15 August, 2009

Asking a cop about marksmanship....

Is like asking your priest about what to do in the privacy of your own bedroom. The issue of whether or not to allow an armed citizenry on school campuses in Missouri is being discussed.

""We rely on the police, but, unfortunately, they are not on sight all the times and aren't there, maybe when they're needed the most," said Rep. Brian Munzlinger, (R-Williamstown.) "

But you can bet armed teachers, administrators, and at the college level, students would be able to respond.

"
“If the students realize that every school principle has a gun, then who's gonna be the first target?" said David Jungmeyer, a Calvary Lutheran teacher. "

Two things, allow every adult at the high school level the option to carry. Sorry Mr. Jungmeyer, life is all about risk. You can mitigate that risk by going armed.
If I am going to be a target, I'm gonna be a reactive one.

Skeptics in the law enforcement community say the weapons permitting process does not red flag the people it should.

"Most of those individuals, if not all, will pass a criminal background check," said Sgt. Kim Vansell, University of Central Missouri.

Again, living your life is risk. Would Missouri law enforcement deny us the right to self defense? Sgt. Vansell is correct, no system will catch everything. I'm going to take my chance that the states imperfect system will catch what it was designed to. Previous felons.

Other officers say arming everybody makes it harder for them to tell the good guys from the bad guys.

“And when you have multiple people potential pulling out guns, that's gonna totally go against our training and potentially create a chaos that we may not be prepared to handle," said a police officer in the audience.

You might not have to handle anything other than the aftermath of an armed citizen stopping the bad guy from shooting 10 people versus the 20-30 in the time it took you to get there.

Here's the shocking truth though. A law enforcement official who understands a citizen's first line of defense is themselves.

Sheriff White argued that armed civilians on campus have the potential to end the threat quickly. And he stunned the room with this assertion.

"In actual shootings, citizens do far better than law enforcement on hit potential,” said White. “They hit their targets and they don't hit other people. I wish I could say the same for cops. We train more, they do better."

It's shaping up to be an interesting legislative session in Jefferson City here in the Show Me State. Stay tuned as the story unfolds.







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