(Video) Police: In an emergency, “you’re on your own”

One of the arguments anti-Second Amendment forces have been using to argue for stricter firearms regulations is that you don’t need to own personal weapons for self-defense. After all, we have alternatives. If whistles and call boxes and puking on yourself (1) don’t work, never fear, the police have guns, and that’s all the deadly force society needs (2).

Well… That all depends on how fast the police can get there, doesn’t it? As this video from James O’Keefe’s “Project Veritas” shows, help can take so long to arrive, you’re essentially on your own:

This should be eye-opening for anyone who thinks the police will arrive in the nick of time, and I don’t blame them at all for their answers. A lot of factors can influence response time, from staffing to being deployed on other calls to miscommunication on the 911 call, itself. Here in Los Angeles, we have an excellent, dedicated police force, but this is also one of the lower-policed big cities in America, on a per capita basis. They simply cannot be everywhere at once.

Which means you’re on your own.

While I have to admit some of the cops’ answers to “what to do if someone breaks in” sounded as pathetic as the items linked above, let me join the chorus singing the praises of Milwaukee County Sheriff Clarke, shown at the end, whose plain-spoken advice to his community was “get a gun and learn how to defend yourself.” This isn’t just a necessary adjustment to times of budgetary difficulties, but sound advice that’s as true now as it was in 1776: Nothing dangerous may ever happen to you, but, if it does, you are your own first line of defense.

Or, as I’ve said before, “When seconds count, help via 911 is minutes away.”

via Katie Pavlich

RELATED: More at Hot Air.

Footnotes:
(1) No, I’m not kidding on that last one. The “if all else fails” tips to prevent rape have since been removed by UC Colorado Springs, which claims they were, of course, taken “out of context.”
(2) Given what happened to these two women, that assurance for some reason doesn’t reassure me.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Media scrubs left-wing manifesto of fugitive cop-killer — Updated

You may have heard there’s a manhunt underway in California and Nevada for Christopher Dorner, a former LAPD officer who’s gone on a rampage that’s left at least three dead:

As authorities scoured Southern California for an ex-Los Angeles police officer suspected of shooting three officers, killing one, officials broadened the alert to include the entire state Thursday morning, and authorities in Nevada were warned.

The California Highway Patrol originally issued a “blue alert” for nine Southern California counties, warning that suspect Christoper Jordan Dorner, 33, was considered “armed and extremely dangerous,” early Thursday. Shortly after 9 a.m. that alert was broadened to the include the entire state.

A statewide “high alert” was sent out about 8:30 a.m. across Nevada for Dorner, authorities with the Nevada Highway Patrol said.

Arizona authorities were aware of the situation but had not issued any formal alerts, said Officer Carrick Cook with the state’s Department of Public Safety.

Local, state and federal authorities are involved in the search for Dorner, who threatened “unconventional and asymmetrical warfare” against police in an online manifesto. Dorner is also wanted in connection with a double homicide Sunday in Irvine, where the daughter of a retired LAPD captain and her fiance were killed.

The search intensified early Thursday after three police officers were shot in Riverside County and Dorner was identified as a possible suspect.

This is terrible news, and I hope they catch this mad dog before he kills anyone else. If he should be killed in the process, I’ll not mourn.

What’s scandalous, though, is the media’ scrubbing of a killer’s online “manifesto” leaving out significant portions that announce a left wing, pro-Obama, pro-gun control belief system. Multiple TV, radio, and newpaper outlets have suppressed this information. Ostensibly, it’s to protect other potential targets named in the manifesto, but the information about his agenda could be given out without releasing the names. But that wouldn’t serve The Narrative.

Read Sooper Mexican‘s post for the full story, but here’s an example:

Pro Gun Control:

Who in there right mind needs a [...] silencer!!! who needs a freaking SBR AR15? No one. No more Virginia Tech, Columbine HS, Wisconsin temple, Aurora theatre, Portland malls, Tucson rally, Newtown Sandy Hook. Whether by executive order or thru a bi-partisan congress an assault weapons ban needs to be re-instituted. Period!!!

Mia Farrow said it best. “Gun control is no longer debatable, it’s not a conversation, its a moral mandate.”

Sen. Feinstein, you are doing the right thing in leading the re-institution of a national AWB. Never again should any public official state that their prayers and thoughts are with the family.

Loves Obama:

You disrespect the office of the POTUS/Presidency and Commander in Chief. You call him Kenyan, mongroid, halfrican, muslim, and FBHO when in essence you are to address him as simply, President. The same as you did to President George W. Bush and all those in the highest ranking position of our land before him. Just as I always have. You question his birth certificate, his educational and professional accomplishments, and his judeo-christian beliefs. You make disparaging remarks about his dead parents. You never questioned the fact that his former opponent, the honorable Senator John McCain, was not born in the CONUS or that Bush had a C average in his undergrad. Electoral Candidates children (Romney) state they want to punch the president in the face during debates with no formal repercussions. No one even questioned the fact that the son just made a criminal threat toward the President. You call his wife a Wookie. Off the record, I love your new bangs, Mrs. Obama.

The guy is obviously a lunatic, just as was Jared Loughner, the man who shot Congresswoman Giffords. If we apply the same standards in Dorner’s case that the Left applied to Loughner’s, then it would make as much sense to say all the people he praises are as to blame for Dorner’s rampage as Sarah Palin was for the shooting of Giffords.

Which, of course, would be nuts to do, something we leave to progressives.

But, again, the real scandal here is the MSM’s apparent suppression of genuine news in what can only be described as agenda journalism: in this case, hiding anything that might harm or confuse the effort to a) press for needless new restrictions on the right to bear arms, and b) the narrative about dangerous right-wing extremists.

