Was the shooting the outcome of our media-driven paranoia fetish?

Nancy Lanza's life seems to have come straight out of the radical talk-show, Savage-Hannity, World Net Daily world.  The mother of the shooter was seen by neighbors as friendly and pleasant, but no one was allowed into her well-armed home.

How many guns Nancy had is not clear, though authorities say several were registered to her, including the ones used in the massacre.

Her former sister-in law, Marsha Lanza, told the Chicago Sun-Times outside her home in Crystal Lake, Ill., that Nancy Lanza wanted guns for protection. “She prepared for the worst,” Marsha Lanza told the newspaper. “I didn’t know that they [the guns] would be used on her.”

Members of Nancy Lanza’s regular neighborhood dice game never got inside her home, either — not in 15 years of regular games. Rhonda Collens, a frequent player in the game, said that while the group’s weekly get-togethers moved from house to house, Nancy Lanza’s was always skipped. ...WaPo

Her older son lived and worked at some distance.  Adam, the shooter, lived at home. 

Adam, at 20, was born not long after the rash of "spree shootings" began in the middle of the Reagan presidency.  Before that, there were much longer intervals between incidents in which young or youngish white man plus gun went over the edge and killed whole groups of innocents -- only two in our history before 1984 when James Oliver Huberty, probably the oldest of the bunch at 41, walked into a McDonald's in San Ysidro and killed 21 people.  "I'm going hunting," he said.  "Hunting humans."

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Chris Cillizza thinks -- or maybe just hopes -- that this time things may be different.

The simple truth, at least according to this poll data, is that the increasing tendency in the wake of shootings like the one in Connecticut is to chalk it up to a troubled person and move on. While the death of so many children could certainly change this equation, the data available suggests that pushing for changes in gun laws following Newtown might not be met with the sort of reception you might think. ...WaPo

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And a Texas (surprise!) member of Congress thinks everything woulda been just fine had the principal kept an M-4 in her office.

Rep. Louie Gohmert, a Republican from Texas, says he wishes Dawn Hochsprung, the principal of the Sandy Hook Elementary School, was armed with an M-4 assault rifle when she confronted Adam Lanza, the shooter who killed 20 children.

“I wish to God she had an M-4 in her office locked up so when she heard gunfire she pulls it out and she didn’t have to lunge heroically with nothing in her hands but she takes him out, takes his head off before he can kill those precious kids,” Gohmert said in an interview on “Fox News Sunday.” ...The Hill

Comments

[DaMav]

Whatever his party, it's good to see that somebody is making sense. It's long past time we stopped advertising schools as places where only criminals have guns. Hopefully this great tragedy will result in a common sense end to banning concealed carry for law abiding adults at schools. The current policies leave our children defenseless.

[VickiJHartley]

DaMay, think about it. He killed his Mom who knew he was mentally ill and was armed to the teeth. How would an armed principal who did not know his intentions have a better chance against him? Are you suggesting she walk around with the assault weapon in her hands at all times?

[DaMav]

If concealed carry were permitted in schools, the criminal (insane or not) would not know who was armed, only that it would be likely that some adults were. This in itself would provide a deterrent as well as a potential stopper to any violence.

There is no need for absurdity -- "walk around with the assault weapon in her hands at all times". This is deadly serious business and permitting concealed carry by qualified adults deserves consideration. Having a law making it illegal for adults to carry on school grounds is utterly ineffective. How many times does that have to be proven before such laws are repealed?

[PW]

I bet you really believe that, DaMav. But it only underlines how sick we have become as a society. Let's get well first and then see if we need gun-toting school administrators.

[Tom Maguire]

" How would an armed principal who did not know his intentions have a better chance against him?"

I have no idea what the circumstances were when he killed his mother but she may very well have been taken by surprise.

From reports I have read the principal was in a meeting with a parent (along with the school psychologist and others) when they all heard what sounded like gunshots. The parent either dove under the table or thought about it (I wasn't sure whether she was engaging in hyperbole in her description.) The principal and psychologist jumped up and ran down the hall to confront the shooter, or anyway, address the situation. another report said she was shot while trying to tackle him.

Bringing brass onions to a gunfight takes tremendous courage and commitment to duty but really - would this be a worse world if she had courage, commitment and a weapon (with appropriate training)? As to whether she could have guessed his intentions, well, the apparent gunshots were probably a helpful clue.

"But it only underlines how sick we have become as a society. Let's get well first..."

What is the prognosis? The mother owned the guns legally and had no problem with a background check. Does anyone think a full and effective ban on rifles, shotguns and handguns is on the horizon in this country? How about a dimunition of privacy rights to the point where the mother can't own guns because her son may be mentally ill?

If a gun ban won't be happening is there a Plan B, or do we just accept the occasional mass shooting as part of the scenery?

[DaMav]

@PW
I do not doubt your sincerity, intellect, or concern but you seem to advocate doing nothing until all the ills of society are somehow cured. Why not consider immediate and easily achieved alternatives that might improve the odds for our children in schools?

There is no ideal solution that would work 100%, but if deterrence plus a hard counter to an ongoing attack worked even a fraction of the time that would be an improvement.

[Trickster]

It's worth carefully considering whether a guard or trained teacher/employee with access to arms might make schools safer. I hate the idea, but it's a question we have to look at.

What's not a question at all is whether we need to take strong action to stop the ever-increasing flood of guns, especially deadlier and deadlier guns designed to do nothing but kill lots of humans quickly.

[PW]

No one -- as far as I've seen/heard -- has suggested the mother may have been the real problem. Was she sane? Or do we just assume she was because she was pleasant at dice games and owned a nice piece of property and, when she bought guns, had nothing disturbing in her background? How sensible and reliable are our current criteria for gun ownership if they allow the sale of "deadlier and deadlier guns designed to do nothing but kill lots of humans quickly," as Trickster writes?