Jan 21, 2013 
The Los Angeles Times has photos of Saturday’s gun appreciation day. This one’s my favorite. (What is it with wingnuts and spelling? Oh, maybe the double Ms in “comming” and “ammendment” are for “milimeter.” This might be what passes for “clever” on the fringe.)
In comments, Justme mentioned a 20/20 segment on armed “good guy” citizens and mass shootings. I found the segment, “If I only had a gun,” online. It demonstrates why the would-be heroes probably wouldn’t be all that heroic, or effective.
Our recent troll, Katechon, who alternatively argued that all mass shootings take place in gun-free zones and that armed citizens are more effective at stopping “bad guy” shooters than police (odd, if all those shootings were in “gun-free zones”) is, of course, wrong. Mark Follman at Mother Jones claimed that not one mass shooting over the past 30 years was stopped by an armed “ordinary citizen.” The “gun people” came back with a list of shootings in which, they say, an armed citizen stopped the shooter. But in another article, Mark Follman went through the list and found that (1) the “citizen” actually was a law-enforcement or security professional or member of the military, off duty; or (2) the citizen didn’t stop the shooter while he was shooting, but followed and shot him while he was leaving the scene; or (3) the citizen was pumped full of bullets by the shooter, who was later apprehended by law enforcement.
Way to go, armed citizens!
There’s still a lot we don’t know about yesterday’s tragedy in Albuquerque, so I will withhold comment on that. Let’s just hope the Secret Service is doing its job at today’s inauguration festivities.
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