Category Archives: Crime

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When the Jew haters tell you who they are, believe them! "Students for Justice in Palestine" could have protested at Israeli consulate, but chose to protest at Jewish center

This poor site, along with literally hundreds of others, has covered the pro-‘Palestinian, really pro-Hamas ‘demonstrations’ on our college campuses last spring. I did note, with some pleasure, that at least at my alma mater, the University of Kentucky, the protests were carried out the way the First Amendment, which guarantees to all of us both the freedom of speech and the right of peaceable assembly, contemplated, peaceably.

Sadly, many of the pro-savages demonstrations at other schools were not entirely peaceable. But I did gloat report on those demonstrations fading away when school was out for the summer.

Well, it’s a new school year — though October seems like this article is a bit late — and the Usual Suspects have been up to their old tricks. From The Philadelphia Inquirer:

Temple suspends pro-Palestinian student group; Muslim advocates call to investigate police over alleged hijab removal during campus protest

CAIR is calling for an investigation after Temple University’s handling of a protest, where they say a Philadelphia police officer allegedly removed a Muslim protester’s hijab.

by Max Marin and Robert Moran | Wednesday, October 2, 2024 | 2:02 PM EDT | Updated: 6:37 PM EDT

Temple University has temporarily banned Students for Justice in Palestine from operating on campus, the latest in a wave of suspensions against pro-Palestinian student groups amid sustained protests against the war in Gaza.

The move comes after police detained four SJP members, including a Temple student, during a demonstration that interrupted an on-campus career fair last week.

So, the “Students for Justice in Palestine” demonstration was not peaceable in nature, but interrupted a meeting to help more sensible students at Temple who were looking to begin their professional careers after graduation. You know, the sensible thing to do after spending a boatload of money for a university education.

Muslim community leaders are calling for an investigation into the university’s handling of that protest after a Philadelphia police officer allegedly removed a Muslim protester’s hijab and detained the woman without access to her religious head covering.

If that happened, and I will never believe claims by “Muslim community leaders” without outside corroboration, it would have been because the woman was resisting arrest.

While Temple did not cite that specific incident, a university spokesperson said in a statement that the interim suspension stemmed from “recent conduct,” and the student activist group is now forbidden from holding on-campus activities, including “meetings, social and philanthropic events.” The suspension was first reported by the Temple News.

The spokesperson pointed to the university’s on-campus demonstration guidelines that are “in place to ensure the safety and well-being of community members while also encouraging and preserving freedom of expression.” . . . .

This is not the group’s first brush with university leaders. Temple president Richard Englert denounced an SJP-led demonstration in August after protesters chanted outside a Jewish student center on campus.

In a statement, Englert threatened disciplinary action against students who participated in the rally, which he described as a form of “intimidation and harassment.” The pro-Palestinian student group pushed back against Englert’s comments, arguing in a post on social media that the president “distorted our message to serve the false narrative that Temple SJP is a threat to Temple.”

No, I suppose that the pro-barbarian students wouldn’t see accosting Jewish students outside of a known Jewish student gathering place as “intimidation and harassment,” but the Jews on campus certainly would have, and did:

Temple University says it is investigating a student pro-Palestinian demonstration held outside a Jewish center on campus

“Targeting a group of individuals because of their Jewish identity is not acceptable and intimidation and harassment tactics like those seen today will not be tolerated,” Temple’s president said.

by Robert Moran | Thursday, August 29, 2024 | 10:40 PM EDT

Temple University said it is investigating for possible disciplinary action a pro-Palestinian march by students and nonstudents who demonstrated outside a Jewish center on campus Thursday.

The protest march began at the Charles Library, said Temple University president Richard Englert in a statement, then some demonstrators went to the Rosen Center, which is the home at Temple of Hillel, an international organization for Jewish students.

“While there, the demonstrators used megaphones to chant directly at the occupants within the building,” Englert said.

