Greg Ellifritz, a nationally known and respected law enforcement and self-defense instructor whom we've met in these pages before, wrote a very good analysis of the Uvalde school shooting soon after it occurred, based on the information then available. A lot has been learned since. Now he's come out with an updated analysis - and his comments on the law enforcement departments, agencies and individuals involved are scathing. Highlighted items are my emphasis.
It turns out that cops were on scene. They chose not to engage stating they feared missing and hitting children in the area.
Imagine being given the opportunity to instantly stop an active killer event at an elementary school before anyone got hurt. Then imagine failing to take that opportunity because you don’t trust your own marksmanship abilities.
I wonder if these officers wished they had practiced more or taken a carbine class on their own dime to build their skill set? Probably not, because in police work, failing to act is always preferable to acting and experiencing an unfavorable outcome.
These officers will never be punished for failing to take the shot, but they would be fired, sued and maybe jailed if they shot and accidentally hit a kid.
Which option would you choose given this scenario? I would argue that sometimes you have to take the shot regardless of the backstop. If these officers would have missed, they may have hit a couple kids on the playground. That would be absolutely horrible, but would be a far better result than the massacre that occurred.
But again, these officers will not be disciplined for allowing a murderer to get into an elementary school. They would be fired and sued if they had missed and shot kids on a playground. These are the rules society has set for officers. There’s no expectation that they do anything. They get punished if they screw up. They aren’t given the training to be truly competent with their weapons. It’s easy to see why they made the choices they did.
People have been clamoring for kinder, gentler, less militarized cops for the last 15 years. This is the result. As my friend Darryl Bolke says: “You get the police department you deserve.” When you reward and promote inept cowards, yes-men, and suck-ups because they never used force or screwed up in the field, you get police chiefs like Pete Arredondo.
Remember, these are the folks you are calling to help you in your worst moments. As I’ve said before, you are on your own. No one is coming to save you.
There's more at the link, covering more issues that have come to light after the shooting.
To my mind, this incident offers yet more justification for homeschooling your children, rather than sending them into the already-failing, corrupt, top-heavy, riddled-with-political-correctness public school system. Turns out big public schools are also shooter magnets. If someone has a beef with society, and wants to go out in a torrent of blood and a blaze of publicity, a perfect target-rich environment awaits him in the public schools of this nation. If you send your child to such a school, you expose him or her to that danger . . . but if you homeschool them instead, either alone or in association with other parents, you remove them from that danger. What's more, there are no laws, rules or regulations prohibiting parents from being armed and ready to defend their children against any threat that might arise. I know a couple of parents who've already (somewhat profanely) emphasized that, and made sure that the homeschooling parent is both equipped and trained to act as protector as well as educator. I've even helped to train a few of them.
I'm sure social justice warriors will have (yet another) attack of the vapors at the very thought of armed parents protecting their own children. I'm equally sure the rest of us won't give a damn about them - which is entirely as it should be. I daresay our kids will be a lot safer and better protected than theirs.
Peter
Some of us do the right thing. Of course as members of the old, "brutal", white, aggressive Police of th 1960s-1980s we were called racists. So we left and those that replaced us are being hired using standards that rank fear, feelings, and fright as virtues.
ReplyDeleteI as one of Irma's supervisors and was two city blocks away when the incident occurred. Irma and her partner had seconds to make the correct decision, act on it, and saved the lives of children and their families.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-met-irma-ruiz-30-years-20180928-story.html
https://www.odmp.org/officer/11612-police-officer-irma-c-ruiz
"reward and promote inept cowards, yes-men, and suck-ups"
ReplyDeleteWelcome to The Screwtape Letters.
I don't understand why people don't homeschool kids more. While my daughter is technically in public school, Florida Virtual School has been online since the dialup days, and they do it very well. The academics are more stringent than the local high school, the only class that leans left is English ("write a paper about Jane Eyre thru a feminist lens". Meh- she got an A, and never finished the book), and I am more aware of what she is learning than the parents of her friends in the local schools.
ReplyDeleteAnd when there was a cop killer on the loose in the area for a week, she was safe at home, and I was in my office with a weapon at hand.
I can see the point of not doing anything, it's sad but I can see it.
ReplyDeleteYou wrote: "Turns out big public schools are also shooter magnets. If someone has a beef with society, and wants to go out in a torrent of blood and a blaze of publicity, a perfect target-rich environment awaits him in the public schools of this nation."
What has happened that would allow someone to decide to go out and shoot up a school? That is just nuts! Where did anyone get the idea this was ok? No one asks what has changed over the last 20 years that has brought on this kind of thinking/insanity... I think it's the drugs big pharma sells to control kids who think differently.
I'm sure you have seen the those 60 second prime time drug ads with the fast talking 45 seconds of side-effects? What are the side effects of the drugs the school shooters are taking? Are those side effects causing this insanity?
Never any talk on the billion dollar companies with their huge ad spends on causing the insanity that allows these things to take place. All the talk is on the tool they use...
God willing, my daughter will deliver twins, probably in September. Grandparents on both sides have/are retiring in order to provide daycare and homeschool services. (There are other reasons, but on the Freeholder side of things, this was the biggie.)
ReplyDeleteThis is a sacrifice, but our grandchildren are worth it.
You do make me think, though. There is talk that the Republican sellout gun control measure is going to "harden schools". Wait until the spree killers figure out that daycare centers are about has hardened as your average grocery store.
I was going to post about how it's actually harder to get to the kids in a daycare than in a school, based on the rules here in Florida, but I remembered that many daycares are run out of someone's home, and none of them have secure playgrounds.
ReplyDeleteSo instead I am going to be grateful that I only read about these things, rather than having them impact my life directly (knock wood) and pray that this remains so in my life.
Our old homeschool co-op has at least one armed parent up front on the only unlocked door at all times. Homeschool or Die!!! as VD says.
ReplyDeleteAs well taken as Greg Ellefritz' observations are, two pieces of information I came across recently make me wonder if he's missing a larger picture.
ReplyDelete1. The Center for Immigration Studies' Tod Bensman noted that Uvalde sits on the crossroads of two major cartel trafficking routes into the US.
2. San Francisco would seem to be as far geographically and culturally from Uvalde as you could get. But Real Clear Investigations reports that behind San Francisco's notorious shoplifting crisis are highly organized businesses run by. . . cartels.
From RCI:
“Everyone knows what’s going on. The cops, mayor, and D.A.,” said Tom Wolf, a recovering addict. “Everyone knows it’s organized and cartel-backed. They just don’t think it’s worth it to stop it, because nothing’s going to change anyway. They’ve surrendered.”
". . .Taken together, the dealers, boosters, and fences comprise a vast illicit industry that generates the cash that pays a Mexican drug cartel to import narcotics into San Francisco’s streets."
Could this be part of Uvalde and San Francisco "getting the police departments they deserve?"
No one wants to shoot the wrong duh-versity with too much melanin in them and be Derek Chauvined.
ReplyDeleteOr if you are a private citizen that shoots the wrong the person with too much melanin. Look at those three White men in Georgia that did nothing wrong or George Zimmerman that also never should have come to trial.
Yet Alec Baldwin walks free.