Right now, today, every day, the Second Amendment is under continual attack. State and federal legislatures are considering a host of misguided and ill-intentioned bills that will have no direct effect on preventing a tragedy similar to the school shooting in Parkland, Florida. Yet, it was that tragedy that lit the fuse on the latest round of anti-gun bills set to strip citizens of their right to bear arms. Now, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has taken anti-gun absurdity to a whole new level that endangers the safety of New York’s public school children.
After all, you can join the military and be handed a firearm at age 17. To join the New York City Police Department, you only have to be at least 17½ years old. In every state in the Union, you are legally an adult the day you turn 18. You can have children and a family to provide for and protect, but if you are under 21, the antis do not believe you can be trusted with a firearm to protect them.
Many of the proposed laws simply make me scratch my head and think, “Who thinks this stupid (bleep) up?” I mean, you can join the military or police force at 17 but can’t be trusted to own a firearm until age 21? Now it looks like we have a serial bomber in Austin, Texas. As I watched the morning news, all I could think was, “What stupid response or new proposed laws will lawmakers come up with in reaction to this?”
My thought was meant to be rhetorical, not a literal challenge, but perhaps that was my mistake. As if New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio read my mind and took it as a personal challenge, I just heard a story that absolutely floored me. Which, given the source, says a lot. Let me back up and add a bit of context to where I am going with this story.
Overall, it seems the Democratic politicians, by a large margin, want to ban guns and make us less safe.
That is a pretty bold statement, and I readily admit the Second Amendment has plenty of gun-owning democrats who are ardent 2A supporters. But even the most ardent liberal gun owners have to be asking themselves, “WTF?” after de Blasio’s latest actions.
Let’s look at the political landscape, highlighted by recent events. First, in the wake of the Parkland school tragedy, we have the condemnation that befell Democratic Sheriff Scott Israel and local law enforcement for sheltering outside and not rushing the shooter to stop the spree. On top of that, and given the positions of the NRA, President Trump, and others all calling for solutions to harden schools and eliminate Gun Free Zones, I think Mayor de Blasio missed the point with his latest order that follows through with his plan to remove armed police officers from all 1,700 public schools in New York City.
That’s right. Mayor de Blasio wants to remove all police officers and replace them with “unarmed school safety agents.”
“There’s nothing more terrifying than putting more guns in our kids’ schools,” de Blasio told WPIX immediately after the Parkland shooting. I would challenge that anyone who has survived an ordeal where someone was set on committing murder, and they were unarmed and defenseless, might disagree with the liberal mayor.
How does de Blasio expect unarmed security personnel to stop a shooting—post another Gun Free Zone sign? Advertise that you have “pulled all of the armed police officers” in an attempt to scare away would-be shooters bent on committing mass murder?
Not everyone has lost his mind in NYC, though. “It’s ridiculous. All over the country, they are telling you ‘arm the teachers, get an officer in your school.’ [Well,] New York City had a designated officer [in the schools], and they are actually cutting the program . . . they are making us less secure,” Parents-Teacher Association (PTA) Co-President Linda Lovett told The Epoch Times. “You are talking about 5,000 people in a one-block radius, and you’re telling me you can’t designate one officer?”
New York City Councilman Joe Borelli also expressed concern that the safety agents would not be enough to keep students safe.
“The school safety agents are great, and they do a phenomenal job, and they do a very important job of monitoring the front door, but unfortunately, we have seen school shootings like this one in Parkland and of course Sandy Hook before this,” Borelli told WPIX.
“We have 40,000 [uniformed] police officers, [and] some of these officers are already assigned to schools. We are not talking about a drastic change,” he continued. “The reality is, this is something that could and will stop a school shooting.”
Last summer, de Blasio’s true colors and motivation peeked out when he stated the cost of stationing officers at each school was impractical.
“Adding an armed police officer in each school building would place an enormous fiscal burden on the city’s budget,” Mayor de Blasio said in a June 2017 interview with the New York Post. “The cost of this proposal is estimated to be $1.2 billion annually.”
State senators Simcha Felder and Andrew Lanza fired back at the mayor for denying the proposal.
“What we fundamentally disagree on is the value of protecting our children. An armed New York City police officer at the entrance of public and non-public school buildings is the best and most efficient way to deter an attack and, if need be, neutralize an armed attacker,” the senators told de Blasio, according to the New York Post.
“Yet, you reject our recommendation not on the merits, but by hiding behind a price tag!” they said. “God forbid we have an incident tomorrow. Do we have to wait for kids in a public school to get killed to do something?”
Now, $1.2 billion a year is a rather large and very bitter pill to swallow. However, we are talking about the safety and security of our children. What is that worth?
Not to rain on the mayor’s B.S. for nothing, but his numbers do not seem to add up. A rookie NYPD officer makes less than $45,000 with uniform allowance and other considerations. A bit of quick math shows it would cost about $76.5 million per year for 1,700 additional officers. Sure, an employee costs more than just their salary, so let’s look closer at de Blasio’s $1.2 billion claim. Doing the math, $1.2 billion divided by 1,700, comes out to roughly $705,000 per officer, per school, per year. Can anyone explain that math?
Either the cost suddenly went from $45,000 per officer to $705,000, or the mayor has a bigger agenda than truth telling by my calculations.
Do you agree with Mayor de Blasio, and his decision to pull the armed police officers and replace them with unarmed school safety agents? Can you explain de Blasio’s $1.2 billion cost claim? Do you think your children would be safer without an armed officer on campus? Share your answers in the comment section.
Sign up for K-Var’s weekly newsletter and discounts here.
Just 1 question…..Does he have any tax payer money providing armed security??? If yes then it needs to be eliminated.