Emphasis mine. Using megaphones to chant directly at the people in the Hillel Center, the majority of who could be assumed to be Jewish, would constitute targeted ethnic and religious harassment.

“We are deeply saddened and concerned by these events,” Englert said. “Targeting a group of individuals because of their Jewish identity is not acceptable and intimidation and harassment tactics like those seen today will not be tolerated.”

This was clearly a protest against Jews in general, not just Israeli policy, as the “Students for Justice in Palestine” have conflated the two. Not all Jews are Israelis, and at an American college 5,774 miles away from Israel, it’s virtually certain that most of the Jews on campus at Temple are not from Israel.

There is an Israeli consulate in Philadelphia, at 1880 John F. Kennedy Blvd, which is just 2.6 miles away from the Hillel Center, at 1441 West Norris Street, pretty much of a straight march down Broad Street, though, admittedly, marching that way takes you partly into the Philadelphia Badlands. If the SJP wanted to protest Israeli government policies specifically, they could have been protesting outside the consulate; instead they were harassing people they knew to be Jooooos.

Temple’s actions won’t stop the SJP from existing; all it does is ban them as a student organization and deny them use of Temple’s facilities.

Our First Amendment was written by civilized men, with civilized behavior in mind; they cited “the right of the people peaceably to assemble”. It does not protect some right to harass others, or gather in mobs, or riot.

But the pro-‘Palestinian’ people in this country, and around the world, are not truly civilized men. They might think that they are, but they are supporting the barbarism of Hamas, they are supporting the antithesis of the Western civilization, the benefits of which they enjoy.  The “Students for Justice in Palestine” have a right to exist, and to protest peacefully; it’s only when the break the code of civilization that they become subject to arrest.

The one thing they do not have is any right to the respect of decent people, and for them, I have none. When the anti-Semites tell you who they really are, you should believe them!

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That this has led to fraud is no surprise at all!

My good friend and occasional blog pinch-hitter, William Teach of The Pirate’s Cove, has an article this Friday morning on the Biden Administration prosecuting a major ‘carbon offset’ sales company for fraud:

C-Quest Capital LLC Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Newcombe, who stepped down as CEO in February, was indicted Wednesday in New York on wire fraud and commodities fraud charges. He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted on the most serious charges.

C-Quest develops emission-reduction projects to earn carbon credits that can then be sold to companies or other entities that wish to offset their own emissions. Newcombe, a onetime Goldman Sachs Group Inc. managing director and World Bank official, founded C-Quest in 2008.

You can read the rest on Mr Teach’s fine site.

But this one speaks to me, due to my experience. It was 2003, and carbon offset salesmen came and made a presentation to the concrete company at which I worked. Ready-mixed concrete producers use pozzolans, materials which are not cementitious alone but when mixed with Portland cement during the production of concrete utilize the excess calcium hydroxide liberated to become cementitious. We use them because they are less expensive than cement. The two most frequently used are flyash, which is harvested from the ignition byproducts of burning coal in power plants, and ground granulated blast furnace slag, the material left over from the smelting of iron ore.

The manufacture of Portland cement is a major carbon dioxide (CO2) emitter, so by the partial substitution of flyash, ready-mix companies reduce their carbon footprint. The salesmen told us that we could gain carbon credits every time we used flyash instead of cement, and that we could sell those carbon credits to other companies, to make it look like they were doing something to help fight global warming climate change, but, since it wouldn’t have changed how we did business since we were already using flyash — other than requiring some bookkeeping — it wouldn’t have reduced CO2 emissions at all! It was simply a way to take money, taking it from one CO2 emitter and giving it to a company which emitted less CO2; virtue signaling for the first, without having to actually spend significantly more money to reduce their emissions, and extra money for us, for doing what was already in our own economic interest.

Is anyone really surprised that fraud would be involved? When it comes to global warming climate change, the scammers and fraudsters will always be buzzing around.

