What can we do to prevent massacres?
Unfortunately, the problems of guns and massacres have become an issue of politics. Politicians exist and work to be re-elected as their primary career goal. They appear to have little interest or, in fact, have an aversion to dealing forthrightly with major political issues where the voters are nearly equally divided on a question and the differences are stark and emotional.
We the People must achieve protected safe environments for our schools, shopping malls, sports and entertainment venues, and wherever citizens gather, the apathy and indecision of our politicians notwithstanding. Protecting innocent life trumps all other concerns—cost, political correctness, partisan politics, or convenience.
I therefore propose an unpalatable and imperfect but hopefully reasonably effective set of solutions to this wearying conundrum. The short term solution is to create a guardian force throughout the country having at least the following attributes:
1. Every school should have armed guards inside its buildings patrolling the hallways and entrances and exits throughout every place were humans congregate, work, or study.
School grounds and perimeters should be scrutinized frequently—say once an hour—by both foot patrols and in vehicles.
2. All guards should be armed with non-lethal and lethal weapons and have available restraints to secure threatening individuals. Guards should be protected with body armor and bullet resistant clothing.
3. All guards should be thoroughly vetted, trained, certified, and bonded; and they should undergo regular refresher training and testing to be recertified.
4. All guards should function under the aegis and discipline of local or state law enforcement. Alternatively, a federal program similar to the TSA could be established.
5. Unpaid volunteers could well be used as guards, particular for perimeter patrol.
All rules (1-5) would apply for these volunteers just as they do for licensed law enforcement personnel. The NRA already has in place firearms training programs with a heavy emphasis on personal responsibility and accountability. In an atmosphere of compromise, I am confident that the NRA would step up to help and to be an important asset to save our law-biding, our most vulnerable, and our least protected citizens—those law-abiding citizens without guns.
Federal, state, county, local and school district funding will be required. And, yes, that would necessitate a modest raise in taxes. Our children are of infinite worth—they are our treasures and our future—and stinginess that leaves them unprotected is morally reprehensible when viewed in that perspective. In addition, philanthropic foundations, charitable groups, and enlightened individuals should be invited to make contributions to help defray the attendant costs of providing the necessary safeguards.
Metal detectors and screening devices should be in place at every entrance and should be manned by competent trained officials.
All guards, teachers, school administrators, and other personnel—even cooks, janitors, and bus driver–should have communications devices that are supervised by law enforcement for controlled person-to-person information transmission in a timely fashion.
By local or state consensus and acting under statutory law, teachers and other personnel may also have weapons but should not be compelled to do so. All such personnel who choose to be armed in their school should be required to comply with the same requirements that guards must obey.
Schools should be retrofitted to have secure panic rooms located in several strategic locations throughout the school. The rooms should be bomb and fire proof and procedures should be established to allow safe communication from within and without the rooms.
I suggest that somewhat similar protective procedures be tailored for and put into place in shopping centers, theater complexes, sports venues and similar gathering places. While the individual private venues should bear primary responsibility for funding the protection, government will have to assist in funding. That governmental help should be linked to an attendant obligation on the part of the owners and managers of private facilities to provide protection to the public.
Finally, there is the thorny issue of gun control in the short term. As a minimum, new laws should be enacted to make it an imprisonable felony to have in the possession of a person any form of a firearm, explosive, or incendiary device either on the individual’s body or in his or her vehicle within 500 yards of any school. Arrest and conviction for such an offense should be a felony punishable by a heavy fine and automatic imprisonment.
Even in the short term, the time has come for both sides to compromise on gun possession. To start with, AR-15 and other semi-automatic or automatic hand guns or rifles can be owned privately but must be controlled under lock in a registered gun range and only used there. No one needs a machine gun for hunting or self-protection. There are already laws in every state forbidding sawed-off shotguns, etc. and those laws need to have more vigorous enforcement. The same kind of restrictions should apply to large capacity ammunition dispensers for firearms, conversion devices for semi-automatics, and anything else that can serve to further the possession of weapons of mass murder.
