Let's hold our fire, give sanity a chance BY KATHLEEN PARKER : JUNE 11, 2014 : Updated: June 11, 2014 4:37pm
So much for the argument that having more people armed in public places will result in fewer gun deaths.
One of the three killed recently by a Las Vegas couple, Jerad and Amanda Miller, was an armed civilian, Joseph Wilcox. Two police officers who were also killed, Igor Soldo andAlyn Beck, were ambushed while having lunch. Seated in a booth, they had no chance to defend themselves, said witnesses.
Wilcox, 31, was inside the Walmart store when the Millers entered firing and ordering everyone to evacuate. Wilcox, who carried a gun, decided to confront the shooter, apparently unaware that Amanda was with Jerad. After he walked past her, Amanda fatally shot him.
During an ensuing gunfight with police, Amanda turned her gun on her husband and then herself. Whether they might have killed others had Wilcox not stepped forward — a decidedly brave if ill-advised maneuver — we can't know. What we do know is that a civilian, perhaps emboldened to heroism because he had a gun, is dead.
Even as we honor Wilcox appropriately, his death should give pause to any who insist that having more armed citizens is the best defense against a would-be killer. Even if one person were to stop a killer in his tracks, it is not logical to extrapolate the occasional success story as proof of the argument.
It may also be unfair to extrapolate that one failure means that having guns in civilian pockets can't ever be helpful. Having an experienced, well-trained person armed with a gun in the right place at the right time might well thwart a slaughter, but not everyone with a permit to carry meets those qualifications. Recall that the would-be hero in Tucson, Ariz. — when Rep. Gabby Giffordsand others were shot — was an armed young man who almost shot the wrong person.
Joe Zamudio unlocked the safety on the gun in his pocket, rounded the corner prepared to shoot, when he saw a man holding a gun. Thinking he was the shooter, Zamudio was seconds from shooting when he decided to slam the man into a wall rather than draw his gun, in part because he feared being mistaken as the shooter himself. It turns out that the man was holding the gun he had just wrested from the killer.
“I was very lucky,” said Zamudio of his split-second decision. As for his training? He grew up around his father's guns.
To be effective with a gun in a crisis situation requires not just instinct but training. Police officers and military forces go through extensive instruction for good reason. It isn't enough to knock a few beer cans off a fencepost or to accurately line up a deer in a rifle sight. Though Zamudio made the right call, he came close to being a cold-blooded killer himself.
The fact is, permission to carry also grants implicit permission to use the gun as one deems necessary. Essentially, we've deputized thousands of private citizens without training them. Taking a shooting class at the local firing range may improve your reflexes and aim, but it doesn't prepare you for the adrenalin-fueled intensity of real-time, close-range combat, which is what the Walmart encounter and Tucson events essentially were.
In both instances, moreover, the perpetrators were deranged and/or delusional. The Millers were so over-the-top antigovernment that they were tossed off the ranch of Cliven Bundy, the rancher who staged an armed stand-off with government agents. There's antigovernment — then there's crazy.
What does the average gun owner know about the minds of domestic terrorists? The Millers were fighting for freedom, they said. Would this include the freedom that allowed them to own guns in the first place?
But no. Freedom is for sound minds and adult dispositions. We can't weed out all the rebels looking for a cause. Nor do we delude ourselves that any but law-abiding citizens will play by the rules or that criminals will come around to lawfulness.
The sensible case isn't that we need to ban guns, as some reflexively would argue. It is that we require reasonable scrutiny of those who wish to own guns, especially to conceal-carry, and require serious training of those who possess them. Even this may be viewed by some as stepping on our Second Amendment rights, but this is an argument without a satisfactory resolution.
What say we hold our fire and give sanity a shot?
kathleenparker@washpost.com
www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/commentary/...a-chance-5545522.php
************************
My reply:
Kathleen,
Unless you know the individual was not skilled with a gun then you cannot really address that point. Fact is even those who are highly skilled with a gun get killed and this applies to law enforcement officer and military.
I would say that the guy that jumped in to stop the situation would have done so wit or without a concealed weapon on him. In fact I did at a restaurant several years back and wish I had been carrying. 2 men came in after closing and by their nervousness and movements it was clear what they were there for. The greeter desk was empty and from where I sat finishing my meal I them and the young girl greeter heading toward the desk…while she was saying they were closed. Then one said we are not here to eat. As she began to close on them and the desk, they began to spread out and I saw a hand go into a jacket pocket. I came out of my chair, I am a big guy in good shape and much larger than those 2 very young looking (maybe even teens) men. I shoved the one out of the way and went for the guy with hands in his pocket. The girl screamed and before we got deep into a fight they were heading out the door. Had I had my weapon they would have ended up in jail rather than escaping thru the parking lot.
Could I have been killed, sure, there could have been another bad actor on the door and he could have nailed me, but that is the chance I took to do what I felt needed to be done that night.
But then that is just the way I am.
Hopefully you will never find yourself in the position the greeter was in, my guess is she would have been held hostage while a robbery took place of the restaurant and the diners. It was a high end steakhouse and no shortage of money to be had. Had your brand of “sanity” ruled, not sure of the outcome, but not likely to have been good.
Your thinking sounds a lot like the 60’s mantra: “Let’s Give Peace a Chance” by John Lennon
Suggest you thank all of us who carry, not condemn.
