Another School shooting at a Texas elementary school

[AgnosticBoy]

(CNN)An 18-year-old gunman on Tuesday fatally shot 18 children and an adult at a Texas elementary school before he was killed by law enforcement officers, officials said.
The shooter -- identified by Texas officials as Salvador Ramos, of Uvalde -- also shot his grandmother before going to the school, three law enforcement sources told CNN. State Sen. Roland Gutierrez told CNN the grandmother was airlifted to San Antonio and "is still holding on," according to information he was given by the Texas Rangers.

The gunman is believed to have acted alone, Uvalde Consolidated Independent School District Police Chief Pete Arredondo said.

The shooting was the deadliest at an elementary school since the Sandy Hook massacre in Connecticut in 2012 that left 26 people dead, including 20 children between 6 and 7 years old.

Source: CNN

Reading this story of yet another school shooting really ticks me off. What ticks me off even more is the likelihood that partisan politicians will not solve this problem. You'll have one side wanting to ban all guns and another side just wanting to allow guns with little to no restrictions.

For debate:
- Is there a way to stop school shootings? Can it happen without banning guns?

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Here's an old debate on Guns (this took place around the Sandy Hook Elementary school shooting):

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Of course, I expect hardline Democrats and Republicans to have different views. But what I want to see is how they will engage each other and get SOMETHING done given those differing views. Will there be any compromising? Any focus on similarities (as opposed to focusing only on the differences) AND acting on what they can agree on?

We'll see! I'm very skeptical that these partisan politicians will do anything given that they tend to be driven by money and power.

 

[2Dbunk]

- Is there a way to stop school shootings? Can it happen without banning guns?

No. Automatic and semi-automatic rifles should be banned, but here's a suggestion that I'm sure the NRA would highly approve:

1. If parents have but one child, the child should be home-schooled!
2. If parents have more than one child, they should send each child to a different school. That way, the percentages are better that some of them will return home from school in one given day.
3. Of course, home-schooling could be an option to the second suggestion, but it is important that the guns of the parents and children are locked-up before the lessons begin.

Kudos for Beto O'rourke for getting into Gov. Abbotts face yesterday! If I lived in Texas, he'd have my vote. If he runs for president in 2024, he will get my vote!

 

[AgnosticBoy]

No. Automatic and semi-automatic rifles should be banned

Your view should be taken seriously by both sides because we already ban a lot of high powered weapons, like rocket launchers. If there was any middle ground position between banning and allowing, then one solution would be to make these weapons harder to get. In some states, it's easier to get an assault rifle than a handgun. That's totally unreasonable.

1. If parents have but one child, the child should be home-schooled!
2. If parents have more than one child, they should send each child to a different school. That way, the percentages are better that some of them will return home from school in one given day.
3. Of course, home-schooling could be an option to the second suggestion, but it is important that the guns of the parents and children are locked-up before the lessons begin.

As much as the NRA would love to offer those solutions over banning guns, they would also know that none of the above items would get any votes.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Here are some more interesting and recent gun debates on CNN and Fox News:

AND

 

[TracyRN]

I feel for the parents of these kids having to go through the loss. We send our kids to school as part of our routine, never imagining that they won't come back alive for whatever reason.

Here in Florida we have red flag laws that allows law enforcement to take away the guns of those who become a threat. Our local news stations have reported that this law has been used thousands of times in Florida. Taking away the guns of someone who becomes dangerous has probably saved hundreds of lives.

Texas does not have any red flag laws and I say shame on them for not having one given that it is a gun friendly state. The leaders are responsible for this mass shooting.

Local NBC media station

Texas does not currently have a red flag law, which generally allows law enforcement or family to petition a judge to remove someone’s guns for a period of time if that person is deemed to be a danger to themselves or others.

“Red Flag laws I think would be important to understand when someone sends a signal that they’re about to do something violent that we address that right away,” Texas Rep. Vikki Goodwin (D-47), who is on the Homeland Security and Public Safety committee, said. Goodwin told KXAN she has requested for the committee to meet before the regular legislative session to once again address gun violence in Texas after a mass shooting.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Welcome back, Tracy.

