Michael Phillips, Tulsa (3/3/2008 6:26:26 AM)

The Tulsa World Editors got it wrong again. Of course crazed people think things out, their crazy not stupid, that is why they keep choosing places where guns aren't allowed. They don't want any return fire. As for not wanting to confuse the police, are you suggesting it is better that the students be defenseless murder victims so as to make the work for the police easier? Those students who have concealed carry licenses and are forced to be defenseless are victims of liberal safety plans before the shooting ever starts.

a, tulsa (3/3/2008 7:05:47 AM)

No, Michael, I think you're wrong on this one. Crazed people don't think it out-stuppid or not. Since they have all ended up shooting themselves anyway(a stupid act if ever there was one), you and I don't know that a lack of guns is why they have chosen the places they have.
What I see is a college that instantly becomes a more dangerous place everyday instead of one that gets hit in the slim to never category of chances.

Heath Flowers, NORMAN (3/3/2008 7:08:04 AM)

Please see

heathflowersDOTcom/SCCC

As the number of CCLs increase crime decreases. As you can see, CCL's do make our state, and would make our campuses much safer.

Your logic about a CCL holder being at risk by responding police is totally false. CCL holders have been trained to handle those situations. If as a CCL holder had to defend his or her life against an active shooter, the CCL holder would: 1. Size up the situation and realize that they need to STOP the killer 2. The CCL holder would draw their defensive weapon and engage the active shooter until the shooter has been neutralized 3. Then the CCL holder would either re-conceal his or her weapon or take the remaining bullets out of his or her gun and lay it on a table and keep his or her hands in the air. 4. When police arrive, the CCL holder will tell police that he or she is a CCL holder and just had to use force to defend their life, and if they want to know anything else they can talk to the CCL holder's attorney.

This argument is false, as if the CCL holder re-consealed the police would not see a weapon or think the CCL holding student was a threat or if the student was standing with open hands in the air, he or she would also not be recognized as a threat.

Furthermore, you are telling us that the threat from police to a CCL holder is greater than the threat to all college students from an active shooter? If this bill does not pass, the active shooter will kill everyone, and the cops will be there in 3-5 minutes, and will get to clean everything up and call students family members. If this bill passes, a CCL holder will not be stripped of his or her right to self defense on college campus, rather a CCL holder can neutralize the threat, re-conceal where the responding officers can't see it and take their chances when the cops show up.

If this bill does not pass, everyone will die. If it does pass, TRAINED, LICENSED, and RESPONSIBLE law-abiding citizens will have the ability to protect themselves.

Oh AND, the governors task force proposed spending 16 MILLION dollars of tax payer money to "make campuses safer" through preventative networks who recognize potential shooters. While a good thought, HB2513 costs ZERO tax payers dollars, and greatly enhances campus security.

David Arenap, (3/3/2008 7:24:59 AM)

Poor Heath. He thinks the Tulsa World's editorial board actually thinks things through in a reasoned, calm manner. Heath, the Whirled's board is made up of a bunch of embittered former reporters and editors who have been practicing the dark arts of biased newspaper journalism so long that being an editorial writer is their reward after years of low-paid drudgery in a dying business (see the plummeting circulation rates of most newspapers). This is their revenge, as they see it. They have an extremely skewed vision of reality, seen through glasses muddied by class-warfare resentment, tax hog gluttony, newly-labeled "progressive" ethics and worse. The "frat boy" meme that turns up in this editorial is obviously one they've been chewing on for weeks, as it also turned up in the poorly-executed hack piece by Plante. It doesn't matter whether it's true. They'll ignore raw numbers and statistics forever. They deal in emotion, not logic.

E T, tulsa (3/3/2008 7:48:43 AM)

Actually Michael is right. How many times have you read where these nut like the one's and columbine had been planning these crimes for weeks. they go to their bedrooms or basements and find diagrams and letters describing how they are going to do it or because someone made fun of them, or they were made not to feel like they didn't fit in. so they may be crazy but they are not stupid.

Vigil Ante, Tulsa (3/3/2008 7:52:31 AM)

Protect our children. Outlaw classes.

David, (3/3/2008 8:13:56 AM)

If there were armed police in each classroom, I would agree with your editoral position. However, the problem is that police can't be everwhere. The question is what can be done to improve the situation in the 5 to 10 minutes before the police arrive.

The accounts of recent shootings indicate that those shooters can stand still in the front of crowded rooms, take careful aim and repeatedly fire, reload and fire some more.

