Not only was there an armed deputy, but he exchanged fire with one of the shooters.

Imagine if you had several teachers with guns you could have an all out firefight!

_________________
RIP ROAD WOES 12/2/2012

I looked through those. The only one that was close to the context was the one who accidentally shot the clerk when two armed robbers were holding the place up.

I believe your greater point is, correct me if I'm wrong, is that CCL holders are capable of gun crimes, and that a CCL is no guarantee a person won't go off the deep end. No argument from me about that.

There is one major difference, though, between the linked examples of people involved in shootings, and my proposed armed teachers. Your examples come from the full spectrum of CCL holders, including people of questionable intelligence/morality/stability. Teachers are a far more limited subset. Teachers who have previous experience as cops or military, who are willing to be tested and trained and monitored, would be magnitudes more likely to be an asset in a crisis than to be a liability.

_________________

They already are possible spots for gun battles. The current legal structure simply makes it a one-sided battle.

_________________

One thing I see cropping up not only here but also in a number of other conversations and news pieces about arming teachers is that they couldn't possibly be trusted or qualified to carry weapons around our children. I'm a teacher, Jim, not a police officer or military member!

And it seems a common thread among all this rhetoric is that somehow everyone is lumping people into special categories like Dungeons and Dragons character classes or something.

"Fighter Magic Users can't possibly be Paladins and wear armor, Bob."

"Why's that, Doug?"

"It's in the rules, Bob. You can see it right here. Also, Teacher types are armed with books and magic quills only. They suffer -5 charisma if they carry weapons!"

"Oh, well that settles it, Doug. Teachers can't possibly carry weapons. It's in the rule book."

_________________
I blog, I tweet. When I'm not writing or goofing around on Seahawks.NET.

Why do we see school shootings? Because there are lots of kids that go to school and they spend a hell of a lot of time there. To put things into more perspective...according to the educational researcher a school can expect to have a student homicide once every 6,000 years. Also, violent crimes have been steadily dropping since 1990.

Now, I'm not proposing that we do nothing in response to these horrific incidents, but I just thought I'd share some stuff with everyone. I understand the reasoning behind putting a cop in every school...but if it costs a state lets say 100 million dollars a year to put an officer in every school to (hopefully) prevent that one school shooting that happens (maybe) every three decades...is that really worth it? I know I know...you can't put a price on somebody's life...but we have to. Everything has a cost. If we spend billions of dollars to prevent every kind of situation that runs a similar risk to losing your life in a school shooting (which is so low it's practically zero)...well we would go broke. That's all we would ever spend our money on. I don't say this to sound harsh, but simply to put things in perspective. Our kids are more likely to die on the way home from school or at home than at school.

We're upset because we've been hearing about a horrific incident involving the deaths of kindergarten children. It's sad. It's sick. But we need to not let emotions get in the way of thinking logically. Our emotions from 9/11 led us to the patriot act and TSA. Lets not make another mistake.

IMO, I think a lot of these charter schools, online schools, and other alternatives to traditional schooling will continue to build popularity and ultimately cut down on these acts of violence..whether it's because kids are staying home or because they are going to school where they and their parents want them to or because the non-government side of things will add to the innovation and figure out a useful solution. Also, I say we bring back the paddle.

I've thought a lot about that same thing recently, Fender. Wondering how parents of kids killed in other accidents or incidents within the last week feel upon seeing all the sympathy porn on TV relating to Newtown. Yes, it's a horrific tragedy. Is the life of each child lost there worth any more than any other child lost in some senseless accident or incident? You'd think so, watching CNN.

Simple risk analysis tells us that the TSA is a grossly overfunded waste of taxpayer dollars for gain per life saved over any number of other transportation methods. And the same would apply to schools. Should we maybe look at mental illnesses a little more? Should we not investigate to see whether there's a way to harden schools, or even better, deter future incidents like this from happening in the future? Certainly. Is it worth the cost? Yes, if you're comparing it to a single life lost, but no, if you're comparing it to all lives lost in general for any number of other preventable causes.

_________________
I blog, I tweet. When I'm not writing or goofing around on Seahawks.NET.

I don't know where you get one school shooting every three decades. There have been several shootings in each of the last two decades. The odds of a shooting happening at any given school are infinitesimal, but they are significantly higher than you suggest.

I agree that we have to be wise with our money. And I agree that it would be cost prohibitive to have cops at every school all the time when kids are there. That is exactly why I am a proponent of allowing armed teachers -- it is the single most cost-effective thing we can do. And one of the quickest.

