Michael Swickard

The recent shooting at Ft. Hood reminds me of a 2005 New Mexico news story. At an Albuquerque Wal-Mart a divorced woman with many restraining orders against her ex-husband was working in the bakery. Despite the vastness of legal paperwork protecting her, he appeared and viciously attacked her. She survived by the grace of God and one other thing.

He came intending to kill her — but not if she was protected by someone with a gun, since he knew better than to bring a knife to a gunfight. He scanned the area and saw no police officers, so he hopped over the counter with a large knife. She was as good as Amen Dead.

The police were called. She had seconds to live and they were minutes away, but her attacker did not see a 72-year-old man with a concealed-carry permit and pistol.

The man pulled his pistol and put that bad dog down for good. The injured woman survived. There were calls to prosecute the “vigilante” because he shot to kill rather than to just shoot the knife out of the assailant’s hand, but he was thanked for saving the woman’s life and turned loose.

At a Utah mall a teen wanted to kill as many people as possible, but his spree was cut short by an off-duty policeman. The teen was watching for the police and did not know anyone else was armed.

At Ft. Hood the shooter shot about 50 people, killing 13 before the police arrived. The perpetrator went about his killing safe in the knowledge he was the only one armed. We can learn a lesson if we want.

A way to fight back

The response to attacks upon defenseless citizens is for politicians with an anti-firearm agenda to advocate banning all firearms, which ignores the reality that authorities cannot stop drugs and weapons from find their way into the hands of criminals. We continue doing the same things and getting the same results. The last wish of defenseless citizens might be for a way to fight back.

Our nation fosters these attacks by having weapon exclusion zones where only people breaking the law can have a weapon. Killers are assured their victims can be shot like fish in a barrel. Assuring killers they are the only ones armed causes attacks.

What if some potential victims could return fire? At Virginia Tech a very firearms inexperienced man was still the only one armed. He would have dropped his pistol and peed his pants if someone had immediately fired back. Perhaps a shooting might still start, but all of the defenseless people would not be exterminated without any ability to fight back.

Potential perpetrators not being sure people are unarmed would have a deterrence effect. They might attack the defenseless, but not if someone would immediately shoot back.

While we do have concealed carry ability in New Mexico, it is legally risky because of the political will against it. There are still many exclusion zones where it is a felony to have a concealed pistol even with the permit. It is acceptable for the perpetrator to have guns in our most sensitive areas, because they will be charged with a crime, but not so potential defenders. They are caught in the anti-firearm debate.

Some anti-firearm advocates say, “It is better a hundred defenseless citizens die rather than one citizen use a pistol for defense.” Every day firearms are used for defense successfully, but the media does not print those stories. They make the news fit their political agenda.

When our nation gets tired of these deadly attacks upon defenseless citizens, a step forward will be for there to be conceal-carry citizens in every crowd able to fight back at the instant of attack.

How many more outrages will it take?

I see this much like the debate about Good Samaritan citizens coming to the aid of highway crash victims. At some point lawyers started a revenue stream to sue Good Samaritans. So a Good Samaritan law was passed, or no one would get involved.

We are required by law to stop, but what we do could be that we call the authorities and direct traffic but not get blood on our hands. The legislators realized that people may not do exactly the best things medically for the injured, but it was certain they would do nothing if they thought their help would expose them to lawsuits.

Likewise medical personnel who happened upon an accident had to be assured they would not be victimized by lawsuits or they would not ply their trade. To get a pool of conceal-carry protectors quietly hidden among the defenseless in crowds, there must be adequate protection of those who protect us. A society that thinly veils its threats against people taking up arms for protection will not have those citizens protecting them.

There will not be protections for people who abuse this relationship. Still, without the protections of unseen defenders we are again defenseless against killers.

While increasing the population of conceal-carry citizens will not end all attacks, it will stop many of these cowardly attacks upon defenseless citizens. It is better to have a gun and not need it than need a gun and not have it.

How many more of these outrages will it take for the citizens to insist upon a new strategy? Our ultimate defense is that some of the sheep in a crowd are able to shoot back.

Swickard is a weekly columnist for this site. You can reach him at michael@swickard.com.

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