Sheriffs vs. Presidents

Sheriffs refuse to enforce gun control laws

It seems that more than 400 county sheriffs in the U.S. are declining to enforce their respective states’ new gun control legislation. Does anyone have a problem with that?

If you do, then do you have any problem with the President of the United States and the Attorney General of the United States (and the various and sundry federal law enforcement officers that report to them) declining to enforce certain laws in the United States, like immigration laws or assorted portions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act?

Essentially, there is no difference. If it is fine for the President to order federal agents and others charged with enforcing federal statutes to use their “prosecutorial discretion” and not deport people for violation of U.S. immigration laws or not to impose statutory punishments for not abiding by the dictates and deadlines of the PPACA (better known as Obamacare), then it would seem to me that it should just as appropriate for the the elected local sheriff to declare that whatever the latest gun control legislation calls for will not be enforce … or be subject to priority enforcement.

Are not the Sheriffs following the example of our President?

Now, I understand not prioritizing enforcement of some statutes because of the vagueness of the law, or its widespread disregard. Heck, speed limits are not strictly enforced in the United States (except in speed traps) and that is because 90 percent of the drivers in the US normally exceed the posted limit by at least 5 to 10 miles per hour all the time. Heck, I can even understand not enforcing a law if you know the law is unconstitutional.

However, I do have problems granting waivers for laws because they are inconvenient or because they might cause political problems for the law enforcement people.

So, those of you who have a problem with the stand being taken by the sheriffs, I sure hope you are consistent and have equally vehement objections to the failures, or refusals, or downright ignoring the law of the Obama Administration.

