The Post-Newtown Witch Hunt

From Michelle Malkin's syndicated column:

In the aftermath of the horrific Newtown school massacre, Americans from all parts of the political spectrum agree that we need to pay more attention to mental health issues. Public death threats and incitements to violence must be taken seriously. The incendiary witch hunt against law-abiding, peaceful gun owners is neither noble nor effective. It’s just plain insane.

Over the past week, I’ve witnessed a disturbing outbreak of off-the-rails hatred towards gun owners and 2nd amendment groups. Whatever your views on guns, we can all agree: The Newtown, Conn., gunman was a monster who slaughtered his own mother, 5 heroic educators, and 20 angel-faced schoolchildren. He ignored laws against murder. He bypassed Connecticut’s strict gun control regulations and he circumvented the Sandy Hook Elementary School’s security measures. Every decent American is horrified and heartsick by this outbreak of pure evil.

But tens of millions of law-abiding men and women own and use guns responsibly in this country. The cynical campaign to demonize all armed men and women as monsters must not go unanswered. What’s most disturbing is that the incitements are coming from purportedly respectable, prominent, and influential public figures.

Consider the rhetoric of University of Rhode Island Professor Erik Loomis. He teaches “U.S. environmental history, the Civil War, late 19th and early 20th century America, labor history, and the American West” in the university’s history department. Online, however, Professor Loomis is a militantly unhinged foe of all things conservative.

This week, the nutty professor took to Twitter to rail against law-abiding gun owners and the National Rifle Association. “Looks like the National Rifle Association has murdered some more children,” Professor Loomis fumed. “Now I want Wayne LaPierre’s head on a stick,” he added. (LaPierre is Executive Vice President and Chief Executive Officer of the NRA.) Professor Loomis was just warming up.

“F**k the National Rifle Association and its policies to put crazy guns in everyone’s hands,” Professor Loomis tweeted. “You are g*dd*mn right we should politicize this tragedy. F**k the NRA. Wayne LaPierre should be in prison,” he spewed. “Can we define NRA membership dues as contributing to a terrorist organization?”

Continue reading.

Michelle cites numerous other examples of leftist loons chanting death to conservatives, and she writes:

So, it’s come to this: Advocating beheadings, beatings, and mass murder of peaceful Americans to pay for the sins of a soulless madman. But because the advocates of violence fashion themselves champions of non-violence and because they inhabit the hallowed worlds of Hollywood, academia, and the Democratic Party, it’s acceptable?

Blood-lusting hate speech must not get a pass just because it comes out of the mouths of the protected, anti-gun class.

The politics of the shooting are just getting going, if the Memeorandum feed is any indicator. [Added: Byron York indicates that things have gotten so bad that President's Obama's announcement of a commission to study gun violence is a way to "freeze" the politics and defuse the push for gun control legislation on the Hill: "Obama, Reid slam brakes on gun control."]

Meanwhile, Badger Pundit dug up Professor Loomis' dissertation abstract, and boy, what a find. Robert Stacy McCain has this, "He’s a Lumberjack, and He’s OK: The Wobbly Scholarship of Erik Loomis, Ph.D."

Expect updates...

PREVIOUSLY: "University of Rhode Island Condemns Violent Labor Historian Erik Loomis."

University of Rhode Island Condemns Violent Labor Historian Erik Loomis

The letter is posted to the main page at the university's website:

Statement From President David M. Dooley:

We appreciate your comments about a faculty member's recent personal social media posts. See URI President's Dooley's response.

My good friend Professor Daniel Nexon is not pleased, "Academic Administrative Fecklessness." But I'll disagree just a bit. As I noted previously, Loomis' timeline was practically splattered with blood from all the violent tweets and retweets he'd been sending out. It looked literally as if he'd blown a gasket, losing complete control of his faculties. At that point it became no longer a free speech issue but a public safety issue.

And it's not just on Twitter. Loomis' oeuvre featured death to conservatives as a supplementary byline. I've blogged on this for some time, for example, "Erik Loomis, University of Rhode Island History Professor, Calls for 'Decades-Long Fight to the Death' Against Conservatives." And on Loomis' Twitter threats, see "Obama and Progressives Exploit Child Killings to Advance Far-Left Agenda."

And see the search entry for "death threat connoisseur" Erik Loomis at Twitchy.

Added: At The Other McCain, "University President Repudiates Professor’s Violent Anti-NRA Messages."

MORE: From Robert "Che" Farley, who clearly advocates bloody eliminationist politics, "Intimidation." These assholes have no clue.

Robert H. Bork, 1927-2012

The great conservative jurist has died.

I've cited Judge Bork many times in my writings on the gay marriage debate, and he's the model for judicial restraint when I discuss the Supreme Court and constitutional interpretation in class. William Jacobson laments that Bork will be remember for the wrong reasons, "Robert Bork, R.I.P."

And at the New York Times, "Robert H. Bork, Conservative Jurist, Dies at 85" (via Memeorandum):

Robert H. Bork, a former solicitor general, federal judge and conservative legal theorist whose 1987 nomination to the United States Supreme Court was rejected by the Senate in a historic political battle whose impact is still being felt, died on Wednesday in Arlington, Va. He was 85.

Judge Bork’s death, of complications of heart disease, was confirmed by his son, Robert H. Bork Jr.

Judge Bork, who was senior judicial adviser this year to the presidential campaign of Gov. Mitt Romney, played a small but crucial role in the Watergate crisis as the solicitor general under President Richard M. Nixon. He carried out orders to fire a special prosecutor in what became known as “the Saturday Night Massacre.” He also handed down notable decisions from the federal appeals court bench. But it was as a symbol of the nation’s culture wars that Judge Bork made his name.

It is rare for the Senate in its constitutional “advice and consent” role to turn down a president’s Supreme Court nominee, and rarer still for that rejection to be based not on qualifications but on judicial philosophy and temperament. That turned Judge Bork’s defeat into a watershed event and his name into a verb: getting “borked” is what happens to a nominee rejected for what supporters consider political motives.

The success of the anti-Bork campaign is widely seen to have shifted the tone and emphasis of Supreme Court nominations since then, giving them an often strong political cast and making it hard, many argue, for a nominee with firmly held views ever to get confirmed.

Till the end of his life, Judge Bork argued that American judges, acting to please a liberal elite, have hijacked the struggle over national values by overstepping their role, especially in many of the most important decisions on civil rights and liberties, personal autonomy and regulation of business.

He advocated a view of judging known as “strict constructionism,” or “originalism,” because it seeks to limit constitutional values to those explicitly enunciated by the Framers and to reject those that evolved in later generations. He dismissed the view that the courts had rightly come to the aid of those neglected by the majority. By contrast, he felt that majorities, through legislatures, should be empowered to make all decisions not specifically addressed in the Constitution.

He most famously took issue with the Supreme Court’s assertion in the 1960s and ’70s that the Constitution implicitly recognizes a right of privacy that bars states from outlawing abortion or the use of contraceptives by married couples.

That position along with his rejection of court-mandated help to minority groups led a coalition of liberal groups to push successfully for his Senate defeat, motivated in no small part by their sense that he cared more about abstract legal reasoning than the people affected by it. They contended that his confirmation would produce a radical shift on a closely divided Supreme Court and “turn back the clock” on civil and individual rights.

Judge Bork, who was 60 at the time, was sitting on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, often a steppingstone to the Supreme Court, when President Ronald Reagan announced on July 1, 1987, that he was nominating him to the high court to replace Lewis Powell, a moderate justice who was retiring. Within an hour of the announcement, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, the Massachusetts Democrat, set the tone for the bruising contest to come when he said in a speech:

“Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, school children could not be taught about evolution, writers and artists could be censored at the whim of government, and the doors of the federal courts would be shut on the fingers of millions of citizens for whom the judiciary is — and is often the only — protector of the individual rights that are the heart of our democracy.”

Mary Jo Kopechne could not be reached for comment.

Added: At Althouse, "Robert Bork has died."

Chuck Hagel Under Fire as Possible Defense Sec. Nominee

It's no surprise that he's O's favorite for Defense. They're like brothers in their Israel bashing.

