More self-defense advice from Joe Biden: “Just fire the shotgun through the door”
posted at 8:41 pm on February 27, 2013 by Erika Johnsen
Because the advice he offered last week to simply “fire two blasts” outside the house wasn’t recklessly bogus enough, here’s the vice president expounding even further on his recommendations for in-home self-defense in an in-depth interview with Field & Stream on Monday (h/t Washington Examiner):
F&S: What about the other uses, for self-defense and target practice?
V.P. BIDEN: Well, the way in which we measure it is—I think most scholars would say—is that as long as you have a weapon sufficient to be able to provide your self-defense. I did one of these town-hall meetings on the Internet and one guy said, “Well, what happens when the end days come? What happens when there’s the earthquake? I live in California, and I have to protect myself.”
I said, “Well, you know, my shotgun will do better for you than your AR-15, because you want to keep someone away from your house, just fire the shotgun through the door.” Most people can handle a shotgun a hell of a lot better than they can a semiautomatic weapon in terms of both their aim and in terms of their ability to deter people coming. We can argue whether that’s true or not, but it is no argument that, for example, a shotgun could do the same job of protecting you. Now, granted, you can come back and say, “Well, a machine gun could do a better job of protecting me.” No one’s arguing we should make machine guns legal.
Honestly, did no one bother to inform the vice president, after his first round of similarly awful advice, that just blasting away on the back porch will 1) reveal your position, 2) leave you effectively disarmed, and 3) possibly get you into some legal trouble?
Personal anecdote, as a young woman of the sort at which the vice president heartily chuckled last week: I’m fairly handy with a twelve gauge, if I do say so myself — I’ve been using them for years on family shooting expeditions, so I’ve had plenty of practice time to get comfortable with them. Just this past Christmas, however, I had my first opportunity to try out an AR-15, and not knowing what to expect, I firmly nestled the ‘assault weapon’ into my shoulder, braced for impact, and… there was virtually no kick. Effortlessly accurate at both short and long distances, and easy to operate, too.
I would never argue that a shotgun is a good option for home defense and deterrence (especially those singularly musical sounds of a ready-to-go pump-action) in the case that a single intruder is bearing down on you, since it doesn’t take much precision at close range… but you better not miss. Tradeoffs, people.
And just firing the shotgun out the door when you think people might be looking to enter your home? …So much for “gun safety” advocacy.
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Simple fix. The NRA has some very nice courses that do exactly what you claim to want. One for younger kids focuses on teaching children that guns are not to be played with. And to be on the safe side, older kids should take the NRA Hunter Safety Course.
Of course, this assumes you actually care about gun safety rather than just wanting to call guns evil.
There Goes the Neighborhood on May 8, 2013 at 2:39 AM
My Dad beat my ass for what I did to his big, black, and (in the day) expensive automotive timing gun…
I am remarkably accurate with a bottle rocket launcher fashioned from one of Mom’s wire coat hangers…
PointnClick on May 8, 2013 at 4:43 AM
My oldest would turn a music stand into a rifle and a violin case into a bazooka. Fortunately, he was pointing them at another kid in the homeschool coop at the time or he’d still be locked up.
CJ on May 8, 2013 at 6:13 AM
I saw…albeit after the fact. I think my favorite quote from the entire massacre was:
Snobbery at its finest.
bigmacdaddy on May 8, 2013 at 7:23 AM
This is idiotic. Boys are supposed to play like this.
bluegill on May 8, 2013 at 7:41 AM
Gee, somehow this other story of a five year old with a REAL gun didn’t seem to get as much attention here on HA:
Five Year Old Shoots Two Year Old Sister With Gun He Got As A Gift
I guess the pencil thing is funnier.
chumpThreads on May 8, 2013 at 7:51 AM
The sad part of all this is that it is the leftist indoctrinated educrats that are behaving like 6 year olds fearful of pencils that are accompanied by the bang, bang, got ya, words.
Why would our government agencies stockpile real ammo when such trained government employees can’t even handle pencil guns?
Perhaps homeland security ought to seek graphite control legislation and background checks to close the stationary store loophole.
If we could save but one life….
Don L on May 8, 2013 at 7:57 AM
Now thar ya go agin, diffusing shrill emotion with rational thought…
Don L on May 8, 2013 at 8:02 AM
So is this:
I’m not thinking you’ll find too many folks on here who find humor in an unsupervised 5-year old with a loaded weapon.
Maybe you do.
But I’m pretty sure that no 5-year old with a pencil has ever killed his sister.
But why let facts cloud your talking points?
bigmacdaddy on May 8, 2013 at 8:15 AM
How is the one thing the same as the other?
