Posted on 04/16/2007 9:36:38 PM PDT by grundle
In January 2002, a former student of Appalachian Law School in Virginia, who had flunked out the year before, returned to discuss his academic suspension. Unable to achieve reinstatement, he went into the office of the school's dean and shot him fatally with a .380 semiautomatic handgun from point-blank range. He then did the same to one of the school's professors. On his way out he shot four female students, killing one and wounding the others.
The carnage ended, according to nearly all the news accounts, when several students tackled the offender as he exited the building.
According to John Lott, however, 204 of 208 news stories on the incident somehow failed to mention a telling fact about the offender's apprehension: two male students ran to their cars to get their guns, and by brandishing one at him forced the killer to drop his weapon. Then they tackled him.
The reporters (and perhaps their editors) failed to mention this dramatic use of guns for self-defense despite the fact that one of the student heroes had explained in detail, to more than 50 reporters, how he and his friend had ended the rampage.
When Lott called the Washington Post to find out why its story hadn't mentioned the guns, the reporter, who had written only of the students "pouncing" on the offender, confirmed that both the armed students had told her the same story but that she didn't focus on the "details" of the incident; also, "space constraints" were a factor.
Even more striking, the Associated Press media relations manager, while denying any intention to downplay the defensive use of guns, expressed his shock at the students' actions. As he told the Kansas City Star, "I thought, my God, they're putting into jeopardy even more people by bringing out these guns."
(Excerpt) Read more at venusproject.com ...
The MSM is complicit in every facet of the decline of America.
Anybody that stupid has no business being out loose among the public!
You can't make this stuff up!
So the media lies. What else is new?
No, it underscores the fact that any legally-armed student, faculty member, or staff member could have potentially have saved quite a number of innocent lives.
Irrelevant.
Well, I was hoping to avoid this discussion while the bodies are still warm, but it's a lose-lose proposition.
This one's going to precipitate lots of thoughts and perhaps some new laws.
Had an armed student or the cops rushed in immediately, guns blazing, and managed to keep the body count to 12, but accidentally killed one innocent student Greta Van Cistern would still be beating the dead horse in 2037... as well as would most posters on this thread.
Some scenarios are unavoidably really lose-lose.
So you're OK with having another another 20 or so killed just to keep Greta from getting ticked off? That's pathetic.
The “problem” with pre-emptive action is that we’ll never know what might have happened if the action had not been taken in that specific case. In the VA Tech massacre we do know that the consequences could not possibly been have been any worse.
Check out The Pre-Emption Paradox
http://give-n-go.blogspot.com/2007/02/preemption-paradox.html
Sorry, I didn't say I agree; I simply stated the obvious from past experience.
I assume the < /sarc > is not always necessary.
I was wrong.
This scenario flies in the face of experience. In all of the school shooting where the perp ran into armed resistance the shooting ended there, there were no shoot outs. Besides given that cinder block can stop most pistol rounds, and most schools make extensive use of this building material, it is unlikely that there will be any innocents downrange.
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