Winds Of Change

Bob Collins at MPR notes a crime that few others did:

In Colorado, a gunman walked into a school and started shooting kids, until a hero teacher tackled him.

I checked the story, from a Denver TV station:

The Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office said the suspected shooter has been arrested. A well-placed source told CALL7 Investigators the suspect is Bruco Eastwood, 32. It’s unclear if Eastwood has any affiliation with the school. He likely will face two counts of attempted murder.

Witnesses said the gunman was tackled by math teacher David Benke as he apparently attempted to reload his high-powered rifle.

Wanna bet Keith Olberman or Rachel Maddow jump on this bit here?

A parent who saw the incident told 7NEWS that the gunman kept mumbling to himself, “I’m fighting for freedom. I’m fighting for freedom,” as he was being taken down.

But Collins had a bigger question:

That’s not the story. This is the story: These stories are no longer considered newsworthy enough for the front page of the country’s major newspapers.

Collins wonders why.  I think there are a couple of intertwining possibilities:

  1. Nobody died.  Thank God.  Two wounded victims may be below-the-fold in Denver; it’s not even page 10 in Chicago.
  2. Obama is President.  There’s no need for the media to keep showing that the wheels are coming off society.  And so the media will not.
  3. The big media is starting to twig to the fact that these stories reinforce the right’s take on the Second Amendment.  The middle-school was a “Gun Free Zone” – and yet, mirabile dictu, the gunman had a, er, gun.

Am I too cynical?  Am I cynical enough?

18 thoughts on “Winds Of Change

  1. Wow — I’m getting multiple giant ads for sandwiches from a Philadelphia-area convenience store from this post. That’s some effective marketing!

    The story is a good catch and I tend to agree with you. And good for Bob Collins for asking why.

  2. Oh, you’re plenty cynical, Mitch. It may be smartness you’re temporarily lacking.

    You’re telling Angryclown that some gun-toting kook muttering teabagger slogans tries to shoot up a Colorado middle school, but is prevented from killing anyone by an unarmed hero public school teacher.

    And you think the librul media is suppressing the story cause of its anti-gun control message?

    Admit it, dude. You are just totally baked right now.

  3. From what I’ve heard the shooter was taken down by a math teacher at the school. For me there are few actual heros in this world, but certainly this guy is one. He took the guy to the ground and wrestled with him in order to subdue him. That’s an extremely dangerous act by itself. I am all but certain the math teacher had no firearm. I think he would have been in less peril if he had, and used it in defense of the defenseless.

    Remember it was security guard Jeanne Assam who shot and killed Matthew Murray as he was shooting and killing people at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, CO back in ’07.

  4. I saw this story earlier, making the connection that it was not far from Columbine.

    How do we arrive at the conclusion that these stories are somehow now NOT news when it seems to have gotten quite a lot of coverage? What about the stabbing of the 16 year old at the Mall of America? Shouldn’t we be giving more coverage to stabbings along with shootings?

    Not Front-page-above-the-fold news? Perhaps because we have fewer newspapers printing fewer papers is part of it, while other media have
    filled the role for national news that newspapers used to fill, and papers tend to be more locally oriented now than they used to be?

    To the extent those remaining papers cover national news, there are issues which affect millions of people which are given greater importance – like Wars.

    How are the “wheels coming off society”more NOW than during other school shootings, like Columbine, or Virginia Tech?

    Shall we consider that school massacres have occurred so tragically often over the past few decades that it is not so unusual an occurrence anymore? Sadly – yes it is a factor that as horrible as students being injured is, the fact that no one died – thank god – does reduce the significance of the story. Much like a tornado doing minor damage differs from wiping out homes and killing people, except there is an element of intent.

    Remember when postal employee shootings were sufficiently common, for example, that the phrase ‘going postal’ was widely recognized? Haven’t read about one of those for quite a while. And yet I don’t see a lot of people armed while buying stamps.

    I’m not persuaded that this shooter won’t, like the nut in Pennsylvania who went off the rails because of believing ‘they’re coming for our guns’ that the solution to this incident is lots and lots of guns in schools. Perhaps better security, perhaps armed security, maybe even some kind of metal detectors (not unheard of for schools).

