My son will be a freshman at Aspen High School next year, and to get us ready last night there was a meeting about class registration. At the end of the meeting the Principal took questions from the audience and quickly the question of how to protect our kids came up. At about the same time that President Trump was proposing arming teachers and other school employees a parent was asking the same question in Aspen. The Principal didn't seem ready to hand out guns, but did talk about ways to 'harden' the school and improve counseling. Sadly he also seemed to indicate that it was less likely to be an Aspen problem than a front range problem. We have our share of mental health issues in this valley (maybe more than our share) and a whole bunch of guns----we shouldn't think just because we are Aspen we are special---Columbine was a 'nice' area too.
But let's take a quick look at some of these proposal in total and take an honest look at what that means.
1. Arm school employees ----expensive, and do you hire a teacher for their teaching skill or shooting skill. Do more guns reduce gun violence or increase gun violence?
2. Harden schools----single point of entrance and exit. Metal detectors. Armed guards at point of entrance and exit. This is expensive. This is kinda counter to helping our kids grow and mature--we will send them on ex ed programs to experience the world but not let 17 year olds leave campus for lunch? Will we require kids to get to school 30 minutes prior to the start of day to go through metal detectors, and be frisked if necessary.
3. Improve mental health screening and if red flags appear do..............what toss them out of school? We want kids in need to feel safe asking for counseling and support, but if they do how is their privacy maintained? At what point do counselors rat out students with 'issues'. What happens to those kids?
Armed employees, hardened structure, and rats (informants)----does that sound like school or prison?
How many freedoms will we sacrifice at the altar of the second amendment?
But wait, there's more:
The Garfield County Sheriff goes on a rant about liberals and hollywood elites using the MSD shooting to push gun control measures. Some folks thought his post over the top and insensitive (I would be one of those) but he continues to defend his comments. While I don't live in his county so I can't vote for anyone but him in the next election (shit I might run against him) it is a useful reminder of how hardened views are in this country around guns--and dangerously uniformed.
I want to ask Sheriff Vallario if the MSD shooter attacked the school with a fly swatter (or a bat or a rifle that held a single round) how many more people would be alive. If the Vegas shooter had to load a round into a rifle every time after he pulled the trigger how many more people would be alive? When your officers pulled someone over or dealt with a domestic disturbance knew the odds of there being a gun nearby were next to nihl how much better could they do their jobs---how much less stress would they face, how many fewer shootings of citizens by police would there be?
Again how many freedoms will we sacrifice at the altar of the second amendment?
Here is a link to his rant:
garfield county sheriff just the facts
And then some other facts (namely we don't have more crazy in the US just more guns and a lot more gun deaths, or why Americans shoot each other--cause we can)
america and the world and guns
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