These “zero tolerance” policies are idiotic. Pointing to a tragedy with a real gun does not make criminalizing the picture of a gun any less idiotic.
While I am a firm 2nd amendment defender, I think it is foolish, to say the least, to give a 5 year old a gun. But that has nothing to do with punishing a five year old for pretending a pencil is a gun.
It is this kind of idiotic speech control and thought control that lefties fantasize about that shows their true colors as tyrants.
Punishing a child for pretending a pencil is a gun will accomplish absolutely nothing. It is the height of idiocy (and the fact that “educators” are the ones coming up with this shows why we need to overhaul the public school systems, the first step of which is to get rid of all teachers’ unions). That anyone believes that punishing a child for using his imagination is a) a good idea or b) will accomplish the results sought is disturbing.
As far as the tactic of “look over there – a tragic story about a gun death”. What is that supposed to prove? Unfortunately, there will always be tragic events. Pools kill more kids every year than guns. Should we outlaw pools? Cars kill more kids every year than guns. Should we outlaw cars? I could go on and on.
There will always be bad/stupid parents and kids who do things that get themselves hurt. We can’t use that as an excuse to limit freedom.
Monkeytoe on May 8, 2013 at 8:16 AM
I played quite a bit with cap guns when I was a child. I also pointed my finger at people and went “bang!” while at recess at school, I’m sure. I may have even used a pencil or pen. That wouldn’t be surprising.
I am saddened for America’s youth.
Chris of Rights on May 8, 2013 at 8:27 AM
Are you kidding? You must have missed the pressure cooker parody thread here after the Boston bombing.
My point is, it’s easy to poke fun at administrative overreaction while ignoring the real-life tragedies.
chumpThreads on May 8, 2013 at 8:51 AM
I agree that the school administrator overreacted.
But just maybe, in a country where the cult of the gun thrives, such a reaction is to be expected. Perhaps zero tolerence in schools is the only antidote to the rampant gun fetishism afflicting our society.
chumpThreads on May 8, 2013 at 9:00 AM
So – thought control. Begin early with the kids and train them, through thought control (i.e., punishing them for having “bad” thoughts) is the answer to our 2nd Amendment rights?
The funny thing is, you don’t realize how much this proves that leftists are fascists at heart. Today we’ll start by punishing children for having “impure” thoughts. tomorrow, what?
You, and those like you, are sick and demented and need help.
Should we take care of the pool fetish also? Again, pools kill more children each year than guns. Should we start punishing kids for pretending to drive cars? After all, cars kill more people each year than guns and we definitely have a car fetish in our society.
Just think about how inane your thought process is and how stupid you are. Try for a minute to understand that.
Monkeytoe on May 8, 2013 at 9:05 AM
I wonder what a trigger guard for a No. 2 lead blasting semi-automatic (it has to be “sharpened” to be re-loaded) would look like?
sadatoni on May 8, 2013 at 9:15 AM
Since she obviously cannot tell the difference between fantasy and reality, I’d like to know what the school system intends to do about its mentally disturbed employees.
dominigan on May 8, 2013 at 9:27 AM
With a gun – NOT a pencil.
Guns are NOT toys, and pencils are NOT guns.
blink on May 8, 2013 at 9:30 AM
She doesn’t. She’s projecting her own thoughts upon another person and that’s easy to do with small child. Kids that age aren’t watching the news.
To the teacher with dodgeball…You’re not the only guerrilla teacher out there. I’ve laughed many times over the years with rational teachers who roll their eyes at this BS. And under whose watch, will let children..be children.
You should ask my kids what they think about tag being banned. They’ve informed me that ALL of the kids know the ‘rule’ and so just call the game something else, like ‘Zombies’. Teachers laugh, kids run and it’s all good.
Btw, I also take every opportunity that I can to let administrators know that the whole thing is foolish. The last time was at a parent meeting for a big outing and afterwards, had a conversation with the principal. I talked about the tag ban and he reiterated the rules. I said “of course that rule makes sense..I remember all of the rampant, terrible injuries from playing tag as a child..like a skinned knee’. And then just eyeballed him. He literally had nothing to say and the idea of it being stupid just hung in the air.
On the flip side, you can have someone’s beloved child acting like little Hitler in a PE class or at recess and all that happens is Junior gets a finger waggle. While every kid in the class knows that Junior is a bullying butthead..but Mom is in the PTA or something, and he’s shielded.
I don’t think that administrators really know what their policies are teaching. If they did, they would feel incredibly embarrassed. Kids aren’t stupid, they can see the stupidity and inconsistancy of discipline policies, and they figure it out at a very young age.
GeeWhiz on May 8, 2013 at 9:30 AM
The ability of the flawed, liberal brain to equate these two is mind blowing.