Global War on Terrorists revisited

As you read, keep this picture in your mind. It is Libyans trying to pull the U.S. Ambassador to safety.
US Ambassador to Libya killed
US suspects jihadists in Libyan attack
Strike in Libya suspected to have been coordinated
Not all agree that all are Anti-American
Some help evacuate ... but four die
For those who thought the Global War on Islamic Terrorists was over: Think again.
This war probably is just beginning. As Winston Churchill said after the climax of the Battle of Britain in 1940: This is not the beginning of the end, but it is probably the end of the beginning.
The Islamic terrorists basically won the prelims and round 1 (9/11), with the US basically winning on points round 2 (we got Osama Bin Laden and a few others of the top leaders of the Al Qaeda gangs), as well as knocked Saddam Hussein out of the box (yes, he was supporting Islamic terrorists, just not Al Qaeda Islamic terrorists, directly). However, that does not mean the fight is over.
The question, now, is where do we go from here? Well, as the latest 9/11 attacks on 9/11/12 indicate, the forces wanting to do harm to the United States are still organized and still capable of organized and well executed attacks. Anybody who thought differently needs to reevaluate their perspectives.
Having said that, it would be easy to go off the deep end and blame all Muslims for what transpired this week, when obviously that would be untrue. Just as those in the Islamic world blame all Americans and all Christians for all the evils that they perceive in the world also are mistaken.
Still, whatever percentage of the Muslim world it is, the number of jihadists and fanatics that see the world through a prism that allows only Islam to shine through is very large and very dangerous. Whether it was the demonstration at the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, Egypt, or the demonstration/attack at the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, there are those in the Islamic world who are willing if not to use violence, then to threaten its use, to protest speech that is protected in other parts of the world and in a more perfect world would be protected in their own parts. However, the tolerance necessary for that to happen apparently is not available among these people.
So, how do you impose tolerance on people. Force rarely works. It just tends to piss off people who weren’t pissed off in the first place but got caught in the crossfire. The U.S. has plenty of experience with that racket and we never seem to learn from it.
Of course, the object is to make it in the enlightened self-interest of those who live in the area where it is unsafe to be an American or a Christian come around to the point of view that making life unsafe for Americans or Christians, or for that matter any minority, definitely is not only not in their own interest but also not in the best interest of those contemplating acts which make it unsafe for Americans or Christians.
We hope that the governments in Egypt and, especially, Libya have already gotten that message. All the things I said in my post “Something wrong here” hold very true. But it is time for the new regimes in Libya and Egypt to step up to the plate and demonstrate that they have gotten the message. Libya appears to be making the appropriate noises, while the new president of Egypt seems to be blaming the victims. That is not appropriate.
No, I feel our Arab Muslim friends need to get themselves out of the playpen or schoolyard mentality or they just might get treated like children.
I have said before and reiterate here, the Islamic world is in desperate need of a rapid period of reformation and enlightenment, much like the Christian west went through three to five centuries ago.
If modern Muslims can get past the violence that is in much of the Quran (just as there is much in the Christian bibles – mainly in the Old Testament, however), then possibly the impending clash of civilizations won’t happen. Still, if only 1 percent of the billion or so Muslims in the world hold to the ways of Islamic Jihadists, we are talking about 100 million people. That is an awful lot of people bent on making war.
The words you see now coming from Americans is merely frustration and exasperation. I would dare say that most Americans really don’t want to go to war with Islam or its radical jihadists. Nope, we would rather sit home and enjoy our family lives, just like most Muslims would like to do the same.
The problem, apparently (on the Muslim side of the equation), is that the religious and political leaders keep stirring the pot. There comes a point, unfortunately, when following people like that becomes counterproductive, if not downright unhealthy, particularly if you are messing with the 900-pound gorilla.
If the gorilla loses its temper (to really mix clichés) it is going to be like the bull in a china shop and a whole lot of things are going to get broken, hurt, killed, etc. that don’t have to get killed, hurt, broken or destroyed. It is not going to be a pretty sight.
The problem is with the Islamic jihadists, no matter how they try, they are not going to kill the 900-pound gorilla without a whole lot of the world suffering. It then behooves the rest of the world to choose sides.
Now, I am not saying this 900-pound gorilla is perfect, or ever will be a perfect gentleperson, but it can be reasoned with and it can willingly reach mutual accommodations. It is, however, not a pacifist. It will strike out when wounded or angered, just like any human or any other animal.
The question then becomes in this Global War on Islamic Terrorists, does the rest of the world want to sit on the sidelines and hope the big guy doesn’t get so mad that he starts doing things that he and they will regret. Remember, despite what you think, there are no Roger Rabbit bullets yet … they still are Dumb-Dumbs.
I don’t have the answer, other than to say to the rest of the world: I suspect that American patience and tolerance is wearing thin. Whether you want to admit it or not, but the Americans have been asked to play global constable and firefighter for the last 70 years and I suspect that a lot of Americans are about ready to hang up those badges.
Some of you might want to say “great, just want we want,” but be careful for what you wish for. Without the restraints of the badge, Americans might turn out to be just like you … only with a lot more firepower. Is that what you want? As much as I hate having to have had carried that badge, I would rather we operate under its restraints than without it. It could get awfully ugly and I hate that type of ugly even more.
We would really rather see all those people, Muslim and not, who don’t agree with the Islamic jihadists to stand up and take back their neighborhoods. It is their town. They have to live in it and if they don’t want to see it smashed flat because some big hammer came crashing down to smash some bad guys, then maybe they should take care of the bad guys.
Just some random thoughts here; I won’t venture to say they are coherent, but they are one American’s reaction to the world.

Post Script: You want a clue about what happened in Libya ... watch the movie "Rules of Engagement", it came out in 2000.

