The Roseville shooting stopped when armed police officers arrived on the scene and confronted the shooter. He then took his own life. Many more innocent people would have been murdered had the police not arrived when they did. If they, or someone else with a weapon, had been present on the campus, the shooting might have been thwarted.
The President defiantly declared that he was politicizing the issue, and would continue to do so. Of course, he politicizes almost everything. This is the first time he has admitted the point.
Umpqua Community College was a gun-free zone (perhaps not by that name, but the possession of firearms was prohibited on campus). One of the victims - one who saved other lives by stopping seven bullets - is licensed to carry a weapon. He had one that day, but in order to comply with the law, he left it in his vehicle. Had the weapon been in his possession, it is likely that the mere sight of it would have been enough to stop the shooter (It happened just that way in Clackamas, Oregon in December 2012, when a concealed carry permit holder drew a weapon - the shooter, who had killed two people, ran off and then took his own life.) Who knows how many more would have been killed at Clackamas if that gun had not been drawn? And, given the extensive number of mass shootings that were terminated when someone (usually a policeman, but sometimes a private citizen) who is armed, arrives and stands up to the shooter, it is reasonable to assume that the toll of the Umpqua shooting could have been lessened as well, if someone with a weapon had been able to use it against the shooter.
Almost all mass shootings occur in places where the possession of a firearm is prohibited. Don’t forget that on September 11, 2001, those four airplanes that were skyjacked were “gun-free zones,” and the box cutters used by the terrorists were the most powerful weapon on the premises – and the terrorists knew it. One of the first things that was done in response to 9/11 was to arm the pilots and employ air marshals. And this is evidence that guns are used to protect lives and to defend lives much more frequently than they are used to take lives. It is no coincidence that gun-free zones are the venue of choice for people such as the Roseburg shooter. Of the seven theaters in the Aurora, Colorado area that were playing the Batman movie – only one was “gun-free.” Which one do you think the shooter chose?
The President and Hillary Clinton have said we should get behind their campaign for "commonsense" gun laws. Well, we already have thousands of commonsense laws, and they do work – but they can’t work in cases where the shooter has never committed a crime or been involuntary committed for a mental illness. Those laws the progressives have proposed would not have stopped any of the notorious shootings that have taken place in the past few years. One thing that some of the recent mass shootings have in common: someone in the shooter's family, a parent or a friend, was aware of their mental state, and either did not perceive him as a threat or ignored the threat. The families of the shooters in Newtown, CT, Aurora, CO; or Roseburg, OR are not to blame for the shootings, but they could had taken steps to prevent them. The motto used by a vigilant society to guard against terrorism is “if you see something, say something.” The same motto should be used by families and friends of potentially dangerous, disturbed people. The victims at Roseburg also have something in common: they were Christians. The only students killed by the shooter were those who identified themselves as Christians. The President has not expressed outrage over that.
The President is completely wrong when he claims that the places with the "toughest gun laws" have the least killings - in fact, the major American cities where guns are the most difficult to obtain are the places where the most murders are committed. The places where a lot of the citizens are legally armed have a much lower incidence of mass shootings and violent crime. The ability of the populace to arm itself of course is not the only reason for this, but it is an important one. Guns do not cause crime – criminals cause crime. Guns do not have minds of their own. Guns do not decide to take someone’s life. The crime rate and murder rate in America have plunged as we put more people in jail and as more people possess weapons. Criminals tend to chose weak, unarmed victims. Laws against murder and illegal possession of firearms are many. We can pass laws that make it more difficult for honest people to protect themselves, or make it easier for criminals to know that victims can’t protect themselves. Will those laws stop crimes? The President places more importance on the weapon than on the user. As gun rights people say, it is relatively easy to disarm honest, innocent people. It is much harder to disarm criminals.