The New York Times reports, "Comments on Israel by Top Contender for Defense Secretary Are Scrutinized."

And see Bret Stephens, at the Wall Street Journal, "Chuck Hagel's Jewish Problem."

Also at Pamela's, "Jew-Hater for Defense?"

Libya Inquiry Sharply Critical of State Department

At The Hill, "Benghazi probe faults 'systemic failures' at State Department":

An independent review of the deadly attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi made public Tuesday night faults “systemic failures and leadership and management deficiencies at senior levels” of the State Department.

The report by the Accountability Review Board says the local mission's reliance on Libyan guards and militia members was “misplaced” and that the Libyan government's response was “profoundly lacking.” However it “did not find reasonable cause to determine that any individual U.S. government employee breached his or her duty.”

The report also confirms that there was no peaceful protest ahead of the attack that killed Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans, as the Obama administration initially said in the days after the attack.

“The Board concluded that there was no protest prior to the attacks, which were unanticipated in their scale and intensity,” the report says.

In a letter to Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.), Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she accepted the report's 29 recommendations, all but five of which are unclassified. She said her department has already taken additional steps to beef up security at U.S. diplomatic posts around the world, including instituting periodic reviews of the 15 to 20 high-threat posts.

Of course she accepts the findings.

If she didn't accept them I doubt she would have taken to fainting so conveniently. She would have been up on Capitol Hill denouncing the politicization of the administration's foreign policy. But now she's just quietly accepting the recommendations, laying low while she eases out of office, keeping the road open to her 2016 presidential bid. How corrupt.

More at Legal Insurrection, "Benghazi Report — No protest, deteriorating security conditions ignored."

PREVIOUSLY: "Benghazi Reveals Obama Is a Coward and Disgrace."

NBC's Richard Engel Says Captors Were Assad Loyalists

At the Wall Street Journal, "Freed Reporter Links Captors to Assad":

BEIRUT—Richard Engel, the NBC News foreign correspondent freed with colleagues Monday after five days of captivity in Syria, on Tuesday said he believed his kidnappers were Shiite militiamen loyal to President Bashar al-Assad who planned to exchange the U.S. news team for prisoners held by the rebels.

NBC said on Tuesday that Mr. Engel and his production team returned unharmed to Turkey, from where they had crossed into northwestern Syria on Thursday.

Read the whole thing.

Kate Upton Strips for Antarctic Photo Shoot

I know folks were doing Rule 5 roundups over the weekend but I wasn't in the mood. Since then most of the big news has been dealing with the gun control debate, save perhaps the fiscal cliff negotiations. Emotional, but tedious (especially the endless gun control mindlessness).

In any case, Egotastic has this, "Kate Upton Bikini Pictures Melt the Antarctic; You Really Must See These." And Page Six at the New York Post, "PHOTOS: See Kate Upton’s sexy bikini shoot in Antarctica."

BONUS: Pirate's Cove remained on full-speed Rule 5 coverage, "If All You See…is a wonder planet healing bike, you might just be a Warmist." And, "Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup."

Erik Loomis Implosion: Do You Need a Ph.D. in Historical Dildology?

Robert Stacy McCain rips Professor Erik Loomis, who, before deleting his Twitter feed, was bragging about the awesomeness of dildo history. See, "Herbert Marcuse, Wile E. Coyote and the Auto-Beclownment of Erik Loomis, Ph.D":

The epic saga of University of Rhode Island Assistant Professor of History Erik Loomis shall live long in blogospheric lore. Twitchy is taking a victory lap over the professor’s unfortunate metaphorical seppuku: He had to delete his Twitter account, but not before Tweeting this:

“I love teaching books on the history of sexuality. I talked about dildos in a completely appropriate way in class today.”

Yeah: The taxpayers of Rhode Island (and the parents of university students) are paying Erik Loomis to teach kids the history of dildos.

Do you need a Ph.D. to do that? Where do you get a doctoral degree in Historical Dildology? Are there federal research grants available?

Humor aside, Instapundit exposes Loomis’s pretzel logic:

The anti-NRA syllogism seems to work this way: (1) Something bad happened; (2) I hate you; so (3) It’s your fault.

This is how people “think” when the object is not to find truth, but to justify their own prejudices. This is the dangerous logic of scapegoating. The characteristic viciousness of the Left stems from a radical certainty of their own moral and intellectual superiority and, by the obverse, the inferiority of the Right...

More at the link.

My previous entries on that violent idiot are here.

Jedediah Bila on Red Eye

Via Ms. Bila on Twitter.

Ambassador John Bolton is a guest as well.

Megyn Kelly Broke Down in Tears During Monday's Fox News Coverage of Newtown Massacre

I think most people have broken down at some point. It's an emotional story.

At Gateway Pundit, "FOX News Host Megyn Kelly Breaks Down in Tears During Moving Sandy Hook Segment (Video)."

I don't know how well I would hold up if something happened to my family. But I know I'd need to be strong for my wife if anything happened to our boys. She wouldn't be able to hold up very long. In any case, the Rekos family story is at London's Daily Mail, "'The life was sucked out of us': Parents of first grader Jessica Rekos reveal moment they found out she was dead - and how they went home and lay in her bed for hours."

ObamaCare Medical Device Tax Will Deal Crushing Blow to Orange County Businesses

My previous report is here, "Democrats Seek Delay of ObamaCare Medical Device Tax."

And here's this at the Orange County Register, "A prescription that kills innovation":

No state will be more adversely effected than California by the 2.3 percent tax increase on medical devices, which the Obama administration expects to raise nearly $3 billion over the next decade.

Indeed, while the United States is the world leader in medical devices and diagnostics, the Golden State is by far the nation's leader, accounting for a fifth of total U.S. sales and employment.

The threat of the federal tax hike on medical devices will be especially damaging to Orange County, which is the hub of California's medical device and diagnostics sector. The sector accounts for more than $11 billion in economic activity within the county, according to life-science association BIOCOM Southern California. The average O.C. salary for those employed in the sector is $108,799.

The Medical Device Manufacturing Association points out that the Obamacare tax hike will be levied on a company's total revenues, regardless of whether it makes a profit.

That means that many companies will owe more in taxes than they generate from their operations.

As MDMA President and CEO Mark Leahy recently told lawmakers in the Nation's Capital, "We are already seeing the negative impact this onerous policy is having on jobs and innovation, and America's med-tech innovators can't afford to find out what implementation of the device tax would bring."

That's why we urge senators Feinstein and Boxer to add their voices to those of their fellow Democratic senators to delay, if not repeal altogether, the scheduled implementation of the innovation-killing tax hike on life-saving medical devices.

Clueless freakin' progs.

'Speaking out is one thing, calling for someone to be killed is another thing entirely...'

Professor Erik Loomis has deleted his Twitter account, but the backlash against him isn't slowing down.

Loomis' problem isn't just the one tweet calling for Wayne LaPierre's head on a pike. It's his entire personal footprint online. He's showed himself over and over again to be a vocal advocate for violent responses to political opponents, even retweeting specific calls for murder. Reading back over at the comments at Campus Reform, Sarah Spooner Curran, a moderate, explains how Loomis crossed the line:

Another embarrasement from RI. And another democrat wolf trying to wear sheeps clothing. Why does he go straight for the divisive card, suggesting that all NRA members must be republicans? I thought a college prof would be more thoughtful, as an RI taxpayer I do not want him teaching my children hate. A terrible thing happened, but I think we first must look at mental health issues and reforms before storming the doors of the nra, looking to lay blame on them. Mentally ill people need help, and parents need resources to help them. We need to also consider as a society how much we want to restrict ourselves, and while I agree that I see no need for a person not in the service/police to ever have a semi automatic weapon, I am not willing to say we should ban all gun ownership. I have a family member who is an avid sportsman, and is a member of the nra, and is the furthest thing from a "terrorist". URI needs to take a long hard look at mr loomis, for speaking out is one thing, calling for someone to be killed is another thing entirely.

