A Blatant Misuse Of Authority

The Parkland School anti-gun children have been off the front pages for a few days, so I guess it is logical that they would want their school back in the headlines again. However, I do question their approach.

The Daily Wire posted an article today about Kyle Kashuv, a pro-Second Amendment student at Parkland School. Kyle Kashuv posted some tweets and a video of himself at a shooting range learning about gun safety and how to use a gun properly. Because of this, he was called to the school office.

In an article posted yesterday, Twitchy describes what happened next:

Near the end of third period, my teacher got a call from the office saying I need to go down and see a Mr. Greenleaf. I didn’t know Mr. Greenleaf, but it turned out that he was an armed school resource officer. I went down and found him, and he escorted me to his office. Then a second security officer walked in and sat behind me. Both began questioning me intensely. First, they began berating my tweet, although neither of them had read it; then they began aggressively asking questions about who I went to the range with, whose gun we used, about my father, etc. They were incredibly condescending and rude.

Then a third officer from the Broward County Sheriff’s Office walked in, and began asking me the same questions again. At that point, I asked whether I could record the interview. They said no. I asked if I had done anything wrong. Again, they answered no. I asked why I was there. One said, “Don’t get snappy with me, do you not remember what happened here a few months ago?”

They continued to question me aggressively, though they could cite nothing I had done wrong. They kept calling me “the pro-Second Amendment kid.” I was shocked and honestly, scared. It definitely felt like they were attempting to intimidate me.

This student went to the gun range with his father to learn about gun safety and the proper use of firearms. There is nothing there that is the slightest bit illegal. Contrast that with the Parkland shooter who had threatened people with a gun and had a record of negative behavior. The school resource office and the Broward County Sheriff’s Office were way out of line here. Students who go to a gun range to learn about gun safety are not the ones who shoot up schools. This is as ridiculous as taking guns away from law-abiding citizens and believing that criminals will not find a way to obtain guns.

Actions Have Consequences

The shooting in Parkland, Florida, was horrendous. There have been a lot of people placing blame all over the place for that shooting. I am not interested in getting into a blame game, but I think we need to look at a series of decisions over the past five years that created the environment for the shooting to take place.

The Conservative Treehouse posted an article yesterday about some decisions made during the past five years that explain some of the mistakes made in assessing the threat this student posed and dealing with that threat.

The article reports a conversation that took place on the Laura Ingraham show:

Within the conversation Mr. Bell (Broward County Sheriff Union President Jeff Bell) points to the 2013 Broward County School Board policy known as the “Promise Program“.  The Promise Program is the collaborative policy between all county officials the school superintendent, school board and law enforcement that instructs officers to not arrest high school students.

This policy sits at the center of understanding why Nikolas Cruz was not intercepted by law enforcement. 

A Broward County School Police Officer must: carry a political hat and be able to intercept anti-social behavior (ie. filter through “The Promise Program“); modify his/her action based on the specific policy need (no arrests); falsify documents (as needed), hide evidence (as needed), manipulate records (as needed); and engage inside the system with an understanding of the unwritten goals and school board/LEO objectives (improve stats).

As such, Broward County school law enforcement are given political instructions, and carrying out political objectives.  The 30 minute CCTV tape-delay is one unofficial consequence of that objective. School police are not given law-enforcement instructions.

This is political correctness run amok. If the statistics are kept under control, the school looks good. Meanwhile, the safety of the students is not a consideration.

Before we totally dismiss those responsible for The Promise Program as idiots, we need to look at what was reported by the media in the early days of the program.

On November 2, 2013, The Sun Sentinel reported:

Just two years ago, Broward County schools funneled the state’s highest number of students into the juvenile justice system, often hauling them away in handcuffs for minor infractions.

But the district this year dramatically altered its discipline policies and launched an intervention program to reduce the number of arrests for non-violent offenses. It’s already seeing results.

The number of students arrested for misdemeanor incidents from August to September dropped to 22 students from 54 in the same period last year, district figures show.

“We need to give students an opportunity if they make mistakes,” Superintendent Robert Runcie said.

On Tuesday, members of law enforcement, the public defender’s office, the NAACP, the state Department of Juvenile Justice and the State Attorney’s Office will join the School Board to sign an agreement to reduce school-based arrests.

It’ll be the first such agreement in the state.

“Unless we put in appropriate interventions to help these students address their behavior and get back on track, then as an institution, we fail,” Runcie said.

Essentially they didn’t stop the crimes–they just stopped arresting the students who broke the law and avoided letting them face the consequences of their actions. That’s not a great way to prepare students for a successful life. The media thought the program was wonderful and published a glowing report of it. So much for the wisdom of the media.

This is the place where common sense seems to have left our educational system. We need to go back to the days of winning and losing and facing the consequences of your choices. It’s time to put sensible people on our school boards to bring about the necessary changes that will make our schools safer.

Watching The Media Use The Shiny Object

The current media shiny object is the parents and children impacted by the school shooting in Florida. These people are truly traumatized, I understand that, but they are being used to push a gun-control agenda which has no relationship to the horrific event in Florida.

John Hinderaker at Power Line posted an article today about some of the facts about the shooting in Parkland that are not getting the consideration that they should.

The article reports some comments made to the FBI by a tipstir:

“I don’t know how he got the debit card, but he did,” she said. “And he took it, and he bought all these rifles and ammunition and he posted pictures of them on the Instagram.”

Another of the woman’s stunning revelations: Cruz was obsessed with ISIS.

“He’s so into ISIS and, um, I’m afraid this is so something’s gonna happen,” she said, describing how Cruz would post pictures of himself dressed up as an Islamic terrorist. She also recounted how Cruz would frequently post pictures of himself donning a “Make America Great Again” cap.

The caller provided the agent with usernames for two of Cruz’s social media accounts, encouraging the FBI to comb through the pages.

“It’s alarming to see these pictures and to know what he’s capable of doing and what could happen,” she said. “He’s [been] thrown out of all these schools because he would pick up a chair and just throw it at somebody, a teacher or a student, because he didn’t like the way they were talking to him.”

The woman said she phoned in because she “wanted a clear conscience if he takes off and, and just starts shooting places up.”

Somehow the FBI did not sufficiently follow up on this lead.

It gets worse.

The article further notes:

In addition to the armed school resource officer, three other Broward County sheriff’s deputies were outside Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School during the shooting crisis and didn’t enter.

What????

Obviously neither the NRA, nor gun control was the problem in the Parkland shooting.