There is a major political stumbling block for any national debate let alone major changes on gun issues—the disproportion in money and power in favor of gun advocates. NRA membership is 4,300,000 as opposed to Brady Campaign membership at under 28,000 Americans. Since 2009, the NRA and associated advocates for gun rights have spent nearly 25 times more in Washington than those advocating for gun control, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Gun advocacy groups have spent $20 million on political contributions and lobbying over that time, while gun control groups have spent $832,000. The NRA has a $300 million budget. Last election, more than 250 candidates for the House of Representatives received the NRA’s endorsement, about a quarter of them Democrats. The association spends millions of dollars every campaign cycle, both on direct campaign contributions and independent expenditures. In 2010, the NRA ranked tenth for outside spending groups in that election, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Candidates receive an average of about $2,000, which increases the odds that multiple candidates in an election will support gun rights. After a string of victories in the courts and Congress, the NRA has increased its funding and power and has both Democrats and Republicans courting its favor and avoiding its wrath. Combined, sources such as fundraising, sales, advertising and royalties produced about $115 million in 2010 with more than 50 firearms-related companies giving at least $14.8 million. Not unexpectedly, the legal and political debate over gun laws has followed a familiar trajectory: toward fewer restrictions.
Anti-gun advocates must compromise to admit the rights of law-abiding gun enthusiasts to bear arms in compliance with the above restrictions and any other safety laws that may be enacted. There should be an end to the useless wrangling which so obfuscates the overridingly crucial need to protect our precious children and other innocents.
In a compromise, everyone and every position has to give—give some to get some. In the United States, there has developed such rancor and animosity that neither pro nor anti-gun factions dare to compromise for fear that a concession will allow the camel’s nose under the tent flap and to compromise their heart-felt concepts and agenda. It is time, posthumous, for that kind of mind-set to be set aside mutually. It is time to stop obscuring the issue of the crucial need for protection.
Being practical and real, such compromises will no more launch a police state than having the TSA protect our air travel or requiring driver licenses and proof of auto insurance. Such compromises will not deprive gun advocates from owning and using firearms. It is a right under the constitution to do so, but nowhere is there a right to have any and every weapon, particularly those capable of launching a massacre.
If the short-term goals, limited as they are, can be achieved, then perhaps We the People can come to a long-term solution about how to deal with the broader issues of managing the manufacture, distribution, and sales of firearms and to establish effective laws to control who can have weapons.
Long-term goals should–at least–include:
Registry, storage, use, and accountability for military and law enforcement weaponry including any and all weapons capable of waging a massacre. Ownership can be allowed, but the weapons, ammunition, and magazines should be limited to legitimate hunting and self-protection needs, and more destructive weapons and ordnance should be seriously controlled. In the current political climate, that suggestion seems to be naive and likely doomed to the fate of most attempts to gain control over dangerous firearms being in the hands of dangerous people. As recently as January 13, 2013, David Keene, President of the NRA, stated that, “The likelihood is that they (Congress) are not going to be able to get an assault weapon ban through this Congress.” With his organization’s powerful hold on members of Congress and the NRA’s immense wealth and influence, it would be a poor gamble to bet against Keene’s statement.
Voluntary buy-back programs for weapons currently in the possession of U.S. citizens should be widespread, convenient, and fair, not compulsory. Currently owned guns, with the exception of those capable of aiding and abetting a massacre should be grandfathered in otherwise.
A more rigorous set of laws and enforcement procedures is needed. No one with a verifiable history of felonious criminal activity or a conviction for weapons violations, domestic violence, substance abuse (including alcohol and marijuana), DUI, public intoxication, sexual predatory offenses, or a mental illness should have the privilege of having in his or her possession any explosive, firearm, or large bladed weapon. Arrest and conviction for violations of these laws should be treated as imprisonable felonies and punishments should also include heavy fines.
Sales of any and all firearms should be rigidly enforced. No firearm, no ammunition, and no explosives should be sold to any person who has ever been convicted of crimes as described in item 3 or to individuals with established mental illness or who takes any of the 31 antipsychotic medications which have adverse psychological effects.
