Rick Santorum Suggests Unarmed 'Soft Target' Shoppers Tempted El Paso Shooter

[marble falls]

Rick Santorum Suggests Unarmed ‘Soft Target’ Shoppers Tempted El Paso Shooter

The former Pennsylvania senator parroted a line often used by gun control opponents — that if everyone is armed, everyone is safer.


By Mary Papenfuss

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/rick-santorum-soft-targets-el-paso-cnn_n_5d4766d3e4b0aca3411fa40b

<snip>

When CNN State of the Union host Jake Tapper asked about the Texas shooting Saturday that killed 20 people, Santorum responded: “So they go after soft targets, that’s exactly right. The whole point is that when you restrict guns to law-abiding people, you make more soft targets.”

<snip>

Texas is an open-carry state where shoppers could legally have been armed — but the law didn’t have any impact on the Walmart attack. Tapper pointed out to Santorum that alleged gunman Patrick Crusius, 21, did not appear to be deterred by the possibility of any armed shoppers. In addition, it wasn’t likely that a gunman could have easily determined who was armed and who was not to make any decision about a “soft target.”

Santorum, now a conservative CNN commentator, was parroting the narrative of gun control foes who argue that everyone is safer if everyone is armed. He also claimed, without evidence, that in “several” shooting instances this year, armed “law-abiding people actually come, not police ... and stop these things.”

In fact, it was police, not armed civilians, who stopped the attacks in both El Paso and later that night in Dayton, Ohio, where a gunman killed nine people in yet another mass shooting. Last Sunday, police also stopped a mass shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival in California that killed two children and an adult.

<snip>




Rick is just full of Santorum.

[PCIntern]

1. Hey (P)Rick:

Yeah, and nine year old boys and girls tempt pedophiles. And cashiers tempt robbers. And attractive women tempt rapists. And Fort Knox tempted Goldfinger.

What a stupid man. Jesus. You’ve heard of the Millenials. He’s a Moronial.

[pangaia]

2. is he still alive?

[marble falls]

4. From the neck down.

[ooky]

31. lol

[Zoonart]

3. I think we need a "Fuck off", Rick Santorum thread.

[PJMcK]

5. Fuck off, Santorum

Well, a sub-thread, anyway!

[Paladin]

6. Eat shit and die, Rick. ASAP. (nt)

[LessAspin]

7. Never forget...

Rick Santorum's allegiance is to the NRA & Russia:

[Eyeball_Kid]

8. Santorum: himself a soft target,

or just generally soft in the head?

[DonaldsRump]

9. Who's that your're hanging out with, Ricker?

Ain't she done a lot with the NRA?

[link:|

(that's Maria Butina!)

[FakeNoose]

58. More to the point

... who kept following her around and snapping pix of her with all the Repukes? I mean every single Repuke who was ever anybody, shows up in a photo with her. Who does that?

[ExciteBike66]

10. Hypothetical...

Armed shopper #1 hears gunfire in the next aisle. He whips out his pistol and turns the corner to find two people with guns shooting at each other. One person is "the active shooter", and one is armed shopper #2.

If both are dressed normally, how does armed shopper #1 know who to shoot?

[Nay]

13. And how do the arriving police know who to shoot? They don't. Considering that so many

police shoot first and ask questions later (and they don't even ask questions if they shoot a black person), you'd have to be nuts to pull a gun in such a melee.

[ExciteBike66]

17. Good point

The cops in Ohio responded so quick, it might have surprised any civilian gun owners...

[marble falls]

19. Let alone the good citizen shot to death by cops in the Baton Rouge Mall ...

last year. He was an off duty cop himself, pulled his piece and was shot immediately.

[Nay]

30. Yeah, I forgot about that poor fellow. He was black, wasn't he? I rest my case.

[marble falls]

35. In his case the cops kkknew exactly who needed being shot.

[uponit7771]

21. MAGA Cultist Answer: "... which ones skin is the darkest..." No sarc tag, they'd actually say this

[Skittles]

54. and keep in mind there are people (including lots of children) everywhere

you have to be an expert shooter too

[tanyev]

11. Right, they were so tempting he drove 9 hours to kill those particular 'soft targets'.

[SallyHemmings]

12. Why does he have a platform?

[marble falls]

20. CNN decided they needed someone who could deliver the demented market niche.

[UpInArms]

14. Man on dog needs to STFU

eom

[real Cannabis calm]

15. here's a 5th recommendation

[BumRushDaShow]

16. He needs to be taken off the air

and relegated to wherever the Pat Buchanans of the world dwell.

[Midnightwalk]

18. So we're soft targets now

Not citizens out shopping or hanging out. We’re targets and is out fault for not being armed to teeth.

What the hell is that crap. We are not supposed to be living in some post apocalyptic hell scaoe where your survival is on the line because you went out.

That is a bankrupt policy and vision for this country. Of course we deserve to go any where unarmed and safe.

The good guy with a gun theory has been proven false but that misses the larger problem

People should be able to go out without the fear of being shot. Period.

[elevator48]

22. Right Tick

Everyone has a gun. That way we can immediately solve, with finality, any fenderbender, or argument in a parking lot, at a bar, sporting event, family dinner etc.

[marble falls]

23. Fun for the entire family!

[liberaltrucker]

40. Your typo fits Santorum perfectly!

[Hermit-The-Prog]

24. stop paying CNN!

CNN will do anything for money -- false equivalencies and 'bothsiderism' started there. Stop feeding them.