There's lots more comments at the link, including some who've contacted the university's administration. Considering how Lawyers, Guns and Money is implicated, no doubt there's some karmic burn at work here. These people dish out the most vicious hate day after day and act with impunity, and now it's coming back to bite on Loomis, and hard. It doesn't look good for him at this point. He deleted his Twitter account and all kinds of people are contacting his university. The police visited him. It can't be fun, but you reap what you sow and in this case he's got a long trail of violent comments, advocating murder of his opponents. That's over the line for most people.

Again, check that Twitchy curation to recall the depravity, "University of Rhode Island professor’s retweet: Murder anyone who thinks teachers should be armed; Update: Police met with prof."

Plus, there's a Memeorandum thread linking Leslie Eastman at Williams Jacobson's College Insurrection, "Rhode Island prof demands NRA chief's “head on a stick” (Update - deletes Twitter account)." Also at Legal Insurrection, "Violent rhetoric for we, but not for thee (Update – Twitter account deleted)."

See Instapundtit as well, "MORE WITH THE anti-gun anger issues," and "ELIMINATIONIST RHETORIC."

More at The Other McCain, "Is It ‘Metaphor’ to Suggest Erik Loomis Should Be Sodomized by Orangutangs? UPDATE: Is Professor ‘Head on a Stick’ Now Under State Police Protection?"

Well, I suspect he got a warning from the police, although the way it's going I wouldn't be too careful about some right-wing crazies showing up in that neck of the woods. Some folks might not take too kindly to Loomis' threats. The guy should be more careful.

Expect updates...

Obama and Progressives Exploit Child Killings to Advance Far-Left Agenda

Let's be clear about some things.

The response on the left to Newtown has been unanimous. Before the facts were known ghouls from every segment of the far-left political establishment went to work, exploiting the dead --- before families had even collected their loved ones --- and pushed to confiscate the guns of law-abiding citizens and to strip them of their constitutional rights to bear arms. This is not the odd left-wing wacko. This is the entire Democrat establishment from the president on down. And the politics is getting as extreme as I've seen in some time, and that's saying a lot considering how bad things have gotten since Barack Hussein's election in 2008.

Radical historian Erik Loomis is doubling-down on his attacks on the NRA and is upping the ante with calls to repeal the Second Amendment:

The NRA pushes for policies that make it complicit in mass murders in the US and Mexico. Repeal the 2nd Amendment.
— Erik Loomis (@ErikLoomis) December 18, 2012

It turns out that Loomis is getting some hard push-back after his calls for the assassination of the NRA president, discussed here. And now this idiot has written a post so stupid that it genuinely calls into question this man's qualifications, and his sanity, "On Metaphors and Violence." Loomis is blaming everyone else for his outrageous F-Bomb Twitter tirade. His tweets were filled with all kinds of violent agitation, retweeting calls for death to gun rights supporters, as this Twitchy curation shows, "University of Rhode Island professor’s retweet: Murder anyone who thinks teachers should be armed; Update: Police met with prof." Pretty much all of Loomis' violent tweets at that link, plus an apt observation:

There’s been a lot of talk lately about the need for access to mental health services. We hope Loomis seeks the help he so obviously needs.

For sure.

But again, it's the hardline progressive agenda that's the source of such violent ideological outbursts. Here's IBD's commentary on the president's statements at the Newtown vigil, "Obama Call For Change Exploits School Massacre":

By using the massacre in Newtown, Conn., to fire up the left's anti-liberty agenda, President Obama and other prominent liberal Democrats are taking Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's infamous maxim — "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste" — to new depths.

At a Sunday night prayer vigil in Newtown, the president delivered words that on their face appear soothing, hope-filled and decisive — exactly what's expected of presidential leadership. "These tragedies must end," he said. "And to end them, we must change."

But when Obama repeats that single-worded slogan from his presidential campaign, we know what kind of "change" he wants.

Instantly after the attack, New York City Rep. Jerry Nadler declared war on the National Rifle Association: "We have to go to war against the people who enable the gun violence, the people who stop us from keeping guns out of the hands of mentally unstable people, of felons, and that means the NRA leadership."

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, proposing a massive package of federal gun-control measures, appeared on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday and declared, "We don't need people carrying guns in public places."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., is introducing an assault weapons ban, and second-ranking Senate Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois announced there will be Senate hearings on gun control.

Beyond banning assault weapons, Senate Judiciary Committee Democrat Charles Schumer mulled limiting clips to 10 rounds and acting to keep guns from the mentally unstable. Schumer's laughable idea of compromise with the right is to "admit that there is a Second Amendment right to bear arms" — which would be kind of hard to deny since the Supreme Court's 2008 Heller decision confirmed it.

All this amounts to an attempt to take political advantage of the butchery of children. But Anders Breivik's slaughter of 69 attendees of a youth camp in heavily gun-controlled Norway last year shows the ineffectiveness of gun-ban laws, as does the violent crime in the big U.S. cities — such as Bloomberg's New York and Emanuel's Chicago — with the strictest gun control.

Indeed, as criminologists Don B. Kates and Gary Mauser found in an exhaustive 2007 Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy study of gun laws and violence rates in the U.S. and Europe, "many high gun-ownership nations have much lower murder rates" than low gun-ownership-countries.

As the Washington Post's Jennifer Rubin notes, "liberals' religious-like faith in government and in the ability of legislation to control and even perfect the human condition" is no protection against mass murderers, whose crimes do "not seem to be affected by the economy or by law enforcement strategies."

As you can see, the gun control fanatics are having an orgiastic outburst of gun confiscation fervor. I've been posting on freaks such as MSNBC's Ed Schultz and the stupid faux conservative David Frum. And Sunday's "Face the Nation" was a veritable who's who of fanatical anti-gun zealots.

Their program has the imprimatur of the man at the top of the left's political hierarchy, and the sick exploitation lobby goes down from the MSNBC journalists spouting editorial points while purportedly reporting the news, to the academic grandstanders among the left's professoriate, to the Democrats in Congress hot off the news pushing for new legislation, to the left's ghouls on Twitter trying to silence reasonable comments on the right to bear arms, and to the ASFL fever-swamp bloggers pathetically pushing the left's disgusting talking points.

This is a truly depraved time in this country. The threat to liberty and goodness is on the left. The country needs to mourn after these tragedies. And we need to think about how mental health services intertwine with the right to bear arms. But blanket calls to ban guns and strip Second Amendment rights from law-abiding Americans is pure political extremism, sick and reprehensible left-wing political extremism.

Added: At Twitchy, "Rhode Island professor Erik Loomis deletes his Twitter account."

The epitome of an Adult Sick Fuck Loser. Pray the dude gets the help he needs before he goes off on someone.

Radical History Professor Erik Loomis Calls for Assassination of NRA's Wayne LaPierre

This idiot gets more violent every time.

At Campus Reform, "Professor calls for assassination of NRA CEO."

Dear Republicans, Do you know the definition of family values? It's not having our kids FUCKING SHOT AT SCHOOL!! Fuck the NRA.
— Erik Loomis (@ErikLoomis) December 14, 2012

Also at the College Fix, "PROFESSOR’S TWEETS SEEK NRA CEO’S ‘HEAD ON A STICK’."

Loomis is yet another objectively bad person, a leftist literally pocked through with visceral hatred. (And right at home with his fellow ASFLs* at Lawyers, Guns and Money.)

PREVIOUSLY: "Erik Loomis, University of Rhode Island History Professor, Calls for 'Decades-Long Fight to the Death' Against Conservatives." He's obviously not kidding.

* "Adult sick-fuck loser" (cf. Amy Alkon).

Half-Mast

I was down in Huntington Beach yesterday, taking my Honda Odyssey to the dealer for an oil-change. The Ford dealership on Beach Boulevard had a big, beautiful flag flying at half-mast in honor of the victims of Newtown.

Drew Barrymore's Baby Joy

Imagine a child movie star you're seen grow up and have her own children, a beautiful woman and a beautiful child.

Now open your eyes.

It's a lovely story, at People Magazine. We need some more loveliness right now.

See: "Drew Barrymore Introduces Daughter Olive."

Says Barrymore, "It's like the biggest crush I've ever had in my life. I dance, I sing, I jump up and down. I do anything!"

