Runner-up for the world's dumbest crook

[seamusTX]

The intended victim was wearing a "Friends of the NRA" cap. Robber busted, no one hurt:

http://www.wbir.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=39597

- Jim

[JKDubb]

No shots fired, interesting. Talk about check your underwear!

[phddan]

I am left wondering just what Lumpy saw to not fire on someone in that situation?
Fear in the thugs eyes?
A certain condition of the gun? Unloaded or no mag?
It's one thing to have a gun pulled on you, but to pull your gun and not fire in that situation has me scratching my head.

Dan

[lrb111]

The young guy folded-up quickly..

[GlockenHammer]

Cute, but I wonder how many stories like this end up with the good guy getting shot? I recall a Dallas area CHL-er that tried to pull a gun with one already pointed at him. He's dead now.

If you haven't thought about what you'd do when the fight starts with you already at gunpoint, you should. Yes, we should all be in yellow/orange and avoid these confrontations altogether, but the sad fact is that the bad guys often get to make the first move. Pulling your gun is probably not the most likely way to get out of that situation alive. Although it worked in this case, it is only because the attacker did not have the killer instinct...yet. I suspect a few more years of crime and a few trips to prison and he'll be back with a bigger gun and the will to use it.

Let's face it. We're gun people. We like problems and scenarios that can be successfully solved by us putting our gun into action quickly and accurately and we become victorious heroes. While fun at the range (and keyboard), this addresses only a fraction of the threat scenarios you are likely to face. This one concerns me greatly and occupies quite a bit of my time whilst I walk around in code yellow.

Sorry for the lecture. Please resume joviality.

[longtooth]

Cute, but I wonder how many stories like this end up with the good guy getting shot? I recall a Dallas area CHL-er that tried to pull a gun with one already pointed at him. He's dead now.

If you haven't thought about what you'd do when the fight starts with you already at gunpoint, you should. Yes, we should all be in yellow/orange and avoid these confrontations altogether, but the sad fact is that the bad guys often get to make the first move. Pulling your gun is probably not the most likely way to get out of that situation alive. Although it worked in this case, it is only because the attacker did not have the killer instinct...yet. I suspect a few more years of crime and a few trips to prison and he'll be back with a bigger gun and the will to use it.

Let's face it. We're gun people. We like problems and scenarios that can be successfully solved by us putting our gun into action quickly and accurately and we become victorious heroes. While fun at the range (and keyboard), this addresses only a fraction of the threat scenarios you are likely to face. This one concerns me greatly and occupies quite a bit of my time whilst I walk around in code yellow.

Sorry for the lecture. Please resume joviality.

No lecture GlockenHammer. That is a real possibility. The article & video of the carwash shooting in Misouri is another good example. He was threatened w/ his life several times & had been ordered on the ground. If the truck had started he may not have been shot but run over.
BREAKFAST IS READY. BACK SHORTLY

Every man must decide for himself & the facts as a whole are never the same.
As for the victorious heros; well at 56, knees completely SHOT, arthritis in hands & shoulders, & now the cancer recovery, WELL, here is what I know:
1. I know I aint whoopin nobody.
2. I agree completely w/ txi on the video of the gun take away. I will never take one away from the street thug. (or a knife either) He will win the wrestling match & I will be shot or stabbed & cut there.
3. I will never live the rest of my life saying "what if I had done this or that."
4. I will never live the rest of my life w/ my head down saying I just gave it to him w/ out doing anything & he shot me anyway.
5. Wife & both have agreed we don't know what will happen but we will not live w/ "We complied, he shot me & took her."
6. We both have agreed that if the grandchildren are with us we will never live w/ "complied & he shot me or us & took the kids."