What’s sad is that that chumpThreads probably isn’t even embarrassed about what he just wrote.
blink on May 8, 2013 at 9:33 AM
I have a feeling that this idiot school would have punished this kid for using his index finger and making noises. Bethanne would be claiming, “The index finger is a weapon when it is pointed at someone in a threatening way and gun noises are made”
Idiots.
blink on May 8, 2013 at 9:36 AM
Everyone knows pencils and Pop Tarts are gateway guns. You gotta nip these things in the bud while they’re young…
Seriously, until we start holding these officials accountable, these moonbats will keep doing this. Let a couple of school board members lose a couple of elections over this stupidity and you’ll see it stop.
Russ in OR on May 8, 2013 at 9:51 AM
I prefer those multi-colored pens with with like 10 different colors, er I mean barrels, so I can relentlessly spray my foes with deadly colored ink.
Nutstuyu on May 8, 2013 at 10:22 AM
Ah, but pencils are usually sharp, pointy things. You could poke somebody’s eye out with one! I’m quite surprised that liberal teachers actually allow such lethal items to be used by their impressionable and innocent charges.
I’d expect nothing more dangerous than than dull pointed crayons be used by children in the classroom.
/s
hawkeye54 on May 8, 2013 at 10:34 AM
Criminals will certainly not have to worry about any ammunition shortages. The left has been working very hard to raise an entire generation that is terrified of guns. Oh, how much easier it will be for anyone to simply brandish a weapon (real or not) and have everyone cower in fear, pass out, soil themselves, etc…
reaganaut on May 8, 2013 at 10:42 AM
“I’d expect nothing more dangerous than than dull pointed crayons be used by children in the classroom.”
How about dull pointed administrators and teachers?
Art on May 8, 2013 at 10:43 AM
They think shot refers to whatever fancy Grey Goose vodka they had at the time, and what was heard was the shot glass being slammed down on the bar.
Nutstuyu on May 8, 2013 at 10:44 AM
Depends on how big it is. They might want to use it for sex ed class.
Nutstuyu on May 8, 2013 at 10:45 AM
When you have no shame, it’s hard to be embarrassed.
bigmacdaddy on May 8, 2013 at 10:54 AM
Right on brother/sister/pet! Let’s ban all guns because of an unsupervised toddler right after we ban all cars…because of an unsupervised toddler.
Nutstuyu on May 8, 2013 at 11:08 AM
Hmm, link didn’t work. Well Google the phrase “Four-year-old crashes car into McDonald’s”.
Or is that too much work for you chump?
Nutstuyu on May 8, 2013 at 11:09 AM
Well, they certainly shouldn’t be allowed to have guns!
GWB on May 8, 2013 at 11:32 AM
Please tell me you are trolling with this comment.
Even if you’re serious, just do me a favor and tell me you aren’t, for my benefit.
I’m not ready to believe that people who think this way actually exist. Sure, we hear about them from time to time with ridiculous stories like this, but at least then, I can comfort myself with the hope that somehow, the story has been horribly misreported, and there’s important context missing.
Please tell me you’re not serious – I’m not ready for a world where this level of inanity exists concentrated in a single person. I’m just not there yet.
RINO in Name Only on May 8, 2013 at 12:04 PM
My dad took his guns out of the gun cabinet and showed me what each one did, how to use it and when to use it. He then put them all back in and said that I was not to touch them when he or a approved adult was present. I was also required to take a hunter’s safety course at a young age.
scrubbiedude on May 8, 2013 at 12:09 PM
BRILLIANT!!!
runawayyyy on May 8, 2013 at 1:16 PM
Seriously, how many children outside of a few zip codes in big cities could even describe a drive-by (as opposed to a drive-up (window) or drive-in (Sonic). I suspect teachers in those schools have their hands full and tend to let semi-automatic chicken fingers slide. The vast majority of kids are blissfully unaware of the larger uglier parts of life unless set upon by shrieking hysterical adults who seem to get pleasure from the children’s fear.
Second piece of idiocy – “everything they see on television news”. Is this person so detached from reality that they think children of any stripe watch TV news? Back in the day with 3 channels maybe, but ratings indicate adults don’t even watch it.
deadman on May 8, 2013 at 4:55 PM
This sort of over-reaction is part of what has been described as a war on boys. Active make-believe play is an important part of how children work out adult behavior and figure out how to tell right from wrong. When so-called educators either do not understand or are actively hostile to the way boys learn, I see it as child abuse or something very close to it. Increasing levels of regimentation and control are not good for children of either sex.
Replacing learning with indoctrination is likely to have a multitude of bad effects.
fast richard on May 9, 2013 at 6:53 AM
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