The NRA Response

It's a good idea but specifics about school defense are needed. I'd say show a generic school layout and have intersecting lines of fire plus steel doors with shooting ports that automatically close and lock in front of and behind any shooter(like a fish in a barrel, literally). Most modern classrooms automatically do a lockout but anybody caught in the hallway would be SOL.
 
gaseousclay said:
as for LaPierre on Meet The Press, I couldn't get past the disgusting spittle on the sides of his lips to take him seriously. plus, he kept dodging straight forward questions about solutions to the gun problem.
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What gun problem?

You've bought into the popular misconception that we have a "gun" problem. We do not. We have a gratuitous violence problem, and some perpetrators of gratuitous violence choose guns as their tool. That's all there is to it.

Allow me to remind you that the worst school massacre in U.S. history was carried out with bombs. (Bath Township, MI, 1927.) At Columbine, the guns were the back-up plan. The primary weapons were two 20-pound propane bombs, which didn't explode.

Look what Timothy McVeigh did in Oklahoma City with a U-Haul truck, some fertilizer, and diesel fuel. The shooter in Connecticut was reportedly a genius. Do you think if he had not been able to access guns that he wouldn't have been able to make a bomb that would have worked?

GUNS ARE NOT THE ISSUE!
 
BigJim5945 said:
People are not understanding the issue here. That press conference wasn't for the 45% of Americans who own guns, they've never held a press conference like that for us before. That press conference was for the 55% of Americans who don't own guns, and that response was abysmal and tone-deaf to non-gun owners.

And before you say to hell with the anti-gun crowd, not all non-gun owners are anti-gun owners, there is a wide spectrum, just like there is a wide spectrum of gun owners, from the ardent 2A believers to the gun owners who are in favor of an AWB.

That message needed to be crafted for non-gun owners to show that the NRA understood the issue, and would work with those in power to do what is best for the country. They didn't have to mean it, but they had a chance to reach an audience they don't usually speak to. Market yourself. Don't draw a line in the sand and cling to your guns, painting the perfect picture for the media to show. The headlines were overwhelmingly critical, and it was as much the NRAs fault as it was the mainstream media hype
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Couldn't agree more. Maybe the transcript comes across better than it did live, but I was completely dumbfounded watching him talk. And all the negative press he's getting isn't coming just from the usual boogymen "the left" and "the antis", it's coming from every direction and source and it completely accurate and justified. Lil Wayne didn't do much to help the cause, on Friday or today.
 
RangerHAAF said:
Most modern classrooms automatically do a lockout but anybody caught in the hallway would be SOL.
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Really? I have never heard of a classroom door that locks automatically. After hearing about Sandy Hook and the fact that at least one teacher didn't have a key to her door I started thinking about automatic locking and I started searching for something that would do this ... and I came up blank.

Even if they had centralized locking, like in a prison, somebody has to throw the switch or press the button. At Sandy Hook, it appears the entire front office was taken out within a few seconds. That school was built in 1956 and probably hadn't been updated since, at least with respect to the classroom door locks, so even if the technology exists we can be certain that Sandy Hook didn't have it.

But I would really like to know if the technology is offered in a package suitable for schools.
 
Laminated and wire-reinforced glass at the main doors and windows would have gone a long way to harden the perimeter, and would not cost all that much to retrofit. It would buy the folks inside some time during an assault to get ready -- if we allowed them any tools for an effective defense.
 
I watched "Meet the Press" specifically for his appearance today. I thought he did a far better job today getting his point across to the undecided than he did on Friday. I'm with Aguila. This isn't a gun problem, no matter how many people wish it were. The issues here are mental health and school safety. Even if the scope gets enlarged to violent crime as a whole, it's still not a 'gun issue'. We need to hammer home the point the gun is a tool used and that simply removing that tool only causes the criminal to pick another. And that across the board crime rates are down, some at record lows, all while there's record high gun ownership and sales.
It's not going to change from one interview by one person, but his performance today IMO was good step forward for us...instead of the step back I felt Friday's press conference was. It wasn't perfect but I feel he expressed a willingness to work with DC and anti-gun factions on some topics and ideas that would benefit everyone not just us gun owners. I thought the idea of pushing states move faster to update or upgrade their databases for the seriously mentally ill for background checks, can't remember his exact wording, was a good idea. While I'm not completely sold one way or the other on the ability to put an armed guard in every school, but to state that if we can come up with $2 billion to train Iraqi police this year we should be able to come up with some funds for our own children's safety was an great point and well put.
 
