Now consider this. There has been no reported mass shooting at any school in any predominantly black or Hispanic neighborhood in the country ever. Now consider this even more. A federal judge in Maryland in a ruling in a suit brought by gun rights groups to overturn Maryland’s ban on assault weapons bluntly said that military-style weapons cause more injuries and fatalities when they are used. She specifically cited AR-15s as the most lethal of these weapons. She made no distinction about whose hands they were in, criminals or law enforcement. They are still weapons of mass killing. She further noted that the weapons pose an even deadlier risk to law enforcement because of their enhanced penetrating capabilities.
Despite the overwhelming evidence that an AR-15 poses a grave threat to all who handle or come within its striking range, these school boards have still barged ahead to allow its school police to arm themselves with these weapons of mass killings. They tore a page straight out of the playbook the NRA has used to beat back any congressional effort to ban assault weapons and claimed that they give cops a weapon to take out the bad guy presumably faster and more permanent in a shoot-out on a school campus.
This imaginary, self-serving, and farcical rationale has served the NRA well. But for school police to have them where the prospect of a Newtown-type school massacre is almost nil is beyond ludicrous. It is horrific.