Thought experiment: If Dorner had been a populist conservative, a second amendment supporter, or an Obama-hater, would any of those ten pages cut from his manifesto been left out, other than the names of his targets?

No, I don’t think so, either.

Good work by Sooper Mexican for bringing this to public attention!

UPDATE: The LA Times is now hosting 18 pages of the 21 page document, including much of the ranting that had earlier been excised.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Gun control: armed defenders save lives

I’d heard about this story soon after it happened, but was reminded of it by Howard Nemerov’s article today at PJM.  An angry ex-boyfriend gets upset with his ex-girlfriend over their break up, so, logically, he decides to shoot up his workplace.

Fortunately, someone in the area also had a gun:

Jesus Manuel Garcia, 19, an employee at a China Garden restaurant next to the Santikos Mayan Palace 14 theater, apparently became upset Sunday night after his girlfriend broke up with him.

He lashed out by sending her a message saying he planned to go to the restaurant and “shoot somebody,” said Bexar County sheriff’s Sgt. Raymond Pollard.

Pollard said the woman called to warn restaurant employees, but by the time she saw his message, Garcia was already outside the China Garden firing a Glock 23 at the front door about 9:25 p.m.

Garcia went inside, chased people out the back door, and followed one employee as he ran toward the theater, apparently because he was the easiest target, Pollard said.

“He was chasing him, shooting in the air and at other cars,” Pollard said.

He said that when a San Antonio police officer heard the gunshots and pulled into the theater’s parking lot, Garcia shot out his patrol car’s windshield.

Garcia then pursued the employee into the theater, firing more shots when he reached the lobby, Pollard said.

One of the shots struck a patron in the back, but the bullet did not strike any vital organs and the man was released from San Antonio Military Medical Center later Sunday night.

Bexar County sheriff’s Sgt. Lisa Castellano, who was working off-duty as a security guard at the Mayan Palace, chased the gunman toward the back of the theater. The 13-year department veteran cornered him after he ran into a men’s restroom, shooting him several times and taking his gun, Pollard said.

Now, an opponent of individual gun rights under the second amendment (and thus going against a top liberal constitutional scholar) will point out with some justice that Sgt. Castellano, while undoubtedly heroic and deserving of the medal of valor she received, was nonetheless a highly trained, experienced police officer, not an armed civilian. But to argue that shows we don’t need armed civilians would be to miss the key lesson of the incident:

“When seconds count, help via 911 is minutes away.”

The police officer (1) who had his windshield shot out only happened to be in the area by chance, as part of his patrol.  He apparently was not part of the take-down in the theater, where people were being shot. Sergeant Castellano was there only because she was working a second job as an armed security guard. That showed wisdom on management’s part. But, had that not been true, had the people running for their lives in the restaurant and theater been forced to rely on urgent calls to 911 –when time is not on your side– well, we can all imagine what might have been the result.

To me, this incident again shows the value of having armed defenders on the spot. The police can’t always (or even often) be there, but a trained, armed civilian can also be effective by distracting for the criminal and buying time for others to escape. (And here’s some more about that armed civilian at the Clackamas mall)

Time and again, armed, law-abiding civilians have prevented or limited potentially horrific mass shootings. To deny this and pretend that gun-free zones make us safer is delusional.

Footnote:
(1) The article doesn’t mention what became of the officer. I hope he or she is okay.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Truths about the police and gun control

Mike McDaniel is a former police officer who writes at PJ Media to burst some misconceptions and point out some uncomfortable truths to readers about the realities of policing and and why you should have little faith in gun control. As always, read the whole thing, but there is one point I want to especially emphasize:

Time Is Not On The Side Of The Good Guys

Response times for emergencies vary enormously from place to place. In some rural or semi-rural areas, emergency response is measured in hours. Even in towns or cities, a five-minute response — from the moment an officer receives the radio call until he arrives in a school parking lot — would be amazingly fast.

Consider, however, that a radio call likely would not have been made until someone at the school realized what was happening and made a call, a call that will take precious seconds — even minutes — to make and to be understood. By the time a radio signal flashes out, a shooter could easily have been shooting for five minutes or more.

And even when that first officer arrives in the parking lot, he will likely not have clear directions. Few police officers have so much as been inside every school in their jurisdiction; fewer know them well. Even if that first officer can hear continuing gunfire, unless by chance he happens to enter the school near the shooter it will take additional minutes to find and stop the shooter. Unless the shooter stops him first.

Every minute is an eternity in a school attack. Every minute costs lives. All competent police officers know this; it’s one of their greatest frustrations. They know that in virtually every imaginable scenario, the real issue is how many will die before they are in a position to do anything.

They also know that if the modern history of school shootings is any guide, the shooter will virtually always have killed himself long before they arrive.

In virtually every American school shooting, the police have had no role in stopping the shooter.

As a friend once told me, “When every second counts, help via 911 is minutes away.”

And anyone who believes any different, who puts their faith in restrictive gun laws and “gun-free zones,” is just a deluded fool.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Self-important twerp (aka “Bob Costas”) exploits death to push a political agenda

By now most everyone has heard of the terrible events of last Saturday, when Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher murdered his girlfriend, Kasandra Perkins, who was also the mother of his child, and then killed himself at the Chiefs’ facility.

There are many ways to deal appropriately with such a monstrous happening. Nowhere to be found among them, however, is the exploitation of death to score cheap political points. That would be a low, disgraceful thing to do.

