shooting on 87th and Dan Ryan

Okay, this is wild.  Instapundit highlighted it,and I clicked over to see it.  Supposedly a shooting in Chicago, some dude sprays traffic with full-auto.

Wow.

Some Links

 Courtesy of Instapundit:

Republicans Are Not Responsible for the Democratic Party’s Crime

To hear the press tell it, Democrats are facing a political conundrum (distinct from a genuine and organic problem of maladministration) in the form of rising violent-crime rates. And that problem is primarily a result of the fact that Republicans just won’t let the issue go.

There is no reason to let it go.  For the past year, the Democrats have fostered a climate of disdain for law-and-order.   The result is rampant crime in the larger cities in the country. 

Homicides Have Skyrocketed in These 6 Democratic Cities. Black People Are Disproportionately the Victims, Data Shows.

Democratic leaders of most of the cities examined voted to greatly reduce police funding amid widespread Black Lives Matter protests last year. In the wake of the death of George Floyd, who died after former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on his neck in May 2020, thousands of protests and riots took place across the country.

 Experts tell New York Times’ Mara Gay that spike in crime is due to ‘trauma, grief … and just general upheaval’  Perhaps Gay needs to read her own newspaper..

The Democrats profited from mayhem last summer and now they have no idea how to shut it down.

Irony

 It seems that an Atlanta politician and mayoral candidate, Anthony Brown, who voted to defund the police department, had his car jacked in broad daylight

In a classic case of "fate loves irony," Atlanta council member and mayoral candidate Antonio Brown, who earlier this year voted to strip $73 million from the Atlanta police budget, just had his white Mercedes carjacked ... at 12:30 in the afternoon ... by a bunch of children ... who fought him off and sped away in his whip.

Heh!  Karma is a bitch, especially when your car is stolen by a bunch of kids.  Some as young as 6 or 7.

 City Council Member Antonio Brown had just gotten out of his white Mercedes coupe to speak to fellow community leader Ben Norman in northwest Atlanta's Dixie Hills community Wednesday when he spotted four or five kids — the youngest only 6 or 7,

The greatest line in the story:  He filed a report with the police department.  Why?  He doesn't like the police, remember?  He wants to defund them.  Maybe he should have called a social worker. 

Sure! Defund the Police

It seems that defunding the police ahs lead to a spike in violent crime in those cities that are led by Democrat administrations.

Below, a young reporter reports from George Floyd Square on the anniversary of his death.  How's that working out for you?  Gunfire,, downtown, on the anniversary of George Floyd's death.  Priceless.

Person Of Interest

 The Rapides Parish Sheriffs Office has issued an update on the homicide investigation related to the murder of my friend last week.

In the press release, they tell us that they have located the vehicle used in the crime, and that they have detained a "person of interest".  This confuses many people. A Person of Interest may of may not have participated in the crime, but may have information vital to solving it.  In this case, the vehicle was taken in a traffic stop, and the person behind the wheel is someone they want to talk to.  That parson may or may not be arrested, based on the interview that is sure to follow the traffic stop.

My prayer is that Jackson will be apprehended soon and safely.  The best of all outcomes would be for him to appear at the front door of the Courthouse with an attorney and submit to arrest peacefully.  Any other scenario might become very dangerous for everyone involved.

Shooting in Metarie

 It appears that someone walked into a gun shop in Metarie, LA and started shooting people.  It didn't end well for the people, nor the shooter.  Two people died before staff and customers gunned him down. 

I'm sure we'll learn more in the coming days, but opening fire in a gun store is a sure recipe for disaster.  Unless disaster is what he intended in the first place.  If the guy intended to commit suicide, hecould have done it in the privacy of his own living room.

What an utter waste.

Bombing In Nashville

 What the hell happened in Nashville this morning?

I'm watching it on the news, trying to figure it out.  This thing doesn't fit many known parameters.

Crime in the City

It seems that the Minneapolis police department is telling residents to be ready to comply with violent criminals.

The Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) told residents they should “be prepared” to hand over their phones, wallets, and purses to robbers.

If tis sounds odd, or out of touch with common practice, recall that Minneapolis is going through a "defund the police" spasm, and the activities of the Minneapolis police department have been severely curtailed.  As a result, violent crime is on the rise.

 Police in the city’s Third Precinct alone have received more than 100 reports of robberies and 20 reports of carjackings in just the last month.

The idea of complying with criminals is repulsive to me.  While the Minneapolis PD may be doing what they have to do to try to keep the citizenry alive and unharmed, it is still repulsive to think that a citizen should be forced to cower in the face of violence.  Rahter, I'd prefer that the criminals cower in the face of outraged citizens.

“If violent crime is to be curbed, it is only the intended victim who can do it. The felon does not fear the police, and he fears neither judge nor jury. Therefore what he must be taught to fear is his victim.”

I was a police officer for 37 years, and I've learned that by-and-large, the police are seldom in a place to end a violent encounter.  We generally show up a few minutes later.

Still, it rankles me that the Minneapolis PD are telling citizens to comply with criminals.

