot more than guns.

I never quoted the Bible, a book I see as merely a nice novel with some possibly historical roots. I said "creator-given" -- because that's what our founding documents say -- "...endowed by their creator with ..." in conjunction with the Bill of Rights. -- which codify an innate right.

Yes, speculation and misinformation are still abundant. We simply do not know the specifics yet, and those of us in the general populace may never know.

First, you have it on your person - concealed or openly, in a secure holster, which means with the trigger guard covered.
Second - you teach children not to touch. Like a hot stove, or a fireplace.
And third - you may not get to it fast enough. You may see some killed before your eyes. But not dozens. (Colorado shooting was different; I'm not sure anyone could have stopped that, but then, no one had a chance to try.)
I believe that if I can stop one, or TRY to, I've done right. That takes training, mental preparation, and familiarity with the equipment.

Yes. That's what I meant by my abbreviated comments above.

Accidents happen, yes. But seldom when the rules of safety are followed. Training and practice are critical.


To all -- thank you. This is a solid, respectful dialog with little of the hate and vitriol that have been seen in previous discussions on this board. I, for one, truly appreciate it.

So, basically, you're saying let's not do anything at all to at least try to prevent these types of things from happening? I know you always like to play devil's advocate, but I think you're being completely abrasive and insensitive. What happened on Friday is a huge tragedy....probably bigger than anything we've seen in years in that 20 innocent children are being loaded into tiny little coffins. Luckily, it seems the majority of people disagree with you. Politicians who once received high ratings from the NRA are coming around to the idea of serious reform. Will it prevent these instances from happening every single time? No. But it hopefully will make it a little more difficult for a maniac to commit this type of crime. I don't understand how anyone could advocate not doing anything at all just because it won't prevent every instance.

You should look at my location indicator and know that I have some personal experience in this area. I drive by the OKC bombing memorial several times a day, office 3-4 blocks as the crow flies from there and actually heard and felt that blast, not to mention knowing some of the victims. My heart goes out to the victims of this tragedy, but I'm not going to support emotional legislation because that's what some think is apparently the sensitive and non-abrasive thing to do. For the record, I think the rulemaking going on right now with regard to ammonium nitrate sales is ridiculous.

Define "serious" reform. In my memory, every reform we've had over recent years has been an expansion of gun rights and every "serious" reform as noted by MC, was worked around by the gun industry so quickly that its effect was negligible.

Okay, let's look at this case, what law would prevent someone from stealing weapons from their mother who lawfully possessed those weapons? The SOB broke multiple laws doing what he did. That really didn't seem to matter much to him.

In reality, any sort of restrictions are going to make it harder on that family in some rural Oklahoma county from being able to defend itself when someone is trying to break in through the back door at 3 in the morning.

I'll readily admit that I'm not very well-versed in all things gun related, so this may be a silly question...

I thought I heard something on the news about Adam attempting to purchase a gun, but being denied. When that happens, is there any kind of communication required to take place between the gun store and some kind of officials? I mean, if a guy attempts to buy a gun and is denied, does the store notify local police of the attempted purchase?

I don't deny that you have sympathy for the OKC victims, but saying you have "personal experience" as to how Newtown people feel just because you're from OK is a poor example. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but the way you worded it really rubbed me the wrong way. It's like my friends from Florida (or me since I'm from FL) saying stuff like, "Oh, I'm from Florida so I know how the victims of Hurricane Sandy or Katrina feel." No. Their homes were never destroyed, their loved ones never died. Just because they've been through a hurricane or two doesn't mean that they have "personal experience" in that area.

So we shouldn't at least attempt to discuss anything because we've failed in the past?

As I said before, any kind of reform won't prevent every single crime from occurring. Let's say we enact reform that limited the amount of firearms a single person could purchase in a year. Or limited the amount of rounds of ammunition the firearm can hold. Or some kind of mental health act was enacted. Right there we may have prevented VA Tech, Aurora and Tucson. May have being the keywords. I'm not saying it would have prevented it, but I don't see why we don't at least try. We owe it to the victims and their families to at least try to keep this from happening instead of throwing up our hands and saying, "Welp, we've never been successful in the past so let's just do nothing at all."

I have a child who is not much younger than those little children who died on Friday. I'm passionate about this because I see him in this tragedy...and it's scary.

Yes the FBI and ATF have access to the application records of anyone attempting to purchase a firearm in this country. As far as I know there is two week waiting period in CT to purchase a firearm. That is so the background check and application to purchase a firearm can be processed. This douche shouldn't have been able to buy a firearm because he was only 20 BUT he tried to purchase it with his older brothers ID. There's not much reporting on why he was denied on the spot.. maybe the store owner realized he was using a fake ID or the guy seemed "off".