And NBC’s Bob Costas is just the self-important twerp to do it:

Costas used this article by sportswriter Jason Whitlock as the basis for his “sermon.”

To say Costas’ screed was filled with anti-Second Amendment nonsense from top to bottom would be an insult to nonsense itself. Seriously, Bob? If people didn’t own guns, things like this wouldn’t happen? By that fatuous blob of illogic, should we then ban bows and arrows, wire, and cars? And maybe hands and feet, too? Get rid of all those, and we’ll keep even more people from being murdered! Costas and Whitlock save the world!

Breitbart’s John Nolte gets it right:

Just like prohibition can’t stop people who want drugs from getting drugs, all anti-gun laws do is ensure that the law-abiding are at a disadvantage against criminals who know their victims are unarmed.

Every day people in this country are killed at the hands of cars, knives, and alcohol. No one on the left wants to ban or put waiting periods and harsh restrictions on any of those. Every day people in this country die due to illegal drug use and illicit sex — two kinds of behavior many on the left glamorize and encourage through popular culture and bowing before the likes of Sandra Fluke.

But our guns they want; and they want them so badly that literally before the bodies at the scene of some awful tragedy have had time to cool, the likes of a NBC, Bob Costas or Piers Morgan refuse to wait to exploit this murder and loss and grief with their illogical, unconstitutional, and un-American emotional appeals aimed at the only line of defense between tyranny, anarchy, and personal safety — an armed citizenry.

Leftists like Costas and Piers don’t give a damn about the dead or those grieving the dead. And they surely don’t care about saving lives or they would be just as strident and insufferable when it came to alcohol and illicit sex. This debate has only and ever been about control.

And they do this in the most unctuous, sanctimonious way possible, transforming a crime –this started as murder, let’s not forget– into a “tragedy” in which everyone is a victim, including the killer, and from which we should learn a lesson.

Ban guns.

Let’s be honest here: a gun was not responsible for the deaths of Jovan Belcher and Kasandra Perkins. Only Jovan Belcher is responsible. He chose to gun down his girlfriend and the mother of his child, and he chose to kill himself. The gun was merely his tool. Restricting or outright banning gun ownership would have done nothing except force Belcher to look for another tool.

But logic and truth don’t matter to the Costas and Whitlocks of the world. There’s an agenda to push, after all.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Mexico arrests two in Arizona Border Patrol killing

No word on whether any weapons were recovered or, if there were, if they’ve been tied to Fast and Furious, but it’s nice to see some suspects brought in quickly:

Mexican troops have arrested two suspects in the killing of a U.S. Border Patrol agent and the wounding of a second officer in Arizona, Mexican security officials said on Wednesday. [T]he two suspects were detained in a Mexican military operation in the city of Agua Prieta, in Mexico’s northern Sonora state, a few miles from the spot where Nicholas Ivie was shot dead early on Tuesday while responding to a tripped ground sensor, a Mexican Army officer, who declined to be named.

Ivie was among three agents who were patrolling on foot about five miles north of the international border when gunfire erupted. A second agent was also wounded while the third, a woman, was unharmed.  

The agents had been patrolling in an area near the border town of Naco, well-known as a corridor for smuggling, and the Cochise County Sheriff’s department has said that tracks were found heading south after the shooting.

Ivie was a 30-year-old father of two, he had been an agent for four years.

A Mexican police official in Naco, across the border from the Arizona town of the same name, confirmed the arrests, which occurred in the early hours of Wednesday.

(Link added)

US officials have had no comment on the arrests. If I were a cynic, I might think that’s because they’re desperately looking for an OF&F connection they can bury.

But we all know I’m not a cynic, right?

Meanwhile, thanks and congratulations to the Mexican Army for quick work. It will be interesting to see what stories these suspects have to tell.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

One Border Patrol agent killed, another wounded in Arizona border shooting

One agent was shot dead, another wounded, and a third escaped unharmed while on horseback patrol in southeast Arizona:

Two U.S. Border Patrol agents were shot, one fatally, Tuesday morning in an area in south Arizona known as a major drug-smuggling corridor, authorities said.

The identities of the agents were not immediately released, but the shooting occurred at the Brian Terry Station near Naco, Ariz., which is just south of Tucson. The station was named after an agent who was killed in the line of duty in December 2010. The area is considered a remote part of the state and sources tell Fox News that the shooting occurred at 1:50 a.m. local time and about 8 miles from the border.

The agents who were shot were on patrol with a third agent, who was not harmed, according to George McCubbin, president of the National Border Patrol Council, a union representing about 17,000 border patrol agents. The agents were on horseback at the time of the shooting.

McCubbin said he had no further information regarding the shooting.

The shooting occurred after an alarm was triggered on one of the many sensors along the border and the three agents went to investigate, said Cochise County Sheriff’s spokeswoman Carol Capas.

Public Service Announcement: According to the President of the United States and the Director of Homeland Security, the Mexican border is more secure than ever. Nothing to see here, move along…

The FBI and local sheriffs are conducting a joint investigation –on horseback, because the terrain is so rugged– but, let’s be honest. The maggots who did this are either back in Mexico or halfway to New York by now.

There’s no word on who did this or why, or whether the weapons used were courtesy of the Department of Justice, but this incident serves as a reminder of just how dangerous our southern border has become, particularly in Arizona; Naco isn’t all that far from Douglas, near where rancher Robert Krentz and his dog were gunned down.

Tomorrow night is the first of three debates between President Obama and Governor Romney, and the focus is on “domestic issues.” Border security would be a good topic for the Governor to raise; when Phoenix becomes the kidnapping capital and Americans are warned against entering sovereign American territory and residents have to live in fear of possibly-armed people crossing their land, I’d call that a “domestic issue.”