"This is the place where it feels right. I was thinking back the other day to all the milestones I've had in this magazine. It was a very positive, introspective moment. I'm ready to try to be the best parent I can be. As life gets shorter, the stakes get higher. And this is the most important thing I will ever do."

Union Thug Was Attacking Crowder Before Fists Flew in Viral Video

At Legal Insurrection, "Union member was taunting and confronting Steven Crowder prior to sucker punch."

More at Twitchy, "Steven Crowder promises more damning video of union thug violence."

No amount of evidence will satisfy the deranged progressive mob, but if stories like this are able to gain mainstream attention, and that's a big if, then Americans for once will get the genuine inside dope on these fiends.

Progressives suck.

Mental Illness and the Gun Control Debate

A thought-provoking essay from Robert Leider, at the Wall Street Journal, "Breaking the Gun Control Stalemate."

Read it at the link.

It doesn't make sense for gun control proposals to ignore the history of mental illness in all the recent shooting massacres. If progressives go after guns without mental health reforms, they'll have no credibility. And mind you, I'm being charitable as it is. I'm taking the president at his word, and Senators Feinstein and Schumer. Democrats will go for a big play on firearms. Of course, confiscating guns is what the left's program is all about. They don't give a s*** about the mentally ill except as a hammer to beat opponents. Once they get their legislation going it'll be all about screwing the "evil" gun lobby.

But again, I think Leider's piece is interesting. I just doubt far-left partisans will be as rational about things.

California Democrats Face the Supermajority Challenge

I don't see what's the problem. It's been a Democrat state for a while now. But come January there'll be no real legislative constraints. They'll be able to do what they want, which will be finding more and more ways to levy taxes on an overburdened populace. It's going to be interesting to see if Californians hold up against the onslaught.

At the New York Times, "With a Supermajority, California Democrats Begin to Make Plans":

LOS ANGELES — The Democratic Party has controlled the California Legislature for a nearly unbroken stretch of 42 years. Yet control goes only so far: it takes two-thirds of the Legislature to enact a host of important legislation in this state, meaning that even the diminished Republican Party has been able to easily frustrate Democratic ambitions.

But with a swell of electoral victories in November, the Democratic Party has now crossed that boundary and controls two-thirds of both the Senate and the Assembly, giving it the kind of unfettered power that no party has had here for 80 years.

This does not appear to be a passing advantage. Even Republicans say that changes in electoral demographics mean that, with the exception of a few brief lapses caused by vacancies, Democrats could hold a supermajority at least through the end of the decade.

Yet in the “be careful what you wish for” department, Democrats are beginning to confront the struggles and complications that come with being in charge of the store. This authority came at least two years earlier than most Democrats had projected. And it is unleashing years of pent-up Democratic desires — to roll back spending cuts, approve a bond issue to rebuild the state’s water system, amend the state’s tax code, revamp California’s governance system — that had been largely checked by the Republican minority.

At the same time, it is stirring concerns from Democrats, among them Gov. Jerry Brown, that the situation may inspire an overreach that could make the party’s reign brief. By contrast, some Democrats argue that handled correctly, the next two years could provide an opportunity to lock in long-term control.

Continue reading.

I don't think the "restraint" forces will have much of a chance. When has restraint been the order of the day in the past? Politics come January is going to be all about ways to change the state's tax system, to find more ways to confiscate the people's money and fund a bloated, tyrannical state bureaucratic monster. Meanwhile, California will continue to lag in all the leading indicators of economic and demographic well-being. The West Coast dystopia.

NBC's Chief Foreign Correspondent Richard Engel Missing in Syria

He's a fascinating reporter.

I always notice his interesting speaking style, and he's very knowledgable on the issues.

London Daily Mail reports, "NBC News chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel missing in Syria since last Thursday."

And at Twitchy, "Rumor mill: NBC News reporter Richard Engel missing in Syria?; Update: NBC can’t reach Engel this morning." The network's trying to enforce a news blackout, presumably to keep Engel safe, but that's not going over so well: "NBC News tries, fails, to eliminate tweets about Richard Engel’s disappearance."

I'll be updating on this story as information becomes available. And I'll be praying.

Shameful Media Coverage of the Newtown Massacre

A Matt Lewis commentary, at The Week, "The media should be ashamed of its Connecticut coverage":

...transparent society demands reporting newsworthy incidents — and this definitely qualifies. But it should be done responsibly. And that is not what we have witnessed. We have instead a feeding frenzy that is all about beating the competition — not disseminating information.

It's about being first, beating other media outlets, and making a name for themselves. It's a ghoulish mentality that stokes controversy and violence — for business purposes. It's a sort of "if it bleeds it leads" mentality that causes cable networks to create logos and theme music for such tragic events (all the while, they feign maudlin concern and outrage.)

Come to think of it, the media is guilty of doing what they criticize big business for — putting money (in this case, ratings, newsstand sales, and web traffic) ahead of humanity and decency. Just as greedy businessmen put profit and personal gain ahead of ethics, so too do our media outlets.

More at that top link.

Also see Hugh Hewitt, at The Washington Examiner, "The Media Vultures Gather."

It's a big story, no doubt, marred by lots of erroneous reporting and more of the same ghoulish Democrat politicization that we've seen after all of the last mass shootings, from Tucson to Aurora. And of course President Never-Let-a-Crisis-Go-to-Waste will be up with some gun control legislation faster than you can say political exploitation.

Gun Violence and the Mentally Ill

From Rick Moran, at PJ Media, "Can We Keep Guns Out of the Hands of the Mentally Ill?"

And from Gabriella Rosen Kellerman, at the Atlantic, "Diagnosing Adam Lanza."

RELATED: From Robert Stacy McCain, "Criticism From a Friend: Can We Help Victims of Random Sarcasm Syndrome?"

President Obama's Speech at Newtown, Connecticut

The Washington Post has both the video and transcript, "President Obama’s speech at prayer vigil for Newtown shooting victims (Full transcript)." (Via Memeorandum.)

I have to agree with Dana Loesch. Obama turned this into a gun control rally, and he's not ashamed to do it. Clear as a bell.

He just politicized a prayer service.
— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) December 17, 2012

If you want death threats from the peace and love "no guns" crowd, just say that you thought the president inserted politics into tonight.
— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) December 17, 2012

And here's this from Twitchy, "Dana Loesch says Obama’s speech at vigil was political; Libs unleash torrent of hate."

I seriously cannot keep up with all the "c*nts," "burn in hells," "all your fault" Tweets from progressives.
— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) December 17, 2012

That's a torrent of hate alright. Progressives are unleashing it all over the place following the shooting.

More from Twitchy, "Post-Newtown witch hunt: NRA president and members bombarded with death threats." And from Weasel Zippers, "Liberals Call For Murder of NRA President and Its Members…"

Well, I mentioned already that the left's gun control agenda is just the prelude to silencing the conservative opposition, the opening program toward stacking conservative corpses in the left's gulag archipelago. The progressive mouthpieces on MSNBC don't even try to hide this agenda. They just put it right out there, so folks shouldn't be surprised at what's coming down the pike, from Weasel Zippers, "MSNBC Knuckle-Dragger Ed Schultz Advocates “Confiscating” Guns From Law-Abiding Americans…"

Democrats Push Gun Control Legislation in Senate

I discussed Senator Charles Schumer earlier, who said the shooting put us at "the tipping point" for the (left's) national conversation on gun control, "Tragedy and Exploitation – the Progressive Way."

And now here comes Senator Dianne Feinstein, "Sen. Feinstein to introduce gun-control bill next year":

WASHINGTON — Two days after the shooting deaths of 26 people at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school, Sen. Dianne Feinstein pledged Sunday that she would introduce new gun-control legislation at the beginning of next year’s congressional session.

“It [the bill] will ban the sale, the transfer, the transportation and the possession,” the California senator said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “Not retroactively, but prospectively. And it will ban the same for big clips, drums or strips of more than 10 bullets.”

Feinstein said the purpose of her proposal, a version of the assault-weapons ban that expired in 2004, is to get “weapons of war off the streets of our cities.”

Officials have said that most of those killed in Friday’s massacre — a toll that included 20 children — were shot with a semiautomatic assault-style rifle.

