My own brief response: when I heard Peter King using the Boston response to call for additional surveillance cameras in cities, presumably government owned, I was put off. Like, viscerally. That was my initial reaction — and not just because I’m reliably non-photogenic. Rather, because it seems to me that store cameras, bank cameras, and personal cell phones, etc., did the work here, and I’m fine with that kind of arrangement.
I suppose I’d be open to the argument for more surveillance cameras to be placed in public provided there was an ironclad guarantee that they’d only be referenced in the event of terror attacks — and even then, I’d expect “terror attack” to be very narrowly defined. And even even then, I’d hate the idea, knowing that somehow, someway, some court somewhere will eventually find cracks in the legal language and allow use of the cameras in ways I wholly despise, based on some thing claiming to be an interpretation.
So it’s a balancing act, and one that won’t be solved in smarmy Tweets.
Assholes like David Sirota (who incidentally blocked me on Twitter, so thoroughly must I have rattled him yesterday — which continues to escape the notice of Twitchy somehow) are now busy arguing that “conservatives” are criticizing Boston for “cowering,” failing I suppose to note that Michael Moore, hardly a TEA Party supporter, did just that.
And yet, what choice did the people of Watertown really have? The government has disarmed them (and I’d bet that nearly 45% of MA residents disagree with the state’s anti-gun policies); the government controls the public transportation; and evidently, we’ve militarized our metropolitan police forces to the point where your best bet is to stay inside, because we have (rightly) nervous law enforcement officers patrolling in areas that might be booby-trapped, armed with “assault weapons,” ready to fire on perceived threats.
— Which incidentally is why the media who were climbing on rooftops or trying to circumvent road blocks are lucky they were identified in scanner chatter.
At the risk of sounding like a real throwback, why wasn’t a makeshift community “militia” of the remaining legal gun owners put together — voluntarily — to aid police in the search? Why is a lock down preferable to a group of responsible citizens with firearms aiding law enforcement of their own volition to help end a community threat?
I think what rankles many “conservatives” — which includes classical liberals, many libertarians, and constitutionalists — and even people like Michael Moore, who is none of those things, is that the Boston lock down, while ultimately proving effective (ironically, by way of its having ended), essentially served the purpose of the terrorists: It shut down cities, shut down (most) commerce, and forced the populace into hiding, in some cases I imagine against the will of individuals.
And this came on the heels of the populace having shown itself on the afternoon of the bombing to be up to the task of acting responsibly and effectively, with civilians rushing to join and augment the brave work of first responders, helping the wounded and the dazed, providing intel that helped find the bombers, and so on.
If it’s time for a national conversation, I recommend a national conversation on what it means to be a citizen of a free country. This would include the price we may have to pay for liberty.
But if the progressives and some on the right think it appropriate to wave the bloody shirts of children to push an anti-gun agenda, pardon me for not taking their outrage seriously over some of us raising the specter of a city on lockdown, with people in many cases left defenseless in their homes, as a perfectly legitimate starting point to counter their anti-gun propaganda.
It seems as though the FBI proclamation of their photo evidence Thurs. afternoon had something to do with the resurfacing of the two murderers, but as yet have we had testimony that the bad guys had been identified (by name) in a call to the FBI prior to their own fresh crime spree? I just don’t happen to know one way or the other.
I’m interested in hearing what those people did while in lock down.
Were they watching their yards/streets, calling friends and neighbors to check up and confirm that they were not being held hostage?
What plans did they have should anyone other than a ‘uniformed police officer’ appear suddenly at their door?
I’m in agreement with you except that I do not think the lock down was effective by any stretch. What was successful was having the lockdown end so that the additional eyes/ears of the public could notice him. We wasted eight million person-hours … several lifetimes worth … so that we wouldn’t inconvenience the government while they roamed around in the wrong place.
We were cajoled into it by a government telling us that the “terrorist came here to kill people” when, in fact, he came here as a nine year old. His decision to kill came after his immersion in the unicorn dreams of the Cambridge public school system. Allowing someone to work out their “special snowflake” identity crisis through school essays about Chechan terrorists is antithetical to what public education should accomplish: a shared society of responsible adults.
The most dangerous labels are the ones some individuals assign to themselves, allowing them to carve themselves off from the rest of us so they can drop bombs at the feet of our children. These labels are a direct result of identity politics. Way to go liberals. Way to go.
peter king is the loser what spended sixty billion chineser dollars on chris christie’s welfare cash for snooki trash bill
he’s a dangerous demagogue
Seems kinda like NY politician is inching toward bein’ a synonym for dangerous demagogue.
They have one thing in common.
They didn’t happen in 2013.
Has there been any answer to the question Ernst posed earlier?
Good points, byondpolitics.
oh. Team R stands with Food Stamp in wanting this to become known as the Patriot’s Day Horror.
Teamwork!
The cops didn’t find the guy. The homeowner saw blood on her boat and called them. Good job law enforcement. I also wonder how many stray rounds ended up in peoples houses.
Those worried about the people becoming inured to this kind of draconian response need only remember that last night’s heroes are now back to catching speeders and breaking up groups of loiterers — in other words, enforcing the malum prohibitum laws that lead to those cop-and-donut jokes.
If all the cops ever did was catch murderers and muggers and robbers, actual malim in se violators, most people would barely know what a cop looks like.
Then again, if there get to be a lot of terrorist acts like the Marathon bombing, and cities get shut down every time, the citizen will be forced to decide whether to remain a citizen or become a subject.
I rather hope he will remember why our coins don’t feature the profile of Queen Liz, but hope isn’t a strategy.
ThomasD,
I was mostly trying to work. But I was acutely aware that the fancy alarm system my wife bought was practically useless if this guy had wanted to come into my house and take my family hostage. I was ALSO acutely aware that I was about as useful as the alarm system.
the Marathon bombing
whaaa?
Oh. You mean the Patriot’s Day Horror.
Get with the program you’re confuzzling everybody
P.S. the police HQ you kept seeing on TV was across the street from the only commercial business open in Watertown…yep…a Dunkin Donuts.
I bet that guy’s boat is a total loss. I hope he’s insured or it belongs to his brother in law.
Thanks for the candid assessment Enrak, have you spoken to any of your neighbors about their experiences that day?
While I certainly can understand how people might feel less than effective at countering an armed and determined threat that doesn’t leave you without any options. If nothing else, staying in routine contact with close neighbors would increase the chances recognizing someone in distress.
Frankly, this common mindset of ‘let the experts handle it’ may be one of the things that allowed this entire horror unfold – if any people saw the unattended bag(s) and did nothing.
If it’s time for a national conversation, I recommend a national conversation on what it means to be a citizen of a free country. This would include the price we may have to pay for liberty.
That conversation has already been had, and here is the outcome. See those blue bits, they have decided that they don’t need horrible guns or liberty, and more cameras, police power and free mobile phones are the way to go. Progress, baby. The price was too high.
I’ll bet the boat can be sold on eBay as a souvenir for more than it cost.
I’ve already seen a spin that the bombing is the “NRA’s fault” because they’ve resisted taggants in powder. Expect reloading to come under attack next.
Probably, Spies. What do you bet the cops confiscated it? I expect pictures of them sitting in it with a thumbs-up to appear on Instagram.
Stock tip: short large backpack manufacturers.
That would be Lawrence O’Donnell on MSNBC speaking as usual of things he knows not of.
Even for high explosives where they are not a safety concern they have been shown to be useless and so only one nation demands that they be put in high explosives and then not all of them.
Senator Lautenberg is going after reloading components. Muzzleloading hunters will love him.
Seems to me there is some sense to cordoning off local areas when it comes to explosives and booby traps just like you’d do if there was an uncontrolled gas leak on the block but that’s about all.
Along those lines it might be a good idea for people to become more informed about improvised explosives. What they look like, how they are triggered, etc.
Towards the larger point, local citizens are a huge asset in a way that no one else can possibly be. They know who’s from the neighborhood and they know when someone or something seems out of place.
Shutting down the entire city of Boston because: one lone hat-backwards teenager was ludicrous. But that exercise did prove to anyone noticing how easily modern Americans are cowed and herded at whim.
This ain’t American anymore, folks.
True that, bh. My grandma was the neighborhood spy when she lived with us. She’d be sitting in the living room, crocheting and watching Mike Douglas and making random observations about the neighbors.
“The Johnson’s are home. It looks like they have company. Again.”
“Looks like the Robertson girl has a different boyfriend than last month. Tsk.”
“That blue car has been in front of the house with the For Sale sign for a few hours now. I wonder who that is?”
Another area that we should maybe all educate ourselves in is the actual tactics used in bombings in public areas. I’ve heard of the initial bomb being used as a magnet for future targets or to herd people in a specific direction but that’s about all I know.
Seems to me that veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan could be great resources to get this sort of information spread amongst ourselves.
And the bombers will have learned much as well. Hats, white and backwards, are easy to spot, as are any standout designs or features on backpacks and clothing. Future bombers will change tactics – and garb – to be less noticeable.
