accidents, man, they happen

Posted on March 10, 2016 by greg

By now, almost everybody has heard about Jamie Gilt, the Second Amendment mom from Florida (of course) who was shot in the back by her four-year old son while driving her pickup truck. Wait, was that confusing? I didn’t mean her four-year old son shot her while HE was driving her pickup. Kid’s only four; he can’t be expected to multi-task like that. You can’t expect a kid to be able to drive and shoot with any accuracy until he’s reached puberty. She was driving the pickup. The four-year old kid was loitering in the back seat, playing with her .45-caliber handgun — which was apparently unsecured, with the safety off, and loaded with a round in the chamber.

Second Amendment Mom Jamie Gilt

I think we can all agree that a .45 caliber pistol is a lot of gun for a four-year old. According to every news report I’ve seen:

The boy was unharmed.

Yeah, right. Kid could have shot himself, but didn’t. Of course, he’s probably going to need years of therapy since he shot his own momma in the back. But hey, he managed not to shoot himself, so there’s that.

It’s great advertising for .45-caliber handguns, though. The round went clear through the truck’s back seat, into the woman’s back, and exited out her stomach. That’s serious penetration, right there. The woman’s lucky she hadn’t loaded the weapon with hollow points, which are perfectly legal in Florida.

But hey, Jamie Gilt wasn’t the only responsible gun owner to have a Second Amendment ‘accident’ recently. She’s simply the most attractive and her shooting was the most ironic, since she’d just posted a pro-gun comment on her Facebook page the day before her son popped her in the back. There were other ‘accidents’ with less attractive victims and less ironic circumstances.

A three-year-old boy shot his momma in Kentwood, Michigan. She was cleaning the family SUV when the boy found his daddy’s 9mm handgun in the vehicle. He “fired one shot before the weapon jammed,” hitting his poor momma in the head. According the report, the momma “wasn’t seriously hurt,” which reveals the weakness of the 9mm when compared to Jamie Gilt’s .45-caliber. The boy’s daddy said he “typically secures the weapon” but on that day “he was in a hurry to visit neighbors” so apparently left the loaded weapon lying about with the safety off and a round in the chamber. Ooop. No charges have been filed.

And there was 23-year-old Jacob Brumbaugh of Knoxville, Tennesee, who shot himself in the leg with his Glock outside a Cheesecake Factory. No charges were filed. And Kentuckian Ward Correll, who accidentally shot himself in the gut (the comments to the article remind us that “we have a awesome Lord” who’ll help Ward through this time of crisis — but who apparently was too busy to prevent Ward from shooting his damned self). No charges were filed. And the two-ear-old Sacramento girl who accidentally shot herself in the head. Well, the child’s mother says the girl shot herself in the head, but the police aren’t entirely convinced since the firearm involved somehow ‘disappeared.’ Is it possible that somebody, during the fuss that naturally follows when a two-year-old is shot in the head, said to themselves “Oh lawdy, that poor child’s gone and shot herself in the head…I’d better hide the gun.” Yes, this is America — it’s very possible. Charges may be filed.

Then there’s Lana Meisner, the wife of a former NFL player, who died after the rifle she was moving accidentally discharged. Apparently a pair of spurs (I’m NOT making this up) shifted in the rifle case and struck the trigger. Which is a lesson all gun owners should take to heart. DO NOT put your spurs in your rifle case along with a loaded rifle. No charges were filed. And Genie Wamsley of Greensburg, Indiana, who was shot in the hip by her neighbor, who was in the adjacent apartment innocently cleaning his loaded 9mm handgun. The round went through the apartment wall and stuck Ms. Wamsley while she was sitting on the sofa watching television. No charges have been filed yet, but authorities stated:

Gun safety classes are available locally…. Classes can help gun owners familiarize themselves with their firearms, which is a vital component of responsible gun ownership.

Hey, tyrant — show me where it says you have to be familiar with your firearm in the Second Amendment.

Gun safety classes are available locally. (Image by Samantha Ann Peartree, age 5)

Oh yeah, and by the way, there’s Christopher Smith of Morgantown, W.V. Seems he was “recklessly manipulating a loaded handgun” and accidentally shot a child in the head. No word on the age of the child or his condition, but hey, at least Smith was arrested and charged with a crime. Of course, Smith is black. Might as well arrest him. He’d probably get arrested for something else anyway. This just saves time.

