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Posts Tagged ‘Robb Elementary’

The Uvalde Massacre Shows the Uselessness of Gun Control and Police Protection – Chronicles

Posted by M. C. on December 20, 2023

https://chroniclesmagazine.org/web/the-uvalde-massacre-shows-the-uselessness-of-gun-control-and-police-protection/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

June 7, 2022By Walter Block

Horrid news. Despicable. A teen gunman killed 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. About the only good thing in this occurrence is that this mass murderer was himself killed in this revolting event, and will no longer be around to plague civilized society. May the name of Salvador Ramos forever live in infamy. What could these two teachers, to say nothing of these 9- and 10-year-old children have ever done to deserve having their lives snuffed out by this monster?

The usual suspects are now calling for stricter gun controls. According to that sage, former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.” But disarming America would be a violation of the rights of millions of Americans who protect themselves from thugs and marauders under the Second Amendment to the Constitution.

In any case, if this evil person had wanted to perpetrate mayhem with a knife or a baseball bat, he might not have been able to murder quite as many helpless school children as he did, but with a little effort he could have shed almost as much misery. Are we to ban knives, baseball bats, and for that matter chairs, bows and arrows, steel-plated boots, rat poison, and all other implements which can be used to murder young kids? What about cars? On crowded sidewalks, they have been even more efficient means of destruction than rifles. Progressives also exaggerate the seriousness of this dastardly act in Texas: many more children are shot to death in Chicago, a city with very strict gun controls.

Several points about the situation in Uvalde are worth considering before politicians use the event to justify new gun-control measures:

  1. Robb Elementary School was a gun-free zone. Why? The feminists who have taken over teachers’ unions feel compelled to engage in this sort of virtue signaling. Yet in other public places, politicians, judges, and civil servants are protected by gun-wielding guards. Pretty much every government building is defended in this way. But not school children, it would appear.

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Uvalde’s Biggest Mistake Was Trusting the Police to “Keep Us Safe”

Posted by M. C. on June 4, 2022

For gun controllers, the takeaway from this is “See? These guns are so powerful the cops were left impotent in Uvalde.”

The police defenders can only shrug and admit the same thing: “Our heroic men and women did all they could do! That guy was just too tough, fast, and smart for us!”

https://mises.org/wire/uvaldes-biggest-mistake-was-trusting-police-keep-us-safe

Ryan McMaken

The Uvalde police have helped demonstrate, yet again, what has long been clear: when you’re facing a maniac with a gun, don’t count on the government’s uniformed bureaucrats with badges to help you. As we learned this week, not even a child begging for help on a 911 call will get the police to confront a shooter. 

Moreover, given the lack of competence and effort consistently displayed by police in cases where they face real danger—as at Columbine, Parkland, and Uvalde—it’s clearly a matter of chance as to whether the local police in whatever town are willing to risk “officer safety” for the sake of public safety. 

Contrary to what gun control advocates think, this reality sends a powerful message against gun control: we can’t trust the government’s armed enforcers to provide any measure of safety, and we absolutely need a right to private self-defense, to private security, and to accountable trained professionals who are not the bloated, overpaid branch of the government bureaucracy known as “law enforcement.” 

“Back the Blue” Plays into the Hands of Gun Control Advocates

When it comes to evaluating the disastrous police cowardice and incompetence at Uvalde’s Robb Elementary last week, those who blindly defend the police are essentially making the same argument as those as those who want to destroy the right to private self defense: “The police did as much as they could, but a single untrained teenager with a gun is just too much to handle for twenty or more trained police officers who are armed to the teeth.”

For gun controllers, the takeaway from this is “See? These guns are so powerful the cops were left impotent in Uvalde.”

The police defenders can only shrug and admit the same thing: “Our heroic men and women did all they could do! That guy was just too tough, fast, and smart for us!”

This sends a message to casual observers of the gun debate—which is most of the public. It suggests those “assault rifles” the Left is always talking about are really “weapons of war,” and allow a single person to outgun an entire police force. Many people will ask themselves: Why would any person need such a thing?

But what retort can the police defenders offer to this? It seems they can only repeat something about how our selfless heroes are beyond criticism and that we should keep trusting the regime, its police, and its schools to “keep us safe.” 

