In Southeast Tacoma Thursday evening, two carloads of rival gang members were driving down Portland Avenue.
When I was a kid growing up in Tacoma, this was the street along which my bus traveled when I went to visit my grandparents (and later the wonderful blonde girl who lived across the street and stole my young heart, but that’s another story).
Today, Portland Avenue can be a battleground or at least the main street through a battleground, as it was Thursday when the morons in these cars began flashing gang signs at one another. Finally, one of the dirtbags riding in a green compact fired several rounds at the people in the other car, described by the Tacoma News Tribune as a red 1980s Ford Taurus. Two people in the Taurus were hit, one of them in the head and the other in his shoulder. The green compact fled.
Also Thursday, a man in his mid-40s was seriously wounded in the Parkland area, which is not far from where my grandparents lived out their golden years in the house my grandfather built in Midland. In this case, according to the News Tribune, the shooting appears to have been (gasp!) drug-related, and may have been an attempted robbery or drug deal that went bad.
How much is anyone willing to bet that none of the people involved in these incidents was legally carrying the gun they used? Gang bangers cannot legally carry handguns in this state, or anywhere else, because they invariably have criminal records. The 40-something victim in the other shooting has a criminal record, and it’s a cinch that is also the case with the guy who shot him.
What started as rival gang members flashing signs from cars ended with two men shot Thursday evening in Tacoma.
Yet fanatics and wannabe Utopians in the gun prohibition movement would have the public believe that the way to deal with such thugs is to disarm law-abiding citizens; make it discouragingly difficult to buy a firearm, nearly impossible to carry one outside the home and a criminal liability if some thief steals it. Of course, the latter condition would be tough on ex-Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske, now the nation’s drug czar under Barack Obama. Kerlikowske left Seattle without recovering the pistol that was stolen from his car in December 2004 when he should have been carrying it to prevent the theft.
Disarming criminals is a laudable goal, but it is too mired in the lofty enterprise of disarming law-abiding citizens. To the gun control extremist, taking guns from honest people is a worthy substitute for taking guns from thugs, and a lot safer since thugs are more likely to shoot back.
And for the anti-gunner, passing a law that affects good citizens gives the appearance, albeit demonstrably false, that “something” is being done about crime.
Whether it’s a clueless Greg Nickels wanting to ban legally-carried handguns on public property in Seattle by royal decree, or Attorney General Eric Holder wanting to renew the ban on sport-utility rifles because Mexican drug thugs are killing each other south of the border, these measures and others like them have no chance at all of preventing a single criminal act. (If Nickels and Holder want to strike a blow against crime, they should meet in Tacoma, rent a car and find the thugs who shot those guys Thursday night.)
It appears to be a robbery or drug deal gone bad
Gun control, as a philosophy and as a political mechanism, is a flimsy sham. It has become a smoke screen behind which its proponents hide two simple facts: 1) they are more interested in controlling the public than reducing crime, and 2) they are incompetent when it comes to reducing crime.
Until we come to grips as a society with a few simple truths, we are not going to make any progress against the new rising wave of violent crime.
First, you cannot rehabilitate wanton killers, so stop trying. Thugs at 16 who kill people do not deserve freedom ever again in their lives (and there should be some kind of special punishment for their parents). Recidivist criminals have blown all their chances.
Second, police officials and politicians who discourage citizens from fighting back should think about different employment. MacDonald’s is hiring, somewhere. Law-abiding citizens not only have a right, but perhaps a duty, to defend themselves and others. If a career criminal gets killed in the process, he called the play, not his intended victim.
Third, lethal self-defense is moral, and it is not “vigilantism.” I explained this in my book, with Alan Gottlieb, America Fights Back: Armed Self-Defense in a Violent Age. If a person is in imminent and unavoidable danger of death or great physical harm from an unprovoked attack, See Item #2 above. Self-defense is not a license to commit murder.
Finally, gun-free zones are risk-free killing fields and should be abolished. Likewise, the notion of “sanctuary cities” should be outlawed. Officials who promote a policy of preventing police from establishing the residency status of criminal suspects should lose their jobs.
Self-anointed “progressives” who think the present situation is “progress” are seriously self-delusional. They’ve had their chance. Time to try something different.