Even casual readers of Ludlum’s ‘The Bourne Identity’ found it difficult to suspend disbelief when Matt Damon always looked like Matt Damon.
thank allan for ins
link
Another area that we should maybe all educate ourselves in is the actual tactics used in bombings in public areas.
Bombs in litter bins, car bombs, bombs in pairs (the second targeted at emergency services responding to the first bomb), booby trapped every day items like mail boxes, bicycles. Memorial events at public monuments, like Remembrance Day services. Train stations, pubs, shopping precincts. Everywhere the public gather, and where maximum disruption, terror and panic can ensue.
And then what? Call the authorities? Scream and cause a scene? Beat them about the head and shoulders? Run away?
I can’t live my life like that.
Aren’t smokeless propellants (even pyrodex) really lousy explosives, owing to the fact that they burn too fast to build up really explosive pressures?
Outside of a cartridge and the comparatively tiny opening of a firearm’s breech/bore, I mean.
We don’t need a license to buy Pyrodex, but we do for black powder, for exactly that reason, Ernst.
They burn too slow, or I should maybe say that they burn, they deflagrate and explosives don’t exactly, the detonate. Smokeless powders aren’t considered explosives. Black Powder is an explosive but is a low explosive because it doesn’t develop the supersonic shock wave that high explosives do.
What the fuck’s up with this hat?
http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/04/20/article-2311443-196530B4000005DC-797_470x423.jpg
ThomasD,
Yes, I spoke with other neighbors as we were checking to make sure each other were okay. Keeping a watchful eye out on the street despite the fact that the police kept telling us to stay away from the windows.
But, let me tell you, if that kid hadn’t been wearing a suicide vest (maybe), armed, and a wrestling champ, you can bet I woulda taken him down myself!!
Wolverines!!!!
geoffb: I love how they somehow HAVE to make it the NRA’s fault. Apparently even O’Donnell is smart enough to know how stupid “pressure cooker control” would sound.
Of course there are numerous explosives that can made from household chemicals, assuming that one believes that a premature detonation will still get you your virgins, or that Dying For The Cause in general is an acceptable risk, so black powder control would be about as effective as gun control (i.e., not at all).
that is a very fancy hat
beemoe: better picture here http://swatmp0.tripod.com/Police/Uniforms/mass_hat.jpg
The ones I saw playing crossing guard in the ground transportation area at Logan were wearing Smokey Bear-style campaign hats, though.
Sorry if this is getting old, but I’ll repeat myself:
They MVST have their Reichstagsbrand. That’s the only way they can progress (heh) to the corresponding Ermächtigungsgesetz. And make no mistake about it, the single thing the Left desires above all is that Ermächtigungsgesetz.
OT: but Timb found me on Twitter. And he’s taken time out of his day to note how unimportant I am. Repeatedly! So very sad is he.
I do so wish he could quit me. I’m like catnip to that pussy.
(Ooh. Ima use that!)
BMoe, that hat used to be called a “50 mission crush” by the Air Force. It was from wearing a head-set over your hat.
I doubt that hat was crushed in that manner by head-phones. It looks like it was rolled up in his back pocket.
Reloading will come under various attacks. The taggants thing has always met the response “come up with a reliable taggant that doesn’t reduce the reliability or safety of the powder.”
No one has.
Also it is likely to be as useful as the registries that tend to be abandoned when people actually try to use them related to crime – in which case they’re fairly useless.
“Assholes like David Sirota”
“Though the real [General Sherman] wouldn’t wax or frost his hair.”
Oh, god, I’m dying here. Laughing like a friggin’ loon.
Insurance companies (those evil, big bad things) will allow certain policy holders a deduction for having security cameras on their stores. Security cameras have helped to bring looters and other thieves to justice, so many businesses use them. I do too tend to lean with Jeff on this one. The private sector is seemingly doing a good job at this, and as much as I like some of the ides of video expansion, I also believe that they would be abused and used in ways I would not like.
Perhaps some temporary video for certain events? Placed and then removed? Even then, are we going to be prying to open container law violations with this? Pervs collecting down-shirt shots from the footage? This is a broad conversation, but I do believe it will not happen.
For the nation to discuss privacy, liberty, and freedoms it would require those politicians, news agencies, and intellectuals in the front of the movements to agree to have one – which only works to the benefit of bringing out the very arguments that the left and big-government RINOs despise: freedom, liberty, and privacy (except when privacy becomes unrestricted access to abortion – then that’s ok)
So yeah, public conversation – but I highly doubt it. The conversation would empower the hobbits and crazy freedom individuals too much.
It’s like they have to consciously pretend I don’t exist. http://twitchy.com/2013/04/19/backpedal-palooza-left-no-longer-wants-to-speculate-about-bombers-motives/
Yeah – I saw that and was wondering if Twitchy is owned by Ace of Spades or some such?
Couple of thoughts after watching the weekend evening news:
Watching people who just spent the day sheltering in place celebrate the capture of a semi-conscious 19 year old who’d just spent the day slowly bleeding out underneath a tarpaulin in the back of a fishing boat like it was V-J Day, or at least Bin Ladin is dead and barking in hell Day, is, well, awkward.
Secondly, these two guys should by all rights have been an American immigrant success story: good schools, great extra-curriculars, etc. These guys shouldn’t have been isolated, alienated, disaffected losers (and I’m not saying here that that’s what they were or believed themselves to be —because I don’t know what was going on in their heads). So when the public displays of chin-stroking and thumbsucking and navel-gazing get going in earnest, the question we have to ask is the question we won’t ask, because the thumbsucking, chin-stroking navel-gazers fear to know the answer. And that question is: who taught these two to hate the country that took them in?
Because it wasn’t the mosque or imam, or the websites and chatboards, or the Chechen/Islamist militant group(s) we’ll sooner or later learn about—at least not entirely. Those entities only taught them how to channel the hate they’d previously learned, and the ends to which it could be employed.
(reposted from the previous thread and apologies for the double-post)
“Shut up.” they explained.
See? You show how tough you are by cowering in your basement, waiting for the benevolent government to proactively protect you.
Of course, the amount of ammo expended into that boat ought to answer the “Who needs more than 10 rounds?” question.
As an academic, you know damn good and well that the best way to deal with an argument that you don’t want to have is to ignore it.
And then hope everyone concludes that that is because the opposing point of view is too ridiculous to notice, instead of concluding that you yourself don’t have a winning counter-argument.
Blow me, internet tough guy.
The #BlockedByDavidSirota Club: Membership Is Growing Rapidly!
Enrak, either your sarcasm meter is busted, or you are cordially invited to go fuck yourself.
i made deviled eggs!
I would just love to hear what you would have done in my shoes.
who will stand with me against the burgeoning avalanche menace??
Assuming that these are your shoes, I also assume that you’re in Watertown or thereabouts. Correct?
Why I don’t get is why my comments about your betters’ opinion of you have struck a nerve that led you to lash out, and the only thing I can conceive of being the problem is that perhaps they’re right.
What I would have done in your shoes is not be in your shoes. I’m about 50 miles south of you and I can assure you that my role in an invasion of my property will not be uselessness.
I think Pablo was trying to get at the same thing I was when I called the scenes of celebration that the media is promoting awkward.
Consider all the dead verbiage in the President’s statement, to say nothing of the media’s misuse of hero, coward(ly), tragic, tragedy, etc.
One of the reasons why we can’t come to grips with the problem of terrorism and Islamism is that we can’t define the problem in the first place.
We’re also redefining cowardice as heroism and vice-versa. See the rhetoric around the recent Senate gun vote. Cheeseburgers will be vegan before we know it.
Realizing that this sounds a bit condescending, I should note that I would have been in your shoes a couple of years ago. It’s a fixable problem, though MA makes it about as difficult as they can.
Somebody really ought to start a blog dedicated to exposing the way the left misuses language, and advocating a return to Enlightenment principles.
But who would go to the bother?
I don’t understand how a city the size of Boston, with the history it has as the launching place of the American Revolution, has come to the place where its citizens have allowed themselves to be disarmed, to have what amounts to CCTV everywhere, to willingly allow police to search their property without warrant and to basically allow themselves to be treated like half-witted children. “Stay in your homes until we say you can come out!” It sounds a lot like “Go to your room!”
And roger that with the misuse of hero, heroic, coward, cowardice, tragedy, et al.
This whole thing stinks. This is a 19 year old kid who is now designated as an Enemy Combatant, a Terrorist and has been stripped of his Miranda rights. The kid is a douchebag, sure, but he is an American citizen and entitled to due process. It wasn’t he who brought the city to its knees, it was law enforcement. A tremendous amount of law enforcement. This is only the beginning of a terrible shift in how we perceive ourselves as citizens and how cheaply we hold our freedoms.
Only for the first 50 minutes or so, from what I hear.
And that assumes he recovers enough to be interrogated.
Wait, let’s have none of this:
This is also known as a grown man.
A douchebag?
He’s accused of murder and maiming. Of the victims is an actual kid, not the grown man kind, the actual kind. Both young and innocent.
