Before It’s News – by Live Free or Die
Former President Bill Clinton disarmed the United States Marines at the Navy Yard in Washington DC back in 1993 when he declared virtually all military bases to be gun-free zones. The interview in the video below with a Marine’s father whose son was at the Navy Yard is telling: “If we had the ammunition, we could’ve cleared that building.” The Marine’s father continues to share that had they had ammunition, they would have been able to prevent the carnage that resulted. I wonder how many lives these gun-free zones have saved? The lives of innocent Americans were surely lost on Monday, September 16th, 2013 as a result of Clinton’s anti-gun legislation.
Dan Joseph took to the streets to ask people how they felt about our founding document. He also asked people if there was anything they would change. In the wake of the horrific shooting at the Washington Navy Yard, one individual made an interesting point about yesterday’s mass shooting at the Navy Yard in the nation’s capital:
“I know a lot of people are concerned about guns these days, but you know if everybody had arms, then there wouldn’t be these problems.
“My son was at Marine Barracks — at the Navy Yard yesterday – and they had weapons with them, but they didn’t have ammunition. And they said, ‘We were trained, and if we had the ammunition, we could’ve cleared that building.’ Only three people had been shot at that time, and they could’ve stopped the rest of it.”
Back in 1993, the Clinton administration virtually declared military establishments “gun-free zones.” As a result, the policy banned “military personnel from carrying their own personal firearms and mandates that ‘a credible and specific threat against [Department of the Army] personnel [exist] in that region” before military personnel ‘may be authorized to carry firearms for personal protection.” Indeed, most military bases have relatively few military police as they are in heavy demand to serve in Iraq and Afghanistan,” according to economist John Lott.
Additionally, Lott discovered that ”every public shooting since at least 1950 in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed has taken place where citizens are not allowed to carry guns.”
Well…. seems like the Navy Yard isn’t exactly a gun-free zone, now, is it?
Also seems to me that “a credible and specific threat against [Department of the Army] personnel [exist] in that region.”
Whether everyone (military or civilian) is allowed or encouraged to carry their arms with them, or specifically designated and trained guards who are armed are on site in these *otherwise* gun-free zones, I don’t have a well-formed opinion about, yet, but…. it seems really, really clear that gun-free zones are NOT safe, and are an invitation to predator-types of people or groups. A no-brainer. It is like leaving the safe unlocked and having a giant neon sign with an arrow pointing, “if you are of a mind to rob me, this is a good place.”
And whether or not this shooter was mind-controlled sleeper agent, or mentally ill (apparently “hearing voices” in his head and claiming that “microwave vibrations” were interfering with his sleep), and regardless of whether or not he was under the care of a psychiatrist, suffering from PTSD, or taking psychiatric meds, just the very fact that people exist who want to harm us in this very way — terrorizing people by going after everyday folks just going about their business (whether office workers or schoolchildren) — seems to me we need to not simply have “shelter in place” drills but also have some countermeasures in place to deter and to neutralize any and all such threats.
I know there are a lot of misled people who feel ever-so-safe in these gun-free zones. Well, I sure don’t.
I sure don’t feel safe without guns either. Whenever something like this
happens or even a solitary killing by gun, I always wonder about the
person, not the gun. Mental illness is rampant but it is one of the least
prioritized illnesses. Forget the DSM – that’s a comic book.
Considering the number of guns owned by people, the vast and overwhelming majority of people do not commit violent acts with their guns — they are responsible gun owners/users. And considering the number of veterans and others with PTSD who do NOT use their guns to commit acts of violence against other people, I for one would love to have anyone delve just a tiny bit deeper. I am concerned when I hear, “we must consider mental illness!” because too often the answer to that is psychiatric drugs or “treatment,” and the liberal, hand-wringing folks I know think the answer is to take the guns away from people diagnosed with mental illness, and give them “treatment” which consists of psychiatric drugs and multiple appointments to monitor and assure compliance. As though that is the answer.
It really is too bad, because there ARE treatments which are quite effective against PTSD (just as there are effective alternative treatments against many cancers), but these treatments are considered alternative and Obamacare is not exactly supportive of alternative treatments…that’s not the direction they are trying to direct us. “Winning hearts and minds” in every instance is the direction we are being given, so we are convinced against our better interests and judgment, and we believe (incorrectly) we have come up with those cockeyed ideas ourselves, through critical thinking. We are given limited cognitive choices. “Thinking outside the box” is a better way.
But we really don’t know what happened at the Navy Yard. A false flag, a programmed “lone wolf” sleeper agent with two others to back him up, a guy on psychiatric meds who otherwise would not have committed such an act, or a guy not on any kind of meds, but who needed treatment for PTSD. Or something else. We just don’t know.