No flea-market type or person-to-person sales or gifting of firearms may be used to convey fire arms. No law enforcement organization may confiscate and then re-distribute confiscated weapons.
Explosives of any kind and in any amount and for any purpose may only be sold to appropriately licensed individuals, and companies. Military grade explosives transactions must require licensing, proof of citizenship, security clearance and proof of up-to-date, training and competency.
It is not that reasonable restrictions about who can possess guns under law have failed to be passed. After the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, Congress passed a law to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill, a measure that was signed into law by President George W. Bush. One of the law’s principle purposes was to strengthen an earlier National Instant Criminal Background Check System by establishing new and firmer incentive and penalties to prod the states to submit records of people legally barred from buying firearms. The 2007 law included those who had been committed to mental institutions. Less than half of the states have provided mental health records to the federal government database that law-abiding gun dealers are required to use for background checks on buyers. States have dithered over which of their mentally ill citizens should be included in the base, and they cannot agree sufficiently to permit a cohesive and effective policy nationwide—or even statewide in most states. Technically, most states have been unable to figure out how to gather the requisite records given the powerful restrictions imposed by HIPPAA guidelines and due to a stumbling block clause in the 2007 law, one that the NRA has championed because it allows its contention that only violent schizophrenics should be restricted. The clause, simply put, requires states to establish a standard appeals process so that mentally ill persons (including those involuntarily admitted to mental hospitals) can have their gun rights restored. The current administration has publically stated that the laws are not clearly enough written and what is written has not been implemented. I agree with the Obama administration that it is high time such laws were revisited and drastically improved.
Concealed carry permit holders should be subject to periodic retraining and recertification. When indicated, physical and psychological certification may be required. Anyone who fails the tests described in item 3 above should automatically lose the carry permit.
No illegal or undocumented person should ever have any permit to have a gun. If found with a gun on his or her person or on his or her property during a legally sanctioned search, should be subject to serious criminal sanctions and not simply deported.
In short, to quote the Brady Campaign recommendations, we need a policy to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and other dangerous people and public health and safety programs to inspire safer attitudes and behaviors around the 300 million guns in our homes and communities.
A long-term solution will take a long time to achieve and will require a genuine effort to compromise, patience, and exercise of common sense and good will directed towards potential future victims of would-be shooters. No one can get everything he or she wants, and no compromise will succeed or persist if the agreement is forced or is unequal. NRA and Brady Campaign (Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence) opponents alike will have to agree on the way to achieve the common good—saving our citizens while protecting legal gun use for qualified, law-abiding, and responsible citizens. It might be a good idea to pay attention to what the American public as a whole actually wants, politics aside. In major polls for decades, gun control, in general, has not been politically popular. Since 1990, Gallup has been asking Americans whether they think gun control laws should be stricter. The answer, increasingly, is that they do not. Gallup reports, “The percentage in favor of making the laws governing the sale of firearms ‘more strict’ fell from 78% in 1990 to 62% in 1995, and 51% in 2007.” In 2010, Gallup found only 44% in favor of stricter laws. However, Americans do not tend to prefer a blanket avoidance of stricter gun laws. An August, 2012 CNN/ORC poll asked respondents whether they favor or oppose a number of specific policies to restrict gun ownership. Asked pointedly, respondents supported many policies, including banning the manufacture and possession of semi-automatic rifles, which are being proposed by Vice-President Biden’s committee in the first of the new year, 2013.
The goal of having a responsibly behaving armed citizenry is a quality of our American culture which should be fostered. The negative violent quality of American culture needs to be brought under effective control and diminished significantly if we are to have a decent country in which to live free of fear. Perhaps the first day of the new debate should center on obtaining agreement on those two principles.
What do you think? Share you views, opinions, insights etc. by leaving a comment below.
Carl Douglass – Author
Carl Douglass Books
www.carldouglass.com
“Neurosurgeon Turned Author Writes With Gripping Realism”
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