While we call him a citizen (as of 9-11-12) here is the oath he swore:
And by the way, the process due to a suspected terrorist and enemy combatant is different from that due to someone suspected of an ordinary crime.
Let me add that when that Cockley scrunt answered the question about interrogation and miranda rights is when she demonstrated publicly why she should be sumarily dismissed from office.
That she hasn’t been says everything about her boss, and her boss’s boss.
FBI Looking for 12 Islamic Sleeper Cells Linked to Boston Bombers
cockley scrunt! hello hello and where are you off to on such a fine morning?
I’m a go see my friend happyfeet he made deviled eggs!
oh. Perhaps I will accompany you.
That would be lovely.
That right there’s reason enough to ship him to Gitmo.
Or hire 72 strippers and let him wake up in a Prisoner of Zenda set and let the pros get him to talk about his manly exploits.
As to his current fraudulently obtained citizenship, I’m not sure that he’ll retain it.
I’m happy to see him charged with treason.
While we call him a citizen (as of 9-11-12) here is the oath he swore:
Yes, bh. I’m not excusing him. Technically he’s not a kid, so I shouldn’t have used that term. I’m concerned about the broadening of the parameters to interrogation. I haven’t watched anything today or read much of it either so I can’t speak to the legalities involved or who is saying what.
Anyway, my point was a larger one about freedom for the rest of us who are not sneaking around making bombs and killing marathoners and what kind of precedent this sets.
next week this whole boston thing will be so last week I think
roobs and mcd have the immigrations all teed up and ready to go
Combined with nr’s 7:37 pm, weird odd things happening around this event.
There is another precedent that we should be aware of setting.
That of allowing murderous jihadists something other than a long interrogation followed by an unmarked grave.
To be clear, there is no Miranda right that has been stripped from him. For one, he’s not currently talking. Two, if he talks before he’s given the opportunity to lawyer up, then whatever he says can be suppressed at trial. Lastly, if he knows enough to pass the citizenship exam, he should know about the Fifth Amendment.
Agreed.
An account of the evening flight of the two bombers.
Coakley? Like Martha Coakley? She’s elected, which doesn’t contradict a thing you said about her.
Carmin Ortiz, Martha Coakley. You know what they say about middle-aged white guys.
Which one is the wise latina and which one is the 1/32 (allegedly) cherokee medicine woman?
(But Ortiz is who I had in mind. I regret the error)
The Cherokee beat Scott Brown. Coakley lost to him. Carmen Ortiz should be doing something more her speed, like janitorial work.
Huff-Puff-Duck in Denver.
Shows how on top of things I am. I thought Martha Coakley was that teenage girl the Kennedy spawn killed with a golf club.
Sirota has unprotected his Twitter thingie again — guess he figured out what that actually does. Heh.
WRT Miranda rights: given that the little god-king already asserts the right to perform extrajudicial execution on any one of us at any time, it’s not really a surprise.
So when the public displays of chin-stroking and thumbsucking and navel-gazing get going in earnest, the question we have to ask is the question we won’t ask, because the thumbsucking, chin-stroking navel-gazers fear to know the answer. And that question is: who taught these two to hate the country that took them in?
Which is why we need to ask it all the more.
I suppose there is a question outstanding then. Is a jihadist with fresh blood on his hands one of us?
Because by my way of thinking, one can be against both Obama’s incredible overreach and against offering our enemies protections they in no way deserve.
“WRT Miranda rights: given that the little god-king already asserts the right to perform extrajudicial execution on any one of us at any time, it’s not really a surprise.”
Sadly, too true. I guess we can all wait for the knock on the door.
You’ll have to define “us”, bh. I don’t think we’re (the Royal we) all on the same page there. Is Bill Ayers one of us?
Teste
Heh.
Why is that EVIL Carmen Ortiz given a mic in Boston?
Teats.
This is why we have a drone program. The old program was that you take prisoners with intelligence value alive and interrogate them. Then you release them after the end of hostilities if they had previously obeyed the rules of war. But, then we couldn’t do that anymore. Shut down Guantanamo, stop enhanced interrogations, etc.
So, what do we do now? We shoot them with drones. We gain no intelligence and they’re deader than dirt but the ACLU doesn’t make a big stink about it. That’s a great loss to our ability to fight the jihadists and is a moral absurdity to boot.
Heh, Pablo. Well, I’d say that Ayers would say that these guys are one of us.
There’s no such thing as Miranda Rights. There’s a Miranda warning.
Making sure you know you have a Fifth Amendment right by giving you the Miranda warning, is what I meant.
“Tsarnaev and Miranda Rights“
“I guess we can all wait for the knock on the door.”
They’d better pack a lunch. It’s going to be an all day job.
“Then you release them after the end of hostilities if they had previously obeyed the rules of war.”
Which the last enemy we had that made even a token attempt at that was Nazi Germany. Says rather a lot about the enemies we’ve had since then, doesn’t it?
Quite true. I suspect that we encourage such sub-Nazi behavior by not requiring a strict quid pro quo in belligerent behavior.
To take a jab at my own question, I would guess Matt Damon’s Will Hunting isn’t the only Bostonian whose mind was blown by Howard Zinn.
So after a ten minute gun battle, culminating with the perp walking openly into the cops gunfire, his own brother had to run him over with an SUV to kill him?
Seriously, how fucking bad a shot are these clowns?
Cops are too busy bullying honest citizens to learn to shoot well.
“It’s going to be an all day job.”
Heh. That’s what we said here.
Again, who needs more than 10 rounds? Everyone, apparently.
This section makes it sound like they were trying to take him alive:
Which, if you’re worried about further terrorist actions from conspirators, is the smart decision if it’s available.
A stress environment, when your average beat cop probably doesn’t have a lot of practice shooting under stress, combined with the limitations of a 4 inch or so barrel? I’d say average.
This is why SWAT carry carbines.
Just a guess, but I’m thinking nobody thought to grab the shotgun out of the cruiser.
Basically, if the one murderer hadn’t killed the other murderer, we’d have twice as many people to interrogate today about their friends.
Also why the cops prefer you have fewer than 10 while they get to keep more.
Collectively or institutionally speaking. Not all cops distrust an armed citizenry.
To be clear, I’m not talking about the gun battle that had just occurred.
I’m saying that obviously you can shoot a man if you can handcuff him. That they didn’t do so is good. Dead men don’t talk and if they’re not a threat to civilians at that time they don’t need to be made dead until some later date.
Maybe bh. Tamerlan was hit a number of times, and so was Dzhokhar —who still might check out.
I understand the logic of taking him alive, I also understand he was a cop killer shooting at more cops. I gotta believe there were at least a couple cops there that wanted those motherfuckers dead.
Oh, I assume they were shooting (poorly perhaps) to kill earlier and maybe later once more, Ernst. I’m responding to the way BMoe stated his comment.
Gunning down a guy you can take to the hospital and then question would have been a real dumb ending to the whole clusterfuck.
I really, really, really thought this was going to go down exactly like that myself, BMoe.
Perhaps it was some restraint and intelligence on their part or perhaps it was just knowledge of all the cameras on them.
Wonder what the drug screens will tell about these two? Jihadis seem to have a history of taking uppers and such.
One more thought on the marksmanship thing. Larry Correia in one of his shooting related posts talked about going through thousands of rounds a month when he was active in three gun competitions. I doubt there’s a police department in the country that allocates that much practice ammunition to it’s officers, SWAT-type units in major metropolitan areas perhaps excepted.
And that goes back to Pablo’s point. The only correct answer to the question how many bullets do you need is as many as I need, which is why I carry as many as I can carry.
I wonder if that explains some of that disposable cash as well. Selling drugs on campus is about as lucrative as it gets.
Saw an auto repair shop owner on TV talking about how the one was wearing $900 shoes. My first thought was foreign funding from their network but maybe not.
$900 dollar shoes. That’s one way to prove you’re not a godless materialist.
Obama was pathetic and so was the U.S. Attorney with her, ‘Now is the start of my journey’ crap – WTF?!?…WTFFF?!?
I wish I would have checked my spelling over at that ‘respectfully disagree’ place. That does it. New rule. Because now I look like a crackpot, and with spelling like that ay dunt hve a lig to stand in. on. leg.
It’s embarrassing as hell, Boston is, and celebrating indominable spirit is even more embarassing. I’m doubly embarrassed, for them, and yet, they’re proud of themselves for behaving so well and for things turning out so splendidly.
That guy killed his own brother and doesn’t even know it yet. Man, when he wakes up he’s in for the shit.
And Boston killed its own indominable spirit and doesn’t even know it yet, and Man, when it wakes up… who am I kidding? It’s indominable spirit is gone forever. It just got totally pwned.
Here is a Debka conspiracy theory… I would dismiss it out of hand, but then I think back over the last five years and I start to wonder if there is any merit to this.
Is it the learned opinion of the commenters here that if you don’t own a gun you are a coward?
read some ace and get back to us
Cowards?
link
I read that. You are gonna have to dumb it down a shade newrouter.
