Blood Of Virginia Tech Shooting Victims Shed In Blacksburg But Splattered In Richmond by Doug Wrenn

Blood Of Virginia Tech Shooting Victims Shed In Blacksburg But Splattered In Richmond

By Doug Wrenn

April 18, 2007

I learned a lot in jail. As a former Corrections Officer, I can tell you that when you lock someone in a cell and deprive him of most of his liberties, you have just acquired an awesome burden and responsibility. Regardless of how contemptible that SOB is, or what heinous crimes he has committed against humanity, once he is charged to your custody, you are as responsible for his safety as you are for his security.

That is why Corrections Officers, or "C/O's," are trained in search and rescue techniques and basic level fire suppression as part of their academy training. In a smoky, working fire, it is the C/O's who must first evacuate, relocate, and if necessary, search for and rescue the inmates from a fire. The facility must be secured before the fire department will even go in.

That is also why any sexual contact between a C/O and an inmate is a serious crime. Consent on the part of the inmate is not recognized, as the courts recognize that the C/O has power and authority over the inmate. Any sexual contact, even if "consensual" by the inmate is still considered sex under coercion, and thus, is sexual assault in the eyes of the law.

The long and the short of it is, when you lock someone up and deprive him of the basic right to freely come and go as he pleases, and the basic right to freely protect himself, you pretty much own him in a liability sense. In a decent, civilized society, we would ideally expect that such would be the case. It's amazing how such fundamental responsibility and common sense is so cavalierly abandoned outside of those iron bars by our elected officials, who we mistakenly grant the sacred trust to govern and theoretically protect us.

My initial thoughts, upon learning of the tragedy at the Virginia Tech campus yesterday, were obviously sympathy for the victims and their families and rage for the shooting demon, who, at least, did us all a favor my killing himself afterward. No lifetime of astronomical taxpayer expense, no free medical care, no color TV, central air conditioning and cigarettes, no appeal, no do-gooder candlelight vigil to spare this low-life; done. Good riddance.

Then I thought of my last article, "Imus: More Shock Than Jock." My point was vindicated in that verbal insults, while cruel and unnecessary, are not the end of the world by any means. Contrary to what Al Sharpton and his racebaiting minions would have us believe, and as I said in the article, we all have bigger fish to fry. In perfect timing, the story about the Duke Lacrosse players being acquitted of all false rape charges broke right after I submitted my article and the Duke story affirmed my point. Ironically, the Virginia Tech shooting story drove my point all the way home. Hopefully, those agenda-driven or thin-skinned people who so foolishly and flippantly threw around terms like "scarred," "wounded" and "deeply impacted" in the Rutgers/Imus incident just a few days ago now have a clearer understanding from the Duke and VA Tech sagas of how those words are more appropriately and truly defined. I don't condone anyone being insulted, but we also need to stop whining and whimpering over such relatively minor slights as if they are pivotal. They are not pivotal, not even close. Whatever happened to the childhood "sticks and stones" ditty? Given my druthers, I'll take being called a "nappy-headed ho'," or more appropriately, "an opinionated, bloviating Cracker-Harp," over getting shot any day. Talk to the Duke Lacrosse players, or the survivors of the VA Tech shootings if you want to know what true suffering is. Meanwhile, we miss the bigger picture in incidents like what occurred at Duke, and even more so, now at Virginia Tech, where two atrocities really occurred. Sadly, most folks only know about one of them. The other relevant atrocity of the VA Tech episode actually occurred a year before in Richmond.

As a vigorous Second Amendment advocate, and a proud member of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and Gun Owners of America (GOA), my secondary thought after hearing about the shooting was the same thought I tend to have in most such instances, "What if one of the victims was armed?"

Approximately two million Americans save their lives or the lives of other innocent people every year on average from perpetration of a violent crime with a firearm, and in most cases, without actually having to fire a gun themselves. In countries, states and cities with more Draconian gun laws, violent crime is up, and visa versa. Professor and author John Lott has written extensively on this fact. I am personally acquainted with one high school teacher who still laments not being able to access the gun in his car in the parking lot when an armed student went on a shooting rampage and at one point, had his gun pointed at that teacher as well. An assistant principle in Pearl, MS was able to stop that October, 1997 school shooting when he ran to his car and was able to access his gun and stopped the carnage and held the shooter at bay until police arrived. In another campus shooting that I only vaguely recall from memory from a few years back, a campus gunman was stopped by two armed students, but the liberal, so-called "mainstream" media gave that story less coverage than tomorrow's weather. Texas state legislator, Dr. Suzanna Gratia-Hupp, watched in helpless horror as both her parents were gunned down in front of her when another demon started shooting up Luby's, a Killeen, TX restaurant in 1991. Ironically, Gratia-Hupp had a gun, but it was secured in her car, out in the parking lot and out of her reach, in compliance with Texas state law at that time. Since then, Dr. Gratia-Hupp has been a staunch activist for gunowners' rights after she learned the hard way. Many news outlets are now comparing the VA Tech shooting to that of Luby's, yet it seems that few people besides Dr. Gratia-Hupp have learned any lessons from the Killeen shooting. They also refuse to accept the common-sense premise, already demonstrated in places like England, Canada and Australia, as well as in New York City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C., that stringent gun control laws only disarm the good guys. The bad guys will somehow always get guns, and without need of a credit card, application form or background check. (Tell that to our top tier GOP 2008 presidential chameleon candidates, AKA: "The Three Stooges," John, Mitt and Rudy, who despite their newly feigned conservative epiphanies and alleged conversions, all have pro-gun control histories in office.) Laws only deter the lawful, but even fools can suffer from foolishness.

Richmond, we have a problem. I couldn't help but wonder if VA Tech had a no-gun policy, as does most schools. I intended to find out, but John Tabin beat me to the punch, and the blame extends much farther than just to VA Tech. In his April 17th article, "A Disarmed Campus," on The American Spectator at www.spectator.org/util/print.asp?art_id=11306, Tabin cites that in January of 2006, Virginia Delegate Todd Gilbert introduced House Bill 1572, which would have allowed for college students with concealed carry permits to legally carry handguns in most situations on campus. The bill died in subcommittee later that same month.

As the saying goes, "Abe Lincoln made all men free, but Sam Colt made them all equal." There is no match against a firearm other than a firearm. To varying degrees in many states, including my own, a citizen first has the ludicrous legal duty to retreat when confronted by an armed intruder. That is reckless nonsense. When cornered indoors, you have nowhere to go except outdoors, maybe. If you are outdoors, I don't care if you are a Gold Medal Olympic track star, you cannot outrun a bullet, and let's face it, most of us are far from being track stars. Such legislation also opens up a more dangerous Pandora's Box later down the road. After disarming it citizenry of firearms, England enacted legislation that also prohibits any citizen from using any instrument as self-defense to assault an attacker. I'm sure a more liberty-sensitive Virginian, Patrick Henry is rolling over in his grave over that one. I don't blame him. Given that scenario, I would rather "Die free than live." I'm sure Mr. Henry would agree and also so revise his famous statement.

The Virginia Delegates who made this horrendous decision willfully made sitting ducks of those shooting victims at Virginia Tech. As the legislative branch of the commonwealth's government willfully and recklessly denied those students the fundamental liberty to protect themselves from imminent and grave bodily harm when they had absolutely no other means to do so, the Commonwealth of Virginia, and specifically, the responsible lawmakers themselves, are liable for the deaths and injuries of those students and they should be zealously and aggressively sued for damages that occurred from their actions accordingly. As the VA Tech story continues to unfold, countless political hacks from the local, state and federal levels of government will be tripping over each other to get their rehearsed, solemn mugs on camera for infinite opportunistic photo-ops. Fine, but with the gravy come the lumps. As long as these politicians are now making themselves sitting ducks in front of cameras and microphones for their 15 minutes of fame (or shame, where applicable), let's turn those spotlights into hotseats and ask those politicos the tough questions that now need to be answered whether they like it or not. After all, the constituents of these pols faced bullets because of their political agenda or sheer ineptitude. Now let them face questions for their decisions and actions that killed and wounded those vulnerable, and yes, law-abiding kids. It can be done, and it should be done. Yes, Virginia, there is still accountability and justice in 2007 America.

It is of no consequence that VA Tech, like many other college campuses, has its own police force. No one writes reports, stretches tape, draws chalk lines, or spills coffee on corpses at crime scenes better than cops, but the fact of the matter is, that is also what they do best. Police officers seldom directly save lives or thwart crimes from occurring. More often than not, they respond after the fact to hopefully apprehend the bad guy who in most cases, is already gone on arrival. Realistically, the police cannot be everywhere at once. The United States Supreme Court recognized that fact, too when the Court ruled that the function of police is not to protect each individual, but society, collectively. Thus, the individual citizen has both the duty and the right to protect himself. Tell that to those dead kids, who thought they were safe in what many are now calling, otherwise "safe and quiet" Blacksburg, Virginia. What better place to wipe out dozens of innocent, unsuspecting, unarmed and totally vulnerable people, who have let their guard down because they deemed their setting to be "safe and quiet"?

Sometimes, like it or not, to fight the gators, you have to get into the swamp. Author and pundit David Horowitz has written prolifically about the mindset of liberals and Democrats. They view politics as war, and the ends justify the means. Where they relentlessly jab with pithy but effective sound bites, we conservatives tend to swing wildly, miss by a country mile and drone on with lofty, logical polemics that are seldom, if at all heard, reflected on, or absorbed by our ideological adversaries. Liberalism is lunacy, and it must be fought with lunacy. Until conservatives learn to roll up their shirtsleeves and get down and dirty, we will lose liberty, and sometimes even life, in every political battle. The VA Tech tragedy is a classic illustration of that truth.