Thank God for religious freedom

Pakistan grants bail to girl accused of blasphemy
Iran releases Christian pastor
The Mutawah
There is one thing that most Americans have a great difficulty in understanding and that is living under theocratic rules.
Of course, to your run-of-the-mill progressive, American Christian fundamentalists fit the description, but believe me, they don’t even come close. Fundamentalists in the U.S. of any stripe don’t hold a candle to the real thing that you find in Muslim countries functioning under the auspices of Sharia laws.
For example, the young Christian girl in Pakistan who was charged with blasphemy for supposedly burning a page from the Quran (the Islamic faith’s version of the Christian Bible or the Jewish Torah, the holy book). Apparently, it seems, that the equivalent of a priest or rabbi or pastor fibbed and that was what got the child arrested. Due to international pressure, at least the girl was released on bail. That doesn’t mean that the charges can’t go ahead, but it does mean that she gets out of jail to be with her family, hiding somewhere in Pakistan from those Muslim fundamentalists who would like to see her drawn and quartered. And you think American Christian fundamentalists are intolerant.
In the second case, an Iranian who was fulfilling the role of a Christian church minister apparently is not going to be put to death for apostasy by the Iranian regime. It seems that the international attention won another victory and he got off on appeal, which reduced his charges to a lesser crime and he was released in lieu of time served, which was three years in the pokey.
You see, things like that don’t happen in the United States and won’t as long as the law is respected by those who believe and those who don’t believe. It wasn’t always that way, but it is the way it is today and has been for a good long time now … well at least for about a century or so. Yes, we do tend to tolerate differing religious views in the U.S., even though those not currently popular often have a relatively rough time of it. Unfortunately, intolerance also is one of those faults/sins that we will never get rid of … but, more than other places, at least we have a bridle on it.
What we don’t have are mutaween … or as I call them the mutawah. In Saudi Arabia, the mutaween are the enforcers of customs and mores, like what you wear, are you observing prayer time, is your shop not selling unapproved goods like CDs, DVDs and alcoholic beverages. I know my progressive friend out west sees an American version of these religious policemen in everything the religious right/conservatives seem to do, but really, our religious right has nothing on the mutawah. And such enforcers here definitely don’t have the sanction of the government, and despite his fears, I don’t think our government will give such enforcers sanction.
When I was stationed in Saudi Arabia, I had a number of encounters with the mutawah. Most were amicable – they didn’t speak much English and my Arabic was limited to about three or four phrases. There was one incident when the business I was visiting suddenly shut all the shutters on the windows to the street and as it continued on with business, the owner explained to me that it was prayer time and rather than shut down the press run he was doing for me, he just closed the shutters so the mutaween wouldn’t see what was going on. I guess my time was worth more than the pressmen’s prayers or the fine he would have faced had he been caught (which he said he was occasionally – he did this often and not just for the infidel American Army NCO who was there – and was ready to pony up the fine).
There was one encounter, which fortunately I missed, where another NCO, who was a friend of mine, literally had to drag a female soldier out of a shopping mall before she got arrested. They were both in civilian clothes and she was wearing the obligatory floor length skirt, but her shirt sleeves only came down to her elbows and she wasn’t wearing something covering her hair. A couple of mutaween decided that she wasn’t observing the local dress code and decided to hassle her about it. Being a proper American who seems to think that the U.S. Constitution applies anywhere in the world, she proceeded to try to make a federal case out of it. Bad idea, young lady. Well, the NCO rode to her rescue, literally dragging her by her arm out of the shopping mall as she was practically screaming about her rights and away from the two officers.
When they got back to the hotel where we were billeted, I got the story and we two NCOs tried our best a) to calm her down and b) explain to her the facts of life that what goes in the US does not always go over in other countries and we have to respect that. We may not agree with it, and definitely don’t have to like it, but we do have to – as we usually put it – SADO. (SADO stands for Salute And Drive On and is what you do when you have to do something someone in authority tells you to do that you disagree with or think is wrong)
When I look around and see a Mormon and a Protestant, backed by two Catholics, running to lead the United States I am amazed (Well, not really, because I am an American who believes in the tolerance of America). It is not something that you will see in very many countries around the world. Well, even in the US, the fact that these candidates even profess their religious preferences raises eyebrows in some progressive quarters that would rather see secular humanists in the job. They have no room for those who see some value in religious faith or the belief in some deity that you can’t see or prove the existence of. To them it, it all opiates for the masses and a bunch of hokum.
Of course, we may come to the obverse of a theocracy, and that is almost as scary as the thought of living in a theocracy.

But it is not my fault I went crazy!

Aurora Gunman's responsibility

It is interesting in our quest to understand what makes an adult walk into a crowded theater and try to kill a whole bunch of people; our society always tries to absolve the individual of his responsibility.

The New York Times spent a whole lot of ink trying to explain that the shooter in the Aurora, Colorado, theater shooting that killed 12 (plus the shooter) and wounded something like 55 was obviously mentally deranged and therefore, obviously, not responsible for actions. Barley Corn.

Yes, there were warning signs. Yes, I suppose, that the appropriate mental health professionals at the University of Colorado at Denver campus could have done more. But you know something; the young man in question could have done a lot more to stop himself. You do realize that this person is an adult, a very smart one from all testimony.

Ironically, he knew he was slipping off the edge. He could have made a choice. He could have gone to the psychiatrist that he sent the tome to and said, “Doctor, I have a problem, and I fear I might go out of control.”

With his intelligence and background, particularly since CU-D is the campus of the CU medical school, one would think that he would have enough awareness to know that he was slipping over the edge. He obviously did, because he told “friends” that he was going to do something, but nothing specific enough to run to the cops and say “you need to investigate him.”

What bothers me is that this young man probably will be determined non-guilty by reason of insanity, or at least the NYT is laying the groundwork for that defense.

How about this, folks: A young man makes some really horrendous, atrocious choices, relatively deliberately and rationally. He is aware what he is doing is not correct, and actually does seek some help from the mental health community. He could go the next step and be honest with the mental health professionals dealing with him, or he could just go to them and say “put me somewhere I won’t hurt myself or other people.”

I know I am sounding far too rational for this case, but since the young man did not make those choices, then I fear he should pay the penalty for committing aggravated murder with malice aforethought.

Given the information that we have at this point, insanity is not a defense. Of course, then we can ask ourselves why people do this. Why do seeming intelligent, rational people choose to kill, maim or rape people? It is a good question, and one I don’t have a simple answer to.

However, if you look through history, you find so many cases where this happens that you begin to wonder about people. Whether is small mass murders to mass murders on the scale of the Holocaust or other genocides, people you would think would know better get swept up in the dementia of killing, torture and rapine.

It is not unique to any society. If you think it is, then you are the one who is deluding yourself. It is a plague upon mankind and cuts across all societal structures.

How do we stop it? I don’t know if we can, given the emotional, rather than rational, nature of humans. How many times a day do we do something that defies even our own sense of rationality? Take a moment and examine your own behavior and analyze how many times you let your emotions of the moment, day, week, month, year, to overwhelm what people would tell you is rational behavior.

Yes, humans are rational creatures, but they also are very irrational creatures. That probably is what sets us apart from all the other animals in the animal kingdom. We have the capability to be both rational and irrational at the same time.

As I said, I don’t have a solution to this dichotomy. I am, however, a reluctant proponent of capital punishment, in that there are some behaviors for which there is no forgiveness. There are some things that people can do that transcend the boundaries of civilized behaviors and therefore those people have forfeited their right to live in civilized society. Since we no longer have the Botany Bay option (sending them off to a deserted island where there is no chance of escape and return to civilization), then the only way to remove them, and the threat they pose, from society permanently is for them to forfeit their lives. You can make a case for perpetual incarceration, but these people still pose a threat not only to the people who perforce must watch over them to ensure they stay behind bars but also to the other people who must, by necessity, share accommodations with them. At some point, society has to say that mere banishment to some penal facility is not enough. In those cases, when the crime has been so wanton or so heinous (killing or attempting to kill a large number of people qualifies, in my humble opinion), then the killer’s life is forfeit.

I know there are a lot of people who will disagree with me on this point, and I do understand. However, some things truly are evil or unacceptable and have to be eliminated. In those cases, there are no excuses.

Fire discipline

2 dead, 9 wounded in New York

Wounded hit by police bullets

19 hit by bullets in Chicago violence

Two dead, nine wounded. All of the wounded were from police bullets. What does one make of this?

Well, you can take away several lessons from it.

First, police are humans and can get very scared.

Second, scared people aren’t the best shots in the world.

Third, when bullets fly, they hit whatever gets in the way and not necessarily the target.

