Cops Say: Guns Work

To most normal, logical persons such as yourself, my dear reader, it makes sense when people say that having a handgun for personal defense should be an allowable option and, moreover, saves many lives.

The Second Amendment is "under fire" so to speak, as I wrote in my post entitled "It Just Gets Worse" on January 15th, regarding a law banning private gun ownership in the District of Columbia:

Since "unrestricted" private ownership of guns clearly threatens the public safety, the 2nd Amendment can be interpreted to allow a variety of gun restrictions, according to the Bush administration.

The argument was delivered by U.S. Solicitor General Paul D. Clement in a brief filed with the U.S. Supreme Court in the ongoing arguments over the legality of a District of Columbia ban on handguns in homes, according to a report from the Los Angeles Times.

Clement suggested that gun rights are limited and subject to "reasonable regulation" and said all federal limits on guns should be upheld.

The presence of a handgun helped stop a mass killing in Colorado Springs last year.

I wrote, humorously, about the Rules of a Gunfight.

And now, in re the above court case (involving private gun ownership bans in DC), we read:

When sexual assaults started rising in Orlando, Fla., in 1966, police officers noticed women were arming themselves, so they launched a firearms safety course for them. Over the next 12 months, sexual assaults plummeted by 88 percent, burglaries fell by 25 percent and not one of the 2,500 women who took the course fired a gun in a confrontation.

And that, says a new brief submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court by police officers and prosecutors in a controversial gun-ban dispute, is why gun ownership is important and should be available to individuals in the United States.

The arguments come in an amicus brief submitted by the Law Enforcement Alliance of America, whose spokesman, Ted Deeds, told WND there now are 92 different law enforcement voices speaking together to the Supreme Court in the Heller case.

That pending decision will decide whether an appeals court ruling striking down a District of Columbia ban on handguns because it violates the Second Amendment will stand or not. The gun ban promoters essentially argue that any gun restriction that is ruled "reasonable" is therefore constitutional, such as the D.C. handgun ban.

This is something that I've known, as a law enforcement officer, for many years. That law enforcement is, evidently, finally publicly acknowledging: GUNS CAN SAVE LIVES.

Yes, of course, guns can kill. They are a tool. If we banned all guns, then killings by knife would skyrocket. Killings by crossbow. Killings by rocks. Killings by shovels. Killings by Stiffel lamps.

Further, from the WND article:

Where the rubber meets the road, he (Ted Deeds, spokesman, Law Enforcement Alliance of America,) said, is when a good guy needs to survive an encounter with a bad guy. There are two possible results: Police arrive on the scene later to have the innocent victim hurt or killed, or they arrive on the scene to "find the victim hearty and the offender on the floor."

"Every cop in American is going to pick the second closing of the story," Deeds said.

Oh yes we will, all day, every day.

The SCOTUS will hear oral arguments on this case, March 18th.

Please allow me to let you in on a little secret that cops can't tell:

1. Cops can't be everywhere;

2. We know that;

3. In the Real World, you're ON YOUR OWN;

4. No matter what anyone says, cops are reactive;

5. Cops want to think they are proactive, but this is a myth brought about by federally-funded programs (whose grants ran out some years ago) such as C.O.P.S. and other "community service" oriented programs;

6. C.O.P.S. programs did MORE to screw over the public, because it created "boutique" cop teams who DIDN'T have to answer basic "calls for service";

7. Diminishing, of course, the pool of cops available for standard "calls for service";

8. Creating, naturally, a divisive nature between the cops who still had to work for a living, and those cops (think melanin, think sex) who got to kick back and attend midnight basketball games, make speeches in high school auditoriums during daytime hours, attend numerous "community meetings" and, essentially, do everything but standard cop work;

The grants ran out, the C.O.P.S. programs died, and we are, once again, back to reality.

Which is:

You have a gun in your house? A burglar intrudes? You have a wife and children?

The gloves are off, baby. If you get the chance, shoot the fucker between the eyes, watch his brains splatter against the textured, taped, finished and painted dry wall.

If he raped your wife, harmed your child, shoot him outside, drag his dead body inside and shoot him again in the brain pan.

At their hearts, cops understand this.

The trouble comes only with the D.A.s office and the "officialdom" levels.

Trust me: at the cop level, every DEAD SCROTE is a GOOD SCROTE.

Oh, yeah, sorry: verbiage.

The word "scrote" harkens back to an original 1975 cop novel by Joseph Wambaugh, "The Choirboys," wherein Henry "Roscoe" Rules, 29, a five-year veteran of the LAPD, is the one most intent on proving he is the toughest cop on the force and refers to people he dislikes (which is just about everyone) as "scrotes" (short for scrotums).

What applied then applies now.

Guns work.

Period.

BZ