I don't believe anyone wants there to be violence in our class rooms. However the reality is that there is and it seems to be happening more often.

If the only choice is between dead students or a dead bad guy, I vote for the dead bad guy.

If there were weapons in the class room the police could easily recognise the bad guy. The bad guy would be the dead body on the floor.

Willard Roker, Las Vegas (3/3/2008 8:50:58 AM)

Oh yeah lets have a bunch of college students carrying guns that will make things better, just like pouring tons of weapons into the Middle East has made it safe and peaceful.

More guns is not the answer.

Brute, Tulsa (3/3/2008 9:04:32 AM)

It's pretty easy really....
If allowed, licensed gunholders (which can be anyone, not just students) would help.

As cops arrive on the scene, those with guns would be the 'good' guys since by that time they will have disposed of the madman and copied notes from the classtime they missed in doing so.

These good citizens would also most likely be able to tell police exactly what happened for their reports.

Jeff, Bartlesville (3/3/2008 9:39:45 AM)

The state of Oklahoma has had a "Shall Issue" law on the books for a while now. If someone is 21 years old or older, and can pass the certification course and the OSBI background check, they have the legal right to carry a concealed weapon. So why should it matter if they do it on campus. They can carry into the movie theatre, the grocery store, and the restaurant that you also may attend. So why then should college be any different? You and your children are no more in danger at college then you are buying milk. Unless the college has a no gun policy. Then the situation changes, then your children are in danger in a big way. Do not take my word for it though, look at all the shootings. They all have one thing in common, GUN FREE ZONE signs.



Let the people take the class, and pass the background check, and then let them carry. They can handle the responsibility. They drive a car after all, which is way more likely to kill people then a concealed gun.

Adam Hardy, Norman (3/3/2008 9:50:15 AM)

Fist of all, to say that frat boys will be packing heat is insulting to me. You assume that animal house is a good representation of college life, well I assure you it is not. And if it is a representation of your college life then that explains a lot. I don't "pack heat," I carry concealed. If a crazed gunman starts shooting and I don't have my gun then it doesn't really matter if the police would have confused me with a shooter because I will be dead anyways. At least if I have a gun I have a chance and if I'm smart I'll put my gun back in my holster before the police come. Also, I know you don't like giving credit to the police, but they aren't as stupid as you think. If they walk into a room where a shooting has occured and they see me with a pistol and a dead guy on the floor with an assult rifle or shotgun I think they would quickly be able to realize what goes on. Also, when I carry concealed I am aware that there is a small posibility of being confused with the bad guy. That's a decision I choose to accept much like undercover cops and plainclothes cops do when they are working in multijurisdictional cases. So get over it.

Lawrence, Tulsa (3/3/2008 10:29:41 AM)

I support very few TW editorials, this is one of them. GO TW!!

Lawrence, Tulsa (3/3/2008 10:31:39 AM)

Rep. Paul Roan, a retired state trooper and no softy on crime, put it right: Currently, guns are illegal on campus, so any cop who sees one knows the armed student is a bad guy.
............
Makes a lot of sense to me. People, let's not make it harder on law enforcement agents.

someone, okc (3/3/2008 10:38:55 AM)

Lawrence like seeing horrific stories in the news and dead students at universities.

Tyler Smith, (3/3/2008 2:22:54 PM)

****Lawrence****

"Makes a lot of sense to me. People, let's not make it harder on law enforcement agents."

In every town and city across the state ok Oklahoma there are police officers who are trained to handle a variety of stiuations. These police officers are aware that CCL holders carry weapons. There have not been any problems for these police officers all around the state. Are you suggesting that we must make it easier for campus police officers because they are not trained as well as all other police officers are in this state? I would expect that these officers go through similar training to what every other officer receives around the state. Not to put words or ideas in the mouths of our great officers, but I would expect that they rather see one dead body of the law breaking individual than several dead bodies of innocent students. Just a thought.

Tim Tucker, Norman (3/3/2008 3:08:38 PM)

I'm a cop in Norman. The"Frat Boys" the author speaks of are all under 21 and not able to apply for a CCW permit. OU campus has dozens if not hundreds of young men and women who have recently returned from Military duty where they were armed 24/7 for a year in the combat zones of SW Asia. To prevent these responsible citizens from having the choice to protect themselves is misguided and foolish. No matter where you are in the world, no matter your race or religion, there is only one antidote to an armed bad guy and that is an armed good guy. We see across the nation almost weekly what wishful thinking gets us, more helpless innocent people murdered.