[tanyev]

25. One aspect of this shooting that I don't think is getting enough attention

is that it was the back to school tax-free weekend. I don't know if other states do this, but TX has done it for many years now and it's a big enough deal that I always make a note to stay out of the stores on that weekend. Almost every imaginable school supply and clothing is tax free and a lot of stores also run back to school sales. Many people wait for this weekend to do their back to school shopping. In the border towns, a lot of people come in from Mexico to take advantage of the sales. I would not be the least bit surprised if that is why the shooter picked that day and went to a Walmart in a border town with the goal of killing people from Mexico.

It hasn't been that long since a Republican party that claimed to be motivated chiefly by capitalism thought it was a good thing when people from other countries came to spend their money in the U.S.

ETA: The shooter might have deliberately targeted families shopping for school supplies much like the Trump administration's idea to separate children from their familes as a deterrent.

[Skittles]

55. chilling

back to school means lots of kids

[tanyev]

56. Mea culpa, I was wrong.

Tax-free weekend is this upcoming weekend. Everybody stay safe!

[Botany]

26. One of those murdered in El Paso was 2 years old so Rick should she be packing?

n/t

[marble falls]

36. This ...

[DeminPennswoods]

27. Rick Santorum is an idiot

That is all.

[Freedomofspeech]

28. He belongs in hell.

Got so sick of him as our representive...

[Me.]

29. Tempted?

[Vinca]

32. The whole argument of everyone being armed is totally stupid.

You can have a dozen weapons strapped to your body, but unless one of them is out and aimed in the direction of a shooter who hasn't appeared yet, you're dead meat. In addition, when faced with the prospect of killing another human being, there will be people who won't be able to pull the trigger. Having a gun super glued to your body 24/7 is just a false sense of security.

[tblue37]

33. This was TEXAS! nt

[Leghorn21]

38. A tweeter yesterday wrote:

“If you can’t find a good guy with a gun to stop the bad guy with the gun in a Texas Walmart, you need to bury that idea in the trash.”

[miyazaki]

34. he has an excuse for everything,

like all assholes do.

[Blue_true]

37. That idiot glossed over the fact that the Dayton shooter shot up

a place that was well known to have a lot of armed cops walking around the sector. Yes, the Ohio shooter didn't kill as many people, but he also was not in a small space that had 2,000-3,000 people in it either.

[marble falls]

45. If the cops hadn't gotten that guy when they did, he was only a step or two from getting ...

inside that bar. He could have added another hundred or so victims. The police got there and ended it quick.

[Blue_true]

47. True.

The point that I was making was that people being around who are trained to use guns did not stop the Dayton shooter from going there. Fortunately city officials and police officials had great foresight in this case and had regular detachments of officers covering the area, that did make the difference between 9 being dead and the new worst mass shooting in US history and likely word history. The cops that faced down that maniac had real guts, it takes that to face an assault weapon with a sidearm.

[marble falls]

48. I support every word you posted on both posts.

[OldDem65]

39. I dare him to go down to El Paso and say that standing next to O'Rourke

I might pay a lot to witness the reaction he gets. I think it would be epic!

[Grammy23]

41. Seems like I recall there was a good guy with a gun (legally licensed to carry) who happened to be a

a Black man. As he was about to pull out his gun, he realized how foolish it would be for him to have a gun out with police trying to determine who was a perpetrator and who was a shopper. So he grabbed kids to rescue (whose parents were not close by), ran for cover and put the gun away. Common sense prevailed.

[Blue_true]

50. Remember what happened to the good Black guy with a gun in the Alabama

Mall shooting situation from a few months back? He got shot dead by responding police. Of course the officers lying about what happened after the fact made things worse, it is understandable that in the fog of such a situation anyone with a gun in their hands is a potential shooter.

Honestly, people should focus on pressuring their city officials to have adequate police presence at large gathering events or areas instead of strapping themselves up. If there is a shooting police will likely be trying to figure out a lot of things, someone running around with a gun in his or her hands could end up innocent and dead.

[Nay]

60. Yep. He had the brains and the sense to put the gun away. But that's

what happens when you have actual training, instead of shoot-em-ups at the town dump.

[jmowreader]

42. Tell that to Glen Oakley

The Fort Bliss Private First Class who is being hailed as a hero of the massacre was carrying a pistol. He pulled it when he heard gunshots...then he put it back in the holster and started saving children.

This has to be addressed with a Gunnery Sergeant Hartmann quote... “Santorum, did your parents have any children that lived?”

[spanone]

43. 'tempting'? so they were to blame somehow?

sick rick.

[Retrograde]

44. "They were asking for it"

If they hadn't dressed in such a provocative manner - oops, wrong crime. But Santarum is going for the old blame-the-victim line of defense: if only they hadn't been alive in the first place the killer wouldn''t have had to shoot them.

[yellowcanine]

46. Ricky proves once again that he is a douche.

[llmart]

49. What the hell do we need to hear from this guy for?

He's a nothing. I'd forgotten all about him. Apparently he thinks he's still relevant in some way.

[yellowcanine]

51. Ah Ricky - go back to ... Virginia - or Pennsylvania or wherever it is that you are from.

[FakeNoose]

59. No we won't let him back in Pennsylvania

He can go to West Virginia though.

[gibraltar72]

52. So when he goes to buy lube

He's always packing??

[TygrBright]

53. Ricky Sanctorectum, the Original Frothy Mix, Thinks He's Relevant. How Cute. n/t

[sir pball]

57. Even if I had a handgun on my person...

...I'm not suicidally idiotic enough to go up against someone with a rifle.

The only purpose of a handgun is to fight your way back to the rifle you never should have put down in the first place.

[marble falls]

61. That is what amazed me in the Dayton videos - thoses cops were RUNNING towards full ...

automatic rifle fire carrying HANDGUNS. That took a lot of guts. No waiting around a corner to sky out the situation: running towards it.