Some thoughts on the SLC Mall Shooting
I've lived in the Salt Lake City area nearly all my life. The recent events are obviously stunning to a community, and my purpose here is not to dwell on the emotional impact of these types of things. Many other bloggers have already weighed in, and I'm not sure what more needs be said.
One interesting view worth noting: When I learned of the events, I was sitting in a hotel restaurant in New York having breakfast with an Israeli co-worker of mine when I showed him the headline on my phone.
Israelis have a unique perspective on these types of things. They live in an unfriendly part of the world and the natives of the land are not exactly welcoming. The best equivalent I can think of would be if the native americans decided to wage war and take back their country. Certainly they don't have a military to fight the battle in a conventional sense, so resorting to terrorism is the only realistic approach to winning their freedom. (Remember the old saying: One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter). Israel's solution was to build a fence around the people causing the problems.
In the old days, the palestinians would walk into crowded shopping malls, pull out an automatic rifle, and open fire on the crowd. This method was highly effective for a long time because it's incredibly difficult to defend, especially in a country where the people enjoyed many of the same freedoms that we do. Think for a minute about what we would do, as Americans, if something like this was happening to us on a regular basis. The Israeli government opted for a unique strategy.
In Israel, all citizens (there are exceptions) are required to serve in the military immediately after high school. Men serve for 3 years, women serve for 2. After their active-duty term expires, they can either opt to continue their career in the military, or start life in the private sector and continue to serve in the reserves until they are about 40.
Israel's solution to the problem was to require all active members of the military to carry their weapons with them at all times. This provided an immediately-available group of citizens who could respond to a shooter firing randomly into crowds. It works, too. The palestinians quickly realized they could no more draw their weapons before being gunned down by a barrage of plain-clothed soldiers carrying weapons.
I mention this because I was deeply disturbed by the comments of Salt Lake City Mayor, Rocky Anderson. Anderson is a staunch liberal who firmly supports gun restrictions. I mention this only because a particular hero emerged from all of this. It was an off-durty police officer from a neighboring city who happened to be eating at a restaurant the evening of the event. He heard the gun shuts, jumped up from his table, and was able to engage the shooter in a gun-fight for several long minutes while police were on their way. Without a doubt, he saved the lives of dozens of people by keeping the shooter busy (and eventually killing him).
The response from Mayor Anderson was interesting, to say the least. He encouraged citizens NOT to run our and get concealed weapons permits in response to this incident (for the record, I do have a Utah concealed carry permit). His view was that having lots of citizens running around with guns while all of this was going on would have caused huge problems for the police and might have gotten someone killed accidentally.
Words fail me.
In any situation where a person enters a crowded area with a gun and opens fire, the people in that crowd are basically lambs going to the slaughter house until officers arrive on the scene. How many people can a gunman kill during those 5 or 10 minutes it takes to bring police in? 10? 20? 50? hundreds? I think Israel has a few case studies on this matter, and their solution was clear: Give the good guys guns. It's been highly effective in Israel not just as a deterrant to terrorists entering crowded places, but since instituting this change, the violent crime index in Israel has dropped to near zero. They don't have murders and rapes in the streets like we do in the states (they used to have attempts, but the risk of getting killed by someone passing by was huge!).
Rocky, you're an idiot. What would have happened in that mall if nobody was armed? Can you say Columbine?