I don't think we should arm teachers but I don't see why more school districts don't have their own uniformed police force or at least one or two armed guards patrolling the grounds. Funding shouldn't be an issue either; If we can pull $10 billion dollars out of our ass to buy fighter jets for Egypt and Libya we should be able to afford security to our own citizens.

I heard the blast, felt the blast, knew victims, my father was in a courtroom in which the windows imploded into the courtroom. Our community lost the children in the daycare, so empathy. I don't really care how you feel about what I'm saying, (lack of empathy) my point is that empathy is a dumb reason to write laws which are really solutions in search of problems.

His chances of being struck by lightening or killed by a shark are exponentially higher than being shot at grade school. Creating strict new laws in response to this is like trying to swat a fly with an H-bomb.

Ok. I'm done with you.

For the love of Christ, having children does not give you magical insight here. In fact, it makes you a lot less objective about things. You're obviously very emotionally connected to this tragedy, so maybe, perhaps, you're not in the best place to be calling for changing the rules for everyone else. This year, there were 40 killings overall, which is probably an aberration considering last year there were 8.

Something which affects 8 to 40 out of 300 million people is not a good reason to spend billions on heightened security, regulations, etc. Especially when our previous experience is that none of those things help.

Heck, this school had just substantially upgraded its security. Would you suggest that this single incident is a reason to have metal detectors and security guards and bulletproof doors at every elementary school in the U.S.?

This, I think, is where the rub comes in. I'll absolutely agree that empathy and sympathy are not the reasons to write laws.

But I don't think anyone is in search of a problem. There is without question a problem, and it is not in the least off the mark to discuss what can reasonably be done to make it less of a problem.

Not every suggestion will be reasonable. Not every suggestion will be feasible. Not every suggestion will be effective. That's no reason not to have the discussion.

Kevin, the problem with your statistics is that they only take into account school violence, but most of the mass shootings this year and last have not been at schools but at malls, homes, places of worship and other non-school related locals.

Michigan Governor Rick Snyder has vetoed the bill the Michigan legislature passed in the middle of the night (Thursday night/Friday morning) before their last session of the year. The bill specifically allowed concealed carry in day cares, schools and churches. It had been passed just hours before the Sandy Hook shooting.

Never said it did. My problem is that you can't seem to make a point without coming off as a condescending douche. See above as an example. Hence, I was done.

Exactly.

FYP. I actually know people who are poor enough that if they want to eat meat, they have to put it on the table themselves. Yes the start-up cost is more, buying the weapon especially, but once you do, it's cheaper on a pound for pound basis to eat game, especially if you do your own butchering. Granted these type of people aren't the norm, and most people who hunt do it purely for sport. But sustenance hunting is not yet completely gone in the US, especially in Rural areas.

I do not know your situation so I won't comment on it specifically, but many people who carry a firearm for defense have no substantial chance that they will be in a life or death situation that requires a firearm.
And here is where things get tricky. First off, the Bill of Rights was written to restrict the power of the federal government, not the state governments. Second it is argueable that the right to keep and bear arms is restricted to what is need to maintain a militia. Discussion of the Second Amendment is difficult because a militia in the sense that it existed in the several states before federation does not exist any more. Keeping that in mind, there have been legal opinions issued stating that the right to keep and bear arms only applies to military duties as part of the militia.

Here's my 2 cents:
1-any gun for private ownership should have to be reloaded after 6 shots.
2-a person should only be able to buy a limited amount of ammo at one time. Yes, they could stock pile it, but that would mean they'd have time to think if this plan is really a good one, and maybe reconsider. If you have to take out 9 boxes of ammo to go hunting, you might want to try lessons before hunting again.
3-any idea that legislating for slight (lightning strike) situations is ridiculous. Airplanes are legislated at every stage and upon every accident. 1 failed shoe bomb equals you have to take off your shoes for every flight (stolen from interweb, but it's true). Children killed while at school is WAY more common than bombs on airplanes and yet anyone who travels knows how many crazy steps we have to go through because of a lightning strike threat.
4-being sympathetic about one civil tragedy doesn't let you off the hook of the rest. The OKC bombing was a terrible thing. Lucky for you it didn't involve guns so you don't have to feel bad about anybody else being a victim of gun violence.
5-mental healthcare reform has to be an element of the change that needs to happen in our society. Reagan's biggest legacy is when he dismantled the mental health institutions because apparently people enjoyed living in nuthouses and took advantage.
6-teaching civility and conflict resolution has to be another thing changed in our society. Would it solve anything? No. Would it help? I believe it would.