Feinstein has been at the forefront of gun-control efforts nationally. The assault weapons ban that she pushed followed mass killings in a Stockton schoolyard and in a San Francisco office tower. Feinstein was also at San Francisco City Hall in 1978 when Supervisor Dan White killed Mayor George Moscone and fellow Supervisor Harvey Milk. Feinstein saw White flee their offices and found Milk, memorably saying afterward that when she felt for a pulse, her finger slipped into a bullet hole. Feinstein, then the head of the Board of Supervisors, became mayor upon Moscone’s death.

Oh, she means well alright, but she'll have more credibility when she also starts pushing the discussion on expanding mental health services, with talk of involuntary placement of the mentally ill. That's not the hippest topic, of course, but it's the one we must have if we're going to have a legitimate "national conservation" on gun violence. See Leslie Eastman, at Legal Insurrection, "Mother recounts terrors of raising genius son with violence-oriented mental illness."

RELATED: From Politico, at Memorandum, "Schumer, Feinstein push changes on gun laws."

Obama to Speak at Prayer Vigil in Connecticut

USA Today reports, and Slone reacts on Twitter:

HERE HE COMES: President-never-let-a-crisis-go-to-waste:President now on Air Force One and en route Newtown, CT #tcot
— slone (@slone) December 16, 2012

BONUS: Aaron Worthing's post from the other day, "A Few Thoughts About the Crime in Connecticut And Gun Control":

...while I am getting sick of the politicization of every tragedy, I am not going to overly object to people talking about gun control today.  I don’t support gun control, but let’s have this out.  If we can’t stand up for the Second Amendment today, we are just going to lose the argument.

The reality is the “lets ban all guns” theory is simply a bit of what I call “silver bullet utopianism”—that is the idea that a large and complex problem can be solved easily with a proverbial silver bullet.  And it is utopianism, with dangerous consequences in real life if we don’t wake up from it.

As I quipped today on Twitter, one only has to drive through downtown D.C. late into the night to see how successful the ban on prostitution is.  You see them, openly and notoriously operating on corners only blocks away from the White House.

(Must... resist... urge... to make cheap “politicians are prostitutes” joke.)

The same can be said for drugs and illegal immigration.  I can name for you several spots where the illegal workers line up.  Everyone can.  It’s no secret.  It’s open and notorious.

And it is downright bizarre to see many of the same liberals who advocate drug legalization, or open borders on the theory that “you just can’t stop the flow” simultaneously argue that banning guns will accomplish anything but disarming solely the law-abiding citizens.

And there are several other problems with banning guns.  For one thing, what liberals are advocating is that the government have a monopoly on the use of deadly force—or more precisely the government and the criminals who violate the law.  Good law abiding citizens shouldn’t protect themselves, the argument goes, the government should protect them...

Well, the left-wing sickos have no shame.

It's all about stripping law-abiding citizens of their guns. The left's "gun control" agenda certainly won't stop gun violence.

PREVIOUSLY: "Tragedy and Exploitation – the Progressive Way."

Tragedy and Exploitation – the Progressive Way

I watched "Face the Nation" earlier. All the panelists were exploiting the tragedy to push for more gun control, with host Bob Schieffer being the most aggressive of them all, even broadcasting a big gun-control editorial at the bottom of the hour. It's really amazing to listen to this. Democrat Senator Chuck Schumer suggested the country was ready for action since Sandy Hook was "the tipping point" in the so-called national conversation. Surprisingly, Schumer sounded at times reasonable, especially when he slammed idiot progressives for wanting to take away Americans' guns. Here's the segment with Schumer's comments, "Is it time for tougher gun laws?" Also on the show was the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg. Over the top, he said this massacre was the nation's "new 9/11" (and folks can just ponder the mind-bogging, incommensurable obscenities dripping from that remark). And what gun control love fest would be complete without the despicable "big thinker" David Frum, who befouled himself with a disgusting series of comments over the past few days. Frum's an objectively bad person and few have topped his inhuman posturing on this, and that's saying a lot.

In any case, here's Derek Hunter, at Townhall, "Tragedy and Exploitation – the Progressive Way":

I’ve said before how progressives will exploit anyone and anything to advance their agenda, but I’d always thought there was a line, somewhere, of decency they wouldn’t cross. I was wrong.

With the blood of the victims still wet, progressives began their call for gun control. They had no idea if the guns were purchased legally (they were, and stolen from the first murder victim, the killer’s mother), what kind of guns they were (they were pistols, not “assault weapons,” though a semi-automatic rifle was found, unused, in the killer’s car), or even if the killer was in custody or dead (there were stories of a hunt for a second shooter) before they succumbed to the siren call of their agenda.

Michael Moore, noted tragedy profiteer, took to Twitter with “Only minutes away from pundits & politicians say, "This isn't the time to talk about gun control." Really? When is that moment?”

A short time later he followed up with “The NRA hates freedom. They don't want you to have the freedom to send your children to school & expect them to come home alive.”

No fiction writer could do the sickness of that man justice.

But Moore wasn’t alone, David Frum was his usual self and joined a chorus of his fellow progressives that included Piers Morgan, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and nearly the entire homepage of The Huffington Post in calling for more gun control.

Actress Rashida Jones tweeted, “Gun control is our only road to freedom. Freedom from the fear of senselessly losing children. I'm so saddened. WE NEED LAWS NOW.”

The stupidity of these people is self-evident. States with the most freedom to own and carry guns have the lowest crime rates. Meanwhile, cities such as Chicago, where it’s illegal to own a gun, have the most gun violence.

But although the side of liberty has the statistics, progressives play on emotion. Facts don’t matter in a world of crying children, and progressives know it. A complicated issue is offered a simple solution that appeals to the feeling of helplessness and promises to alleviate it. It’s a tactic used by despots throughout history.

Actually, Hunter is only partially correct on the weapons used. We didn't know that the Bushmaster was used until yesterday, when the medical examiner issued a report on the findings from the crime scene. Initial police reports said only that two handguns were used. But Hunter is right to note that the facts don't matter to the despicable gun-confiscation leftists. Just to mention that the gunman may have had a semiautomatic rifle was enough for radical leftists to launch the most heinous campaign of lies and disinformation. These people are depraved. As Hunter continues:

The president was reserved and presidential in his remarks, and the White House said this is not the time to press an agenda (we’ll see how long that lasts). But their allies would have none of it. Progressive activists and their fellow travellers in the media have a storied history of dancing on graves to advance their agenda, but rarely have they danced so gleefully on such tiny graves yet to be dug. Time will tell which argument wins the day, but I have my suspicions. As President Obama’s former chief of staff once famously said, “You never want a serious crisis go to waste.”

Dancing on the graves. The blood hadn't dried and horrible, horrible progressive ghouls were demanding immediate action on gun control in Congress. Never let a crisis go to waste for these people, even before families are able to collect their loved ones. Godless and inhumane. Progressives are destroying this country right before our eyes. Don't let them. Stand for decency. Stand for liberty. Stand for reason and what is right, all that is the exact opposite of what the authoritarian collectivist left is pushing.

Progressives Push 'Social Justice' in Public Education

A great post and video at Blazing Cat Fur, "Ending Progressive Public Education."

Also at Eye Crazy, "Good news everyone! Canadian school kids are now getting Marxist indoctrination in Math class."

Connecticut Killer's Mother Taught Him How to Shoot

This story's at the New York Times, "Killer's Mother, His First Victim, Was a Gun Enthusiast, Friends Say" (via Memeorandum), and Telegraph UK, "Connecticut school massacre: Gunman's mother taught him to shoot."

She loved her guns, apparently, which is fine. But notice this bizarre and internally contradictory passage at the Telegraph's piece:

The killings have once again pushed America’s lax gun laws to the top of the political agenda. It was claimed last night that he had even tried to bolster his arsenal by buying another gun on Tuesday — three days before his murderous assault — but was refused because he did not have a “proper” permit.

The authors didn't think that through, eh? Connecticut's gun laws are not "lax," a point made even more obvious in the case of the suspect, who was turned down for another weapon by those very same not-so-lax state gun laws.

More here: "Semiautomatic Rifle Was Used in Attack."