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Fast and Furious: DoJ-supplied guns used in Mexican lawyer’s murder

Well, ain’t that just dandy.

I’ve said before that the number of Mexican soldiers, federal agents, police and civilians killed by weapons allowed to “walk” over the border into Mexico under the Department of Justice’s “sting” operation has amounted to at least 300, per the Mexican Attorney General.

Here are some specifics, courtesy of Borderland Beat:

Firearms connected to Operation Fast and Furious were used in the 2010 slaying of the brother of the former Chihuahua state attorney general, according to a U.S. congressional report.

The report said the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives traced two of the weapons suspected in the murder of lawyer Mario González Rodríguez, but did not report this fact to the Mexican government until eight months after the tracing.

(…)

A video of Mario González Rodríguez’s “interrogation” by armed men was carried on YouTube. The body of the well-known Chihuahua City lawyer was found Nov. 5, 2010, in a shallow grave.

Then, Mexican federal authorities, following a shootout with drug cartel suspects, seized 16 weapons and arrested eight men in connection with Mario González Rodríguez’s murder.

The serial numbers on the seized weapons were run through an ATF database and, sure enough, two AK-pattern weapons were were flagged as “walked guns.” But it took eight months for the US government to tell Mexican authorities of their findings. When Carlos Canino, then the ATF attache in Mexico City, finally did bother to tell the Mexicans that, hey, some of our guns killed one of your citizens –our bad!– he gave the following explanation for the delay:

Canino feared an international incident might break out with Mexico if the information leaked out to the news media instead of being sent through government channels. He told U.S. lawmakers that he did not want to undermine the trust that U.S. law enforcement had developed with their Mexican counterparts in the war against the drug cartels.

Because, Lord knows, nothing builds trust like supplying automatic weapons and grenades to your ally’s enemies. Hate to see that spoiled.

When did I move to Bizarro World?

PS: Note to Mitt Romney, two words: Special. Prosecutor.

RELATED: Earlier entries for Operation Fast and Furious, aka “Gunwalker.”

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Afghanistan: US soldier murders 16 Afghan civilians?

Horrifying news.

An American soldier apparently went nuts in Afghanistan and gunned down 16 civilians in a village. From the BBC via Threat Matrix:

The soldier has not been named, but is thought to be a staff sergeant.

He is reported to have walked off his base at around 03:00 local time (22:30 GMT Saturday) and headed to nearby villages, moving methodically from house to house.

“Eleven members of my family are dead. They are all dead,” Haji Samad, an elder from Najeeban village, told the AFP news agency.

Haji Sayed Jan, from Alkozai village, was quoted by the AFP as saying: “My home was attacked and I lost four family members”.

A delegation from the provincial governor’s office has arrived in the village to determine exactly what happened, a spokesman said.

The soldier – who had reportedly suffered a breakdown before the attacks – is said to have handed himself over to the US military authorities after carrying out the killings.

The Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) said in a statement that US officials in Afghanistan would work with their Afghan counterparts to investigate what happened.

These are first reports and we can expect some part of them to turn out wrong, of course, but one has to wonder why a soldier who had “suffered a breakdown” was still in Afghanistan or even allowed a weapon.

Regardless, while doing all it can to quell the almost-inevitable furor, the Administration should resist any demands to turn him over to Afghan authorities for “justice.” He should be tried and, if found guilty, punished as dictated by Article 118 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

This will almost surely make the riots after the Qur’an burning incident look like Sunday in the park; the Taliban are already exploiting this for all it’s worth. In a tribal shame-and-honor culture, revenge killings are the norm. Let’s hope any precautions taken are enough to prevent other American and Coalition soldiers from suffering for this man’s crime.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Things you don’t expect to see on your commute

Such as a drug gang dumping 35 bodies on the highway:

Suspected drug traffickers dumped 35 bodies at rush hour beneath a busy overpass in the heart of a major Gulf coast city as gunmen pointed weapons at frightened drivers. Mexican authorities said Wednesday they are examining surveillance video for clues to who committed the crime.

Horrified motorists grabbed cell phones and sent Twitter messages warning others to avoid the area near the biggest shopping mall in Boca del Rio, part of the metropolitan area of Veracruz city.

The gruesome gesture marked a sharp escalation in cartel violence in Veracruz state, which sits on an important route for drugs and Central American migrants heading north.

The Zetas drug cartel has been battling other gangs for control of the state.

Prosecutors said it’s too soon to draw conclusions from the surveillance video.

“We’re not going to confirm or deny anything,” Veracruz state Attorney General Reynaldo Escobar Perez told the Televisa network Wednesday. “We’re looking at it in different ways, we’re seeing different numbers, that’s why we don’t want to get ahead of ourselves.”

Escobar said the bodies were left piled in two trucks and on the ground under the overpass near the statue of the Voladores de Papantla, ritual dancers from Veracruz state. He said some of the victims had their heads covered with blackplastic bags and showed signs of torture.

Authorities said each of the victims (including apparently a cop who had gone missing) had criminal ties, so this looks like one gang, maybe the Zetas, taking out the soldiers of another gang and throwing it in their rivals’ faces.

But it’s also a slap in the face to the Mexican federal and state governments, mocking their authority and denying their sovereignty. Doing this while the city hosts a major judicial conference says, in no uncertain terms, “We rule here, not you. Fear us.” And that’s exactly what the people do, as they lose faith with each atrocity in Mexico’s ability to protect them and render justice.

These aren’t just bodies; these are thirty-five more milestones on the road to a failed state.