And Pablo it has nothing to do with home invasion. I wanted to know what you would have done that wasn’t “cowering in [your] basement”. You can even have your gun. Now what would you have done?
Your government placed you in the position of being unarmed and then demanded that you cower while their armed men went out to deal with two murderous cowards.
That does not make you a coward Enrak. It does suggest that your state and local governments are controlled by people who do meet the definition that was laid out at Ace’s since they fear to confront an armed populace and so have arranged to never have to do so.
Why do you all keep assuming I was cowering?
Can’t speak for Pablo, but I am guessing “gone about my business as usual” will be pretty close to his answer.
It’s what I would have done.
I get Ace’s coward distinction, and as Pablo pointed out I could own a gun I choose not to. I was unaware that not owning a firearm a de facto bad thing. I will eventually own guns, but not for home defense. My odds of needing a firearm to defend my home are minuscule. I may change my mind, but the statistics back me up. If I feel a need to defend myself against the gov’t I will leave MA before it gets to that. Then I’ll get a gun.
” I wanted to know what you would have done that wasn’t “cowering in [your] basement”. ”
Moving away from a place where you’re not allowed to protect yourself and your family would be a good start.
Ever notice that this stuff always happens in regions/locations where the people have been disarmed?
It’s a common mistake. Now that Vesuvius has started rumbling, though, the question becomes whether you’re going to take steps to deal with the problem or continue living on the slopes waiting for the next “incident”.
Can’t speak for Pablo, but I am guessing “gone about my business as usual” will be pretty close to his answer.
It’s what I would have done.
First of all, I did (other than watching the news too much). Second, I was much more afraid of the police than the Chechen. People were outside, walking dogs, talking, etc. I was working and taking care of my family.
How many of you have military experience and/or know how well you would react when being fired at?
SBP, I gotta make a living. I’m not moving out of state just because I have a one in a billion chance of having my home invaded whilst unarmed.
“SBP, I gotta make a living. ”
http://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm
SBP, c’mon. You’re better than that.
I have a specific industry. I have family in the region. I have a wife that works as well.
I know you don’t know me anyone, but just do me a favor and assume I’m not a total moron. I do come here to learn (and I do, which is why I keep coming back), but I get basic economics thank you.
Is it the learned opinion of the commenters here that if you don’t own a gun you are a coward?
No. If you don’t own a gun, there is increasing likely hood that sometime in the future you are going to regret not having one. Or, that you are a useful idiot who believes Teh Government is going to keep you safe, while protecting your rights.
Increasing likelihood, yes. When that likelihood passes my threshold I’ll get one.
Not sure how useful my being an idiot is to anyone.
“I have a specific industry.”
A specific industry that only exists in Massachusetts?
Really?
Anti-gun ownership folks are useful idiots. That is my point.
And, the problem of of waiting until you reached that threshold – by then it may be too late.
Just like the Jews who waited too long to leave Germany.
Who said I was anti-gun ownership?
I didn’t say it only existed in MA. But your table of unemployment rates by state is of no use to me. I have a good job, that I like. The odds of me finding an equivalent one in a red state are quite low.
Not sure how moving to New York or Washington D.C. would help me out of the predicament we are currently discussing.
True, but I don’t think we are there quite yet. YMMV. I have a plan should SHTF. But it would have to do so pretty quickly for me to get trapped here.
I’m always surprised by how much I get the beat down whenever I post on this site. I guess I really am a slow learner.
(Of course, posting “Bite me” to Pablo was PROBABLY not the best way to start an intelligent discussion. I do apologize Pablo, I was just irritated by your assumption that I was cowering. I continue to be irritated, but I regret my post.)
First I didn’t say that you or anyone did “cower”, just that the government said for you to do so. From the sounds of that video of the firefight and having 9000 heavily armed and on edge men roaming the streets you did have more to worry about from them than the one bomber who was at large.
I’m not a young man so this is from over 45 years of living apart from parental control. I’ve lived in good neighborhoods and bad over that time period and over those years there have been 3 occasions where I displayed that I was armed to someone who was making threats of physical violence against me and mine. Each time it time it ended it right then.
I have always had a firearm available at home to protect myself and my family. Even if I didn’t I would be glad to know that others around me did as that knowledge means that those who would break-in to my home to steal things will be more likely to do so when no one is home out of fear of confronting an armed homeowner.
Same for CCW in the public spaces. I don’t have to carry to gain the benefits that come from criminals knowing that anyone they confront might be armed. I myself would not like to have to live in a place where I was not allowed to be armed and to use them for self defense but that is just me from my own life’s experience. YMMV of course.
Anti-gun ownership folks are useful idiots. That is my point.
Who said I was anti-gun ownership?
Sigh.
I’m trying to explain the arguments put forth here. Not directly accusing you. Non-gun owners can fall into a few useful categories, one of them being anti-gun useful idiots. Or those who haven’t gotten around to it. But be careful, if you’re the latter, because ticktock, time is running out.
There is nothing to be “celebrated” by having an entire city remain helpless in their homes while the “authorities” search.
Which – ironically – didn’t lead to the man’s eventual discovery.
Outside of the parameter, I believe (but I’ve worked ALL FRICKEN WEEKEND, so if I have that fact wrong, forgive me).
The terrorist was still found by an average citizen. Not the dudes authorized to search.
I find that fact … ironic or something. Just like rain on your wedding day.
I don’t remember hearing the instruction to cower.
I’m 40. I’ve never had to show a firearm to anyone to avoid violence. And the statistics are on my side.
My wife and I are currently in discussions about buying a firearm for SHTF reasons, but NOT because we feel we need it for home defense or to fight a tyrannical government.
Why isn’t anyone harassing Pablo to move? He’s in the same basic state as me (Rhode Island which is just as bad).
Why isn’t anyone harassing Pablo to move? He’s in the same basic state as me (Rhode Island which is just as bad)
Because we’ve got Pablo installed there as a sleeper cell.
Connecting the dots, only they’re not the dots one would immediately presume to be spoken of, but the dots left by the purported “dot connectors” themselves.
He was found just outside the perimeter.
I was not cheering, and I found it a little odd as well. We didn’t exactly win a Superbowl here.
Car in, there are a few themes in this comment thread. I am reacting only to the supposition that those of us who remained indoors were “cowering” and that living in a blue state is de facto stupid or something similar. I am not arguing that the lockdown was a good tactic, nor a good precedent.
And don’t sigh at me. :P
I’m in Michigan, so … it’s a rather blue state, but with the # of hunters up here, gun control in any form isn’t gonna go over so well.
“Why isn’t anyone harassing Pablo to move? ”
No one’s “harassing” you (or Pablo) to do anything. You asked what you could do to mitigate. We responded. Just because you don’t like the answer doesn’t make it “harassment”.
“NOT because we feel we need it for home defense or to fight a tyrannical government.”
And yet you agree that you and yours were put in danger by the government, a greater danger than that presented by an active terrorist. Don’t you see how wrong this is?
I was kidding about the harassing. I’m enjoying our conversation. I didn’t ask for mitigation, I asked what Pablo (or anyone else) would have done. I even allowed you to keep your firearms cause that’s just how I roll.
Are you honestly saying that you would have gone out there with your firearm amidst all the trigger-happy police out there.
I’m also Caucasian, and if I had a son he might look like Dzokhar. IYKWIMAITYD
Yes. SBP, I do see how wrong that is. That’s why I always vote.
the shoot out was near dexter-quimby st. franklin where he was found is less than a mile away. top notch manhunt no?
Say Enrak, as a formal matter, how did you understand the ‘shelter in place’ suggestion (should we call it merely a suggestion? or should we call it something else?) to have come about? Who made the first announcement of the thing (local official? State official?) and when? When the announcement was made, were specific authorities cited in support of it, or merely assumed in the statement? Who called it off for your locality (same official as announced the inception, or another)?
… and how many of those tens of millions of rounds did DHS need ? a couple of thousand
link
Like sdferr, I would like to know that as well. If you happened to be out and about did those people have to state their business?
The whole thing is morbidly fascinating from a psychological stand-point. You are all going to have the honor of being the first test case of the new normal in how far the government/law enforcement can push people in the event of a crisis, be it real or invented. I’m thinking the authorities got the response they were looking for and it makes me sad.
No, it wasn’t. They practically admitted that much of it was ‘for show’ during the press conference where they lifted the ‘shelter in place’ order.
SBP,
I got a call around 2:30 AM from our police autodialer (usually it tells us when the parking ban is lifted – yeah we have lots of bans), telling us there was an incident and we should stay inside and avoid windows. Detective Conners and Chief Devoe were the only authorities mentioned. It was ‘advised’. As I mentioned people did leave their homes. I saw one guy in a truck following a bunch of cops around taking pictures with his smartphone. They ignored him – though he kept his distance.
It was called off by Deval during a press conference on Friday, right before boat-guy found him.
It was called off by Deval during a press conference on Friday, right before boat-guy found him.
Did he say why he was calling it off? Not that I’d expect him to admit that people were reaching their limit of tolerance or anything like that, but that I’d expect he may have had some professed rationale reflecting backward at the need for the thing in the first place.