It is a fact that 95% of all police responses nationwide are in excess of 5 minutes. Win, lose, or draw the outcome is final for a student on Oklahoma's campuses within seconds of coming face to face with an active shooter.

The police are coming to draw a chalk outline around someone's body. Deciding to allow law abiding citizens with CCW permits to carry on campus is the only way for those persons to be able to stop violent criminal attack and affect the outcome.

Our most basic human right is that of self defense. The author puts forward the notion that "crazed people" don't think things through. I wonder why there has never been an active shooter at a Fraternal Order of Police convention or a Gun Show? As long as we create "helpless people zones" on our nation's campuses the insanity will continue.

Ron B, Broken Arrow (3/3/2008 4:52:36 PM)

Mr Tucker is 100% correct. Morons, such as the TW editors, think we need to spend millions of dollars on warning systems, which do not get help soon enough. These incidents are measured in seconds...a 3 minute response would not be fast enough. I do give the police credit for being able to determine which is the bad guy. A crowd hunkered down around a guy with a gun probably means this is the good guy's side. The body language should tell anybody who is causing problems and who is trying to keep things under control. It does amaze me how many of these "nut jobs" think ahead far enough to avoid a place in which we with a permit can carry a weapon. I will give the TW credit; they came down on the wrong side, just as most of us would have predicted...they aren't smart, but they are consistent.

rlg, BA (3/3/2008 5:26:30 PM)

All must remember that the TW does not believe in the second amendment as an individual right, But a collective one. some how along the way they came to believe that the second amendment is a hunting amendment.So we got another hair brained editorial from Ken and his gun control crowd at the TW.

Brent , (3/3/2008 6:58:46 PM)

Every police officer I have asked in both Tulsa and Oklahoma City told me that their wife’s have a concealed carry permit and they recommend that citizens do the same. If guns are not an effective crime deterrent why do police officers carry them? The reason we continue to have mass shootings in these weapon free zones is because the bad guys know that they will not encounter any resistance. They are cowards and they pick on the weak and vulnerable. If you arm your self you are no longer vulnerable and you have an effective means of defense. Wake up and allow persons with CCW permits to carry concealed on campus. If not then each college would have to provide a police officer for every class and they sure as hell aren’t going to do that.

Ernie G, (3/3/2008 7:32:26 PM)

As usual, the Tulsa World editorial board with their knee-jerk reaction gets it completely wrong again. Actually, crazed people certainly do think it out. The evidence showed that the Virginia Tech shooter had been planning his crime for months. He thought it out enough that he brought chains and padlocks to secure the doors of the building where he intended to shoot his victims, so they couldn't escape once he started shooting. It is painfully obvious that one concealed carry permit holder could have prevented 32 deaths at Virginia Tech if he had been there when Cho started shooting. Law or no law, it is time for people to start arming and defending themselves, rather than be shot execution-style by a deranged maniac who go by no rules other than his own. We certainly can't count on the police or campus security to take care of the situation. By the time they get there, dozens of people could be dead. It's the Tulsa World editiorial board that needs to go back to school on this one.

Talon Pruitt, Oklahoma City (3/4/2008 12:26:25 PM)

Obviously the shooter at Virginia Tech planned out what he was doing and new that no one would able to do anything about stopping him. That's why he chose a college campus full of unprotected people who didn't have any way to stop him. When I took the concealed carry course last spring we were instructed on what to do when law enforcement arrived, put your weapon down and stand still. Don't wave it at the cops. And in Oklahoma only citizens with no mental health history or negative legal background can carry, and you have to be 21. Old enough and mature enough to now when to keep the gun put away, and put it down. And seriously who carries a 357 mag concealed anyway. sounds like shock jargon.

Kent Horton, Owasso (3/16/2008 9:44:54 PM)

Thank you, Officer Tucker, for a breath of fresh air. Your vantage point as an active police officer provides a much better view of reality than is available from the Ivory Tower in downtown Tulsa.

Kent Horton
Captain, US Army (Retired)

Lance, Austin, TX (4/4/2008 11:00:29 PM)

"Officers responding to an emergency like the Virginia Tech massacre would face a nightmare within a nightmare if marginally trained amateurs were pulling out their guns."

That makes no logical sense--there's 10s or 100s of thousands CCW holders across the nation...how do the cops deal with self defense shootings currently?

(Are we being deliberately lied to with such assertions or is the author really that logic challenged.)