RELATED: Was this a message to Los Zetas from a new cartel? (Graphic pic warning.)

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Violence? Look for the union label. UPDATED: video link added

Ever notice how the Right is regularly accused of violent rhetoric, fascist sympathies, and plain-old knuckle-dragging thuggishness, but it’s from the Left that we usually see garbage like this:

Ohio Business Owner Shot For Being Non-Union, Police Investigating

With around 25 employees, John King owns one of the largest non-union electrical contracting businesses in the Toledo, Ohio area. As a non-union contractor, his business happens to be doing well at a time when unions in the construction industry are suffering. This, it seems, has made the usual animosity unions have for him even greater, making him a prime target of union thugs. So much so, that one of them tried to kill him last week at his home.

(…)

Last Wednesday, however, the attacks on Mr. John King became much more serious when he was awakened late in the evening at his home in Monroe County, Michigan and saw that the motion lights in his driveway had come on.  When he looked out his front window, he saw a figure near his SUV and went outside.

As soon as he got outside his front door, King yelled at the individual who was crouched down by King’s vehicle. As soon as King yelled, the suspect stood and, without hesitation, fired a shot at Mr. King.

Luckily for King, as he yelled, he also stumbled. If it weren’t for that, however, John King’s injuries might have been much, much worse. In fact, he might have been killed.

Upon scrambling back into his house, King got to his cell phone and called 911. However, due to the pain in his knees and shoulder from falling, King was unaware that he had been shot in the arm.

At first, King thought that his assailant was merely trying to break into his vehicle. Little did he know, however, that the perpetrator was targeting him–because of his non-union company.

The night of the shooting, police recovered a shell casing from a small caliber handgun. In addition to the shell casing, police also found a Swiss Army knife that police say was likely going to be used to slice the tires on King’s SUV.

While neither the police, nor Mr. King can say which union was behind the attack, it is very clear by the word ’scab’ scrawled on his SUV that it the attack was union-related.

Emphasis added.

What upsets the unionistas isn’t that King is exploiting defenseless workers like some caricature of an 1890s robber baron. No, they’re angry because he is providing jobs they can’t, because his union-free status allows him to charges prices in-line with a bad economy, while the labor union’s cartel’s contracts have priced them out of the market. In other words, they would rather their workers have no work at all, if it can’t be under the union’s terms.

And those who defy them get their property and even their lives threatened.

Tell me again who the fascists and the thugs are?

RELATED: I suppose Kenneth Gladney should be glad he was only beaten into a wheelchair by union thugs, and not shot. “Labor Union Report,” the author of the quoted article, maintains a very informative site that tracks union intimidation, corruption, and violence. He (or she) can also be followed on Twitter.

FOR THE RECORD: I am not opposed to private-industry* labor unions per se; the right to form one is part of our right to freely associate under the First and Fourteenth amendments. However, I am unalterably opposed to laws that force one to join a union just to have a job; not only does that deny the freedom of the individual negotiate his own contract (yes, I’m a fan of Lochner), it creates a labor cartel that enables price-fixing just as harmful to the consumer as any corporate monopoly. And when labor unions engage in intimidation and violence, they become little better than rackets and should be treated as such.

*(As for public-employee unions, I agree with that noted conservative, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.)

UPDATE: Breitbart.TV has video of an interview with John King, the victim in the shooting.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Not surprising: Londoners left undefended move to defend themselves

Well, what did anyone expect when the police are kept on a tight leash, the fire brigades are overwhelmed, and the Home Secretary thinks the proper response is to scold parents?

When the government refuses to do its duty, vigilantism is the inevitable result:

Top London officials have warned the city’s citizens against administering vigilante justice in the midst of widespread riots after several groups organized to protect their property by any means necessary.

“We don’t want to see vigilantism,” London mayor Boris Johnson said today in a press conference, according to The Telegraph. “People defending their homes and shops must only use reasonable force.”

Metropolitan Police Deputy Assistant Commissioner Stephen Kavanagh also urged restraint, saying “vigilantism” could lead to further violence, according to a report by the BBC.

Three men at least have already been killed, run over as they were apparently defending their neighborhood in Birmingham, also torn by riots. Whether it was an accident or deliberate isn’t known. And London itself seems to be quieter after thousands of police have been brought in. (And the rioters are probably tuckered out, poor dears.)

Maybe Mayor Johnson and Deputy Assistant Commissioner Kavanagh (and the rest of that gelded government) should consider that citizens wouldn’t be resorting to vigilantism if the government had only done its bloody job to protect lives and property. These riots should never have got past the first night. Where the state ceases to exist, people will revert to a Hobbesian state of nature to protect their lives and property, which is just we’re seeing here. Those men who were run-over were only doing what any reasonable person would do, and their deaths are to be laid directly at the door of this pusillanimous government.

And don’t get me started on the insane British restrictions on firearms. When Los Angeles erupted in riots in 1994 1992, stores in Korean neighborhoods were relatively untouched. Why? Because the Korean owners had guns and made it quite clear they were willing to use them if the police couldn’t protect them. As is their right.

But in the UK, the people aren’t allowed guns to defend themselves from a mob. They’re told to rely on the police. And when the police aren’t there? They’re reduced to ordering baseball bats from Amazon.

The government should resign. This is pathetic.

via Allahpundit

LINKS: More from The Guardian. Read it all, but here’s a sample:

When the rioters came to attack the premises of Kurdish and Turkish businesses in Hackney’s Stoke Newington High Street and Kingsland Road on Monday night, the owners were waiting for them.

