Horrid news. Despicable. A teen gunman killed 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas. About the only good thing in this occurrence is that this mass murderer was himself killed in this revolting event, and will no longer be around to plague civilized society. May the name of Salvador Ramos forever live in infamy. What could these two teachers, to say nothing of these 9- and 10-year-old children have ever done to deserve having their lives snuffed out by this monster?

The usual suspects are now calling for stricter gun controls. According to that sage, former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, “You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.” But disarming America would be a violation of the rights of millions of Americans who protect themselves from thugs and marauders under the Second Amendment to the Constitution.

In any case, if this evil person had wanted to perpetrate mayhem with a knife or a baseball bat, he might not have been able to murder quite as many helpless school children as he did, but with a little effort he could have shed almost as much misery. Are we to ban knives, baseball bats, and for that matter chairs, bows and arrows, steel-plated boots, rat poison, and all other implements which can be used to murder young kids? What about cars? On crowded sidewalks, they have been even more efficient means of destruction than rifles. Progressives also exaggerate the seriousness of this dastardly act in Texas: many more children are shot to death in Chicago, a city with very strict gun controls.

Several points about the situation in Uvalde are worth considering before politicians use the event to justify new gun-control measures:

1. Robb Elementary School was a gun-free zone. Why? The feminists who have taken over teachers’ unions feel compelled to engage in this sort of virtue signaling. Yet in other public places, politicians, judges, and civil servants are protected by gun-wielding guards. Pretty much every government building is defended in this way. But not school children, it would appear.
2. Robb Elementary is a public, not a private school. Why should that make even a bit of difference? Simple: private schools can lose money and go bankrupt if they do not satisfy their parental customers. The same does not apply to public schools. It is safe to predict that as a result of this horrendous event, private institutions, but far less likely governmental ones, will be more assiduous in protecting their young pupils. Is it any accident that this evil young man chose the school he did, rather than a possibly better-protected private one? The next perpetrator (and there will likely be one given the fallible human condition), if he is rational, will possibly take this into account. Thus, if all elementary education were privatized (there need not be any change in future subsidization for the poor via the implementation of the voucher system) future children will be safer.
3. Although full reports are not yet in, it looks as if it took one hour of stalling on the part of the cops before they got off their rear ends and finally did their job. Nor is this the first time on record that the police acted in such a manner. Why did they sit on their rear ends for such a long period of time? The cops have been emasculated. They are running scared; afraid to do their jobs. There is even a new phrase to describe this phenomenon: the Ferguson effect. Where once constabularies would have bravely plunged in to save the victims and deal harshly with the criminal, they now feel they have to look before they leap. And look and look and look—lest they err. This, of course, does not apply to each and every policeman; we are talking averages, tendencies here. But it cannot be denied that on the whole, there are horrendously negative aftereffects of severely punishing the men in blue for making mistakes when they must make split-second decisions.
4. Worse, far worse, early reports suggest that the police actually prevented parents from storming into the building and saving their children. If so, then there is a low rung in hell reserved for those responsible. If this indeed did occur, the parents in my opinion would have been justified to use violence against the police in order to attempt to save their children.
5. Maybe we can borrow a leaf from Israel, a country whose children are under continual threat. There, they “harden” the target: teachers and other adults are heavily armed; there is only one entrance to every school, and a heavily armed guard is posted right there. This service could be provided more effectively by private security firms. If members of a private protection agency had acted in the hesitant and cautious manner that the Uvalde police apparently did, bankruptcy would be the result. Public sector employees and departments don’t face the same consequences for failure. Are our children not precious enough to deserve such protection?

The progressive left’s mantra of “Defund the Police!” has taken on an entirely different interpretation on the basis of this sad and tragic episode. And now they want us to get rid of guns and rely on the police for protection? Ha! Gun control? No. Safety for kids? Yes, yes—a thousand times yes!

 

Image: Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, taken on July 22, 2015 (Don Holloway / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0)