When Civil Order Fails

Seen at Instapundit:

These riots and lawlessness are hitting liberal bastions a whole lot harder than conservative areas.

"Do what you have to do" leaves a lot of room for individual interpretation.

Culpable, Accountable

It seems that the Obama team may finally be coming to that time where their culpability will finally be exposed for all to see, and be forced to account for their malfeasance.  The idea that Obama had a scandal-free administration is both laughable and myopic.  Those of us who railed against government excess can remember the way that Obama and his minions played fast-and-loose with both the law, and the ethics of governing.

The complicit media was no help.  By fawning over the first black president and failing to hold him accountable, they did themselves no favors.  The lack of scrutiny and journalistic curiosity about anything that the administration didn't want covered  is a huge stain on the journalist class. 

Victor Davis Hanson writes about all this in the National Review.

The remains of the Obama team (Susan Rice, Ben Rhodes, Hillary Clinton, John Brennan, James Comey, Samantha Power) are not offering much of a defense for the Obama years — they are now too busy scrambling to hide their own legal culpability and exposure. The bending arc of the 2009 dream team finally ends in the platitudes of “I can’t remember” and “Not to my knowledge” that will eventually find their way from CNN and MSNBC into the court room.

I remember the Obama administration to be one big rolling scandal.  From the very start, terms like Fast and Furious, Lois Lerner,  and Obamacare entered into the national consciousness.  Now, it seems that the last scandal, Russia, Russia, may finally bring some accounting.  Perhaps if the media had been more curious about the earlier scandals, and less complicit in the cover up, the Obama team might have been less bold in trying to undo a national election. 

I have no expectation that Obama himself will ever face the docket, but his minions, Clapper, Comey, Rice, et al, feel the sting of handcuffs and are forced to account for their indiscretions, then perhaps America will know that the law applies to everyone.

School Shooting Southern Cal

Evidently, there was a huge problem at a high school in southern California today.

The Santa Clarita Sheriff's Department just held a press conference and confirmed that two students aged 16 and 14 have died in the hospital. The shooter is alive but gravely injured and under medical care. The shooter's social media accounts are being investigated. The weapon used was a semi-automatic .45 caliber pistol. Thursday is the shooter's 16th birthday.

It's quite disturbing the number of laws that were broken there today.  By my calculation, it is quite illegal for a 16-year-old to possess a handgun without an adult around.   It's also illegal for a handgun to be on a school campus, and it's decidedly illegal to shoot someone with it.

I would also note, for the record, that once again, a mass shooting happened in a gun-free zone.   I haven't seen any reporting on how the shooter became wounded, whether by his own hand, or by other armed personnel.

Goblin Down

News out of Conyers, GA from yesterday.  It seems that three masked teens tried to rob a man during the early morning hours Monday.  At least one of the teens fired on him, but he was a better shot.



So, three young men lost their lives yesterday, involved in what everyone agrees was a criminal episode.  It's tragic, but not nearly as tragic as if they had succeeded.  The law worked.  What is remarkable about this event is that the homeowner did something that the liberal media tells us is never done.  He used an AR in defense of home and family.  From everything that I've read, it was precisely the right tool for the job.

Okay, You're Crazy

David Cicilline is the Dem rep out of Rhode Island.  He does the tweets and shows that he's an idiot.

Everybody is calling him crazy.  I haven't been following it, but I understand that the Odessa shooter was a 2nd felony offender, who bought his AR at a private sale.  It's regrettable, but it shows that criminals don't obey gun laws.

And, that David Cicilline wants us to call him crazy.

More Idiocy

It sounds like the opening to a bad bar joke.  "So, this guy walks int a Walmart wearing body armor and a rifle."

It's no joke.  Some jazzbo walked into a Neighborhood Walmart wearing body armor with a handgun on his belt and a rifle slung around his neck.  Then started taking video of the ensuring panic.  Luckily an off-duty fireman was carrying and held him at gunpoint until police arrived to arrest him.

The incident at the Missouri Walmart comes hours after police in Florida identified a man they were looking for who they alleged told a Walmart salesperson in Port St. Lucie that he was looking for something "that would kill 200 people."

I need to go to Sam's Club later today to pick up a few things.   I will not be causing panic.  But, I will be very alert.  It looks like the crazies have fixated on the Walmart stores.

Illinois is Anti-Business

TTAG and others are reporting that over half of Illinois gun dealers went out of business this week.  It seems that a new law went into effect that adds burdensome regulations to gun dealers inn Illinois.  Evidently, the new law requires a state license in addition to the normal BATfE dealers's license.

Previous Governor Bruce Rauner saw the writing on the wall and refused to sign the bill. However, our new Gov. Pritzker, along with the bill’s sponsors, see driving off dealers as a feature, not a bug.

I'm sure that this new law will result in an immediate, measurable decline in gun crime in Illinois, especially in that mecca of peace and prosperity, Chicago.   I bet that the immediate decrease in gun crime will save so much public money that it will offset the economic impact of driving business out of the state.

