This shooting in Uvalde resembled, at first blush, Sandy Hook. Now it is taking on overtones of Overland, because of the inadequacy of the police response. This story is developing to be a tragedy on more levels than one. So far it is screaming not only at the ineffectiveness of the ridiculous gun laws in this country and the state of affairs re: guns in Texas, in particular, but what it says about law enforcement response leaves a lot to be desired as well.

Now here is how this is shaking down: the cops were there and they did nothing. They had the wherewithal to arrest this woman and then un-arrest her, but they didn’t go into the building to take down the gunman, who was in the school for an hour.

Here’s a video that is going viral. This is all starting to come together now.

This is so out of control. I so hope that this particular gun tragedy will be the one that turns the tide. We can’t go on like this anymore. This has to be dealt with. This isn’t the wild west. We’re in the 21st century and we need to get a grip on not only the availability of weaponry but also get the protocol for handling these situations in place.

It doesn’t get more basic than this. We cannot be afraid to send our children to school and they cannot be afraid to go there. This is the Rubicon. It has been crossed one two many times and it has to stop here. No ands, ifs, or buts.

 

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3 COMMENTS

  2. The city spends $4 million a year on the cops – a hefty chunk of their budget, given they only have 16K people. And the cops don’t even have things like body armor in their cars? They may need it only rarely, but they mostly have SWAT training, they claim, so they should be better prepared for this than the average cop-on-the-beat.

    I think that police forces should lose SWAT training and equipment money until they prove it’s needed. Not getting it because consultants say it’s needed, but when the local crimes require it. Otherwise it’s a waste of everyone’s time and money.

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    • I see LE including wearing the marking Sheriff (some with none apparent – I don’t yet know if local LE and Sheriff’s Dept. are the same and if not their working formula) wearing tactical gear AND more importantly with assault weapons slung across their chests. If the initial cops, the so-called school resources officers were only armed with handguns and had to initially back down within minutes they had backup.

      Now, when that backup arrived just WTF? did they have in the trunks/backs of their vehicles? Fishing gear like the old Any Griffith show? Even if they didn’t have vests (if not, WTF?) or assault weapons (and I say again WTF?) they at the very least should have had shotguns and/or non assault weapon rifles. Surely there was at least one among them who was a hunter and a great shot who could have been put in a good sniper spot and given the green light.

      I get taking a few minutes, especially if gunshots aren’t being heard to consult and organize a tactical plan on the fly – to get some LE in to clear rooms of students who weren’t locked in that classroom with the gunman. But no more than that. And an hour? From where I sit that town needs a whole new fucking police force because what they’ve got doesn’t have anyone up to the job.

      Of course, if we had politicians with guts the assault weapons ban would never have been allowed to expire. Everyone including conservatives knew mass shootings with them would increase and they have. Worse, they are increasing and the rate of increase even appears to be itself increasing. Yes, mass shootings take place with other weapons including handguns. But with FIVE armed people from the school this murderer wouldn’t have had even that many but armed only with handguns outgunned. It would have been the other way around!

      I grew up hunting. I’m not against private gun ownership and even consider it a right but with that right comes RESPONSIBILITIES. And as I’ve recently said there’s an important qualifier in the second amendment (A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state,) that gun goobers want to pretend doesn’t exist. Even Scalia acknowledged state and local governments retain the ability to enact controls on firearms when his decision granted most people the right to possess certain guns including handguns in their homes. Their homes!

      But we have millions (tens of millions in fact) who have been carefully conditioned by gun rights groups (funded by manufacturers) to worship their guns. Take a look at pictures in the attached link. I’m in my mid-sixties and I’ll guaran-goddamn-tee you if there’d been an internet during the first thirty or so years of my life, you’d have simply NOT seen the kinds of pictures you see in the link. People who were that casual with guns, and especially the stuff with their kids and guns would have been ostracized! Shunned! Probably shamed out of town.

      That’s what’s changed. Gun ownership turned from a right that most (not all but almost all) understood because that’s what they were taught from the very first came with RESPONSIBILITIES. They were tools to be used for hunting, and perhaps home defense. DANGEROUS tools. Now they are props for worship and playing around. Is it any wonder that in a culture that doesn’t shame and ostracize people who treat guns this way and even post pictures of it suffers from an epidemic of mass shootings and other gun deaths?
      https://images.search.yahoo.com/search/images;_ylt=AwrFeFuc749iaZUBJCJXNyoA;_ylu=Y29sbwNiZjEEcG9zAzEEdnRpZAMyNDI4MlVTLUNfMQRzZWMDc2M-?p=guns+as+babies+pictures+images&fr=yfp-t-s

      Look qnd weep:

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