Doing nothing is not an alternative. If our public policy is to not do anything because the odds are so small and most measure are cost-prohibitive, people would rightly go through the roof, starting with the families of victims of previous shootings.

_________________

Yeah that was a stretch. Washington State has one just about every decade. In my defense, I did say maybe

But my underlying point remains.

I'm going to go through a few of these points. Direct cost and indirect cost.

Putting a policeman in a school is a costly endeavor if it's only duty is to prevent the NEXT Sandy Hook. Fortunately, there's far more that an on-duty police officer can do as a liaison, teacher, general security and authority figure. My high school got a police officer (unarmed) prior to Columbine and began being armed afterwards. He broke up fights, and probably prevented far more, watched kids who try to sneak off campus and get high during school hours, answered questions and was a part of the school. Whether he prevented a Columbine I don't know, but it was certainly a positive presence.

The TSA has an even larger impact. After 9/11 flying wasn't exactly popular. For those of us who had to fly frequently it was an uneasy time. Now, I have complete confidence that a bomb isn't going to go off or some guy didn't bring a box cutter onto the plane. I'm back to being afraid of mechanical problems instead of terrorism.

When people are scared to fly, they don't. And that halts this country.

_________________
RIP ROAD WOES 12/2/2012

So you are all for Security Theater to make you and other's feel better? The TSA has become a constitutional abomination. I am not a big fan of allowing Teachers to be armed but I'd prefer that to an overreaction the size of what the TSA has become.

TSA is an entirely different situation and discussion, razor. Come on, don't be comparing apples and orangutans.

I am not the person to make the comparison, I was just responding to Sonic's point and my response was relevant.

I hate to burst your bubble, but even with all the money spent on the TSA, I accidentally brought a box cutter on a plane post 9/11. I didn't realize it til I was already through security and looking through my stuff, but it happened. Do you honestly believe that stuff doesn't get through? I'm glad it makes you FEEL better, but if they want to, they can still get stuff through.

I agree with Razor on that, actually. People are idiots, and Congresspeople are no exception. When people think with their emotions, they aren't thinking. Given their track record, it isn't hard to imagine a huge new bureaucracy that would govern all aspects of school security. And school food. And school buses. And parking lots. And landscaping. And whatever else they can get their mitts on.

(Seriously -- Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms?)

_________________

This is why, the only two things I think congress could handle efficiently (and that's being kind) would be to assist with the mental health angle, and to legislate more security features into the building codes (similar to fireproof codes or earthquake proof buildings). The rest needs to be done at local levels where they know best what may work best for them.

I'm thinking people stopped flying after 9/11 initially because of fear, and then because of TSA - which began only 2 months after 9/11. Lots of people are still driving today instead of flying.

Fair points about the police officer, but ultimately I don't think the risk warrants that type of cost.

What risks are you talking about?

_________________

I completely agree with you about the benefits an on-duty officer can bring to a school. Granted, he's not going to be the most popular guy there, but what he brings to a school is far more than just preventing massacres.

I don't think it's cost effective to have a cop at every school, though. I grew up in Wenatchee and that (relatively) small town has about 11 public schools (K-12). With an average income (before benefits and bonuses) of around $50,000, the city is then paying out a MINIMUM of $550,000/year to have 11 different officers at 11 different schools. These officers are going to be getting paid to hang out at schools for 8 hours a day, roughly 8.5 months out of the year...

I don't think arming teachers is even in the ballpark for answers, but I don't know if taking 8 hours out of officers' days is the best idea ever.

My point to this post is, I DON'T KNOW WHAT THE BEST IDEA IS.

That seems more than a little disingenuous. "I have no idea what the answer is, but I know it's not that."

_________________

So what do you propose in response to these 'horrific incidents'? Share please. To make a point, and not to derail the topic, you must have been against the Iraq War from the beginning seeing as if there actually would have been WMD's in Iraq they had no way to deliver and use them against the U.S. If you're averse to spending money protecting lives from threats that are statistically close to zero then I'm sure you'd be fine cutting back every bit of spending we increased post 9/11 for the same reason?



The war in Iraq was way more detrimental to us as a Nation than either the Patriot Act or the TSA. That was also an emotional, knee-jerk reaction. Thousands of American lives lost, billions spent and veterans committing suicide at higher levels than ever before.



So to reduce school shootings keep kids at home? Or you're saying that their parents will choose to send them to schools were school shootings won't happen ever? And WTF is the non-government side of things that will possibly fix this?

I'm sure it wasn't covered on the websites your get your news from but in case you missed it the shooter in Connecticut WAS fucking home-schooled.