No one had to ‘state their business’, but if they were in an active search they would yell at people to ‘get back in the house!!’ Plus there were APCs roaming about. As if the guys wearing automatic rifles and body armor weren’t intimidating enough. I noticed that trigger discipline was mixed.
Most people listened, some did not. No one got shot. (Though honestly, during the initial shootout that was kind of a miracle – not sure if you saw that one fellow’s apartment with the holes in the TV, walls, and easy chair.)
I can’t remember exactly why Deval said he was lifting the ban. The gist was, ‘we can’t find him, we think he is still in Massachusetts, the house to house search in Watertown outside of the perimeter was mainly for show to make people feel safe, and this should still be considered an active manhunt so be careful out there’.
I do remember thinking “how exactly is it legal for them to just come inside our houses?”. Then I remember thinking “probably not the right time to stand on principle”. Feel free to come down on me for that, but do so honestly thinking about what you would have done.
No one searched inside my house, though they did go inside my garage and on my property.
If we listen to and reflect on the commonplace warnings put out by police in pursuit of active criminal targets, they say “So and so is armed and dangerous. Do not approach him. If you see him, call 911” etc.
There are teachings embedded there. We, (the public fellows going about our business) are (presumed to be) not armed and dangerous. We are sheeplike, in need of the guard-dogs for our protection. Guard-dogs suffer danger, yet are capable of being dangerous themselves. Fear them . . . but thank them, lest they forget themselves.
Plus there were APCs roaming about. As if the guys wearing automatic rifles and body armor weren’t intimidating enough. I noticed that trigger discipline was mixed.
All of the vehicles, body armor, weaponry, and boots (especially boots) looked to be brand spankin’ new. Much better than our brave boys in the field are sporting these days. Shameful.
I’m not sure that is bad advice for most people. We live in a highly specialized society. I have no training to deal with that. Why shouldn’t I call 911?
If there were an actual assault or some such going on, I’d like to think I would man up and take action (I have in a limited way in the past), but I’m pretty sure I’m not the right guy to go out and look for an armed criminal who likely has much more experience with a firearm than I. From what I hear, it is pretty hard to shoot and hit while you are being fired at. Takes either a very special person, or some real training. Hence the 199 or so misses at the original shootout by semi-trained professionals.
Yep. I have some nice pictures. They were very well outfitted. And I was not happy to see an APC rolling down my street. Evidently there were real military (not National Guard) involved as well, though I didn’t see any.
But it would have to do so pretty quickly for me to get trapped here.
Ask the residents of Watertown, Cambridge, and Boston how quickly it can happen.
And Car in said: “the problem of waiting until you reached that threshold – by then it may be too late.“, to which you replied: “True, but I don’t think we are there quite yet.” And when you are there, it is too late. So you need to take the appropriate action BEFORE (i.e. now).
I live in Mass. I work in Mass – Waltham – one of the towns ordered closed. I went about my business Friday – I went to work. Sadly, I was only one of about 8 out of close to two hundred that did. I am also a CCW permit holder, and take a firearm with me everywhere I legally can.
(Just to set the record straight, in Mass, it is up to the “licensing authority” – usually the Chief of Police – in each city/town as to whether you can have a CCW permit [Class A License]. I live in a town where the issuer believes in the Second Amendment. So I have a permit, which is valid in the whole state, but the residents of some towns like Boston and Worcester can’t get them. They MUST be issued a Class C license for long guns when they ask, but can be denied hand gun permits strictly on the whims of some authority figure.)
National Guard is real military.
Apologies. No insult intended. But I don’t believe the National Guard is subject to posse comitatus, which was my intended point.
some authority figure
“Whence authority?”, Hobbes asked himself of man in the ‘State of nature’. Whence, indeed.
Scott, as an intellectual exercise, I’d like to know if there is a spike in gun trafficking in the next days and weeks,for those who aren’t willing to go through legal channels. I think it only fair to ask if the “heavily armed”* brothers purchased their weapons legally and where. Perhaps the press can drive another FFL out of business like they did after the Lanza case.
*speculative at this point
I don’t need to ask. Had I wanted to leave, I could have left. Some people did.
If you live in Waltham, how can you come down on me for not leaving Ma?
No, the posse comitatus act is not applicable to the National Guard.
buying a firearm for SHTF reasons, but NOT because we feel we need it for home defense or to fight a tyrannical government.
I find it fascinating that you don’t consider “home defense” or “fight a tyrannical government” to be SHTF reasons. In my mind, they are exactly the SHTF reasons I have guns.
My point was that we are both feeling that SHTF (flu, weather, economy) is becoming an actual real possibility. Fighting a tyrannical gov’t or home invasion are still statistical outliers, in my opinion. Likelihood, not degree of seriousness.
If you live in Waltham
I WORK in Waltham – I don’t live there. I couldn’t – too urban.
how can you come down on me for not leaving Ma?
I didn’t come down on you for living in MA – any criticism I had was of you being nearly defenseless by being unarmed.
Fighting a tyrannical gov’t or home invasion are still statistical outliers, in my opinion. Likelihood, not degree of seriousness.
My God, man. You just had your home (outbuildings) illegally searched.
And I think this is the crux of my original issue. I fully support the unalienable right to bear arms, and I also agree that we are responsible for our own welfare. I do not agree that not owning a firearm is an irresponsible thing to do at this point. I don’t think firearms are right for everyone. Even if I owned one, I don’t have time to get properly trained to use one.
(Though I evidently have time to engage in pointless internet discussions.)
OT: FNS is going to be close to unwatchable. Brother Juan is a guest, Dianne Feinstein, Bill Kristol, Jane Harman and Pete King.
I may need some pre-emptive aspirin.
pointless internet discussions
We might think of ourselves as burdened with a duty to prevent any such thing from occurring — if not a duty to arm ourselves against our power-grabbing government with firearms, then a duty to recognize, assert and teach the rights bequeathed to us by our forebears. Which means, in the event, our schools are problematical.
Enrak, as leigh points out, it seems that the likelihood of “tyrannical gov’t
orhome invasion” is now 100%. So SHTF reasons that are both serious AND likely.(As I write this, I hear my “neighbors” down at the range next door – I live next to a rod and gun club, of which I am a member. And those aren’t rifle shots I’m hearing.)
“All of the vehicles, body armor, weaponry, and boots (especially boots) looked to be brand spankin’ new. Much better than our brave boys in the field are sporting these days. Shameful.”
I’m not willing to be quite so critical. For most of these guys that stuff probably sits in the trunk and only comes out on training days. So it could easily be years old.
And, as far as the guys in the field are concerned, there is a difference between worn in and worn out. Worn in is often more comfortable, no matter how shabby it may appear. While worn out probably would even make the pictures, since it gets discarded. There being no point in carrying something that is useless, or dangerous – better to make do without.
My concern about the general newness of everything is the same as when I encounter another hunter / backpacker / outdoorsperson whose kit is all brand new – it says they probably have little or no idea actual experience of what they are getting into.
Enrak, as leigh points out, it seems that the likelihood of “tyrannical gov’t or home invasion” is now 100%. So SHTF reasons that are both serious AND likely.
I’m not convinced, though the 2016 election might change my mind. I don’t see anyone taking up arms yet, when I do I know which side I’ll be on. Though not which side, if you take my meaning.
ThomasD, the reason I bring up the new(ish)ness of the kit, is that it has been a complaint of the soldiers stationed in the ME, that they are light on socks and that their boots are worn. The husband of one of my friends has done four tours and finally got new footwear. I agree about worn in, but it seems theirs are worn out, at least according to self-reports.
Of course, when Hubs was in Vietnam, they were eating C-rations that had been packed for WWII.
And those aren’t rifle shots I’m hearing.
I can’t be the only one, surely not here at least, who was struck by how many people cannot distinguish between the sound of gunfire versus the sound of firecrackers. Also, shortly after Little Brother was found, newsies were saying “30 seconds or more of gunfire!” Thirty seconds is a long time. The homeowner should pick up the brass and eBay it.
Stalest cigarette I ever smoked was a Lucky packed as a WWII mil.-ration. Fired it up in 1976. Nasty.
Heh. I have a picture of a Thanksgiving meal that Hubs’ company received in ’67. It shows one of those ration packs of smokes (can’t remember the brand) and a can of beer that had been opened with a churchkey.
With the Boston “lock down” as a backdrop, you really have to wonder how the US survived WWII.
To take a jab at my own question, I would guess Matt Damon’s Will Hunting isn’t the only Bostonian whose mind was blown by Howard Zinn.
Bingo. Where is a non-alcoholic Tailgunner Joe when we need him?
Senator Feinstein: Watertown Citizens Don’t Need “Assault Weapons” (Video)
link
In need of assault weapons? Probably not.
Assault repelling weapons? Yes.
Un-ironically they just so happen to be functionally identical.
Feinstein prefers you disarmed, and dependent.
There’s that word again.
Heh. Had they been trying to escape in rural Wisconsin, my guess is they would have gotten away.