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Killadelphia Yes, homicide is significantly down, but still more than thrice that of the rest of the Commonwealth

It was March 16, 2022, when this poor site noted liberal Philadelphia magazine reporter Victor Fiorillo‘s story about how applications for concealed carry permits had skyrocketed. He had expected an increase, following the 562 officially reported murders in the City of Brotherly Love, but “wasn’t exactly ready for just how big this increase has been.”

Mr Fiorillo doesn’t like Fox 29 News reporter Steve Keeley’s reports on crime in the city, just as WHYY reporter Cherri Gregg, who said his reporting “definitely makes me cringe,” while Philadelphia Inquirer columnist Jenice Armstrong “wrote on Facebook: ‘His Twitter feed is also disturbing.'”

So, @phillyvictor, Mr Fiorillo’s Twitter handle, gleefully told us that homicides were down in the city, slamming Mr Keeley for not reporting on that:

Philadelphia Homicides on Pace for Historic Low. No, Really!

The news Steve Keeley won’t tell you.

By Victor Fiorillo | Tuesday, September 24, 202 | 3:29 PM EDT

If you’re addicted to local television news or Fox News or if you live your life based on 15-second blips on TikTok or whatever the awful Citizen crime app[1]Hyperlink not in Mr Fiorillo’s original, but added by me. I have assumed that this is the Twitter site to which he referred, but cannot say that I am certain. has to say, you are probably still convinced that Philadelphia is a desolate hellhole, the Wild Wild West of urban living, where anything goes and where crime is rampant and without consequence. The “car meetup” events from Saturday night into Sunday morning, which featured a ring of fire outside City Hall and at least one flamethrower, are probably all you can talk about. You’re living your best Steve Keeley life.

But here’s some news that Steve Keeley and his ilk can’t find the time to tell you: Philadelphia’s homicide count is on pace for a historic low. You read that right, and I’ll say it once again for those in the back: Philadelphia’s homicide count is on pace for a historic low.

Now, this isn’t fake news. This isn’t my opinion. This is real news based on, you know, facts. Data. Statistics.

According to the latest data provided by the Philadelphia Police Department, homicides in Philadelphia are down 40 percent in Philadelphia as of Tuesday morning compared to the same time period last year. If you think I’ve told you similar things in the not-too-distant past, you’re not wrong. Back in April, I cautiously reported that our homicide count was down 34 percent. I say cautiously because, well, anything can happen at any time, sending those numbers in the wrong direction. Also because we hadn’t yet hit summer, and generally speaking, summers are associated with more violent crime.

Well, friends, guess what? Summer is officially over. And we went from a 34 percent decrease in homicides as of April to a 40 percent decrease in homicides as of today. If we stay on that track, that would mean that we’d end the year with 246 homicides. And if we do that, 2024 would tie 2013 for the lowest number of homicides in Philadelphia for the last 56 years. To do better than that, we’d need to end the year with fewer than 234 homicides. That’s how many homicides the city saw in 1967. One can hope!

Perhaps so, but it comes back to the first story of Mr Fiorillo’s that I cited, concerning the surge in applications for concealed carry permits. And then this, from Thursday morning’s Philadelphia Inquirer:

One killed, one injured in gunfight during an attempted robbery that ended in SEPTA bus crash in West Philly

There were nine people — eight passengers and one driver — on the SEPTA bus, a SEPTA spokesperson said. Nobody was injured.

by Rodrigo Torrejón | Thursday, October 3, 2024 | 9:44 AM EDT

A 36-year-old man was killed and a 17-year-old was injured when gunfire broke out during an attempted armed robbery in Mantua on Wednesday night, police said. After the teen and his accomplice fled the scene in a getaway car, the car crashed into a SEPTA bus a block away.

The 17-year-old was identified as Sage Black-Rivera.

Police responded to a report of a shooting at a candy store on the 800 block of North 40th Street at 10:11 p.m., police said. When officers arrived, they found the 36-year-old man on the floor of the store with multiple gunshot wounds, police said.