If you believe any of the above paragraph, I have a bridge I'd like to talk with you about.  Until then, we have our monthly gun match today, and I really need to start prepping for the gunfights that are sure to occur.  Peacefully and safely.

Corruption

In the middle of this Sheriff's race, there is an ongoing corruption investigation within the Sheriff's office.  While on the surface it seems to be a corruption investigation, it goes deeper than that.  The investigation highlights failures in leadership, from the basic low-level supervisors, to upper management.  So far, three low-level deputies have been arrested, and two others fired.

Over my career, I've been involved in a couple of corruption investigations.  One, in the early 80s, led to the arrest and conviction of a sitting Sheriff.  He did a stretch of hard-time for that debacle.

This investigation is getting interesting.  It may be that one of the major players is also a candidate in this race, and is the guy that the sitting Sheriff has endorsed to take his place.


Yeah, it is starting to get interesting.

Seattle Grapples

We talked, in March, abut Seattle's homeless problem.  It seems that the city's uber-liberal city council was trying to make Seattle a beacon for compassion for the homeless.

Compassion is easy at at distance, but it is hard up close.

The piece also profiles a tech industry worker who says he’s a fan of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. But he is bothered that he can’t take his kids to the local park anymore because it has become a tent camp.

 [Austen] Ruf uses the city’s Find it, Fix it app to report problems, but more often than not, he says, the requests are closed a few days later with the problems unresolved. Rather than walking their three daughters down to the spray park in the summer, Ruf and his wife load them in the car and drive to a park in another neighborhood.
“I’m an environmentalist,” Ruf said. “God that’s frustrating, that’s so frustrating.”

I dealt with the homeless issue during my last duty assignment.  It's frustrating, because we don't want to be stern with people who are down on their luck, but sometimes  you just have to tell them to Move Along.

Seattle is dealing with it on a massive scale because they've become they've subsidized it.  When you subsidize something, you get more of it.

Capital Punishment

The use of capital punishment is a continuing debate across the nation.  We used to hang people, then we went to the electric chair or the gas chamber, then we moved to lethal injection. 

Louisiana moved away from the electric chair in 1993.Nowadays, the drug companies don't want to sell us the pharmaceuticals necessary for lethal injection.  The last person executed in Louisiana was in 2010.  Yesterday, the state senate rejected a bid to end the use of capital punishment in Louisiana.

I've heard the arguments on both sides, and many of them are compelling.    I see both sides of the issue.  But, what w have right now is a de-facto ban, because the drug companies won't sell us what we need and the legislature won't change to law to make it easier to either; 1)  obtain the drugs, or 2) change the method of execution.  So, the argument is going nowhere.  That is probably politically expedient.

I agree that the death penalty as it stands right now is not a deterrent to crime.  A penalty that you are not willing to use is not a penalty at all.  And, I agree that maintaining a death row is horribly expensive.  But, then again, keeping a person in prison for many decades is also horribly expensive.  Yet, we have predators among us,ad prisons are a necessary part of our society.

The issues are complicated ad the answers aren't easy.

Seattle Is Dying

That is the name of a documentary by KOMO TV in Seattle, Washington.  They have reported on the intersection of the homeless/addiction/mental health/criminality problem.

My wife, the lovely and talented Belle has been a Mental Health/Developmental Disability nurse for over 40 years and puts the blame on the Clinton Administration, who started shutting down mental health hospitals because of yada, yada, yada, civil rights, these-people-deserve better, their rights to live in the community trump your rights to live in a safe, pleasant environment.

It's a problem for the police all over the country, especially if you work in an urban environment.  Even in this small city in central Louisiana, we have the same problem, to a lesser extent.  Where I happen to work, in the downtown area, we have a magnet for the homeless, but it is not just confined to the downtown area.  I talk regularly with the homeless coordinator for the schools, and we have approximately a thousand homeless children in the area.  She works tirelessly trying to insure that these children have a safe place to live and the things they need to succeed, and her work is never-ending.  It's a problem everywhere, and kudos to KOMO for highlighting the problem.

It's a great documentary, and I'm going to leave it right here so that I can find it later.



We need to get a handle on this as a society.  This is a police problem, but it is not a police issue.  By and large, we're doing our job.  This is a problem that other agencies need to address.  Seattle estimates that they spend a billion dollars a year on the problem.  Across the US, there is no telling how much we spend.  And, since 1992, it's been an abject failure.

Crime Boss Slain

It seems that a reputed Mafioso was slain yesterday in New York city.

A man said by federal prosecutors to have been a top leader of New York's notorious Gambino crime family was shot and killed Wednesday on Staten Island.
Francesco “Franky Boy” Cali, 53, was found with multiple gunshot wounds to his body at his home in the borough's Todt Hill section just after 9 p.m.

Any murder is police business, but cops from time immemorial have recognized that there are generally four types of homicide.  Felonious, Accidental, Justifiable, and Admirable.   What we need to realize is that when something like this happens, something else is going on.  Someone just made a bid for power, and Franky Boy was in the way.

I'm sure that the cops are on it.