From the link
“Can you imagine how bad this would have been if the bombers were actually smart?”,/i>
Or better equipped, trained, and experienced? Image what would have happened if they had performed a home invasion or two, or had planned/executed an ambush of a group of cops.
Even as is, these two could have been on a plane out of Toronto back to Russia any time between Monday evening and Thursday afternoon.
html fail, sorry.
why is Fox News interviewing useless dumb bitch senatorsluts about last week’s failed gun grab when there’s a terrorist sleeper cell killing people and hijacking boats and what have you
banality thy name is america
“the peeps of watertown cowered when the state officials told them to do so.”
my god Ace could bore the cheez out of a can of cheez whiz and put it on a triscuit with a slice of fresh jalapeno and call it a motherfucking canape
No.
Just a cowerer.
I don’t think your dictionary proves your point Newrouter.
hide your kids hide your wife and hide your husbands cause of there’s a terrorist on the loose
what looks sorta like a cross between one dimension dreamboat harry styles and a sheboygan pothead
do NOT approach him if you see him cause of he is dangerous and you are but a wee defenseless unarmed citizen of america yup you’re insecure (don’t know what fer)
Is it the learned opinion of the commenters here that if you don’t own a gun you are a coward?
Enrak, there was a time in my then young life when I thought guns were stupid and only necessary for hunting and that of course they should be registered and rationed and no one needed a scary machine gun style gun. Then there came a time that I was attacked, stripped, beaten and left for dead in my own home.
Never again.
Tamerlan Tsarnaev, a Caucasian (from the Caucus Mountains) hated Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Quick call the race detectives Charles Johnson, Chris Matthews and David Sirota!
It’s ok EBL, the islamist terrorist shitbag hated MLK, not because he was brown skinned, but because he was one of them Xtian types.
So Johnson, Matthews, and Sirota remain nonplussed.
So I would guess you always have a gun nearby then, leigh.
Yes, cranky. A hard lesson was learned.
And I think this is the crux of my original issue. I fully support the unalienable right to bear arms, and I also agree that we are responsible for our own welfare. I do not agree that not owning a firearm is an irresponsible thing to do at this point. I don’t think firearms are right for everyone. Even if I owned one, I don’t have time to get properly trained to use one.
Has this not been a salutary experience? Has it altered your expectation of unpleasant events that you could possibly avoid by being a bit more prepared for?
If you go through the London events on this list and the following lists from 1975 and 1976, then you have my my high school years in London covered. Not once was London shut down during any of that period. Nor during 7/7. Well, we did have to evacuate school on quite a few occasions, and the Underground was often closed due to some of Pete King’s mates getting happy with the gelignite.
Liberty on Judge Napaletano’s site.
SW, quite obviously not enough children were murdered in London. Now Londonderry was a different story according to the hagiographic made for television movies we watched here in America.
“provided there was an ironclad guarantee”
Would you settle for Old Ironsides?
link
“the ruling class cowered when confronted by a domestic jihadi attack.”
‘Cower’ may be a bit strong a term to describe many Citizens’ compliance with Government Authoriteh after it was ‘suggested’ that they cower in their homes. A better word choice for non-recusants might be ‘complacent’, ‘acquiescent’, ‘controllable’, ‘obedient’, or my favorite, ‘docile’.
There was a bomb on our road the Draycott Ave. telephone exchange, but that didn’t make Wikipedia. Just to make sure I didn’t imagine it – there it is in the paper clipping.
Yes, I’m very grateful I wasn’t in Ulster. My nearest miss was the Flaming Cherokee attack on Glasgow Airport. I had put my nephew on the plane to the US that morning, and we had gone in that very door where Kafeel Ahmed was to memorably get kicked in the clangers by John Smeaton.
This post from a couple weeks ago seems to fit into this thread.
Boston’s security plan was similar, on a much larger scale, to the one used at Newtown. It is “the” security plan for any “gun free zone.” All of which are created by the rules/laws/edicts of those who “run” the zone and are sold as protecting those inside it but really are just there because they simplify the jobs of the administrators of any given zone.
I’m afraid I have to cop to docile. For now.
Thanks for the excellent comments PWers. I’m off to kindly go fuck myself!
I think I object to the notion that civilians who aren’t police are incapable of self-defense or of looking for fugitives more than anything else. The notion of a Sheriff gathering a posse to go after a criminal is much more in keeping with a free citizenry rather than our current serfdom.
Also, I think recent police behavior has proven that they are really not much better than anyone else at identifying and capturing fugitives. However, what they do have is layers of legal protection that average citizens do not. Perhaps instead of expanding their protection and shrinking ours, we should be looking into putting all of us on equal footing.
Enrak, that’s not physically probable. If you manage it, please get someone to take pics. And don’t get the hump.
Yikes! Too close for comfort, SW.
My nephew and I are now known as the Flaming Cherokee Dodgers.
Fantastic name for a band.
Hijacking boats?
two boston first responders walk into a doughnut shop and the first first responder says hey what are those ones
those ones are our special orange dreamsicle cake doughnuts, officer, says the doughnut guy
ok I’ll take one of those plus also a bearclaw says the first first responder
the second first responder says mmmm these ones look yummy what are those ones
that’s a maple cruller officer it’s my grandma’s favorite says the doughnut guy, whose name is stanley pickles
well I’ll take one of those plus I’d also like a bearclaw too, says the second first responder
ok that will be $3.50 each minus the 10% first responder discount so that comes to $3.15 each says stanley
I got this says the first first responder to the second first responder you got it last time, and hands the doughnut guy a ten-spot
stanley says hah I’m just kidding officer there’s no charge cause of how you saved us from the fearsome terrorist in the boat we were all so fucking scared my grandma was put off her cruller
well thank you very much says the first first responder, and the second first responder echoed his gratitude around a mouthful of tasty bearclaw
No. Thank YOU very much says the doughnut guy.
just go with it Mr. moe
events were happening so fast
A while back Ernst asked:
This might contain an answer to that question.
so Mike and Sunil are still at large???
everybody back inside
So cops have to power to publicly, and falsely, incriminate known-innocents as “suspected terrorists” as a psyops move against their actual targets?
Sure would have been “a darned shame” if Mike or Sunil had been ‘accidentally’ shot or beaten to death by someone who didn’t get the memo.
Cops. Is there anything they can’t do?!?
Cops. Is there anything they can’t do?!?
Make a convincing soufflé?
hmmm
but what does Lindsey Graham think?
just kidding
– You need to stay in the cupcake racket feets. Donuts don’t seem to be your forte’.
– Speaking of which, how the hell was Dunkin able to deliver 9000 dozen donuts with all the street traffic banned?
Sen. Mrs. Daffy Feinstein:
What else is unhelpful are goofy old broads jackin’ their jaws for to bolster the wind.
DiFi and Jan Harman in the same studio was almost a critical mass of stupid. Bill Kristol looked like the voice of reason, there.
So what exactly is the administration ready for?
my money’s on a vacation
Waaaay OT (and a motherkahones link) but on the subject of academia and liberal bias, a topic dear to hearts hereabouts.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/04/higher-education-liberal-research-indoctrination
From sdferr’s link…
Because Obama’s got them looking a hyper-radicals on blogs, in churches (clinging to their bibles) and on shooting ranges (clinging to their guns). Important things, ya know.
The nation is probably about ready to plead them a vacation, with a hearty “good riddance . . . and don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out, Momma-jeans Sport”.
Thought the nation was gonna say “Boy” there, didntcha?
A good start to that end would be legislation limiting the police to the same kinds of firearms, with the same kinds of limitations, as are available to the ordinary citizen.
Just so I’m clear on the subject, did they shut just Watertown, and maybe some of the adjacents areas down, or did they shut down the entire greater Boston metropolitan area (so to speak) down?
Because if they shut down everything inside of I-95/I-93, I think I’m going to join happyfeet in weeping into my chai-tea herbal smoothie for my failshit little country.
those are the ones what have the wild hibiscus garnish from mexico
The entire city of Boston has shut down. How much will this cost?
[…] “Security theater, martial law, and a tale that trumps every cop-and-donut joke you’ve e… […]
another masshole
Bishop Robert McManus of Worcester, Massachusetts blames Boston Marathon jihad bombings on violent video games
him and marsha blackburn should get together climb a tree and pick each other’s nits like the retarded monkeys they are
Caroline Glick, Israel — The Happy Little Country:
*** Obama came, hugged Netanyahu and showered us with love just like Bill Clinton did back in the roaring ’90s. He praised us to high heaven and told us he has our back. And then he told us we should force our leaders to give Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria to our sworn enemies even as they teach their children to aspire to kill our children.
And we smiled and wished him a pleasant flight home.
Obama had no idea what he was getting into when he came here. Like Kitzis and his colleagues on Channel 2, Obama surrounds himself with people who, like him, prefer fantasy to reality. In Obama’s world, Islamic jihad is about the West, not about jihadists. In Obama’s world, the most pressing issue on the international agenda is apartments for Jews in Jerusalem and Efrat. And in Obama’s world, what Israelis need more than anything else is for leftist Europeans to love us.