The man, who police did not identify, was pronounced dead at the scene minutes later.

The victim had been in the store when a 17-year-old boy and another male tried to rob him at gunpoint, said Police Deputy Commissioner Frank Vanore. The 36-year-old man then took out a gun and fired at the two men, striking the teen.

The teen then shot the 36-year-old manm, said Vanore.

The two assailants then fled the store in what police believe is a Mazda, but only got a block away before the car crashed into a SEPTA bus near 41st and Brown Streets, said Vanore.

Miss Gregg complained that “it is not good reporting to simply repeat police accounts/narratives,” but that’s what Inky reporter Rodrigo Torrejón just did, as shown my Mr Keeley’s tweet with the image file of the police report.

There were nine people on board the Route 31 SEPTA bus, eight passengers and the driver, a SEPTA spokesperson said. No injuries were reported to anyone on the bus.

The two alleged robbers then fled on foot. Police later found the teen on the 700 block of Preston Street with gunshot wounds to his arm and chest. He was taken to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, where he was placed in stable condition.

Homicide detectives are continuing to investigate. The 17-year-old boy has been arrested, and police are looking for his accomplice.

Mr Fiorillo noted, in the first cited story about concealed carry permits:

Of course, just because you’re denied doesn’t mean you’re not carrying, and carrying without a license is generally a first-degree misdemeanor, punishable by up to five years in prison. But that charge can be upgraded to a felony depending on the circumstances.

It seems sadly appropriate that I’m writing about another Philly murder while drinking my coffee from a blood-red mug.

We have not yet been told whether the 36-year-old victim had a license to carry his weapon, but we do know that the unnamed 17-year-old did not have one, because such permits are not issued to minors. I am waiting on someone to whine that the 36-year-old victim would not be dead had he not been carrying a weapon and tried to defend himself, not that anyone can know that, but if he had been unarmed and simply handed over his wallet, both armed juveniles would have gotten away, and would still be out on the streets, waiting to rob at gunpoint someone else. At least now the 17-year-old will spend — hopefully — the rest of his miserable life behind bars, at least he will if the George Soros-sponsored, criminal loving District Attorney, Larry Krasner, charges him as an adult with second-degree murder, Pennsylvania Title 18 §2502(b). Under Pennsylvania Title 18 §1102(1)(c)(1), “A person who at the time of the commission of the offense was 15 years of age or older shall be sentenced to a term of imprisonment the minimum of which shall be at least 30 years to life.”

Yes, homicides are down and crime is down in foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia, but there is still a culture in the city, and in most of our major cities, that allows crime to continue. Let’s use Mr Fiorillo’s statistics, estimating that Philly will finish with 246 homicides. With an estimated population of 1.55 million in 2023, that would still leave the city with a homicide rate of 15.87 per 100,000 population, significantly higher that the state’s 8.9 homicides per 100,000. Using the 2022 numbers — and the fact that the full 2023 numbers are not yet available is just plain sinful — Philly saw 514 homicides out of the Commonwealth’s total of 1,068, 48.13% of the total, when the city has only 11.96% of the state’s population. The rest of the Commonwealth had a homicide rate of 4.85 per 100,000 population, less than a third of Philly’s.

What will the numbers look like once full figures are available? Well, who knows, but even if they’re better than 2021, that won’t mean that they are good.

So, yes, things aren’t as bad as they once were, but if you live in Philly, you have slightly more than thrice the chance of being murdered than anyplace outside the city. It’s a shame that Mr Fiorillo didn’t mention that part.

References

References
↑1 Hyperlink not in Mr Fiorillo’s original, but added by me. I have assumed that this is the Twitter site to which he referred, but cannot say that I am certain.
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Democrisy! The party of more and more gun control are now buying themselves more guns.

