Monday, April 16, 2007

Contagious Malkin

There's a tragic school shooting in Virginia, and of course Michelle Malkin comes to the conclusion that the real problem is that students don't have enough guns:

Andrew's Dad, noting a recent editorial from Va. Tech's university relations vice president arguing against allowing students to carry in self-defense on campus, blogs:

Just imagine if students were armed. We no longer need to imag[in]e what will happen when they are not armed.


PJM round-up here.

Reader Kevin e-mails: "Imagine if sensible CCW laws allowed people to defend themselves, this tragedy could have been avoided."


I guess she never heard of "contagious shooting":

It is known in police parlance as “contagious shooting” — gunfire that spreads among officers who believe that they, or their colleagues, are facing a threat. It spreads like germs, like laughter, or fear. An officer fires, so his colleagues do, too.

The phenomenon appears to have happened last year, when eight officers fired 43 shots at an armed man in Queens, killing him. In July, three officers fired 26 shots at a pit bull that had bitten a chunk out of an officer’s leg in a Bronx apartment building. And there have been other episodes: in 1995, in the Bronx, officers fired 125 bullets during a bodega robbery, with one officer firing 45 rounds.

(edit)

In the 1995 Bronx bodega robbery in which officers fired 125 shots, the suspects did not fire back. “They were shooting to the echo of their own gunfire,” a former police official said at the time.


That's what happens with trained professionals. Can you imagine a roomful of college students with guns?

2 comments:

Dirk Gently said...

by malkin's argument, shouldn't every nation arm themselves with nuclear weapons? isn't that the whole point of mutually assured destruction?

saddam, li'l kim, and ahmadinejad only wanted to do their global duty to ensure the peace.

Anonymous said...

The only thing worse was all the sanctimonious crap on TV today. "We're here for you." Really? Where were you when a little brat bought 2 9mm Glocks and enough rounds to take out a dorm or two?