Madness, Deinstitutionalization and Murder

From Clayton Cramer's research paper at The Federalist Society (via Althouse):

Studies in New York and Connecticut from the 1920s through the 1940s showed a much lower arrest rate for the mentally ill. In an era when involuntary commitment was relatively easy, those who were considered a danger to themselves or others would be hospitalized at the first signs of serious mental illness. The connection between insanity and crime was apparent, and the society took a precautionary approach. Mentally ill persons who were not hospitalized were those not considered a danger to others. This changed as deinstitutionalization took effect.

Be sure to read it all. For example:

Patrick Purdy, a mentally ill drifter, used his Social Security Disability payments to buy guns, while having a series of run-ins with the law. After one suicide attempt in jail in 1987, a mental health evaluation concluded that he was “a danger to his health and others.” In January 1989, Purdy went onto a schoolyard in Stockton, California with an AK-47 rifle, murdered five children and wounded twenty-nine others, before taking his own life.

Lots more examples like that at the link, but Purdy's is interesting. His crimes led to the passage of the federal assault weapons ban in 1994 (which expired in 2004). The left always uses these horrific killings to take away guns, and the media's working hard now to exploit Sandy Hook for the same purposes. See: "Media Sets Gun Control Narrative, Shuts Down Mental Health Debate."

  RELATED: At The Other McCain, "Guns Don’t Kill People …"

Semiautomatic Rifle Was Used in Attack

More details on the Sandy Hook Massacre, and an update to my previous report, "Ghoulish Walter James Casper III Exploits Connecticut School Massacre to Push Gun Control, Spread Lies and Disinformation."

At the Wall Street Journal, "Semiautomatic Rifle Was Used in Attack":

SANDY HOOK, Conn.—The 26 victims who were shot inside a Connecticut elementary school on Friday were each hit by more than one bullet, most of them from the high-powered semiautomatic rifle wielded by the 20-year-old suspect, the state's chief medical examiner said on Saturday.

Authorities worked into Saturday morning at a temporary morgue on the school grounds to identify the bodies, H. Wayne Carver II said, as state authorities released the names of those killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. history.

On Saturday afternoon, authorities revealed the truth behind the grim numerical toll: a list of names, overwhelmingly female, heart-rendingly young. Twenty of the 26 victims in the school were just 6 or 7 years old.

"I believe they were all first-graders," Mr. Carver said.

Six adults also were killed in the school, including school psychologist Mary Jo Sherlach, the oldest victim, at age 56.

Mr. Carver said his staff would perform an autopsy Sunday on the two remaining dead in the spree: the suspect, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, who took his own life at the school, and his mother, Nancy Lanza, 52, whom Mr. Lanza shot and killed in the house the two shared in town.

Mr. Lanza's body was found close to the rifle and two handguns he carried, police said, and he is believed to have taken his own life.

Continue reading.

It wasn't until today that the medical examiner could release these details, including the information on finding the suspect's body and the weapons used. As the report continues:

The forcible entry helped solve one of the many unanswered questions about the massacre Friday: how a heavily armed young man was able to pass through the locked security doors of an elementary school.

School staff members saw evidence of forced entry as they were ushered out of the school, said Mary Ann Jacob, a clerk at the school library who hid with others in a storage room during the shooting spree. As they left the building, Ms. Jacob said she saw that the plate-glass window next to the building's front door was broken.

But much remained unanswered, and much of what had been assumed in the rush of the crisis turned out to be wrong. It was incorrect, Lt. J. Paul Vance of the Connecticut State Police said, that Mr. Lanza's mother had had any connection to Sandy Hook Elementary, where early reports suggested she had been a teacher.

Law-enforcement officials initially said an assault rifle had been discovered in a car in the school's parking lot. In fact, said Mr. Carver, the medical examiner, it had been the primary weapon used in the killings.

Robert Stacy McCain live-blogged developments yesterday. In an update he mentions the dramatic shifts in what was known throughout the day, "Chris Rock Was Right":

When I got up Friday morning, live-blogging a mass murder was not part of my plan for the day. In fact, at the end of a post Friday morning about labor union violence in Michigan, I promised further developments on that story. As I was researching that, however, the TV kept updating with news about a shooting at a school in Connecticut and I figured this might be a story worth mentioning on the blog.

The original 12:15 p.m. ET post relayed reports that “three people have been wounded or injured and one person, the suspected shooter, is dead,” but added the caution that “early reports on events like this can be often be confusing and/or inaccurate.”

To say the very least.

By the time I added the first update, NBC was already reporting 20 dead and next it was 24, then 26, then 27, and all these changing numbers were coming amid a welter of confusing (and, as it turned out, largely wrong) details about the shooter, about the victims, etc. And this kept going for about six hours. Everything is still pretty sketchy, but we now have the bare-bones facts of the story.

Well, the actual facts of the story didn't matter to the radical leftists like Angie Coiro and her hate-addled followers like Walter James "Hatesac" Casper III. Indeed, it's not about "gun control" with these people. It's about literally destroying right-wing impediments to statist authoritarianism:

@damkina Because the #NRA is partnered w/ #ALEC, which is fueled by the #Koch brothers. Unending $$$. We can't tackle this in bits &pieces.
— Angie Coiro (@Angie_Coiro) December 15, 2012

RT @leftonmain: NRA Under Twitter, Facebook Attack After Shootings huff.to/U17j8V \\ Only a taste of what's coming to them & #ALEC.
— Angie Coiro (@Angie_Coiro) December 15, 2012

Yes, "Only a taste of what's coming to them."

Stalin couldn't have stated his plans for liquidation of political enemies any more clearly.

The right to bear arms guarantees citizens the individual protection against the state. That's the central liberty guarantee extant in the Second Amendment. Along with freedom of speech, it's perhaps the most important right Americans have to defend against tyranny. And the radical left would strip those rights in a split second, obliterating the civil liberties of millions of law-abiding people who had nothing to do with this massacre or any one before it. Indeed, mass shooting like Sandy Hook are possible explicitly because upstanding citizens obey the law and come to places of work and school unarmed. It's the criminals who violate those so-called gun free zone to wreak unfathomable evil. The left's policies facilitate the killing, and then these sick-fucks exploit the murders to bring about even more draconian policies that will ultimately bring about even more killing. It's the progressive death loop of ever-expanding gun confiscation. This is the evil the Walter James Casper III tweeted out yesterday in his utterly inhumane rush to politically capitalize on the deaths of those innocent children, 16 of them just 6 years old. This is why decent, intelligent and God-fearing people stand up for the truth. This is why decent, law-abiding Americans repudiate the left's lies. They know where it leads. They know the left's policies will bring the reign of terror and the camps. The piles of bodies stacked like cord wood is the "taste of what's coming." The leftists just lay it out there for everyone to see. It would be shocking but we've seen this play before and the millions of piled corpses before the final curtain.

Stand tall against it. Stand for liberty. Stand against the left's program of death and destruction of the individual.

New Details in Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting

The chief medical examiner has released the names of the victims. At the Wall Street Journal, "Victims Are Named in Connecticut Shooting." And the Los Angeles Times, "Victims of Sandy Hook school shooting are named."

And contrary to some earlier reports, the gunman was not "buzzed in" the school's entrance. See the Los Angeles Times, "Connecticut shooting: Gunman forced his way into school, police say."

Plus, check this Fox News interview with criminal psychologist Alan Lipman, who notes that in every case, "the facts are, as in Aurora, as in Arizona, as in Virginia Tech, as in virtually every case the Secret Service studied of these kinds of events... Every one of these episodes is proceeded by an undiagnosed, untreated, mental illness."

Also at The Other McCain, "‘He Was a Quiet Ewok, Kept to Himself a Lot. Kind of a Loner, I Guess You’d Say’." (Via Memeorandum.)

Expect updates...

5:18pm Pacific: More, at London's Daily Mail, "Twelve little girls and eight little boys: Police name Connecticut massacre victims - all aged six and seven - as it's revealed gunman shot each child up to 11 times in 'revenge' attack after fighting with teachers the day before."

10:15pm Pacific: More, "Semiautomatic Rifle Was Used in Attack."