“It was between about nine and 10 at night,” said Yilmaz Karagoz, sitting in his coffee shop next to a jeweller’s shop that has been shuttered since Sunday when the rioting began and a pharmacy that closed a day after.

“There were a lot of them. We came out of our shops but the police asked us to do nothing. But the police did not do anything so, as more came, we chased them off ourselves.” The staff from a local kebab restaurant ran at the attackers, doner knives in their hands. “I don’t think they will be coming back,” Karagoz said.

EDIT: Fixed the date of the LA riots. I lived through them, you’d think I’d remember.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Britain: Her Majesty’s Government surrenders to the rioters

Just unbelievable fecklessness:

The Home Secretary [Theresa May] appeared to rule out sending water cannon or the Army onto the streets of the capital, despite a third night of violence.

Speaking on Sky News, she said that police intelligence and the support of local communities would help quell the disturbances.

“The way we police in Britain is not through use of water cannon,” she said. “The way we police in Britain is through consent of communities.”

WTF??

Since when do the police need “consent” to enforce the law? And what about citizens whose properties are being burned to the ground, or the workers who no longer have jobs to go to because their workplaces are in ashes? What about law-abiding Britons too frightened to go out into their own neighborhoods to buy food?

Are they not part of the community, Madame Home Secretary? Perhaps you have their “consent” to defend their lives and livelihoods without having to ask “Mother, may I?”

I’m probably just overreacting because I’m one of those “Cowboy Americans” who doesn’t understand the subtleties and nuances of “sophisticated” Euro-policing. I should have guessed that Secretary May had the perfect solution:

As those charged with offences appear in court today, “people will start to see the consequences of their actions”, Mrs May added.

“There are many who are easily identified through CCTV cameras.”

She also told BBC Breakfast that “parents need to be asking themselves where were their children, what were their children doing in the evening.”

She added: “There are longer-term questions about when we see parents letting their children as young as that sort of age be out on the streets in this way.”

So, there you go. The perfect nanny-state answer to an uprising by vandals: passively watching and then threatening to tell their mothers. Excuse me while I go hurl.

And you can bet that the fascists of the British National Party are rubbing their hands with glee, knowing that this nerveless, cringing, emasculated, pathetic excuse of a government whose only response is a scolding will just drive more and more people their way out of desperation.

Alfred the Great, Edward I, Queen Elizabeth I, Queen Victoria, Canning, Disraeli, Churchill… They’re all spinning in their graves now.

via Bryan Preston

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Gunwalker: “What did he know and when did he know it?” UPDATE: ATF armed Sinaloa cartel?

Oh, my. I think the fuse has been lit on blowing this fiasco wide open, and the spark is headed right for the White House:

At a lengthy hearing on ATF’s controversial gunwalking operation today, a key ATF manager told Congress he discussed the case with a White House National Security staffer as early as September 2010. The communications were between ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix office, Bill Newell, and White House National Security Director for North America Kevin O’Reilly. Newell said the two are longtime friends. The content of what Newell shared with O’Reilly is unclear and wasn’t fully explored at the hearing.

It’s the first time anyone has publicly stated that a White House official had any familiarity with ATF’s operation Fast and Furious, which allowed thousands of weapons to fall into the hands of suspected traffickers for Mexican drug cartels in an attempt to gain intelligence. It’s unknown as to whether O’Reilly shared information with anybody else at the White House.

Congressional investigators obtained an email from Newell to O’Reilly in September of last year in which Newell began with the words: “you didn’t get this from me.”

“What does that mean,” one member of Congress asked Newell, ” ‘you didn’t get this from me?’ “

“Obviously he was a friend of mine,” Newell replied, “and I shouldn’t have been sending that to him.”

Newell told Congress that O’Reilly had asked him for information.

So now we are certain that someone senior at the White House knew about Operation Fast and Furious (aka “Gunwalker”) in late 2010, yet as late as this last spring, Holder and Obama were claiming they had learned of it only much later.

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told Issa that he did not learn about Fast and Furious until this spring. President Obama said that Holder told him he would not have allowed guns to go into Mexico.

Hmmm… We’ve already established that it’s about as likely as the Sun rising in the West that Holder didn’t know, but what about Obama? If this org chart (PDF) is still accurate (1), then NSC staffers with regional responsibilities report to the Deputy National Security Adviser, who reports to the National Security Adviser, who reports to… the President of the United States.

Very suggestive, but not proof-positive.

As Ed Morrissey asks, why did O’Reilly want to know, and why did Newell feel compelled to say “You didn’t get this from me?”

Either O’Reilly was attending a meeting of peers and wanted to be brought up to speed — it  is in his purview, after all, but then why the “cloak and dagger” stuff? — or was he briefing those above him? And how high did the briefing go?

Let’s keep in mind that this debacle has cost the lives of at least one US federal agent and roughly 150 Mexican civilians, federal agents, and soldiers. Agencies of the US government supplied weapons to criminal cartels that threaten the stability of our large southern neighbor and then lost track of nearly 2,000 of those guns. It is a monument to gross stupidity and incompetence — and very possibly criminal, what Rep. Darrell Issa has called “felony stupid.”

With the revelation that people on the President’s national security staff knew about Gunwalker, it’s about time for subpoenas.

Footnotes:
(1) While O’Reilly’s office doesn’t appear on this org chart, I think it’s reasonable to assume that, whether it’s new or renamed from “Western Hemisphere Affairs,” he too would report to the Deputy NSA.

UPDATE: “The ATF armed the Sinaloa Cartel. It’s disgusting.”