This isn’t even a comprehensive list of the accidental shootings in the last week or so. It’s just the ones that caught my eye. There’s not enough space here for the recent intentional shootings — the road rage shootings, the domestic violence shootings, the suicides, the murder-suicides, the mass shootings, the drunken arguments that would have resulted in fistfights if there wasn’t a gun handy.

Legislators, of course, say they won’t interfere with a constitutionally protected right. Besides, this last week they’ve been too busy in Indiana and South Carolina and Utah and Florida and West Virginia and Kentucky finding new ways to restrict the constitutionally protected right of women to have a legal medical procedure to terminate a pregnancy.

Priorities, people, priorities.

it ain’t over

Posted on January 27, 2016 by greg

First, let me say this: it’s always easy to know the right thing to do when you don’t have to actually do it your ownself. So when I say I think the Feds fucked up strategically in their dealings with the Great Bird Sanctuary Treason Plot, but did well tactically, remember that I’m mostly talking out my ass.

Second, let me make a pretty bad analogy. I mean, it’s not a totally horrible analogy, it’s just pretty bad. Here it is: Pretend you have a child (unless you actually have a child). That child knows he (and yeah, it’s a boy on account of boys are just like that) isn’t supposed to have chocolate. Now, pretend that boy takes a damned chocolate. You take the chocolate back from the boy, and he’s pissed on account you’re mean and stupid and he hates you. Now pretend that the boy takes a damned chocolate and you tell him “Child, you are NOT to take chocolates” but you just stand there with your thumb up your butt while he eats the chocolate. Then the next day the little bastard takes another damned chocolate. This time you take the chocolate from him, but now he’s pissed times two on account of you let him have the chocolate last time and didn’t do anything.

Get it? Wait, I meant to tell you the Bundy family is the child and the chocolate is seizing control over government lands. Now, get it?

My point is if the Feds had confiscated Cliven Bundy’s livestock like they were authorized to do before he called in all his faux patriot buddies, then it’s unlikely the Lesser Bundys would have started the Great Bird Sanctuary Treason Plot. Strategically, the Feds fucked up. If you tell the boy he can’t have chocolate, then you have to be ready to take his damned chocolate.

Charter Members of the Fuckwit Collective.

But they didn’t, and now there’s a dead fuckwitted cowboy and a wounded fuckwitted whatever-the-hell Ryan Bundy is.

It could have been worse. It could have been much worse. And there’s a very real possibility that it will get worse. On account of it’s not over. Not yet.

It’s important to remember that the people involved in the Great Bird Sanctuary Treason Plot aren’t just fuckwits. They’re fuckwits who are part of a religious/political/ideological movement with a long history of violent confrontation with law enforcement, a penchant for armed resistance in a siege, and a tradition of martyrdom. That’s not a recipe for peaceful resolution.

We’ve seen this same basic situation several times since the early 1980s. Well-armed, conspiracy-oriented, survivalist-minded, right-wing fuckwits with strange notions of Christianity and a deep, abiding suspicion of the U.S. government have repeatedly sparked violent confrontations with Federal law enforcement agents. Gordon Kahl and the Posse Comitatus in 1983, Robert Jay Mathews and the Brüder Schweigen (the Silent Brotherhood) in 1984, Richard Wayne Snell and The Covenant, the Sword, and the Arm of the Lord in that same year, Randy Weaver — whose wife and son were killed during their stand-off in 1992, David Koresh and 75 members of his group died after a long siege in 1993, the Montana Freemen in 1996, and on and on and on.

Some of those conflicts were resolved peacefully. Most weren’t. Most ended in bloodshed. Because these people have some real issues with impulse control AND they have guns.

Lavoy Finicum

Earlier I said the Feds fucked up strategically. I personally think they also fucked up by not taking a harder line against the Great Bird Sanctuary Treason Plot plotters in a way that’s what you call ‘timely.’ Like, say, a couple of days after they moved in. Instead, the Feds allowed the Lesser Bundys to think this was going to be BundyFest II.

Still, when the Feds finally decided to act, they did well tactically. By that I mean they handled the arrest of the Bundys and their camouflage remora in a professional way. They waited until the leaders of the movement left the compound, stopped them, and took them into custody with relatively little fuss. Aside from, you know, shooting the cowboy (and I don’t mean to make light of that; it’s sad that it happened, but it seemed clear from the beginning that Lavoy Finicum was redolent with the smell of burning martyr).

The problem is there are still at least a couple of Finicumesque fuckwits camped out in Malheur, working on their Braveheart imitations. It may not be easy to dislodge them.

you’ve probably got one in your community

Posted on January 9, 2016 by greg

So they arrested Trey Sudbrock again.