MSNBC's Alex Wagner: Hopefully Connecticut Massacre Will Create 'Political Capital' for Gun Control

These inhuman MSNBC progressives have no shame.

Video at RealClear Politics, "MSNBC Host: CT Shooting May Bring 'Political Capital' For Gun Control."

Tougher Gun Control Laws Unlikely After Elementary School Massacre

Listen to Piers Morgan get all angry and "furious," in his own words, all while completely ignoring the facts, and even distorting them. He points to the Bushmaster rifle in outrage even though that gun was not used in the massacre, and he rants about how all these guns were bought legally. They were, although the suspect stole them from his mother, whom he murdered, and then killed 20 children and 6 adults. Morgan was spouting the same nonsense after the Aurora shooting. We'll have more stupid gun control outrage after the next shooting, God forbid. But no matter what happens, fortunately, we're not likely to see a wave of repressive gun control laws that will only strip the civil liberties from law-abiding citizens and do nothing to stop gun violence.

More at the Los Angeles Times, "Tougher gun laws seem unlikely even after school shooting":

WASHINGTON — Another mass shooting, another drive for gun control. But will the latest shooting — this time at an elementary school — change the political calculus in Washington and generate more support for tougher gun laws?

"I think the impact of this is going to be inescapable," said Kristen Rand, legislative director of the Violence Policy Center.

The massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., is among the worst shootings in the nation's history and comes after a spate of other high-profile episodes of violence, including mass shootings this year at a Colorado movie theater, a Wisconsin temple and an Oregon shopping mall. The rampage in Connecticut left 27 dead, 20 of them children ages 5 to 10. The shooter then killed himself.

But although the tender age of the victims brought tears to President Obama's eyes and an assertion from him that "We're going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics," political observers from both parties were doubtful that anything major would be done.

"You think Social Security is the third rail of politics, try guns," said a Republican strategist, who spoke on the condition that he not be named because of the sensitivity of the subject.

Congress, far from being inclined to tighten gun laws, allowed an assault weapons ban to lapse in 2004.

"You have Republicans getting a lot of push-back from the base on a number of issues, such as agreeing to tax increases and compromising on immigration. Throwing the 2nd Amendment and gun rights into the mix would be devastating to the party," said a congressional Republican staffer, requesting anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the issue.

Opposition comes not just from Republicans. A number of Democrats have been skittish about the issue, contending that Al Gore's support for gun control cost him votes in rural states in the 2000 presidential election.

White House spokesman Jay Carney steered clear of the issue when asked about it Friday, saying it was a day for mourning, not policy debates. That stance immediately drew criticism from the left, and gun control advocates moved swiftly to ratchet up the pressure on Obama.

"If now is not the time to have a serious discussion about gun control ... I don't know when is," said Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.).

"President Obama rightly sent his heartfelt condolences to the families in Newtown. But the country needs him to send a bill to Congress," New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said.

About 200 protesters calling for immediate action appeared outside the White House, some carrying placards that read, "Today: Sandy Hook. Tomorrow?"

"Condolences don't work," said Pastor Michael McBridge of Oakland. What will work is "action now," he said.

"We've had enough," added Ladd Everitt of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), a leading gun control advocate who sponsored the now-lapsed federal ban on assault weapons, has said she plans to make a new effort to revive the measure.

Still more at the link.

And after that head over to read Jeffrey Goldberg, at the Atlantic, "What Can We Do to Stop Massacres?" (At Memeorandum.)

Stimulus Forecasts Show Obama Can't Blame GOP for Poor Economy

At IBD, "Obama's Attacks On GOP Tax Policy Blunted By Own Data":

President Obama continues to blame the soft economy and record red ink on Republican policies, including "tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans."

But three years ago he seemed convinced the economy had made a clean break from those old policies, and would soon roar back on the strength of his own policies. The proof is in his economic projections.

In his 2010 budget, Obama predicted his American Recovery and Reinvestment Act would "jump-start our economy" and "create new jobs" and "many years of economic growth."

Stronger economic activity, he promised, would bring in more government revenues and "cut the deficit in half by the end of my first term in office," putting "our nation on sound fiscal footing."

"The time has come to usher in a new era — a new era of responsibility in which we act not only to save and create new jobs, but also to lay a new foundation of growth," the president said.

Didn't Deliver

His recovery plan included more than $1 trillion in new government spending. A Democrat-controlled Congress passed it without a single Republican vote.

Based on the new economic program, the White House forecast real GDP in 2012 would grow at a robust 4.6% clip, cutting the unemployment rate to 6.0%. It also saw the budget deficit dropping to 3.5% of the economy.

The projections didn't come even close to panning out. Real GDP growth has stagnated at 2%, while unemployment hovers near 8%. Far from being halved, the deficit had soared to 8.5% of GDP.

As the jobless rate soared to 10% — well beyond the promised 8% high point — the White House had to adjust its assumptions and timeline. In its 2012 budget, however, it still projected 4.0% economic growth.

Despite White House spin, it became clear the president's economic plan had failed to deliver on its promised stimulus.

They all knew this. Obama, David Axelrod, Stepanie Cutter --- they all knew all of this.

Which is why they lied 24/7 about the problems facing the country and launched the most unprincipled demagogic smears against private property and wealth accumulation in modern history. And it worked! I doubt four more years of economic stagnation will help the party maintain its general election majority, but then again, I was wrong about 2012, so who knows? Maybe another paradigm of lies will lift these criminal authoritarians to yet another presidential win in 2016. Democracy doesn't just collapse in one big instant, it withers away in the slow death of a thousand cuts. It's withering now under the Democrats, but all is not lost. The republic will survive when enough people who've been butt-reamed and had the wool pulled over their eyes wake up and scream, "I'm not going to take it anymore!"

The End of the Dive Bar on Skid Row

At the Los Angeles Times, "The last call for a skid row era at King Eddy Saloon":

Wire-thin and slumped like a question mark, James Maley nurses a watered-down whiskey at the battered bar inside the King Eddy Saloon. Around him a boisterous crowd presses in. Maley taps a cracked fingernail nervously on his glass and stares warily at the newcomers.

They've come to see novelist John Fante's son, Dan Fante, read at the bar that inspired his father's 1939 classic "Ask the Dust." They're also here to experience skid row's last dive bar before it shuts down for renovations on Sunday.

"If this happened every day, I would never show up," says Maley, who lives in transitional housing a few blocks away.

Other time-worn regulars, many with leathery skin, bad teeth and watchful eyes, nod in agreement. The bar provides home and family for those who have neither. They come for community and to spend what little money they have on plastic pitchers of beer and $2.50 gin and tonics.

When the Fante reading ends, the interlopers quickly disperse.

"There go the slummers," says John Tottenham, a poet who has been coming to the King Eddy since the 1980s.

Chances are the crowds will be back when the bar reopens under new management. The owners plan to use old photos to restore the bar's Midcentury look. They hope to renovate the abandoned speak-easy in the basement and open the bar's windows that are covered by stucco, letting natural light into the place for the first time in decades.

They haven't finalized their plans, but one thing is for sure. Drinks won't come cheap at the new King Eddy.

The bar is located on the corner of 5th and Los Angeles streets in the King Edward Hotel, which was built in 1906 and was a tony destination for visitors to what was once a thriving commercial district. The hotel now provides low-income housing for many of King Eddy's regulars.

The pre-Prohibition era King Eddy is painted black. With neon beer signs providing most of its light, the room is dim and gloomy. Its black-and-white checkered floor is grimy. Plastic beer flags hang from the ceiling and the place smells of stale smoke and disinfectant.

The bar itself, shaped in a square, commands the center of the room, with cracked vinyl banquettes lining the perimeter. A glassed-in smoking space is set off to the side. Behind the bar is a tiny fluorescent-lighted kitchen where prepackaged burgers, pizza and sandwiches are heated in a microwave. A beer and burrito would set a person back only $4.

Next week, Maley and the other dislodged drinkers will have to find another bar, but they face a new downtown landscape of high-end mixology bars, restaurants and Brazilian waxing salons...

