Robert Pogson

Piers Morgan seems incapable of listening to people who do not share his vies that “assault rifles” should be banned.

1. This evening, he shouted down a guy who claimed homicides rose after private ownership of handguns was banned in the UK. Here is a study that shows clearly homicides rose dramatically after the ban. That’s by the government of the UK, not the NRA or some fanatics but the people who banned the handguns.
   
2. Too, he ranted repeatedly that the firearms recently used were “AR-15″ military rifles. That’s not so. The AR-15 was made by Armalite and then Colt years ago in the run-up to the current M-16 M4. Bushmaster and others sell imitations. They are not AR-15s. He also went on that it was easy to convert them to full-auto. That is not so and also not legal in USA. One can get them to fire full-auto, but it’s pretty useless, not being aimed fire (note, the shooter does not modify the firearm at all but arranges the recoil to repeatedly pull the trigger, emptying the magazine in seconds, rendering the guy unarmed).
3. He also claimed being able to shoot an armed intruder would not protect school children. His logic escapes me. Why do we even bother to have armed police forces? That’s just a silly argument to claim the other guy is silly, wrong, foolish, etc. as Piers did and had other commentators do the same. Piers seems to assume all semi-auto firearms could disappear in January. That is not possible so how are kids to be protected when they return to school?
4. Further, he claimed the murder rate in USA was huge compared to countries where firearms were more closely regulated. Tell that to the victims of the Ruwandan genocide who were hacked to death. It doesn’t matter how many firearms you have if you have few murderers. Even if you have no firearms and lots of murderers, guess what happens? Murders, lots of them.

All in all, the NRA suggestion to protect schools with armed guards until a Utopian society is achieved makes sense to me. A layered defence works. Have armed guards at the gates, in the buses, at the doors and in the hallways and watch the body-count fall. Properly trained and deployed guards can create safe zones of fire and firing accurate rifles with fluffy bullets instead of handguns would put the intruder down promptly, saving a lot of kids. If the USA is wealthy enough to put hundreds of thousand of military in harm’s way around the globe they should be able to do the same. Offer those returning vets a guaranteed job. They would not need much training, just a savvy sergeant per school.