Showing posts with label mass murders. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mass murders. Show all posts

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

GUNS, GUNS, GUNS - AGAIN, AGAIN, AGAIN

I really have said all I have to say on guns* and hunting** before.

First there was the murder of two African Americans by police (in St. Paul, MN, and New Orleans, LA) and then the murder of five police officers in Dallas, TX.  But while the news media stopped reporting on everything else to dwell on these murders, two bailiffs in Michigan were murdered and, in another community, several in Bristol, TN along with an average of 25-30 gun murders a day in the U.S.  So the drum beat of murders continues.  The saturation coverage by the news media on certain mass murders might be worth it if it led to some sort of action, but no.  Even a mild gun law that will supposedly be voted on in the House keeps being put off.

I'm indebted to the Daily Kos for publishing the following piece.  Though the reference title is long, it works.

Missouri Republican Sen. Roy Blunt thought that cherry-picking some mass killings and saying “radical Islam” would be enough to undo any argument in favor of stronger gun laws and devastate his Democratic challenger, Jason Kander. Not so much. Kander had this response to Blunt’s accusation that “Despite Ft. Hood, Boston & Orlando,@JasonKander won’t acknowledge the root of threats we face: radical Islam

The argument about semantics is a stupid one—Republicans running around screaming “SAY RADICAL ISLAM” while the reality is that, between 2001 and 2013, 3,380 Americans were killed by terrorism while 406,496 were killed by guns—but Blunt shouldn’t have wanted any part of this argument. Does he really believe that the “R” beside his name makes him the winner any time terrorism is invoked? And does Blunt really want to give Kander a chance to highlight his time in Afghanistan in comparison to Blunt’s three Vietnam-era draft deferments? Way to give Kander an opening there, genius.*

* http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2015/06/guns-and-illegal-terrorists-in-america.html
http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2016/01/death-and-injuries-by-guns-in-us.html;
http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2016/01/us-has-most-of-everything-including.html
** http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2014/04/prey-animals-and-predator-animals.html
*** http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/6/21/1540931/-Sen-Roy-Blunt-gets-a-lesson-in-why-he-should-think-before-you-tweet?detail=email&link_id=3&can_id=af3794f2758d0c72ac0763afb2350d28&source=email-church-whose-pastor-praised-orlando-shootings-is-being-asked-to-leave-by-landlord&email_referrer=church-whose-pastor-praised-orlando-shootings-is-being-asked-to-leave-by-landlord&email_subject=church-whose-pastor-praised-orlando-shootings-is-being-asked-to-leave-by-landlord

GUNS, GUNS, GUNS - AGAIN, AGAIN, AGAIN

I really have said all I have to say on guns* and hunting** before.

I'm indebted to the Daily Kos for publishing the following piece.  Though the reference title is long, it works.

Missouri Republican Sen. Roy Blunt thought that cherry-picking some mass killings and saying “radical Islam” would be enough to undo any argument in favor of stronger gun laws and devastate his Democratic challenger, Jason Kander. Not so much. Kander had this response to Blunt’s accusation that “Despite Ft. Hood, Boston & Orlando,@JasonKander won’t acknowledge the root of threats we face: radical Islam

The argument about semantics is a stupid one—Republicans running around screaming “SAY RADICAL ISLAM” while the reality is that, between 2001 and 2013, 3,380 Americans were killed by terrorism while 406,496 were killed by guns—but Blunt shouldn’t have wanted any part of this argument. Does he really believe that the “R” beside his name makes him the winner any time terrorism is invoked? And does Blunt really want to give Kander a chance to highlight his time in Afghanistan in comparison to Blunt’s three Vietnam-era draft deferments? Way to give Kander an opening there, genius.*

* http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2015/06/guns-and-illegal-terrorists-in-america.html
http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2016/01/death-and-injuries-by-guns-in-us.html;
http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2016/01/us-has-most-of-everything-including.html
** http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2014/04/prey-animals-and-predator-animals.html
*** http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2016/6/21/1540931/-Sen-Roy-Blunt-gets-a-lesson-in-why-he-should-think-before-you-tweet?detail=email&link_id=3&can_id=af3794f2758d0c72ac0763afb2350d28&source=email-church-whose-pastor-praised-orlando-shootings-is-being-asked-to-leave-by-landlord&email_referrer=church-whose-pastor-praised-orlando-shootings-is-being-asked-to-leave-by-landlord&email_subject=church-whose-pastor-praised-orlando-shootings-is-being-asked-to-leave-by-landlord

Monday, June 20, 2016

WHERE ARE THE IMMIGRANT TERRORISTS?

There are two types of immigrants: legal and illegal.  On the one hand we are told that illegal terrorists are streaming across our southern border among the illegal Hispanics; on the other hand we are told that there a loads of legal immigrants streaming into the country concealed among peaceful immigrants.  Of course there are also  terrorists that must be coming into the country.  Where are all these terrorists?

Shootings The New Town, CT, school shooter and the Aurora, CO, theater shooter were both non-Muslim Americans.  Going further back, the Columbine, CO, shooters were the same.  The 2014 Ft. Hood shooter (Ivan Lopaz) was born in Puerto Rico so was also an American citizen and wasn't a Muslim. No immigrant or illegal terrorists there.  The VPI shooter(Seung-Hui Cho), a South Korean citizen and not a Muslim.  He was on a permanent visa and was the only foreign, non-American citizen among the group.

The 2009 Ft. Hood shooter (Major Malik Hasan) was an American born psychiatrist and Muslim born to Palestinian parents.  He had several brothers, all but one of them have moved to Jerusalem.  The Orlando nightclub shooter (Omar Mateen) was American born to "moderate Muslim" parents.  His father immigrated from Afghanistan in the 1980s.  There are questions as to whether Mateen's massacre was a terrorist attack.  Though both of these were Muslims, neither was an immigrant, legal or illegal.  This brings us to the San Bernardino, CA, shooters (Sued Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik), where the husband was American born of Pakistani descent and Malik was born to Pakistani parents but lived in Saudi Arabia.  She is the sole Muslim immigrant on a visa, therefore legal, but not a U.S. Citizen.

Bombings  The major successful bombing was, of course, that of Oklahoma City, OK,  by the duo of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, with many more deaths (168) than any of the shootings.  Their motive seems to have been to avenge the Ruby Ridge standoff and the Waco David Koresh cult fire.  There are the Boston Bombers, too, the Muslim, Chechen Tsarnaev brothers (Tamerian and his younger brother Dzhokhar who became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2012.).  They originally entered the U.S. legally with their parents seeking political asylum.  U.S. authorities were warned about the older brother twice.

What about the non-successful terrorists?  The failed Times Square Bomber (Faisal Shahzad) was a naturalized Pakistani-American citizen.  The failed Shoe Bomber (Richard Reid) was a Brit who had converted to Islam while in jail and tried to set off a bomb on an American airlines flight from Paris to Miami.  The Underwear Bomber (Umar Mutaliab) was from Nigeria and has a Nigerian father and Yemeni mother.  He tried to set off a bomb on a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.

Domestic Airlines Even the 9/11 airplane hijacker terrorists were in the U.S. on legal visas, and none had come "streaming" across of southern border or from Canada, or by stealth boat.

I see no evidence of of terrorists streaming across our southern border, perhaps because of easier ways of entering the U.S.  Of the mass shootings, al were American born except for tow , one of which was a Muslim.  So far, at least, there is no evidence of a large number of people coming into the the U.S. legally or illegally to commit terrorist or other deadly acts.  Certainly as the CIA Chief, John Brennan has said,"To compensate for territorial losses, ISIL will probably rely more on guerrilla tactics, including high-profile attacks outside territory it holds," Brennan said. "A steady stream of attacks in Baghdad and Damascus demonstrates the group's ability to penetrate deep inside enemy strongholds."  We must be vigilant, but there is no need to panic as some politicians would have us do.