OK WHAT WILL YOU DO if the BG has a gun ON ME, OR, what I consider worse, a knife on me at 6ft distance or less. I would rather face a gun at 4ft than a knife if he knows how to use it. I will take it for granted that he is better w/ a knife than a gun because he has the opportunity to practice w/ a knife & not a gun.
1. Thought process is (all you young, BIG, strong, quick, healthy guys remember the above physical condition) What is my best spot to attack knowing I am about to be hurt bad.
2. I will start from the premesis that he is not going to let us go.
3. We are not going anywhere, complying w/ any order that does not give better access to gun or knife. ie Give me your wallet is a good command.
4. Will make the best attack I can, reasoning that NO street thug EXPECTS a fight from the victim or he would have chosen a different one.
5. Fight as hard, sudden, & unstopping as I can.
a. You cain't tell I might just win starting fresh & w/ surprise.
b. He may break off attack & run.
c. Someone may hear, see, & help.
6. For me, my Wife & my Mother, we have decided we can live with lost the fight & lived better than the what ifs of compliance & being a victim.

With that I agree that this is not the decision for everyone & do not say anyone is wrong for deciding differently. Every one can live with the decisions they make if they win & live. This one is mine & the one I can live with if I lose & live.
LT.

[seamusTX]

Here's another article with more details:
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/ ... 42,00.html

Mr. Lambert was indeed lucky.

He also gained national attention earlier this year for offering customers a rifle with the purchase of a vehicle. Oh, the outrage!

- Jim

[txinvestigator]

I am left wondering just what Lumpy saw to not fire on someone in that situation?
Fear in the thugs eyes?
A certain condition of the gun? Unloaded or no mag?
It's one thing to have a gun pulled on you, but to pull your gun and not fire in that situation has me scratching my head.

Dan

I think Colonel Grossman explains it well;

Within the midbrain there is a powerful, God-given resistance to killing your own kind. Every species, with a few exceptions, has a hardwired resistance to killing its own kind in territorial and mating battles. When animals with antlers and horns fight one another, they head butt in a harmless fashion. But when they fight any other species, they go to the side to gut and gore. Piranhas will turn their fangs on anything, but they fight one another with flicks of the tail. Rattlesnakes will bite anything, but they wrestle one another. Almost every species has this hardwired resistance to killing its own kind.

When we human beings are overwhelmed with anger and fear, we slam head-on into that midbrain resistance that generally prevents us from killing. Only sociopaths--who by definition don't have that resistance--lack this innate violence immune system.

Throughout human history, when humans fight each other, there is a lot of posturing. Adversaries make loud noises and puff themselves up, trying to daunt the enemy. There is a lot of fleeing and submission. Ancient battles were nothing more than great shoving matches. It was not until one side turned and ran that most of the killing happened, and most of that was stabbing people in the back. All of the ancient military historians report that the vast majority of killing happened in pursuit when one side was fleeing.

In more modern times, the average firing rate was incredibly low in Civil War battles. Paddy Griffith demonstrates that the killing potential of the average Civil War regiment was anywhere from five hundred to a thousand men per minute. The actual killing rate was only one or two men per minute per regiment (The Battle Tactics of the American Civil War). At the Battle of Gettysburg, of the 27,000 muskets picked up from the dead and dying after the battle, 90 percent were loaded. This is an anomaly, because it took 95 percent of their time to load muskets and only 5 percent to fire. But even more amazingly, of the thousands of loaded muskets, over half had multiple loads in the barrel--one with 23 loads in the barrel. In reality, the average man would load his musket and bring it to his shoulder, but he could not bring himself to kill. He would be brave, he would stand shoulder to shoulder, he would do what he was trained to do; but at the moment of truth, he could not bring himself to pull the trigger. So, he lowered the weapon and loaded it again. Of those who did fire, only a tiny percentage fired to hit. The vast majority fired over the enemy's head.

During World War II, US Army Brig. Gen. S. L. A. Marshall had a team of researchers study what soldiers did in battle. For the first time in history, they asked individual soldiers what they did in battle. They discovered that only 15 to 20 percent of the individual riflemen could bring themselves to fire at an exposed enemy soldier.

That is the reality of the battlefield. Only a small percentage of soldiers are able and willing to participate. Men are willing to die, they are willing to sacrifice themselves for their nation; but they are not willing to kill. It is a phenomenal insight into human nature; but when the military became aware of that, they systematically went about the process of trying to fix this "problem." From the military perspective, a 15 percent firing rate among riflemen is like a 15 percent literacy rate among librarians. And fix it the military did. By the Korean War, around 55 percent of the soldiers were willing to fire to kill. And by Vietnam, the rate rose to over 90 percent.