    I was hugely disappointed that a tenuous Columbine connection made it into a headline, instead of
    focusing on what a tremendous hero this teacher is.

    It prompted a number of questions in my mind as well.

    Why was this man shooting children? No one seems to have discovered what this (alleged) shooters motives were,
    or if he has any connection to these two children, or if he had intended shooting the same two children again or other children.

    Big Media is likely to be asking why this man owned a high powered rifle, and if it was a legal weapon – and properly so.

  5. Dog Gone Says: “And yet I don’t see a lot of people armed while buying stamps.”

    You are not allowed to carry in a post office even if you have a carry permit. No flame on you, it’s just what the law is.

    Supposedly the authorities have some idea what his motive was, but I haven’t heard that they released that information as of yet.

  6. AssClown, maybe it really was a kook Tic muttering something like “Dissent is patriotism and freedom”.

    ….

    “And yet I don’t see a lot of people armed while buying stamps.”

    You don’t? Why not?

    ….

    Hey folks, notice how the left thinks more security and metal detector for this but are against shoring up our countries borders.

  7. Scott, thanks for clarify that guns are not allowed in the post office, but you miss my point. KR, as usual misses it deliberately, and inaccurately asserts that other people are against border security – a non-sequitur.

    There was a time when there were problems in post offices. Post offices, like schools, are supposed to be gun free zones.

    So….why are there no longer the number of shootings in post offices that there were when the phrase ‘going postal’ first was used?

    Today the news is reporting that there was a second person who helped the math teacher subdue the (alleged) shooter. I hope they both get full recognition for their heroism.

    The (alleged) shooters family is claiming he suffered from mental illness.

    If this is true, how did the shooter get a high powered rifle?

  8. Um, regarding the Post Office, there IS a reason that we describe random mayhem in the workplace as “going postal.”

    And yes, you don’t see people armed while buying stamps. For starters, most people who have permits don’t carry openly, because that changes every interaction you have. Then there’s the post office regulation/law that prohibits it.

    Regarding the “fine upstanding citizen” who committed the crime; yes, his dad’s testimony indicates he probably should not have had a gun; a long arrest (not certain about conviction) record and a history of mental illness. Numerous laws didn’t work.

    Oh, and the media didn’t cover that, did they?

  9. I’d like to know what “high-powered rifle” was used. I’m guessing a hunting rifle, if reloading took enough time for a guy to wrestle him to the ground.

    Anyway, I blame video games and rock music for all of this violence. And the reason it wasn’t big news is #1.

  10. Hey, what about the East Texas church burnings….turns out the arsonists were members of the Atheist religion. No surprise there. But why no front page articles on this?

  11. Stooj, given that they’re saying it sounded like a firecracker, I dare suggest it was .243 or .223. Deer riflles chambered in 7mm, .270, or virtually any .30 round make an entirely different sound–and of course, impact on the victim.

    In other words, it might not have been a truly high powered rifle after all.

  12. but you miss my point.

    DogNabit, maybe if you got to your “point” in 1000 words less, people would actually get to it without hitting the fast forward button.

  13. There was a time when there were problems in post offices. Post offices, like schools, are supposed to be gun free zones.

    So….why are there no longer the number of shootings in post offices that there were when the phrase ‘going postal’ first was used?

    DG, those shootings you refer to were not patrons coming into the post office and shooting things up. They were employees coming in and shooting their bosses and coworkers, or sometimes ex-employees shooting ex-bosses and ex-coworkers. That is “going postal”

    Maybe the post office has improved their employee management style to reduce the tensions.

    You don’t see armed people buying groceries much either. But I assure you that they do. Whether they are licensed to carry concealed. Or not.

  14. That’s a “if a tree falls in the forest” DJ. In order for it to count someone actually has to watch the nightly news.

  15. Is DJ me?

    Are you suggesting the Nightly News is no longer part of the liberal media? Who has more viewers at 6PM central time, Ben? NBC or all of the cable news channels combined?

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