Yes, red flag laws are a start. Those laws should be nationalized, but I doubt even that will start all mass shootings, although nothing is perfect, anyways.

I feel for the parents of these kids having to go through the loss. We send our kids to school as part of our routine, never imagining that they won't come back alive for whatever reason.

An even more damning news is that the Texas school shooter was in the building at 11:30am, but was not taken out until 12:50pm. Apparently, the police were on the scene minutes later, but they did not engage the shooter immediately and that cost even more lives. Kids inside the classroom where the gunman was shooting were still alive and calling 911 all WHILE officers were outside the classroom.

That mistake is reported by MSNBC here:

And you can hear it from the mouth of Texas law enforcement (very damning):

(first 2 or 3 minutes of this video)...

 

[TracyRN]

Welcome back, Tracy.

Thank you, I read you guys posts here and there.

And you can hear it from the mouth of Texas law enforcement (very damning):

(first 2 or 3 minutes of this video)...

I saw the full press conference and it was disgraceful. There has to be accountability.

 

[2Dbunk]

2Dbunk said:
1. If parents have but one child, the child should be home-schooled!
2. If parents have more than one child, they should send each child to a different school. That way, the percentages are better that some of them will return home from school in one given day.
3. Of course, home-schooling could be an option to the second suggestion, but it is important that the guns of the parents and children are locked-up before the lessons begin.

From AB's post #5

As much as the NRA would love to offer those solutions over banning guns, they would also know that none of the above items would get any votes.

I hope you understand that those three suggestions I listed were tongue-in-cheek. I was trying to hi-lite the absurdity of this argument.

I was trained as an engineer -- engineers solve technical problems for a livelihood; this is as much a technical problem as it is social. To approach it from the social problem POV would be akin to collecting and sifting through clouds of flatulence for potential shooters (which Republican lawmakers aren't about to fund in ANY case). The engineering solution is to take away the one HARD ingredient in mass slayings: automatic and semi-automatic guns, pure and simple!

 

[AgnosticBoy]

I hope you understand that those three suggestions I listed were tongue-in-cheek. I was trying to hi-lite the absurdity of this argument.

I figured that you weren't being literal about those suggestions being offered.

I was trained as an engineer -- engineers solve technical problems for a livelihood; this is as much a technical problem as it is social. To approach it from the social problem POV would be akin to collecting and sifting through clouds of flatulence for potential shooters (which Republican lawmakers aren't about to fund in ANY case). The engineering solution is to take away the one HARD ingredient in mass slayings: automatic and semi-automatic guns, pure and simple!

While a lot of the focus after school shooting tends to be on making it harder for a mass shooter to attack schools, but we should not also forget that law-abiding citizens need an effective self-defense as well (to make it harder for the criminals to victimize someone).

I won't presume that you want all guns banned, but only the semi and fully auto types so allow me to make a point about self-defense tactics and effectiveness. I'd be all for banning the semi- and fully automatics just as long as civilians were left with something effective that they can defend themselves with, something that doesn't require close contact, something that can neutralize a threat while minimizing injury to themselves (the victim). A fist fight or knife fight won't help because the victim has to be in close contact, and if it's a woman or lady, or even the weaker male, then the victim will definitely get injured, or killed even.

If the gun is slow to operate (which will be the case if it's not semi-automatic, e.g muskets?), if you miss the shot, the suspect has a chance to attack in between that ONE shot, or one shot may not be enough to stop him. That's especially the case if there are multiple criminals involved.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Here's a template for bipartisanship... An example of bipartisan backed gun laws passed in Florida

From a Washington Post article...

Florida Republicans beat the gun lobby. Congress hasn’t followed. By Mike Debonis

“No matter the cause of violence and no matter the cost on the families,” Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Thursday, “nothing seems to move them.”

But that broadside wasn’t entirely accurate: Not long ago, GOP lawmakers bucked ferocious pressure from the National Rifle Association to pass significant new gun restrictions after a deadly school shooting, which were then signed into law by a fiercely conservative Republican.

It just didn’t happen in Washington.