Well, it's probably for the better, right? Skid row's the roughest of rough-and-tumble hardscrabble habitats, so cleaning up the place is good policy. But if you're down and out downtown, this kind of gentrification can force a relocation to even more dangerous haunts. It's hard out there on the streets. Hopefully folks can hang on to a little stability and continuity.

Continue reading at the link.

Progressives Don't Want 'Gun Control' Laws, They Want to Abolish the Right to Bear Arms Altogether

First of all, folks need to read William Jacobson' essay in full, "My long car ride mourning the victims “regardless of the politics”." This part is especially good:

Banning guns not only is unconstitutional, in a free society it would be no more effective than banning drugs, and truly would leave guns only in the hands of criminals.

Will we address what kind of society we would have to have in order to impose the type of gun control which exists in a place like China, where an attack on school children by a knife-wielding assailant injured 22 students just yesterday, but did not result in any deaths?  I doubt it.

What exactly is the “meaningful action” to be taken to prevent an obviously sick person from killing his own mother and then going to a kindergarten to shoot children?

The easy answer of more gun control would not have changed today.  Today took place in a state which has gun control and in which all the rules were followed, except by the homicidal killer who would not have cared about any rules.

The seemingly easy answers will be all about the politics.

Following the links takes us to the NRA's information page for Connecticut's gun laws. As William notes, the state indeed "has gun control," and how. There are background checks, waiting periods, and gun registration requirements. All of these no doubt encroaching on the Second Amendment. You can watch MSNBC all day and the idiots there won't tell you that. They'll spout disinformation about how mental illness isn't correlated with increased gun violence, claims that disregard the fact that all the recent high-profile massacres have been committed by suspects with psychiatric problems. As I've been reporting with more frequency of late, the left, during the Obama interregnum, is increasingly divorced from objective reality, pushing propaganda and disinformation that promotes the state-approved party line. And with the president announcing his intent to seek "meaningful" policy reform on America's gun laws, law-abiding citizens can expect to bear the brunt of an authoritarian infringement (yet another infringement) on their constitutional rights.

More here: "Gun Control Laws Seek to Punish 'the People Who Didn't Do It' — And Don't Work Anyway."

Ghoulish Walter James Casper III Exploits Connecticut School Massacre to Push Gun Control, Spread Lies and Disinformation

All the reports I read yesterday, and most of those I listened to on television, indicated that the shooter used Glock and Sig Sauer handguns, but that a Bushmaster .223 automatic weapon was found in the suspect's vehicle. For example, according to this CNN report:

[Updated at 6:51 p.m. ET] A law enforcement official familiar with the investigation says the three guns found at the shooting site were legally purchased by Nancy Lanza, the mother of the suspect in the shooting.

According to the law enforcement official, the Glock and Sig Sauer handguns were found inside the school with the deceased gunman. The Bushmaster was found in a car outside the school. The official did not know if the car was registered to the gunman, to his mother or to someone else.

And the New York Times reported:

Law enforcement officials said the weapons used by the gunman were a Sig Sauer and a Glock, both handguns. The police also found a Bushmaster .223 M4 carbine.

But facts make no difference to the dishonest, despicable far-left criminal stalker Walter James Casper III, who retweeted this bald face lie from Angie Coiro early in the day:

RT @aurosan: This is the gun used by the shooter. It's legal. Can someone explain to me why any citizen needs this? twitter.com/aurosan/status…
— Angie Coiro (@Angie_Coiro) December 15, 2012

There's lots more disinformation where that came from, at Hatesac's timeline.

During a press conference yesterday, Connecticut Governor Dan Malloy announced that "evil visited this community today." And as fast as a blast from the gun barrels, the progressive ghouls are now attempting to capitalize on such unthinkable horror in order to strip the civil liberties of millions of law-abiding citizens who had nothing to do with this horrendous crime. That too is evil, but then again, progressivism's an evil ideology, all too perfectly embodied by "troll rights" harassment thug Walter James Casper III.

See also: "Gun Control Laws Seek to Punish 'the People Who Didn't Do It' — And Don't Work Anyway."

WaPo's Ezra Klein Will Almost Certainly Retain the Title of World's Dumbest Blogger in 2013

An awesome report, from Doug Ross, "WORLD'S DUMBEST BLOGGER: My 'Facts' About Gun Control Aren't Political, As Far As You Know."

Gun Control Laws Seek to Punish 'the People Who Didn't Do It' — And Don't Work Anyway

See Glenn Reynolds' commentary at USA Today, "Gun-free zones provide false sense of security":

Policies making areas "gun free" provide a sense of safety to those who engage in magical thinking, but in practice, of course, killers aren't stopped by gun-free zones. As always, it's the honest people — the very ones you want to be armed — who tend to obey the law....

Gun-free zones are premised on a lie: that murderers will follow rules, and that people like my student are a greater danger to those around them than crazed killers. That's an insult to honest people. Sometimes, it's a deadly one. The notion that more guns mean more crime is wrong. In fact, as gun ownership has expanded over the past decade, crime has gone down.

Fortunately, the efforts to punish "the people who didn't do it" are getting less traction these days...

RTWT, via Memeorandum.

And see also The Astute Bloggers, "SAD, SICKENING NEWS OUT OF CONNECTICUT."

Gunman Kills 20 Schoolchildren in Connecticut

When I stepped out this morning, the facts were still coming in on the Newtown shooting, and by late evening on the East Coast, it's still far from a complete picture on what happened in Connecticut. I'll be writing on this story as I have on previous massacres, hoping to add, if possible, a little insight and analysis on events. Meanwhile, here's the report at the Los Angeles Times, "Gunman kills 20 kids, 6 adults at Connecticut elementary school":

NEWTOWN, Conn. — A gunman massacred 20 children and six adults at a suburban elementary school here Friday morning before killing himself in what appeared to be the second-deadliest school shooting in U.S. history, authorities said.

Sources said Adam Lanza, 20, earlier killed his mother at home and then drove her Honda to Sandy Hook Elementary School equipped with firearms that were registered to one or both of his divorced parents.

Clad in military fatigues and carrying two semiautomatic pistols, he entered the school, argued with someone in the hallway and then opened fire on staff members and children around 9:30 a.m., a law enforcement source said. He focused his gunfire on two rooms. Children huddled in closets and corners as the carnage unfolded.

Connecticut State Police Lt. J. Paul Vance said police searched "every nook and cranny" of the kindergarten-through-fourth-grade campus after receiving a 911 call. He said 18 children and seven adults were found dead at the school — including the shooter — and two other children died at the hospital. Victims' bodies remained inside the school into the evening as relatives were gathered at a nearby fire station.

Vance did not officially identify the shooter or any of the dead. He said another adult had been killed elsewhere in Newtown, but he did not say whether it was Lanza's mother. Police are questioning Lanza's 24-year-old brother, Ryan, of Hoboken, N.J., the Associated Press reported.

It was the deadliest school shooting since 32 were murdered in the 2007 Virginia Tech rampage.

"Evil visited this community today," Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said Friday evening. "It's too early to speak of recovery."

Continue reading.

Also at the New York Times, "No Motive Known as Trail of 28 Dead Is Left in Connecticut." And at the Wall Street Journal, "Dozens Killed in Conn. School Shooting."

President Obama Wipes Away Tears While Describing 'Overwhelming Grief' of Newtown Massacre

It is overwhelming grief.

And perhaps a day like today would be a day to put aside politics and instead get closer to loved ones and God, but no, the left's mass-shooting exploitation chorus is kicking it into high gear.

Here's the take at The Right Scoop, "President gives emotional statement on mass shooting, hints at possible gun control legislation."

And at Twitchy, "In wake of Conn. school massacre, President Obama calls for ‘meaningful action’; Anti-gun zealots turn on White House for not politicizing shooting to their liking; Michael Bloomberg demands a plan."

And this curation's been updated, "Execrable ghoul David Frum mocks victims of Conn. school shooting; Update: Eric Boehlert, Piers Morgan join in; Update: Michael Moore swoops in; Update: Celebrity ghouls crawl out." Plus, "Anti-gun vulture Michael Moore swoops in, says NRA hates freedom, wants children dead."

Expect updates...

PREVIOUSLY: "Report: More Than Two Dozen Dead at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut."