FBI Can’t Stop Attacks, So — Disarm!

In the days since the brutal terror attack in Orlando left 49 people dead, the FBI has expressed its inability to prevent all terrorist attacks from occurring — at the same time that the left has intensified its push to disarm law-abiding citizens.

Devout Muslim Omar Mateen had been on the FBI’s radar in 2013 and 2014 and was the subject of an in-depth investigation after several of his co-workers reported him for comments he made claiming ties to al-Qaida and Hezbollah. After months of investigation failed to turn up any indications of imminent threat, the FBI said it dropped its investigation and Mateen was let off the hook — which led to serious accusations against the Department of Justice in the aftermath of the Orlando shooting on June 12.

“I can assure you, had [Mateen] indicated he was going to take action, that [the FBI] would have stayed on that investigation,” Attorney General Loretta Lynch said on ABC’s “This Week” Sunday. “At the time, the FBI did everything it could to see if he was about to carry out anything.”

“At the time, the FBI did everything it could to see if [Mateen] was about to carry out anything.”

Dr. John R. Lott Jr., founder and president of the Crime Prevention Research Center, agreed with Lynch’s assessment of the situation, saying that there was little the FBI could have done differently.

“It’s very hard to get in someone’s head and predict their actions,” Lott said, adding that just because someone is a Muslim, or says he hates the U.S., or says he supports the Islamic State, doesn’t mean he’s going to go and carry out a mass shooting himself.

The day after the shooting, FBI Director James Comey addressed the complaints and accusations thrown at the Department of Justice and its actions, saying, “Our work is very challenging. We are looking for needles in a nationwide haystack, but we are also called up to figure out which pieces of hay might someday become needles. That is hard work. If we can find a way to do that better, we will.”

Comey ultimately advised his fellow Americans to channel their “anxiety into awareness” so that “you can live your life and allow those of us who are paid to investigate and to stop terrorists to do that work while you live the full life that this great country offers you.”

“Our request to you is — please don’t let them make you work into a state of anxiety that is disabling,” Comey said. “Find ways to channel that into a healthy awareness of your surroundings, and live your lives.”

But these warnings of the limitations of law enforcement, and encouragements to be aware, come at the same time liberals are making a massive push to ensure that Americans cannot defend themselves.

“The difference between life and death is the faster you can get a gun on the scene, the faster you’ll be able to save more lives,” Lott said.

The U.S. Senate considered four pieces of gun control legislation on Tuesday — the GOP-controlled chamber struck all four down. Lott noted that even if these four bills had been passed and put into effect long before the Orlando shooting, they would not have stopped any of the United States’ mass shootings in the last couple of decades.

“Look, what they’re pushing doesn’t have anything to do with stopping any of these attacks from occurring,” Lott said. “Democrats push these regulations and use the crises to push gun control laws … and by making it more costly for law-abiding citizens to get guns.”

One thing that would make a difference, however, would be allowing law-abiding U.S. citizens to legally purchase and maintain guns.

“There is no way that the police, the government, or the military can protect citizens all the time,” Lott said, adding that most of these mass shootings occur in gun-free zones. “The difference between life and death is the faster you can get a gun on the scene, the faster you’ll be able to save more lives.”

If the FBI, the Department of Justice, and law enforcement officers cannot effectively prevent terrorist attacks and mass shootings from occurring, then why are liberals so keen on taking Second Amendment rights away from citizens who may be able to intervene and prevent further tragedies?