Visit with other Gun Rights Examiners:
For more info: America Fights Back: Armed Self-Defense in a Violent Age.
Comments
Dave hits the nail on the head. Gun control is established by self serving people in order to disarm law-abiding citizens and not to control crime. Want to control crime? Arm the citizens!
Punish the parents!! Thats a great idea. Thugs breed thugs. If you have a kid and you can't bring them up to become usefull members of society you shouldn't be having kids. For every kid you have that commits a felony before the age of 18 you should loose a limb!! Might sound harsh but it will bring discipline back to america's youth.
Good article. One additional point that drives me out of my mind is that, in addition to punishing the innocent with restrictions, gun control laws also saddle those same innocent people with the costs (in time and money) to enact and enforce the restrictions. Not only do we get punished for being law abiding, we also have to pay for it!
You are correct, sir. Unfortunately, those who need to understand these truths are both deaf and blind, and apparently they prefer to be that way. I don't see this battle ending anytime soon...
"gun free zones are risk free killing fields"
Somebody drank the kool aide! What kind of Orwellian double speak is that? You gun nuts are so lost in your paranooid fantasies and obsession with your deadly toys that you make absolutely no sense. Up is down, right is wrong, and a gun free zone means more gun violence! It would be funny if so many children were not dead so that a minority may indulge their perverse and deranged "hobby".
To Olivia,
Look at the places where all those children were killed gun free zones. They do nothing but create a victim rich environment were the nut jobs can go on their rampages with out fear of encountering armed resistance.
Olivia wrote:
"What kind of Orwellian double speak is that?"
It's not doublespeak. It a simple observation of the fact that gun free zones don't keep homicidal maniacs from using guns to murder scores of people.
How often do you hear of a successful mass shooting at a location where law-abiding, peaceful citizens are allowed to carry arms in self defense? Why would a homicidal nutcase want to go on a shooting rampage in a location where somebody might shoot back?
Is it a paranoid fantasy when there are many documented cases of multiple-victim firearm murders in places where guns are supposedly banned?
"a gun free zone means more gun violence!"
It certainly does not mean there won't be any guns there.
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Olivia doesn't really believe the crap she is spewing. She would be aghast at the thought of disarming the police or the military. She simply hasn't the courage to accept the responsibility for the safety of her own children or for her own life. Being a responsible adult is just too hard for her.
She isn't opposed to guns, she isn't opposed to violence that protects her, she just wishes to hire it done at no risk to herself.
Ok, I can see the attraction in that. Except that those she thinks she hired to wield the sword of violence in her defense can't and won't be there when she needs them. That's just stupidity, but it feels so good if one happens to be fortunate enough to never be assaulted. Why, Hell, one can make all kinds of assumptions about the low life women who are raped or killed and their children should have had better sense than to be born to a future rape or murder victim. Especially when they could have hired Olivia's gun bearers to protect them.
Oh, wait those hired killers weren't there to protect them either, something Olivia should know since the Supreme Court on no less than four occassions has stated that those hired killers have no duty to protect her or any other citizen. Hell, they aren't even obligated to respond to 911 calls. Check the USSC.
Thanks for the well reasoned article. The biggest thing i draw from it is that:
Criminals ignore the laws related to murder, shooting, drugs, robbery, and guns. It is ignorant to think that any sort of gun legislation will solve the problems that exsist.
While I respect the position put forth by this article, the fact remains that for the most part, states with the least restrictive gun control laws have the most gun violence. For example, Lousiana, Alabama, Alaska, and Mississippi have the highest rates, while Hawaii, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, and New York have the lowest.
Source: The Violence Policy website. (You can see the specific charts that list the gun violence rates under the "press releases" tab.)
Yes OCM, that source you gave says exactly that. They lied. Check the FBI sources and you would know that.
OCM - How can you respect the position put forth by the article if you believe the skewed logic put forth by the VPC and the outright lies they publish to support their twisted agenda? Either gun control works (to stop crime) or it doesn't. The facts and reality show that it doesn't. I don't respect the position put forth by the VPC because it's wrong, and I don't respect the disingenuous dishonest way they try to sell it. Neither should you.
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