[longtooth]

txi's above article

That is the reality of the battlefield. Only a small percentage of soldiers are able and willing to participate. Men are willing to die, they are willing to sacrifice themselves for their nation; but they are not willing to kill. It is a phenomenal insight into human nature; but when the military became aware of that, they systematically went about the process of trying to fix this "problem." From the military perspective, a 15 percent firing rate among riflemen is like a 15 percent literacy rate among librarians. And fix it the military did. By the Korean War, around 55 percent of the soldiers were willing to fire to kill. And by Vietnam, the rate rose to over 90 percent.

Patton is the one that made me change my "willingness" from
Willing to die for my family or country to:
Willing to make the other so & so die for his crime or country.

[Mithras61]

From the military perspective, a 15 percent firing rate among riflemen is like a 15 percent literacy rate among librarians. And fix it the military did. By the Korean War, around 55 percent of the soldiers were willing to fire to kill. And by Vietnam, the rate rose to over 90 percent.[/b]

The primary method used by the military is to de-humanize their opponents. It is why you hear the members of the armed forces use "ragheads" to refer to the people of Iraq & Afghanistan. Other pejoratives were used in other wars.

This method is also what leads to some of the more brutal things we hear about in the news. The fact is that if you want 90%+ to be able to shoot the opposition, then you have to condition your troops to not view them as human beings, which unfortunately leads to transference of that viewpoint to the civillian population of the area. Similar methods were employed in WWII with lesser success, and with gradually increasing success through Korea, Viet Nam and finally Desert Storm & the occupation of Afghanistan & Iraq.

The major problem yet to be faced is "how do we de-program these kids?" Look at the level of violence between the returning vets and their families, and you will see what I mean.

BTW, I don't oppose the method used. It allows us to have a more effective military with fewer people in it. We can have a military that has roughly 1/6th the soldiers and be as effective as a traditional force. It's cost effective. The problem with thie method is we haven't figured out how to undo what we've done. How do we make our soldiers be civilians again? The military spent decades and millions of dollars figuring out how to make a better soldier, but not how to unmake them when the military is done with them.

[longtooth]

Well said Mithras61, I have spent many pastoral counselling hours w/ vets & some LEO's that have the problem you state in being combat tough & mentally uncaring on the battlefield or street then coming home to a wife & children that make tiny "mistakes" & they reep the battlefield response.
We live in a wicked world & that is why we need a Savior.

[txinvestigator]

Sorry, I did not intend to create a discussion on battlefield psychology :)

My post was in response to this question ;

I am left wondering just what Lumpy saw to not fire on someone in that situation?

[stevie_d_64]

Each one of us understand the reality of what we are capable of doing...

It is not an excuse, nor is it free reign to arbitrarily dispense with what has not been mentioned so far...

That is your "humanity"...

Having compassion for human life is not a reason to hesitate, nor worry about what others think about you afterwards...Your humanity is not in question...

What the focus should be, is that every single one of you, is worth more in this life, than someone who does not hold in as high a regard a compassion for others, and have lost (by no fault to anyone but themselves) their sense of "humanity"...

I say this all the time...I do not believe anyone here wakes up in the morning thinking, "Is this going to be the day?"...I don't believe that for a second...

I also believe, that regardless of skill level or experience, that the odds are better for us than any threat out there...

You have to carry confidence, and seriousness of purpose after you take on this responsibility...

Its either that, or I'd probably hang 'em up...

I know I kid around a lot more than I should, but I am as serious as a myocardial infarction on this one...

[longtooth]

Stevie d 64 wrote.
serious as a myocardial infarction

Dumb country boy don't know what that is but sure sound serious as snake bite to me.

[phddan]

I think Colonel Grossman explains it well;

snip

Wow
I have never seen that. I was totally unaware that soldiers would rather die than defend themselves. Course back then I believe the soilders were a lot younger.
I was questioning what Lumpy saw or noticed about the perp to not drop the hammer. Never dawned on me that perhaps he just couldn't pull the trigger.

Dan