Ok, if I was going to criticize the police officers, I would say that they forgot one of the basic marksmanship rules I was taught when I first learned to shoot, and which was strongly reinforced when I went into the military: Always, always, always know where the bullet is going to go when you shoot it … or at least have a relatively good idea where it will impact. Unfortunately, when you are scared poopless – as most people would be looking down the muzzle of .45 caliber handgun at close range – remembering that axiom is pretty difficult.

In the military, I was taught in the Navy, never bother shooting warning shots and always shoot for the center of mass of the target. Why not a warning shot? Because where is it going to go? IF you shoot up, there probably are things above you that don’t take kindly to bullets and cost lots of money to fix. If you shoot down, the deck most likely is metal and the bullet most likely will ricochet off in God-knows what direction.

However, if you shoot for the center of mass of a person, a) you have a much greater chance of hitting what you are shooting at and b) when it hits the person, it is not very likely to ricochet off and hit something you don’t want it to hit.

In the New York City case, obviously, the police officers didn’t always hit the target that they were aiming at … and that was a major oopsie. Still, in a way, the fact that most police departments use hollow-point bullets actually worked in their favor this time. You see, when a hollow-point bullet hits something it usually breaks apart and loses a lot of its energy. When it hit a human body, it creates a god-awful wound. When it hits something else it breaks into smaller pieces and goes off in several different directions at a somewhat less speed which means that the people hit by the pieces are going to get hurt, but less likely to have a really serious wound like the person hit by the initially intact bullet.

The tragedy is that the police officers basically emptied their magazines in their pistols at the target. This is an understandable reaction when facing someone with a large-bore pistol (and all pistols look large-bore when you are staring down the muzzle of one). You want to make sure the guy you are shooting at is down and out of the game. However, with your adrenalin pumping and your instincts screaming - “WARNING EXTREME DANGER” - it is very hard to keep your brain engaged to remember that aimed shots work better than un-aimed shots. And since most police officers rarely find themselves in a shooting situation, they don’t have a lot of experience to draw upon in those cases. Soldiers will tell you it takes experience to know when to shoot and when not to shoot … especially when your life is on the line.

Now, a second point: It is interesting that the gunplay in New York City got national news play while a series of shootings in Chicago that left 19 wounded got zip. I suppose that may strike you strange, but then I understand it. It might be that I spent a lot of years in the news business and understand how these things work, especially for television.

Most of the gunplay in Chicago happened off in its various ethnic neighborhoods on the South Side – the basically who-cares-what-happens-there section of the city. The New York City shooting happened just outside a major tourist attraction – the Empire State Building.

That is No. 1. No. 2 is that it happened quite close to where the major television networks and cable news companies have their offices. In fact, a CNN news producer just happened to be walking by when it happened. The shootings in Chicago were all nowhere near the offices of the TV stations or newspaper offices. The NYC shooting could feature good video while the Chicago shootings featured none.

Strange world we live in isn’t it?

I bet it also is politically incorrect of me to point out that the mayor of Chicago also is the former chief of staff for President Obama and that the president points to his “hometown” as the model of America. Actually, it is irrelevant to the President or how he is doing his job. It is just an interesting coincidence.

Last point: The shooter in NYC was breaking the law. He didn’t register his handgun with city authorities. However, it is somewhat significant to point out that the pistol had been purchased 20 years earlier in Florida, quite legally. So, ratcheting up restrictions on gun purchases would have not done much in this case.

No Fear tour

No Papers No Fear tour

Ok, it sounds like some music group, but apparently there is a bus-load or so of undocumented immigrants / illegal immigrants / illegal aliens (you take your pick) on a tour of U.S. cities flouting the fact that they have no immigration papers and basically, at least from my impression, are telling American citizens and their government where they can stick their immigration laws and rules.

Once again, folks, does this seem right to you? If it does, I surely would love to have an explanation, because I don’t understand. You see, I have first hand experience with the U.S. immigration system: My wife is, and still is and will be, a Canadian citizen. She has her “Green Card” which took almost three years to get. She has a work permit, which took a year to get. In other words, we played by the rules. We paid the fees, etc., too. So, between you and me, I don’t have a lick of sympathy for these people who have entered the U.S. without following the rules and the law. Sorry, like in the game of Chutes and Ladders, you get to go back to square one and start all over.