Liberal lawmakers on the local, state and federal levels have tried in several instances to introduce legislation that would give shooting victims the right to sue manufacturers of guns. Many such laws have been defeated or denied by the courts. This inane, liberal, utopian, knee-jerk brainstorm is as idiotic as crash victims suing car manufacturers. Guns, like cars, do not hurt anyone, barring genuine but rare product defects. Injury and death is typically caused by the humans who wield those objects with neglect, recklessness or malicious intent.

Such is not the case, however, for the socialists in Richmond, who have apparently, with trendy, politically correct, radical liberalism taken over and possibly even "Yankee-ized" (This, coming from a Connecticut Nutmegger!) the once great Old Dominion. Yes, apparently, the South will fall again! To see the future of their mistakes, all Americans have to do is look across the Atlantic Ocean to socialist Western Europe. All Southern Americans need to do is look across the Mason-Dixon line to the socialist northern states. Much like Dr. Suzanna Gratia-Hupp, those poor kids at VA Tech complied with the law and subsequently became victims of it. Those decent, law-abiding citizens learned the hard way that no good deed goes unpunished. That is just not acceptable. The blood shed from Blacksburg has splattered over to, and is now as rightfully on the hands of those naive (and some not-so naive) Delegates in Richmond as it is the dead shooter. Now, those Delegates must be punished. For those so apathetic or willing to endanger their own constituents, and those of like liberal mindset, who thwart the process and advance their legislative agenda via their attempts at manipulating sympathetic activist courts, staffed by their cronies, let them now get a much-deserved taste of their own medicine. Those kids complied with bad law, and they paid the price for their legally mandated compliance with that bad law. Now, let those responsible for the current bad and inane law that killed those kids also pay the price for their actions. We're not talking about an errant-mouthed radio shock-jock here. "I'm sorry" may heal bruised egos, but it won't cut it with bullet-ridden students, armed only with blood-stained textbooks and false promises by blithering incompetents, erroneously trusted and charged with their safety.

How could those kids have even possibly protected themselves? I heard one witness say he barricaded himself in a classroom and flipped over a couple desks to protect himself. Doing something is better than doing nothing, but what that student really gave himself was concealment, not cover. One gun the shooter had was a 9mm, which discharges not an overly powerful round, but nevertheless, a round that could have just as easily penetrated a flipped-over desk as an average locked door. "Lockdown"? All that does is corral the victims and make them easier targets, like fish in a barrel. The shooter knew that, too. He chained at least one door to prevent escape. And again, no one can realistically outrun a bullet. The VA Tech students had no other options for defense other than desperate hope and fervent prayer. The responsible subcommittee in the Virginia House of Delegates knowingly and deliberately stripped those kids of any and all liberty to potentially protect themselves in such a situation, and in that setting, those government officials became as responsible for the safety of those dependent kids as I was as a C/O when I locked up a dependent inmate. If something happened to that inmate on my watch, I would rightfully have had to answer for his injury or death. Now, so be it also with the Commonwealth of Virginia.

In his article, John Tabin quotes David Kopel, director of the Second Amendment Project at the Independence Institute. Kopel cites that while no school or business has ever thus far been successfully sued from an on-site shooting, administrators of such institutions are nevertheless scared of being sued. They should be scared, but perhaps not for the reasons they think justify their fear. Lawsuits are like some knives; they can cut from both sides. Now, give all the accomplices responsible for the VA Tech shooting something substantial to fear. Let the lawsuits commence!

Another sage little gem reminds us, "Your right to swing your fist ends at the tip of my nose." Unlike conservatives, liberals more often than not try to force their agenda down our throats, and in many cases, cover up their bullying and tyranny with puffball euphemisms like "tolerance." Liberals are about as tolerant as a rabid pit bull. They just smile more. Most conservatives do not demand that every citizen be armed. Conservatives respect the right of two-legged sheep to choose to be sacrificial lambs. All most of us conservatives ask is that liberals leave us alone and allow us to reasonably protect ourselves and our families and property. Liberals, on the other hand, want no one to have a gun. When I was a kid and got myself into a bad situation, my mother would admonish, "You made your bed; now sleep in it." Ditto, Richmond. You created this nightmare; now you can deal with it. Your fearful, tunnel-visioned, Fantasy Island, liberal panacea killed 32 (and still counting) innocent kids and wounded many more, who did absolutely nothing to deserve their fate, and thanks to you, also had no way out of that fate. Somehow, you did manage to get one thing right, though, your state motto, "Sic Semper Tyrannis." Yes, indeed, "Thus ever it be with tyrants." And as a dying Julius Caesar said to his friend, turned betrayer and killer among the Roman senators who also turned against him, "Et Tu, Brutus." As blood still oozes from the bodies of precious young lives robbed and tears still stream from agonized, inconsolable families crushed, back in a "safe and quiet" place called Blacksburg, may you Virginia bureaucrats sleep well in those beds you made a world away from both denied reality and its devastating results in a now less-than-capital place called Richmond.