Most modern classrooms automatically do a lockout but anybody caught in the hallway would be SOL
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Really? How many schools have you been in lately that have this in place? At the school where I teach, large sectors of the building can be sealed off by the main office tripping the automatic doors, but when it comes to the classrooms we have to lock them from the inside.

Oh, and we have bazillions of windows facing the outside world...
 
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Most schools are brick, but, lots and lots of windows.

Most are struggling with budgets. Retrofits and new buildings won't be possible.
 
I waited to watch Wayne LaPierre on meet the press. Last time I watching him was during the NRA Press Event on Friday. All I can say is that he isn't doing us any favors.

OK, factually he may be accurate about lots of things that I agree with. The thing is that he doesn't need to win me over and in spite of that I thought he came off looking really bad.

He literally looked and sounded like some lunatic who's answer to the question of "Would you like a steak knife for your meat?" would be met with the response of "No, that's alright, I've got a gun."

If Wayne is missing the target in presenting "our side" of the issue in a way that makes us facepalm then what do you think "John Q. Public" is thinking listening to Wayne?

I wasn't able to sleep last night so I watched CNN and Don Lemon had some former cop/gun shop owner on who did a MUCH superior job of explaining the various types of guns to Don Lemon (by extension to the audience) than Wayne LaPierre ever did.

I'm disappointed once again by our "Mouthpiece" and think we need to either tell Wayne to hire a spokesperson or do something differently cause he's making things worse and not better.

I don't think I'm exaggerating anything when I say he's sort of making a laughingstock out of himself and us by extension.

ON THE PLUS SIDE:
I just got a box of 50 rounds of some .32, 71 grain bullets for one of my guns from my dad. Dad's are awesome!

Edit: As far as Wayne goes, I think Heston rubbed off a little bit too much on him. Just all around bad bad bad. It pains me to have to say this but it was bad and made us look bad.
 
Gotta say I agree with No1der regarding a spokesman. Even my wife, who seldom comments on the current gun control issues, said she thought LaPierre did nothing to help the NRA and probably helped rally the anti gun crowd with his presentation.
 
All of the school shootings that I've read about were initiated from the inside that's not to say a shooter couldn't have started shooting from the outside through the windows but that just seems to be their pattern.

Schools don't really need to be redesigned just hardened and reinforced with hidden weapons placed in key areas for use like a fire extinguisher. Wayne has the right idea but he could have gotten the message across a little more tactfully.
 
FUDD's are a serious threat to our 2nd Ammendment rights.
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Let's watch the blanket aspersions.

While many of the "guns are for hunters" gun owners may not be a help to us, I don't see them harming us. Many will just stand by and let the wind blow.

However, some are much more supportive than you'd think, and insulting them doesn't help.
 
RangerHAAF said:
All of the school shootings that I've read about were initiated from the inside that's not to say a shooter couldn't have started shooting from the outside through the windows but that just seems to be their pattern.
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???

Sandy Hook wasn't initiated from the inside. Lanza shot out the glass beside the locked front door to let himself in.

zxcvbob said:
Most of the schools I'm familiar with have brick exterior.
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And I'll bet they have glass entrance doors, or large glass sidelights adjacent to the entrance doors. How about the secondary entrance/exit doors? How many of them are solid/opaque with no glass sidelights?
 
If you secure every school they'll target daycare centers. Creating a police state doesn't enhance our rights. The nra needs to build the case for the role of armed citizens. Wayne isn't effective at that.
 
I waited to watch Wayne LaPierre on meet the press. Last time I watching him was during the NRA Press Event on Friday. All I can say is that he isn't doing us any favors.
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How so? I admit that I've only read the transcript because I haven't yet found a video link that will play well so maybe I'm missing something. That being said, I thought LaPierre did quite well considering that this was basically a hostile interview.

David Gregory seemed to be doing his level best to goad LaPierre into a "gotcha" moment and LaPierre wouldn't give him the satisfaction of it. In particular, I thought LaPierre did a good job in not letting Gregory get away with the "Columbine had a cop and that didn't work argument" in thoroughly pointing out that today's police procedures are different than they were at Columbine. Also, I thought LaPierre addressed the tired old "if it could possibly save one life" argument by pointing out that we've already tried an AWB before and that it didn't prevent Columbine.

Being factually correct is, IMHO, all we've got right now. The media is, by and large, on the other side of the issue and seems to be doing all that they can to portray us in a negative light. As time goes on and people's emotions calm down, I think that the facts rather than appearances will carry more weight.
 
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