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Nightmare in Norway: at least 92 dead, and the question of religion

How awful for them:

Norwegian police said Saturday that the death toll from Friday’s attacks has risen to 92 and confirmed that they have arrested a suspect whom they described as a right-wing Christian fundamentalist.

In a news conference Saturday morning in Oslo, police confirmed that they had arrested Anders Behring Breivik, 32, on suspicion of orchestrating both the Oslo bombing and the youth-camp shooting rampage and had begun searching two apartments that he owns.

Breivik reportedly owns four properties including a farm on the outskirts of Oslo, allegedly to enable him to store legally a large amount of fertilizer.

Police would not comment on whether he acted alone but said no other arrests have been made. They said Breivik had no criminal record.

They would not speculate on his motives, but said, based own his own Twitter and Facebook accounts, he appeared to be a right-wing Christian fundamentalist.

Police say he was arrested by security forces at the Labor Party youth camp on the island of Utoya after the shootings. They said 84 people were killed on the island. At least seven were killed in the Oslo bombing.

Police Chief Oystein Maeland told reporters that they could not confirm the number of victims would stop at 92, adding that the attack had reached “catastrophic dimensions.”

He said officers were still “looking in the water around the island for more victims.”

It appears Breivik stalked the island for an hour-and-a-half, shooting the teens wherever he found them. The survivor accounts in the rest of the article are just horrifying. And there’s something dreadfully wrong with Norwegian law if the worst he can face is only 21 years in prison.

The issue of “why” remains unresolved and it likely won’t be settled for weeks, though it bears resemblances to both the attack on the Murragh Building in Oklahoma City for its anti-government angle and the massacre of children that occurred at Columbine and Dunblane.

The role of religion as motive is obviously going to play a role, however. Yesterday I hypothesized that this might have been an act of jihad — inspired by Islam. I wasn’t alone in my speculation, as the pattern of the attack fit previous jihadist operations: near-simultaneous attacks aimed at mass casualties (Bali, London, Madrid), the focus on children (Beslan), and a history of Islamic terror threats against Norway, including threats to kill government officials. Violent jihad is central to Islam. And lest anyone say that, even if this were an act of jihad, Islam wouldn’t permit the killing of innocent children, let me point out that Muhammad himself defined “innocent child” differently than we.

Now it appears that a narrative is building that this sociopath acted out of “Christian fundamentalism,” whatever that is. If that takes hold, and I say this as a thoroughly secular person, it would be grossly unfair and a slander against religious Christians because, unlike Islam, their faith forbids just this kind of action and makes it a mortal sin. The Fifth Commandment is, “You shall not murder.”

In other words, for Breivik to do what he did here or, more locally, for a Christian to gun down an abortionist, he necessarily acts against his religion. Not so with the jihadist, and I can see another false equivalence being created that needs to be pushed back against for the sake of moral and intellectual clarity and truth.

And the core truth at this time is that Breivik, regardless of whatever reason he did this, is an immensely evil human being, and that our hearts go out to the victims, their families, and the Norwegian nation in this awful time.

LINKS: More from Power Line and Hot Air, and ST. Also The Anchoress (thanks for the link!).

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Tiny body, big heart

Must be seen to be believed: a chihuahua terrorizes shotgun-wielding robbers…

That’s going to make those thugs’ reputation back in the ‘hood.

Good doggie! 

PS: Of course, as anyone knows, a cat would just have gone full-auto.

UPDATE: The diminutive tough-guy’s name is “Paco,” and he’s now a TV star.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Felony Stupid: Gunwalker guns now showing up at US crimes

Having just posted a video about Rev. Jeremiah Wright, it’s fitting that this post should be an example of chickens coming home to roost. It seems that some of the guns the BATF allowed to “walk” into Mexico in Operation Fast and Furious are coming back to be used here:

For months the ABC15 Investigators have been searching through police reports and official government documents. We’ve discovered assault weapons linked to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ controversial “Fast and Furious” case strategy have turned up at crime scenes in Glendale and Phoenix communities.

(…)

Weapons linked to the strategy have been turning up at dangerous and deadly crime scenes near both sides of the border, including the murder scene of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry, who was killed last December.

The ABC15 Investigators uncovered documents showing guns connected to at least two Glendale criminal cases and at least two Phoenix criminal cases also appear in the ATF’s Suspect Gun Database, a sort-of watch list for suspicious gun sales.

All four cases involve drug-related offenses. In one Glendale police report dated July 2010, police investigators working with DEA agents served search warrants at homes near 75th and Glendale avenues in Glendale, and 43rd and Glendale avenues in Phoenix as part of a “large scale marijuana trafficking” investigation.

Police investigators reported they “obtained information that members of the (trafficking) organization were using the homes…as stash houses used to store large amounts of marijuana temporarily.”

They reported finding hundreds of pounds of marijuana, more than $63,000 in U.S. currency and three guns inside the homes. One of the recovered weapons, a Romarm/Cugir WASR-10 rifle, appeared in an official ATF Suspect Gun Summary document in November 2009, proving agents knowingly allowed the suspicious gun sale, months before the weapon turned up at the crime scene.

In a separate Glendale Police Department case, dated November 2010, detectives discovered “bulk marijuana and weapons” inside a residence near 75th Avenue and Bethany Home Road in Glendale. Investigators recovered nearly 400 pounds of drugs and several firearms from the home.

One of the recovered weapons, another Romarm/Cugir WASR-10 rifle, appeared in an official ATF Suspect Gun Summary document in February 2010.

Check out the ABC 15 report and video for more incidents of Gunwalker guns showing up in Arizona. And if they are in Arizona, you can bet they’ll be turning up elsewhere in the US. Keep in mind that at least two US federal agents have been killed with Gunwalker guns, and roughly 150 Mexican soldiers, federal agents, and civilians. I fear it’s only a matter of time before more people are killed on this side of the border, with weapons provided by your United States government.

Representative Darrell Issa (R-CA) has been holding hearings on Gunwalker; it was he who coined the phrase “felony stupid.” As his investigations and those of Senator Grassley (R-IA) continue, that word “felony” may well become more than an expression of exasperation.

LINKS: Previous posts about Operation Fast and Furious.

via Ed Morrissey

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Gunwalker: ATF head to tell all?

Well, this could get very interesting. Instead of resigning in disgrace and going away quietly so that everything could be swept under the carpet, Acting ATF Director Ken Melson has agreed to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee in a deal between Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Charles Grassley (R-IA):

The head of the embattled federal agency that combats gun trafficking has agreed to talk with Senate investigators, a potentially important breakthrough as Congress tries to determine whether higher-ups in the Obama administration knew about a controversial sting that let assault weapons flow across the border into Mexico’s drug wars.

The testimony — expected next month from Kenneth Melson, the acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — was brokered as part of a deal between Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and the committee’s top Republican, Iowa’s Charles Grassley. Grassley and his fellow Republicans were given full access to ATF documents, Melson, and other key witnesses; and in return, Grassley agreed to release three Obama administration nominees he had been blocking, according to correspondence obtained by Newsweek and The Daily Beast.

So, is Melson the new John Dean, or is this a prelude to being the fall-guy? At Pajamas Media, Bob Owens considers five possibilities:

1. Melson falls on his sword.
2. Melson implicates the head of the DoJ Criminal Division, who signed off on a Gunwalker wiretap.
3. Melson implicates Attorney General Holder, himself.
4. Melson also names Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano.
5. Melson does the “full Dean” and implicates Obama.

For various reasons, Bob considers numbers two and three the most likely, leading to the resignation or even impeachment of the officials involved. Be sure to read the piece to find out why. Going a step further, Howard Nemerov makes a plausible argument that Holder and other officials could be charged as accessories before and after the fact to federal crimes.

Regardless, Melson’s forthcoming testimony promises some summer fireworks.

RELATED: Background on Gunwalker.

UPDATE: Welcome Hot Air readers!.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Predictable, really

The marketing divisions of the Democratic Party, aka The New York Times and The Washington Post, have launched a vigorous defense of the Obama administration in the wake of scandalous revelations about Operation Fast and Furious (“Gunwalker”) by launching a smear campaign against Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), chairman of the committee investigating this fiasco. Patrick Richardson at PJM’s Tatler blog has the story:

Issa of course has been holding hearings on the fiasco that was Operation Fast and Furious, where the ATF allowed thousands of guns across the border into the hands of the drug cartels, weapons which then began showing up at crime scenes, including the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

The NYT is continuing to tell the lie that most of the weapons which end up in Mexico came from the U.S. They also show their complete ignorance when they say the weapons sold were military rifles. They were not. Whatever the semiautomatic rifles sold may look like, they are not true assault rifles. They do not have a selective fire capability, meaning they cannot fire full auto, as military rifles will. The NYT is merely using these hearings in order to push for the re-enactment of the so-called assault weapons ban while doing the administration’s dirty work.

The WaPo is perhaps more thoughtful in their attack, attempting to look like real reporting. Using anonymous sources to take potshots at Issa, claiming he was briefed in on the operation last year.

Let’s keep in mind that not only have two US federal agents been killed by guns that were allowed to “walk” over the border with the full knowledge of the ATF, but at least 150 Mexican soldiers, federal agents, and civilians. And Mexico is an ally.

If they were real newspapers truly concerned with the pursuit of the truth, the Times and the Post would be demanding to who knew what when and who gave the okays. They’d be digging into the serious foreign policy implications for the United States (1), and they’d be giving wall-to-wall coverage of the grotesque human tragedy caused by gunwalker — on American orders — something Representative Issa has described as “felony stupid;” an understatement if there ever was one.

But that would only happen if there were an (R) after the president’s name.

Real newspapers are mostly gone, at least at the national level. (2) Now, instead, we have PR flacks disguised as newspapers trying desperately to distract us from a trail that seems to lead directly to the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security, if not to the Oval Office itself.

Heckuva job, guys!

Footnotes:

(1) Supplying weapons to groups that threaten to destabilize a foreign state. Y’know, those little things we used to call “acts of war.”

(2) One exception is the Washington Examiner, which has a great lineup of journalists and analysts. Among the legacy media, CBS deserves real credit for following “Operation Fast and Furious” almost since the story first broke.

RELATED: Background and links

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)

Weinergate: police involved? Updated!

Okay, this may just have taken a big turn for the worse for Congressman Weiner:

Police on Friday afternoon came to the home of a 17-year-old high school junior to ask her about direct online communications she has had with Rep. Anthony Weiner.

Two officers from the New Castle County Police Department arrived at the girl’s home around 4:30 p.m. and asked to speak with the girl’s mother about the daughter’s contact with Weiner. Another officer appeared at the home a short time later. A FoxNews.com reporter was at the home when the police arrived.

The girl, whose name is being withheld because she is a minor, told FoxNews.com, “I’m doing OK.”

But Rep. Weiner won’t be doing OK, if it turns out he was “sexting”  a minor.

via ExJon

UPDATE: Weiner has admitted knowing she was 17, denies anything inappropriate. Patterico makes that very hard to believe.

(Crossposted at Sister Toldjah)