Three weeks after 17 people were gunned down in 2018 inside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., then-Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) signed into law a bill that included provisions banning weapons sales to those younger than 21, imposing a three-day waiting period on most long-gun purchases, and creating a “red flag” law allowing authorities to confiscate weapons from people deemed to constitute a public threat.

The NRA’s powerful leader in the state, Marion P. Hammer, condemned Republicans backing the bill as “betrayers.” But 75 out of 99 GOP lawmakers voted for it anyway, and Scott — who was preparing to seek a U.S. Senate seat — signed it, calling the bill full of “common-sense solutions.” Other provisions of the bill included $400 million for mental health and school security programs, and an initiative, fiercely opposed by Democrats, that would allow teachers and school staff to be trained as armed “guardians.”

Former state representative Jared Moskowitz, a Democrat who led the push in Tallahassee to pass the bill, recalled on Friday some conversations he had immediately following the Parkland attack: “There’s no way Rick Scott is raising the age to 21. The NRA is opposing it. They’re threatening Republican members. These guys are all A-rated. Marion Hammer is the strongest NRA lobbyist in the country. No way, no way, no way is it going to happen,” he said. “And then it happened.”

In a different political reality, what worked in Florida — a huge center-right state that is often seen as a bellwether of national political trends — might well be seen as a template for a national compromise to address mass acts of gun violence, such as Tuesday’s shooting in Uvalde, Texas.

Most Florida Democrats, meanwhile, did not consider the bill a victory — at least, not at first. It did not include a blanket assault-weapons ban or a proposed moratorium on the sales of AR-type semiautomatic rifles, as parents and students wanted. And it included the “guardian” program, which allowed individual counties to decide whether to allow school staff to receive security training and carry guns.

Moskowitz had to argue passionately in the closing phase of the debate to convince enough Democrats that the perfect could not be the enemy of the good. Now, he said, the guardian program has become well-accepted, even in more liberal counties.

A few Democrats, including Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), have started pointing to the Florida bill as an example of gun laws that work — particularly the “red flag” component, which has kept guns out of the hands of nearly 6,000 troubled Floridians since it was first implemented.

Asked whether he would be willing to grant Republicans concessions, such as arming teachers or “hardening” school facilities, Blumenthal did not rule it out: “I’m always in favor of using honey rather than vinegar,” he said, so long as the sweeteners “advance, not detract, from the effort to save lives.”

[emphasis added]

 

[2Dbunk]

I won't presume that you want all guns banned, but only the semi and fully auto types so allow me to make a point about self-defense tactics and effectiveness. I'd be all for banning the semi- and fully automatics just as long as civilians were left with something effective that they can defend themselves with, something that doesn't require close contact, something that can neutralize a threat while minimizing injury to themselves (the victim). A fist fight or knife fight won't help because the victim has to be in close contact, and if it's a woman or lady, or even the weaker male, then the victim will definitely get injured, or killed even.

If the gun is slow to operate (which will be the case if it's not semi-automatic, e.g muskets?), if you miss the shot, the suspect has a chance to attack in between that ONE shot, or one shot may not be enough to stop him. That's especially the case if there are multiple criminals

That is good that you don't presume.

Sleep well in your citadel.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

A good poll on how Americans feel on certain gun law proposals:

 

[2Dbunk]

Your cited FOX NEWS poll is a good start but it will never happen. NRA bribed Republicants will never vote it in!

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Your cited FOX NEWS poll is a good start but it will never happen. NRA bribed Republicants will never vote it in!

I agree with you for the most part. The only exception I see is if their power gets threatened. Some Republicans might choose power over money in this case.

The Republicans might feel threatened if polls show a high unfavorable rating (or low chance of winning an election) for their side for not doing more to prevent mass shootings.

 

[AgnosticBoy]

Another school shooting today in Nashville, Tennessee.

What I'm even more frustrated with is the typical all or nothing responses that we get from politicians. President Biden again calling for a ban on assault weapons (which includes handguns) and Republicans usually call for more guns (good guys putting out bad guys). In my view, both are extreme positions. All it takes is more regulations to prevent guns in the hands of the wrong people (those that are mentally ill, criminals, etc.). Why even mental health routine/repeated checks is not on the table is beyond me.