Talk about retro. ***
Boston, Newton, Cambridge, Waltham, Watertown were all shut down [originally in Boston it was just the Allston-Brighton section, which borders Cambridge (MIT) and Watertwon].
Someone I know very well works in Boston and lives in a town next door to it [that wasn’t part of the order]. He says he had no trouble getting into Boston at 0630, except for having to detour around City Hall, which was locked down. When he left work at 1145, he was not stopped, nor did he spy any roadblocks on his way home through the Back Bay and then through East Cambridge by MIT. Others who work with him ventured out on foot to Dunkin’ Donuts and were not stopped and the police presence was light.
So, while some called it ‘martial law!’, it obviously wasn’t, he says. People in Boston and East Cambridge were out walking their dogs and you could tell they were being observant [as he said he was being].
He believes the order was overkill…and wrong.
Of course, it was not surprising given that Gov. Patrick is Obama-Lite and Mayor Menino is a Leftist Thug.
Yeah. Martha probably ain’t helpin the cause a whole lot, huh?
Because you displayed butthurt in reaction to my assessment of what Obama really said, a comment tht was not directed at you in any way, shape or form except to the extent that you saw yourself in it.
Perhaps I’ve misunderstood your complaint. “Blow me.” is a tad short of nuance.
I’m mocking “leadership” that thinks that’s the best place for you in a crisis.
EXCLUSIVE — Secret Emails: Cato, Norquist, Rubio Use Boston Terror Attacks to Push Immigration Reform
– What I find most interesting is that while Obama and the eternally out of synch Left harangue at the mere mention of Jihad or Islamist extremism, this entire episode in terrorism took place right in the heartland 0f denial, and was most likely facilitated by the very political denial mindset of these pinhead pseudo-intellectuals.
– Just as an historic point of reference, it was a similar group of Socialist leaning intellectuals that gave Adolf the support he needed to gain a toehold in pre-war German politics.
Stunner. Two Boston Bombers Did Not Have Gun Permits
My butt was fine, thank you. Perhaps my pride, such as it is, was momentarily bruised.
Who is the “you” in this sentence? It certainly wasn’t Obama. I naturally assumed you meant those of us who obeyed the advice to “shelter in place”. So’s I got testy.
I apologized upthread for the ‘bite me’ comment, but I shall again. I momentarily let my testiness take control. I sincerely apologize, and I will attempt to think more before posting in the future.
Which, I’m certain, for some in this crowd will be taken as yet another act of abject cowardice as I cower before Pablo’s almighty keyboard.
If those quotes are accurate that is some industrial grade bullshit coming out of Rubio.
It is hard to express how far he just fell in my eyes.
@bbh
UMD professor: ‘I hope I didn’t contribute’
BBH: Having lived in New England my whole life, I am, of course, not surprised at all.
To a certain extent, you can consider MA, RI, and CT one big Gun-Free Zone and a hotbed of Zinn-Masters.
roobs is a gangbanger
Whatever else he’s up to, Rubio is stuck holding the sad-sack argument of the capabilities of government to do something well. Tough fuckin’ row to hoe, let alone expect a crop to spring from.
Because that would be redundant. If you’d like to join the effort anyway, I believe my not-so-ex-wife has sign up sheets.
No. Way! Don’t they know there are laws????
It’s everyone! Who wants to be tough. In the age of Obama, where it’s best if you just get the hell out of the way while your government solves everything. What with them being very good at everything, and you being basically a ward of the benevolent state.
On the bright side, they’ll tell you when it’s OK to come out again!
It’s hard for me to believe Rubio is really saying that, because he is destroying his credibility with both sides. He is basically proposing amnesty for illegals, fucking himself with the right, and saying he wants to make it harder to get in legally, which is playing right into the hands of the leftards saying Republicans are against all immigration.
It is pretty much the absolute stupidest position he could take.
no that was teaming up with the sleazebagschumer
In a book to be published next year, “Inferno in the Caucus: The Chechen insurgency and the Mirage of Al Qaeda,” he says that no matter what the Chechens are, “they are not al-Qaida. Repeat: They are not al-Qaida.”
– To which I would necessarily respond to Mr.’s Matteo and Williams: That is a distinction without a difference when your actions lead to the death of innocent people, regardless of the nature or purity of your cause.
– I also do not for a second think they are showing some bit of contrite guilt of conscience. Much more likely they’re concerned that at some point people are going to have had enough of the ivy hall anti-American rhetoric and opportunistic tendencies to sedition.
The link between the two is Islam, which is again proven the easiest religion on planet to use to ferment deadly radicalism in young people’s minds. A shame, but that’s an easy truth.
the easiest religion on planet to use to ferment deadly radicalism in young people’s minds.
If we don’t bother to count Socialism as its direct competitor, that is, religiously speaking. If, on the other hand, we do [count it], then we’re left reassessing a standing problem of human nature.
– At some point also, the collective Left is going to start being held responsible for the consequences of their actions (at last), and that will be the end to this installment of the “peoples movement” cult – again.
nr, KDKA says there’s a bomb threat onna SoSide. Wadda yinz know abot it?
nothing
10 Crazy Things on Tamerlan Tsarnaev’s Amazon Wish List
My mistake. It’s South Hills Village. Bethel Park PD is on it.
Here’s a point I haven’t seen written about the video cam debate:
In the early years of Predator development and use, it was an unarmed surveillance tool. While the ACC commanding general certainly wanted it armed, it was after years of helplessly watching thousands of Bosnians being murdered live on video WITH NOTHING YOU COULD DO ABOUT IT that there was finally will from above to push for arming the device, and it was. Testing began BEFORE 9/11.
Fast-forward to the current War on Home Grown [Right-Wing] Terror. What do you think it will take before all those Government cameras are armed?
– “Bombing Suspect Is Responding to Questions in writing.“
” Bethel Park PD is on it.”
see that’s across a river so no concern to me;)
Heartless, you are. ; )
Perhaps, but I say a way of twisting human nature through the use of human nurture. Both Islam and Socialism can only be of use, to those who wish to subjugate all others to their will, if they can have access, relatively unfettered access, to the young. It is the twisting of those young minds, souls, that lets them ascend to the heights of power. Without that base they are but shadows that mutter in darkened tunnels to themselves.
“Bombing Suspect Is Responding to Questions in writing.”
First statement: “I am an Ellen Jamesian.”
Love that he’s at Beth Israel, by the way. I wonder if they’ve told him.
I found that amusing as well, Spies.
Ellen Jamesian? The World According to Garp reference? Good show.
– Drudge has a piece up that says the FBI has connected the brothers to a 12 man sleeper cell. Right after the idiot mayor says he’s sure they acted alone.
– Sometimes it seems that once Bumblefuck took office America was transformed to a Monty Python skit.
“The dead parrots and donuts shop.”
Ellen Jamesian seems appropriate.
Our “Three Monkeys” security service.
“Voluntary” searches on video.
That search video had damned well better go viral. Un-fucking-acceptable.
bostonians got fucking pwn3d by their piggy piggy pension whore first responders
betwixt doughnuts of course
I repeat:
He lies.
Orwell was a prophet.
Which bit of that are we supposed to believe? An M-4? I don’t believe it. I think what these morons meant to say is that “an AR-15 carbine rifle, similar to the M-4 [..]”. And a BB gun used in a shootout with police? Was some of that 80 round count BBs? The Duranty Times is surely the sorriest excuse for a newspaper that ever wrapped a fish.
another member of the “ruining class” speaks up
Ryan Calls Rubio’s Plan ‘Productive’
and does it with a commie
U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is scheduled to discuss immigration reform during a joint appearance in Chicago Monday with U.S. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.).
‘
The FBI was too busy trying to figure out how gate latches work to properly investigate.
I blame the sequester.
jeffin’k
Confusing Terrorists with Their Victims’: Kerry Slammed for Comparing Families of Gaza Flotilla Incident with Boston Bombing Families
“I blame the sequester.”
OT: I see we’re now losing air traffic controllers “due to the sequester”.
Not to worry: there’ll still be plenty of them available for presidential and vice-presidential vacations.
Schumer, Graham: Boston brings urgency to immigration reform
Obama campaign plans major push for Gang of Eight immigration bill
Could be. Windham is marketing M-4’s, sans happy switch.
Pablo, can’t see that in their catalogue or online. Do you mean the MPC?
Assuredly not, sw. The brothers must have been using eeeeevil 40-round clipped magazines in their two handguns.
Seems like Glenn Beck (among others) has run smack into the identity problem this morning, coupled together with the subtleties of the American Constitution regarding the vigorous exercise of executive power in national emergency of war. The resulting incoherence (not restricted to Beck, I hasten to add, but rampant across media as the failure to understand the provisions of the Constitution run their course from the mouths of these various incomplete accounts or misunderstandings of war powers) is frightful to behold.