Meanwhile, gun control advocates are mocking the old conservative line that “a good guy with a gun stops a bad guy with a gun.” It’s difficult to mount an effective response to this if one is committed to the idea that the Uvalde police were even remotely competent or conscientious in their work. If it’s true that Uvalde police were in any way doing their best, then an entire department of “good guys with guns” could truly do nothing to stop one person with an AR-15.

The reality, however, is that the Uvalde police were most certainly not “good guys with guns.” They were cowards clad in impressive-looking taxpayer-funded gear who made the situation worse. As their own supervisors admit, they sat around waiting for backup because had they actually tried to stop the shooter, the police “could’ve been shot.” 

The police at Uvalde were not just useless in terms of public safety. They actively got in the way of public safety. When a group of parents—some of whom were likely armed—attempted to intervene in the school themselves, the police literally assaulted the parents. Witnesses report police at the scene tackling women, pepper spraying men, and drawing their tasers in order to further intimidate the parents. The police did this while the killer was rampaging inside the school. Naturally, the police, swaggering around in their cowboy hats and body armor, didn’t like being shown up by the uppity private citizens of the town.

Enforcing Gun Laws Also Requires “Good Guys with Guns”

Repeated displays of incompetence from police agencies also calls into question the idea that these same bureaucrats could effectively enforce gun prohibition laws.

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Police Botched the Uvalde Standoff. Now Gun Controllers Want to Give Police More Power.

Posted by M. C. on May 28, 2022

There are conflicting reports over whether or not the police waited more than an hour to confront the gunman, or if they waited “only” forty minutes.

Parents, social media watchdogs, social media followers, police-all failed. If only Uvalde denied climate change on social media he would have gotten attention.

https://mises.org/wire/police-botched-uvalde-standoff-now-gun-controllers-want-give-police-more-power

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Contact Ryan McMaken

Ryan McMaken (@ryanmcmaken) is a senior editor at the Mises Institute. Send him your article submissions for the Mises Wire and Power and Market, but read article guidelines first. Ryan has a bachelor’s degree in economics and a master’s degree in public policy and international relations from the University of Colorado. He was a housing economist for the State of Colorado. He is the author of Commie Cowboys: The Bourgeoisie and the Nation-State in the Western Genre.

First it was Columbine. Then it was Parkland. Now, we learn that at Robb Elementary School, police officers again stood around outside a school while the killer was inside with children.

NPR reports today:

Frustrated onlookers urged police officers to charge into the Texas elementary school where a gunman’s rampage killed 19 children and two teachers, witnesses said Wednesday, as investigators worked to track the massacre that lasted upwards of 40 minutes and ended when the 18-year-old shooter was killed by a Border Patrol team.

“Go in there! Go in there!” nearby women shouted at the officers soon after the attack began, said Juan Carranza, 24, who saw the scene from outside his house, across the street from Robb Elementary School in the close-knit town of Uvalde. Carranza said the officers did not go in.

Others have reported that parents attempted to go into the school themselves, but were prevented—sometimes violently—by police.

According to the New York Post:

While he anxiously watched the officers standing outside his daughter’s school, [Jacinto Cazares] suggested storming into the school building himself along with other civilian bystanders.

“‘Let’s just rush in because the cops aren’t doing anything like they are supposed to,'” he said he told other onlookers….

“There was at least 40 lawmen armed to the teeth but didn’t do a darn thing [until] it was far too late,” Cazares, the father of 10-year-old victim Jackie Cazares, told ABC News.

This video from the scene shows police pinning one person—presumably a parent—to the ground while other officers have drawn their tasers in order to further threaten and intimidate the parents who begged the police to take action.

There are conflicting reports over whether or not the police waited more than an hour to confront the gunman, or if they waited “only” forty minutes. So far, the only rationale offered by the police for the long waiting period is that the officers were waiting for a SWAT team to arrive.

It remains unclear how the shooter got into the school at all, since he was apparently confronted by law enforcement before he entered: 

uvalde

When police finally did enter the scene—after forty or sixty minutes of protecting themselves—many of them ignored the shooter in order to find their own children, as admitted by police personnel on the scene—who also repeated a propaganda line about “those brave men and women.”

If it is indeed found to be true that law enforcement officers protected themselves while people nearby were being killed—it certainly wouldn’t be the first time.

“Officer Safety” Is What Matters to Police

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