Unfortunately, that is not the politically correct view we should have. We should be empathetic and understand that most of these people are here contributing to the U.S. economy (supposedly doing jobs “normal” Americans refuse to do and would rather sit out collecting on welfare and extended unemployment), but I am not sure I buy that argument.

And then we are supposed to be welcoming of those young people whose parents brought them here illegally more than five years ago and are between 16 and 30 now because they weren’t responsible for their plight, their parents were.

With all due respect to what are probably righteous and upright individuals, but sorry but that is equine fecal material. Of course, we can’t apply the “law” to you because it wouldn’t be “fair”. That is part of the problem with our society today: We are carving out so many exemptions to applying the law that it no longer applies to anybody. And that really burns me.

You see, I happen to be one of those people who firmly believes that the law – any and every law – should apply to everybody. It shouldn’t matter what race, religion, ideology, color, economic status, wealth or whatever. When it comes to the law, we all should be equal before it. Is that what we have now? Not only no, but HELL NO! and that is wrong.

The easiest place to start is the federal tax code, particularly the income tax portions of it for both individuals and corporations. The code is so riddled with exemptions, deductions and tax credits (most tailored for specific special interest groups, rich and poor) that it is not surprising few Americans do their own taxes. They go out an hire someone professing to be a professional who has studied and understands the intricacies of it, or buy a computer software program that promises the same.

I know, and understand, all the various reasons given for all those exemptions, deductions and tax credits, but they are wrong. They are wrong because they make some pigs (oops, people) more equal than others, to borrow a cliché from George Orwell’s Animal Farm.

It doesn’t matter what the law is, you will see that it has been tailored to impact one group while leaving another group unaffected. You see this in all sorts of regulatory law and administrative law where the regulations and rules only apply to individuals or corporations that meet certain criteria. Don’t meet the criteria, and then the law doesn’t apply.

Sorry but that is bovine scatology.

So, these people going around the country making a big deal that they have no papers? Ok, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, where are you? Got a group that is making it easy for you and are in violation of the rules you are supposed to enforce. Oh, that is right; our President (you know the man who is constitutionally empowered to enforce the laws of the United States) has told you not to enforce that law. It seems that he either disagrees with the law as it stands … or he has some other reason (like trying to buy votes of the Hispanic community – please, people, don’t sell your souls and your votes so cheaply).

I didn’t know that we could pick and choose what laws we wanted to obey. Hey, do you think that is a great idea? Hell, why have any laws then at all. Let’s just let our hair down and enjoy the anarchy. I mean that why should we let government control any of our activities? Hey, progressives, I need to hear from you on this. Why should government tell us what to do on anything? Why should government be allowed to regulate any of our behaviors? If we want to go out and kill someone, Hell, it is our choice, where does the government have any business in it.

Heck, if we want something, aren’t we just allowed to take it?

I know I am being sarcastic here, folks, but it seems to me that when we stop applying the law to all, and only apply the law selectively, then we are drifting into deep trouble.

Yes, I know prosecutors will tell you all over the country that they and the court system is overwhelmed and that they can’t prosecute every case of a broken law. They plead for prosecutor’s discretion. Seen far too much of that in my years of covering court and putting court news in the paper. Plea bargains are fine, so are suspended sentences, but when you are prosecuting a person for a seventh offense DUI, or fifth time for driving while suspended, or the umpteenth time for assault, battery or burglary … or armed robbery or violations of stock exchange regulations, then it is time to reexamine your priorities. As prosecutors, they need to really get out there and explain why some laws are “good” and need to be enforced and why some laws are “bad” and shouldn’t be on the books.

However, I know that a) that takes too much work and b) it is easier to just game the system.

I guess, if this is what the American people like, or at least are willing to tolerate, then I should, as Pappy used to say, “Go back in the teapot.” I just wish more people would say it is time for this crap to stop.

Enforce the law, or repeal it and let us take the consequences.