Who the hell is Trey Sudbrock? Nobody special. He’s a 21-year-old local guy who got dumped by his girlfriend. He’s just another guy at the intersection of male privilege, misogyny, and guns. There are tens of thousands of Trey Sudbrocks across These United States. You’ve probably got one in your community.

Here are the basic facts behind Trey Sudbrock’s story. on 24 November, a couple of days before Thanksgiving, he had a fight with his girlfriend. I don’t know what the fight was about, I don’t know who started it, or how it progressed. What I know is Trey Sudbrock was arrested and charged with domestic abuse. His girlfriend filed for a restraining order, which was granted. Sudbrock posted bond, and was released from jail with the proviso that he have no contact with his former girlfriend.

The story is pretty predictable from this point.

Trey Sudbrock

A week and a half later, on 3 December, Sudbrock violated that restraining order. During that incident, he killed his ex-girlfriend’s dog. Again, he was arrested. He posted bond and was again released. Then, on 23 December, the local sheriff arrested Sudbrock for the third time. He was charged with animal torture, stemming from the earlier incident.

Three days later, the day after Christmas, having been released from jail yet again, Sudbrock contacted a friend, asking to buy a gun. He allegedly told the friend he needed the weapon so he “could kill a lot of people.” He reportedly had US$2000 to spend on the firearm. His friend refused to sell him a gun, and instead reported Sudbrock to the Sheriff’s Office. Sudbrock’s been arrested yet again; this time he’s been charged with threatening terrorism — a Class D felony. The subsequent investigation revealed Sudbrock had contacted other friends about buying a firearm. They didn’t sell him one, but neither did they report him.

But guess what. Had his friends been less decent, they could have legally sold Sudbrock a gun. Or even loaned one to him. And had they done so, the odds are they would be completely free from any responsibility for whatever Sudbrock might have done with that gun.

As far as that goes, had Trey Sudbrock been patient enough to wait a couple of weeks, he could easily have bought a weapon from one of the unlicensed dealers at the gun show that’s going to be held next weekend at Adventureland Park in Des Moines. There were earlier gun shows he could have attended, but they would have required an inconvenient two or three hour drive.

Even though existing law prohibits anybody charged with or convicted of domestic abuse from buying a firearm from a federally licensed firearms dealer, there are almost always unlicensed dealers at gun shows. These unlicensed dealers are folks who don’t own a physical gun store. They have business cards, they sell firearms obtained directly from the manufacturer — new guns, still in the box, and they may make a substantial amount of their income from selling firearms and gun accessories, but they are considered by law to be private sellers, not ‘engaged’ in dealing firearms. And these unlicensed dealers don’t need to perform background checks. Even if they sell their weapons online.

That’s right, Trey Sudbrock could have gone online, bought himself a gun, and had it shipped right to his door. It’s easy. How easy? This easy.

Go to http://www.armslist.com. Pick out the gun you want. Create an account. Buy the gun.

Glock 42 — US$399.00

Let’s say Sudbrock wanted this sweet little Glock 42. It’s only a .380 caliber, so it lacks the stopping power of the 9mm, but hey, it would still do the trick. It’s less expensive than the 9mm too (with his $2000 Sudbrock could have bought five of these deadly beauties). If that’s not enough, the .380 is more easily concealed than the 9mm.

What about that inconvenient domestic abuse charge hanging over Sudbrock’s head? That awkward restraining order? No problem! All Sudbrock, as the buyer, would have to do is acknowledge the responsibilities listed on the seller’s website.

By purchasing through this system you agree to follow all manufacturer safety instructions and to only use the firearms in a safe manner in an approved area for a legal purpose.

Buyer assumes all responsibility for the legality of a specific item when you purchase it.

Buyer is responsible for securing your firearms from unauthorized use.

Buyer is responsible for checking all local laws before ordering or using an item that is sold here.

Buyer is responsible for complying with all firearms laws in your area.
Buyer must be of legal age to own any items you order.

Buyer must be at least 18 years of age to purchase ANY item from [name redacted]. Proof of Age can be requested prior to shipping an item.

Then it’s just a matter of waiting until that Glock arrives at the door.

Easy peasy, lemon breezy. For now.

This is one of the things that will change under President Obama’s new executive orders. If a gun seller has a website, if he has business cards, if he sells multiple firearms that are new from the manufacturer, if he obtains a substantial profit from those sales, he’ll be considered to be engaged in the business of selling firearms. That will obligate him to obtain a Federal Firearms License, and that will require him to conduct a background check on his customers.

The gun rights folks get one thing right: the executive orders issued by President Obama won’t stop mass murders. But they could prevent some of the Trey Sudbrocks of the world from buying a weapon at a gun show or online.

That’s a good thing.

It’s important to NOT allow the issue of mass murder frame the entire discussion about gun violence. This isn’t about trying to end mass murder. It’s about trying to reduce the level of overall gun violence — not just murders, but non-fatal shootings as well. It’s about making life a tad more safe for women like Trey Sudbrock’s former girlfriend.

They need that extra protection. Over the last decade, nine women were fatally shot by their domestic partners (husbands, boyfriends, and former husbands and boyfriends) every week. Every week. Easily twice that many are shot and survive. Something like 90% of those women who are shot had been physically abused on at least one prior occasion by the person who shot them.

If Obama’s executive orders make it even slightly more difficult for men like Trey Sudbrock to obtain a firearm, then it’ll be a success. It ain’t much, but it’s a start.

active shooter

Posted on November 28, 2015 by greg

We don’t know very much. His name, we know that. Robert Lewis Dear. Fifty-seven years old, six-four, about 250 pounds. Beard. We know he was armed with some variation of the AK-47. We know he used it to kill three people and wound nine others. We know this took place in and around a Planned Parenthood facility.

REUTERS/Isaiah J. Downing

Beyond that, we can only speculate. Make informed guesses. Form conjectures. Assign blame. Most people, hearing about the shooting, assume it was an attack on Planned Parenthood. It’s a pretty safe assumption. It may turn out to be wrong, but there’s plenty of support for that assumption.

PP clinics are routinely vandalized. They’ve been the target of arson attacks and a variety of homemade bombs. PP employees are frequently harassed, often threatened, sometimes assaulted. occasionally killed. In recent months PP as an organization has been falsely accused of crimes through widely distributed, highly edited, agenda-driven videos. The organization has been widely demonized by Republican presidential candidates. So is anybody really surprised to hear a mass shooting is taking place at a Planned Parenthood clinic? Is anybody really surprised to turn on their television and see police officers in military gear establishing a perimeter around an active shooter barricaded inside the clinic?

This morning, still less than 24 since the shooting began, we don’t know that this was a deliberate attack on Planned Parenthood. But as assumptions go, this is a pretty solid and completely logical one.

Unless you’re an extreme conservative. Unless you’re a regular on FreeRepublic. In that case, you assume the active shooter at a Planned Parenthood clinic is a Muslim terrorist. While the shooting was underway, I followed the FreeRepublic discussion thread. Here’s a sampling of what I saw:

– Colorado Springs was one of the cities ISIS listed it wanted to attack…
– Quite likely a case of Islamic Terrorism at the Planned Parenthood Clinic, despite Obama promises that America was safe over the Thanksgiving Holiday.
– Hope that the injured recover quickly. From a politics standpoint – it does not matter. Now the message will be that all terrorists come from all part of the world. There will be no way to stop the Islo terrors.

But if it wasn’t Muslims, then it was probably a ‘false flag’ event — a covert operation designed to deceive the public and disguise who actually planned and executed it in an effort to further an undisclosed agenda. Almost certainly not a decent white Christian conservative man.

– I suspect false flag. Left wing nut cases doing this.
– If they are a shooter, it is a false flag operation.
– Too many benefits for the left for it NOT to be a flase flag. 1. Equate white Christians with Muslim terrorists 2. Gun control. 3. Counterbalance the memory of the videos 4. Damage pro-lifers.
– I’m more than willing to find out what happened later, because I know oboma needs a major sized false flag right now. He seriously has to draw attention away from his ISIS boys and Syrian imports and make their innocent victims the new boogie man instead. Things aren’t always what they appear to be.
– I think it is a staged by the left event in order to get pro-lifers placed on official terrorist lists, all to help Hillary and the Democrats in general.

Who would plan and execute a false flag assault on Planned Parenthood? And what would be the ‘real’ purpose of the attack? President Obama, of course, and his left-wing minions who want to disarm innocent white male Christians.

– They hope it is “Christian terrorism,” which, incidentally, does not exist. Until we know for sure, it could be a false flag operation, or something else.
– Hold onto your guns. This will absolutely result in major, major anti-gun maneuvering by Obama. You can’t assault the ultimate feminist sacrament of all time without paying on hell of a high price.

But if it wasn’t Muslims and it wasn’t a false flag event, then it was almost certainly the work of liberals or ‘leftists’ who are clearly insane. Conservatives would never do such a thing.

– A leftist looney with a gun…who would’ve thought. BO cannot say this was a right wing idiot!! Not this time!!
– Odds are it’s a leftist or retard. It’s a thin line.
– Those of us against abortion and planned murderhood are not the types that blow up and shoot up people and places.
– The media will get quiet pretty quickly when they dig into the suspect’s background and find out he was an ardent Leftist.

But even if the shooter was NOT a liberal or leftist, you can be sure those hippie types (and all those Planned Parenthood billionaires) are delighted about the shooting.

– This is where there loony lefties start equating perceived right wing terrorism with islamic terrorism. RIght wing terrorism doesn’t exist, at least in the US, but they are looking for any reason at all to show us that the Muslims really aren’t all that bad after all.
– Distraction to make pro-lifers look bad and counterbalance the videos? These people have the same moral code as the Nazis or the Communists — so it wouldn’t surprise me if this is for show. As much as the Planned Parenthood billionaires love to play the victim, the fact that even the (friendly) media is being kept away seems suspicious to me.
– The left is rubbing their hands with glee over this, I assume.
– they so want this to be tea party type trying to shoot up PP…but it may be a bank robbery gone bad.
– Leftists are all over this as “Christian terrorism” before the body is even cold.
— You would think leftists would be cheering, an officer is dead
– Know why liberals don’t like Christmas? Because it’s about a birth, not an abortion.

We don’t know very much. Maybe the Freepers are right. Maybe Robert Lewis Dear is a Muslim. Maybe he’s involved in a sinister false flag operation designed by the Obama administration to give them an excuse to seize everybody’s firearms. Maybe Dear is a leftist looney, or maybe he’s in the hire of Planned Parenthood billionaires who need to be entertained.

Robert Lewis Dear

But if it turns out he’s NOT a Muslim or a leftist, if we discover the shooting was NOT a false flag operation, if Robert Lewis Dear happens to be a white male conservative Christian who was deliberately attacking the Planned Parenthood clinic — well, then that’s okay.

– And how many active killings going on inside the building?
– Only in a fallen, lawless America: A mass shooting in which more innocent lives are likely saved today than are lost, and in which a number of the innocents who were saved today will be brought back tomorrow to be murdered, with police standing guard for the murderers.
– At least the baby killers got the holy crap scared out of them. Maybe some will repent. unlikely.
– At least some lives were saved today!
– Won’t it be wonderful if some who didn’t get abortions today decide not.
– I do not care. IF someone kills members of Planned Parenthood, I simply do not care. If i’m on a jury, i’ll acquit. What they do at Planned Parenthood should never have been tolerated in the first place.

We’ll know more about Robert Lewis Dear before the day is out. We’ll be more informed about his motivations. Eventually we’ll know more about the weapon he used to kill three and wound nine other innocent people; we’ll know whether he bought it legally or not. We’ll know more. But we won’t be any smarter.

The ugly truth is that whatever we learn about this guy and why he did what he did, it won’t change anything. The United States has become a culture ruled by fear, a culture in which politics are dominated by anger and bluster, a culture in which opinion and belief overrule rationality and science. We’ve become a culture in which the expression ‘active shooter’ has become commonplace.

we don’t have to make it so easy

Posted on October 3, 2015 by greg

It’s become traditional, after high publicity mass killings, for the families of the victims to make a public statement. And right there, that demonstrates how routine mass killings have become. We’ve developed social patterns based on them, and those patterns have developed into traditions.

Most often, these family statements take the form of a public eulogy. The families talk about the victim — how wonderful they were, how tragic their death, how much they had to offer society, how much they’ll be missed. Sometimes the statements will include a call for finding some way to insure “this will never happen again.” That call will be repeated for a while, then conveniently ignored.

The family of 18-year-old Quinn Cooper, who was killed in the Umpqua Community College mass killing, has issued the traditional statement. It includes this:

“We are hearing so many people talk about gun control and taking people’s guns away. If the public couldn’t have guns it wouldn’t help since sick people like this will always be able to get their hand on a gun(s).

We need to be able to protect ourselves as a community and as a nation. Please don’t let this horrible act of insanity become about who should or shouldn’t have a gun. Please remember the victims and their families. Please remember Quinn.”

I have a lot of empathy for the Cooper family. I’m certain they are sincere in their belief that nothing can be done to prevent these tragedies. But sadly, they are misguided — and more to the point, they’re just plain wrong.

Quinn Cooper

This ‘horrible act of insanity’ is always about who should and shouldn’t have a gun. I’m sure the Cooper family would agree that Chris Harper Mercer should not have been able to stockpile an arsenal of a dozen or more firearms. The only reason ‘sick people’ are ‘always…able to get their hands on a gun’ is because we’ve made it ridiculously easy for them to do so. The only reason so many people were killed and wounded at the Umpqua Community College is because we’ve made it ridiculously easy for mass killers to hike up the body count.

And we’ve done it deliberately. We’ve deliberately created a convoluted and inconsistent record-keeping system that impedes the transmission of mental health records to gun dealers. We’ve deliberately created barriers that prevent law enforcement officers from obtaining or sharing information about potentially illegal firearm transactions. We’ve deliberately created an alternate system of firearm sales that’s essentially designed to avoid background checks.

And, of course, when I say ‘we’ deliberately did that, what I really mean is ‘Republican legislators’ and ‘the National Rifle Association’ have deliberately done that, along with a scattering of cowardly and selfish Democrats.

Yes, of course, there will always be disturbed people who want to kill groups of people. And yes, of course, many of them will always be determined enough to find a way to do that. But we don’t have to make it so easy for them. And we don’t have to give them tools that multiply the body count.

The Cooper family is right in one regard: we should remember the victims and their families. We should remember Quinn. And we should also take a few simple common sense steps to prevent other families from experiencing what the Cooper family is coping with right now. One last line from the Cooper family statement:

“No one should ever have to feel the pain we are feeling.”

Agreed. So maybe instead of just offering post-tragedy ‘thoughts and prayers’ we should take a few practical steps to make it a wee bit more difficult for these tragedies to take place.

credit where credit is due

Posted on October 2, 2015 by greg

“Let me be very clear, I will not name the shooter. I will not give him the credit he probably sought prior to this horrific and cowardly act.”

That was Douglas County Sheriff John Hanlin speaking at a news conference in which he briefed the news media about the mass killing at Umpqua Community College. He announced ten people had died during the crime, but refused to say whether the shooter was one of them.

Sheriff Hanlin is a man of strong opinions and beliefs — and some of those opinions and beliefs are about firearms. The sheriff and I have that in common.

Sheriff John Hanlin

Here’s another thing we have in common: on January 15, 2013 both Sheriff Hanlin and I were writing about guns. It was a month after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT. A month after six adult school staff members and twenty children — all aged six or seven — were slaughtered in a five-minute shooting spree. Let me just repeat that bit. The victims were little kids. A month after a mentally deranged young man deliberately walked through the halls of a school shooting little kids.

It was also the day before President Obama was scheduled to propose some new executive firearm policies. Both Sheriff Hanlin and I were writing about that on the 15th of January. I was writing to mock Texas Republican Steve Stockman, who’d vowed to thwart the president’s proposals by any means necessary. Stockman didn’t know what those proposals were, but he was sure they were “an attack on the Constitution and a violation of his sworn oath of office – they are a direct attack on Americans that place all of us in danger.”

That’s right — a member of Congress claimed a few policy proposals made by the President of the United States were a direct attack on Americans that would place all of us in danger.

Sheriff John Hanlin

Sheriff Hanlin — the law enforcement officer in charge of the investigation of yesterday’s mass killing — was writing a letter to Vice President Joe Biden to say pretty much the same thing (full letter is below). Biden had been named to head an interagency gun-violence task force after the Sandy Hook massacre. Sheriff Hanlin requested that Biden’s task force:

…NOT tamper with or attempt to amend the 2nd Amendment. Gun control is NOT the answer to preventing heinous crimes like school shootings.

Hanlin went on to formally notify the vice president:

…any federal regulation enacted by Congress of by executive order by the President offending the Constitutional rights of my citizens shall not be enforced by me or by my deputies, nor will I permit the enforcement of any unconstitutional regulations or orders by federal officers within the borders of Douglas County Oregon.

Got that? The sheriff was essentially announcing that he didn’t care what the President of the United States or Congress wanted, he was going to insure that folks in his county could have all the guns they wanted, all the high-capacity magazines they wanted, and all the ammunition they wanted.

In effect, Sheriff Hanlin was protecting the right of Chris Harper Mercer to buy and own three pistols and a semi-automatic rifle. The weapons Chris Harper Mercer used to kill nine citizens in Douglas County. The weapons Chris Harper Mercer used to wound ten other citizens, ones he failed to kill. Those are all citizens Sheriff Hanlin is sworn and duty-bound to protect.

Chris Harper Mercer

Sheriff Hanlin refuses to say Chris Harper Mercer’s name because he “will not give him the credit he probably sought prior to this horrific and cowardly act.” I think it’s important that we all say the name of both Chris Harper Mercer and Sheriff John Hanlin. Sheriff Hanlin deserves his share of the credit.

NOTE: Here is the letter Sheriff Hanlin sent to Vice President Biden:

By the way, I’ve written about these so-called Constitutional Sheriffs before, and Sheriff Hanlin’s name is included. If you’re willing to put up with it, here are The Dimwit Sheriffs and the Return of the Dimwit Sheriffs.

it seems some mass shootings aren’t mass enough

Posted on August 27, 2015 by greg

Sometimes I find myself sitting around and thinking You know, this situation is pretty fucked up. I was thinking that after yesterday’s mass shooting. Which by the most commonly used definition of the term wasn’t actually a mass shooting.

A culture is pretty fucked up when there has to be a debate over how to define ‘mass shooting’. Here’s the most commonly used definition:

Shootings at a public place in which the shooter murdered four or more people, excluding domestic, gang, and drug violence, in a single episode.

There are at least three problems with this definition. Here’s the first and most obvious problem: murdered. This definition only counts bodies. You go to your neighborhood cineplex and wound half a dozen people but only kill a couple of them, it’s not going to count as a mass shooting. That’s pretty much fucked up, right there.

Not a mass shooter.

Second problem: excluding domestic, gang, and drug violence. I can sort of understand why researchers would choose to exclude gang and drug violence. That sort of violence is incidental to other behaviors — the violence is a consequence of gang/drug activity. You get involved in gangs or the drug trade, you’re voluntarily assuming a certain amount of risk. It’s like BASE jumping in that sense. So if you kill a half-dozen folks when your drug deal goes bad, it’s not going to count as a mass shooting. That’s fucked up.

But domestic violence? Why exclude that? It’s the most common sort of violence faced by the public. In fact, if you include domestic violence, the number of mass shootings skyrockets — even if you restrict the definition of mass shooting to those that produce multiple corpses. The research is limited, but it all suggests that the vast majority of mass shootings take place in a domestic situation — a house or an apartment.

What we’re talking about here is male violence against women. Almost all mass shooters are men, and the most common type of mass shooting is a man shooting members of his family (or his ex’s family, or his girlfriend’s family, or the family of a woman who rejected him). Most of those victims are women and kids. You get pissed off and kill a bunch of folks you claim to love — folks who aren’t strangers — it doesn’t count as a mass shooting. Maybe they’ll count it if you do it in at the local McDonald’s. Maybe. But otherwise it’s just another domestic murder. You know what that is? It’s fucked up, is what it is.

And here’s the third problem with that definition: in which the shooter murdered. The shooter isn’t included in the butcher’s bill. Now, I understand the emotion behind excluding the shooter. The sumbitch doing the shooting doesn’t deserve to be considered a victim. But it’s still part of the episode; he’s still dead or wounded. And let’s be honest, that’s often just as intentional as the shooting of the other folks. You shuffle over to the local mall and open fire, kill three people, wound half a dozen more, then eat your Glock, it’s not going to count as a mass shooting. That is totally fucked up.

Not mass shooting victims.

The shooting yesterday? Not a mass shooting. Not the one in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota in which four people were wounded. Not the one in Chicago, where only one of the four people who were shot actually died. Not the one in West Palm Beach, in which two were wounded and two were killed. And not the one in Virginia — the one that was televised, the one that left three people dead (yes, I’m including the shooter) and one wounded.

That’s six dead and ten wounded. Yesterday. And not one of them is considered a mass shooting. Fucked up, is what it is. We’re talking 33 shooting incidents in August (so far) with 40 dead and 124 wounded — and not one of them is considered a mass shooting. That’s fucked up on so many levels.

What if we broaden the definition of mass shooting?

Shootings in which four or more people are killed or wounded in a single episode.

Makes sense, doesn’t it. There’s actually a crowd-sourced mass shooting tracker that uses that definition. By that definition there have been 248 mass shootings so far in 2015. That’s as of fifteen hours ago. There’ll be more today. You can count on it. And the fact that you can count on another mass shooting today — one that will go uncounted because not enough people died, or because the wrong people died, or because the dead weren’t littering a public place — that’s fucked up beyond all recognition.

And here’s another thing that’s fucked up. The guy who shot the reporter and cameraman in Virginia recorded the non-mass shooting on his phone and posted it to Facebook and Twitter. That’s fucked up in ways beyond the obvious ‘What sort of twisted individual would put that shit on social media?’ way. It’s fucked up because research shows that mass shootings that get publicized tend to be contagious. They spark more mass shootings, often with the same weapons used in the initial mass shooting.

People who, for one reason or another, are fucked up in some way often model their behavior on the behavior of other folks. Some highly publicized behaviors, like teen suicides or hate crimes, establish what social psychologists call a path of action — a complete narrative in which the person can visualize their steps and their effects. And that path of action helps them follow through on the act — whether it’s suicide, bashing trans folks, or shooting a whole bunch of people.

So it’s fairly safe to assume we’ll see more homemade first person shooter videos. This may become a trend. Which brings me back to my original thought. This situation is pretty fucked up.

UPDATE: As of January 2016, the mass shooting tracker mentioned above revised its definition of a mass shooting to exclude the shooter. The new definition is “Four or more shot and/or killed in a single event [incident], at the same general time and location, not including the shooter.”

My initial response is that excluding the shooter from the body count seems unnecessarily judgmental, as if including the shooter would suggest sympathy for him. On further reflection, though, the definition includes the wounded as well as the dead — and it makes sense to exclude the shooter if he was wounded by law enforcement in their efforts to stop the shooting.

it’s a fucking miracle, is what it is

Posted on August 14, 2015 by greg

When brainstorming about what to do with the area, the idea of a gun range came up.

The area in question is behind the Rocky Mount United Methodist Church in Jemison, Alabama. According to Pastor Philip Guin, the area was a gully “full of kudzu, snakes and other vermin.” Nobody in Jemison like kudzu, or vermin, or snakes. They fucking hate snakes in Jemison. Totally hate those slithering little bastards. So they decided to clear the area and turn it into…something.

Pastor Phillip Guin

We don’t know what other suggestions for the area might have been considered and rejected. A community vegetable garden, maybe. That would have been nice. Or maybe somebody suggested planting a few trees, maybe build a little gazebo — a nice, quiet place for community picnics or concerts given by the Jemison High School Jazz Band. Or hey, how about a couple of basketball hoops? You know, keep the local kids busy and out of trouble. A baseball diamond might work, or a soccer pitch (though that might be seen as unAmerican).

The thing is, there were LOTS of inexpensive, community-oriented options open to the Rocky Mount United Methodist Church. Options that would be in keeping with church doctrine. But no…the idea of a gun range came up.

It just came up! Just like that, out of the blue, completely unexpected. It was like divine inspiration! Like a miracle!

“We had quite a number of church members, some elderly ladies, for example, and some not so elderly women that had purchased guns, but didn’t know how to use them.”

Okay, I’ll admit the thought of a bunch of old folks unfamiliar with firearms having guns in their homes is disconcerting and alarming. But…a question: why the fuck are the elderly women of Jemison, Alabama arming themselves? We’re talking about a town with a population of about 2500 people. Total. There can’t be much crime there. The Jemison Police Department has only eleven full-time officers. Eleven. That includes the park ranger at Minooka Park. Who the hell are these women planning to shoot?

The whole purpose of this range is to provide recreational and gun safety in a warm, loving, Christian environment.

Uhh…well…lawdy. Okay, then. Recreational gunfire in a warm and loving…oh for fuck’s sake, are you insane? We’re talking about a church, here. A building used for religious activities, for worship. I’m not a Christian, but even I understand that there’s a fundamental disjuncture between a structure dedicated to a religious figure called the prince of peace and a goddam gun range. Jeebus on toast, what the fuck is wrong with you people?

“This is an opportunity for us to reach out in the name of Jesus Christ in a setting that is completely unique.”

No. No, it’s not. It’s not even remotely an opportunity to reach out in the name of Jesus. It’s an opportunity to pimp some seriously distorted Jeebus figure into a flag-waving Second Amendment Martyr.

Don’t be blaming this bullshit on the old women of Jemison, Alabama. I’m just guessing here, but I really most sincerely doubt it was an old woman who raised her hand during the discussion of what to do with that overgrown area behind the church and said “Hey gang, let’s make a gun range! You know…for Jeebus!” I’m pretty sure it was a guy who suggested that. I wonder if anybody other than elderly women have a use for a handy firing range.

The range has also become a favorite of the Jemison Police Department

Yeah. Well, there’s a coincidence.

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it's this or get a real job

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