But then regarding the failure to comprehensively articulate the Constitution ought not to be terribly surprising, seeing as the Constitution has been more or less abandoned as a serious source of guidance to American politics — that is, to the extent that progressivism has actively encouraged the disarticulation, dismemberment, or annihilation of the Constitution. Nor surprising in the light of ObaZm’s failure to conduct American war policy in the full light of day together with the American people, keeping them informed of the state of the war fighting efforts, the truthful purposes of his policies (he can hardly explain, for instance, why he makes use of troops for his personal electoral purposes, now can he?) and so on.
Yet there’s the war, right on that Watertown front porch, if we only look at it. So people would be confused.
Some bonehead yesterday opined that “But nothing is as fast as those clips!” Not the cartridges in the magazines, the magazines themselves are deadly.
I believe it was in response to Marsha Blackburn talking about assault hammers and such.
Jesus wept.
The next shell into which gun control measures will be poured and baked is up but text is not available yet.
I can’t hear the BB gun, can you?
Sdferr, Beck’s appreciation of the Constitution, how it forms the basis of law and order (the precedence of law being the sin qua non of constituted order) has always struck me as shallow and suspect.
I think his lack of coherence has more to do with a greater than usual degree of disconnect between his perceived audience, and the people who are actually listening. Likewise, I suspect he’ll work to harmonize the discord as soon as his marketing and focus data make him aware of the gap.
My question in regards to the weaponry is: What if any of it came from the body/cruiser of the murdered MIT security officer?
Beck is more about outrage and drama than about knowledgeable commentary.
I can’t hear the BB gun, can you?
Moderated assault BB gun.
I don’t mean to pick on Beck so much as take his confusion up as a ready example ThomasD. Had I the fortitude, I could use Jane Harmon’s appearance on the Fox panel yesterday just as well, or ol’ neighbor Juan’s. The thing is, the confusion has been made manifest, and I believe it to be profoundly widespread.
The thing is, the confusion has been made manifest, and I believe it to be profoundly widespread.
Amen. You said a mouthful there brother sdferr.
Beck’s problem is that he is self taught. He has a tendency to incorrectly interpret information because he doesn’t have the foundation necessary to understand the material. At the risk of stepping on toes, it is like someone who is a self-taught musician rather than one who has been classically trained. The self-taught will develop bad habits that have been trained out of the classicist by those who are Masters.
Glenn’s reach exceeds his grasp and he risks muddling his message (such as it is) as well as misinterpreting the Founders on more than one occasion by making the common mistake of assigning contemporary sensibilities to an 18th century document.
He means well, but he’s still a sophomore.
VDH on the paradoxes of the Boston bombings.
[…] “Security theater, martial law, and a tale that trumps every cop-and-donut joke you’ve e… […]
‘Some bonehead yesterday opined that “But nothing is as fast as those clips!”’
The pressure wave from a pressure cooker explosion is pretty peppy, I reckon.
Part of the problem is that the general public have convinced themselves that they are incompetent and incapable of taking care of themselves, defensively. They believe only “professionals” have the tools and skills to do it, and their only recourse is to wait for these others to arrive to help.
From terrorist’s point of view, a city “sheltering in place” to stay out of the way and let law enforcement do their work, is indistinguishable from a city cowering in fear. Both have the same net effect on the citizenry.
Leigh, the ‘self taught’ analogy seems very apt. The classically trained musician, knowing what his audience expects, is not typically going to do something that would be deemed incorrect. Or if he did so, it would be with informed purpose. While the self taught musician, not being similarly informed, has two choices – playing what he want to hear or what he thinks his audience wants to hear.
Part of the wider discord may be a certain amount of confusion over the apparent consent of so many Watertonians to live by diktat, at least under those particular circumstances. Since no one seemed willing or able to provoke a confrontation with the civil authority, no formal resolution of the concern would appear forthcoming.
Can we please ditch the idea that Boston was in LOCKDOWN and there was MARTIAL LAW?
Boston, usually at least once a year during big storms, requests everyone stay home so that emergency crews can respond to actual emergencies, plows can work, and everything works out nicely. This was a similar request.
Yes, public transportation was shut down, but this was not lockdown.
Police were knocking on doors and asking permission to look around. If told no, they simply left.
This was a perfect of example of police and the citizenry working together.
Seems like Glenn Beck (among others) has run smack into the identity problem this morning
Forgive me for not re-reading the entirety of this frightfully long thread, but what is ‘the identity problem’?
I was upset with Glenn this morning for going on about the guy “not being Mirandized,” as if that were a violation of his rights, when in fact his rights would be violated only if they used his un-Mirandized statements against him at trial—but not until then.
Is it not common for Little Fish to not be Mirandized so that they get them to talk about the Big Fish? We never see it on TV, so maybe that’s why nobody knows.
what is ‘the identity problem’
In the grossest philosophical terms, it’s distinguishing the same from the other. Sometimes the other from itself. But at root, the problem of errors of all sorts.
And so in which way has Glenn failed to distinguish same from not-same this morning?
The MPC, CFR, CDI and SRC are all tagged as M-4’s.
Hi fellas.
This is good stuff. Read it all, as they say, but here’s the money quote:
Be cool, I gotta keep running. Catch ya later…
In part, Beck’s particular difficulty seems to lie in distinguishing Dzh. Tsarnaev as citizen on the one hand from enemy combatant in war on the other hand (he’s both at once! but which applies?). Or in another sense, and to put it another way, is this a civil criminal matter requiring procedures established to regulate justiciable civil criminal conduct, or is it a warfighting matter (see the storming of the Watertown house Geoff linked above, which resembles action we’ve seen before in Fallujah — though the ‘storming’ forces of Watertown left the door intact — for instance, or imagine the hypothetical were there a threat of a potent nuclear, chemical or biological weapon on offer), empowering measures altogether different from civil criminal conduct?
In another sense, we’re all confronted with the problem of distinguishing civilization from barbarism, as Kristol puts it, due largely to the incoherence propounded by our ‘leaders’, and there Silver Whistle’s link to Joan Walsh just above can stand as a fine example of that confusion.
In part, Beck’s particular difficulty seems to lie in distinguishing Dzh. Tsarnaev as citizen on the one hand from enemy combatant in war on the other hand (he’s both at once! but which applies?).
Yes, there’s that, and there’s his fundamental misunderstanding of Miranda (which he shares with a lot of the populace). A lot of Beck’s problem comes from the fact that he no longer trusts the gubmint to do the right thing: he’s just come into information that shows where the intelligence and security peeps identified that Saudi national as “2123b”—an extremely severe designation meaning BAD BAD BAD terrorist involvement—and someone upstairs removed the designation, against all procedure, apparently at the request of the Saudis.
That smiling Saudi kid apparently got here on a “safe traveler” student visa but he never showed up at the school he was supposed to attend and instead is actively recruiting and training local Muslims: if they’re already here in the U.S., they don’t cross international boundaries and set off alarms.
Beck is worried that not Mirandizing Little Brother sets a precedent for the O-ministration to randomly violate the rights of other “terrorists.”
Which, it’s true that the O-ministration is hoping to make their political enemies into enemies of the state. But not Mirandizing Little Brother isn’t an example of that hope.
JohninFirestone seems to be right at least for the videoed group that came to this guys place as he says in comments.
Lots of videos out there.
I elided the problem of distinguishing the present executive administration from a nominally normal American executive administration, but figured it could be assumed as a matter of course. That this problem itself subverts nearly all other national political problems can go without saying. But again, possibly shouldn’t [go without saying].
@SethMnookin on Twitter and 2 good friends of mine were on the ground posting about it the whole time.
A couple of feet of snow blanketing an entire city and a 19 year old killer that needs bagging are very different problems. The latter was solved due to more eyeballs, not fewer.
It is still. as described, a “security theater” not unlike that which TSA performs 24/7 at every airport. A show which costs much money, time, and inconvenience for all. Done to achieve a perception that allows some people feel that their government is “doing something.”
An ineffective, costly, cumbersome, something. A something, which as we saw in L.A., may put more people in danger than the threat that is the reason for the theatrical production in the first place.
Potemkin security while real things just get pushed away as not worth any effort at all.
Choke on this, haters.
Ah, but they have in the UK. The alignment of the Left with the Islamists has all but destroyed all that was the British “way of life.”
There are at least two forms of “calm response.” One is the calm determination to win against an enemy. Another is the calm of resignation to a fate chosen for you by others.
Is there enough difference between an AR-15clone and an M4clone to get spun up over?
– But wait, there’s more. With Holder and Ortiz in control of this mess I see endless opportunity for massive screw-ups.
Perhaps this will sufficiently enlighten all on the M-4 business.
And this came on the heels of the populace having shown itself on the afternoon of the bombing to be up to the task of acting responsibly and effectively, with civilians rushing to join and augment the brave work of first responders, helping the wounded and the dazed, providing intel that helped find the bombers, and so on.
Just a brief note to remind everyone that civilians ARE the first responders. It’s rare that you have a collection of medical and law enforcement standing by waiting for Bad Shit to go down.
I have training in firearms, firefighting, and first aid, because I am the first responder, and my first response sure as shit ain’t gonna be hiding in a basement.
Good thing you don’t live in Watertown, Squid.