I imagine the two armed robbers breaking in to my house at 0300 would agree. Or the team of 3 who rob my bank while I'm in line. Would they limit themselves?

Can you explain how one would practice? It's difficult enough to practice with "range ammo" (ball, full metal jacket, for health reasons at indoor ranges) and know that the self-defense ammo one carries (ball ammo is more dangerous as it is more likely to go through the target and cause additional damages) shoots differently.

I regularly shoot 150-300 rounds at the range. That's how I know I could hit what I must, when I must.

Bringing in TSA procedures hardly helps anyone's argument. An example of another government bureaucracy four times as large as it needs to be to provide the essential (debatable, but that's another post) service.

The worst school incident -- a bombing in Bath Township, MI, in 1927 -- didn't involve guns. It, too, killed elementary-school children.

Conflict resolution, yes. But also individual responsibility.

And reality. One cannot go through life believing one is just as good as the next guy at everything. Self-esteem is important, but everyone has strengths and weaknesses; those who never learn that never learn interdependence and often build resentments against those who excel at something.

"Those who do not learn from the past, are doomed to repeat it!"

Ive researched this and know its not the exact quote from George Santanya, but it definitely fits this situation.

Regardsless of the laws, and creator given rights, evil is evil and the biggest question no one had been able to answer yet is Why? Why did this person at this time decide to do what they did?

The bad part is that in this case we will never know for sure as the guy killed himself and so anything the investigators find is purely conjecture, and speculative.

I don't even know why this discussion went past 10 posts. Dude is a piece of shit who shot up some kids. Unfortunately, this dumb shit will happen again, probably in less than a year. Are they going to change the gun laws? No, because there is too much money involved, and if they did, all that would do is make it more difficult for folks like you and me who want to protect their cribs, to get the guns. The criminals are going to get the guns regardless. What they need to do is make the laws (as far as punishment goes) more harsh. Fuck a mental institution, start putting mofos out of their misery.

[QUOTE=badgeguy;2194135Regardsless of the laws, and creator given rights, evil is evil and the biggest question no one had been able to answer yet is Why? Why did this person at this time decide to do what they did?

The bad part is that in this case we will never know for sure as the guy killed himself and so anything the investigators find is purely conjecture, and speculative.[/QUOTE]

You're right. The closest we can get is the sad acceptance that at some time we will observe the raw face of evil.

I've read the thread and agree that more has to be done -- we've seen four of these types of atrocites in 2012 alone. That's enough of a pattern for me.

The problem is probably more on the mental health side, but it's the guns that escalate the carnage.

So what to do? Personally, I don't think assault-style weapons should be allowed outside the military.

-renew assault weapons ban
-close gun show loopholes
-limit/eliminate high capacity automatic clips.

let's start with that.

I'm not saying I disagree, but what about criminals obtaining weapons on the black market? You can't stop that.

This just means that Kevin, like the media, is blowing those incidents off because they didn't involve a large number of sweet innocent children, just grimy old everyday grownups, and are therefore unimportant.

Thank you for giving me a good jumping off point for me to vent what is really chapping my hide about the coverage of this story. The references to "20 angels" are particularly unfeeling and offensive to the friends and family of the 6 adults that were killed.

I agree with you. Law enforcement will always have to be on the front lines of this multi-faceted attack.

But logic suggests that some % of black market acquisitions were originally legally purchased (and later stolen, lost, etc.). If we can find ways lessen the numbers of these types of weapons that exist, we lessen the numbers that fall into black market circulation/use.

there still isn't really a viable statistic for these kinds of incidents, since they are so rare. But this recent trend of rampages, especially by persons that appeared to have had mental disturbances is really alarming. In the wake of this horrible tragedy, I sure hope mental health finally comes to the forefront of public discussion, and something is done to help those who need help in a better way than what we have, which isn't much. I think it's even more important than gun control, although there should be some amends there as well

As has been said before though, an open discussion is not going to happen because people are too protective of their sacred cows. We don't trust teachers enough to let them form unions, yet we want them armed? Really?

Who would be paying for the teachers' guns and licenses? If a teacher is in an "armed" school, can s/he opt out? Can a parent opt out of his/her child being in an "armed" classroom?

#RandomThoughts

What I think would be a good possible solution would be for there to be a member of the local law enforcement at all schools, and for that matter other soft targets like movie theathers. Of course that brings concerns of a police state, so *shrugs*