We noted, 2½ years ago, that, in the aftermath of its bloodiest year on record — 562 homicides in 2021 — even Philadelphia Magazine’s Victor Fiorillo, who is so dramatically opposed to Fox 29 News Steve Keeley actually reporting on crime, told us about Philadelphians applying for concealed carry permits at a greatly increased rate.

Now it seems that significant numbers of the American left, who have been so vigorous in their demands to infringe upon our rights to keep and bear arms, have decided to keep and bear arms themselves. From The Wall Street Journal:

The Most Surprising New Gun Owners Are U.S. Liberals

After decades of decline, gun ownership is rising among Democrats

by Cameron McWhirter and Zusha Elinson | Thursday, September 19, 2024 | 9:22 PM EDT

Michael Ciemnoczolowski, a lifelong Democrat, supports stricter gun laws and contributes to Sandy Hook Promise, a gun-violence-prevention nonprofit.

But this summer, the liquor store clerk in Iowa City, Iowa, for the first time in his life bought a gun. Apprehension about street crime, armed right-wing extremists, and “whatever else the world could possibly throw at us,” drove his decision.

“Domestic politics have grown increasingly acrimonious,” says Ciemnoczolowski, 43.

This is kind of laughable. “(A)rmed right-wing extremists”? It wasn’t “right-wing extremists” who have tried to assassinate former President Donald Trump recently. It wasn’t “right-wing extremists” who shot up schools in Nashville or other places. And it certainly hasn’t been “right-wing extremists” who have been responsible for the “street crime” we’ve seen in Chicago, Philadelphia, and our other major cities.

American gun culture has long been dominated by conservative, white men. Now, in a marked change, a burgeoning number of liberals are buying firearms, according to surveys and fast-growing gun groups drawing minorities and progressives.

“It’s a group of people who five years ago would never have considered buying a gun,” says Jennifer Hubbert, an anthropology professor at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Ore., who has researched liberal gun owners.

Historically, it wasn’t unusual for Democrats to own guns, with many more of them living in rural areas. Also, hunting was much more popular. But starting in the early ’90s, gun ownership among Democrats dropped significantly. Increasingly divisive political battles over the role of firearms in American society led the Democratic Party to become an advocate for gun regulation. Republicans became the party of gun rights.

Now, today’s Democrats are rediscovering guns.

There follow several paragraphs giving liberals’ reasons for increasing their firearm ownership percentages, up from an all-time low of 22.5% in 2010, to 29.2% in 2022, the last year one which information was available. That’s a 29.78% increase, and since this deals with percentages, it isn’t an increase due to population growth. The number was only 25.4% just the previous year, a 16.14% increase in just one year, the year after the murderous carnage of Joe Biden’s first year in office.

The Democrats interviewed for this article brought up all sorts of reasons, many of them political, which the Journal’s authors diligently reported, but 2021 and 2022 were years of Donald Trump losing voter fraud cases in courts, and the January 6th protesters being tried and jailed. The credentialed media tried drumming up fears about conservatives, but, for the very greatest part, the violence of 2021 and 2022 was perpetrated from the criminal classes in our major cities.

Four decades ago, Democratic gun owners were typically white men, including auto or steel union workers who grew up hunting.

That line is absolutely rotten reporting, something very unusual in the Journal. Four decades ago, Democrats in the South were far more rural than they are now. Four decades ago, Democrats controlled state legislatures and gubernatorial seats in most of the South, rather than being so heavily packed into urban areas as they are today. The Journal’s comparison of those numbers wasn’t even as close as apples and oranges, but more like apples and turnips.

Of course, today’s Democrats in general are not very much like the Democrats of “four decades ago.” The Democrats of forty years ago would have laughed at the notion of homosexual marriage, were pretty much anti-war as a holdover from Vietnam, were complete free speech supporters, and would have hauled off to the insane asylums anyone who held that a guy could simply declare himself to be a girl and compete in women’s sports.  The only Democrats who could have been called #woke forty years ago were the ones who had gotten up with the alarm clock to actually go to work. The urban Democrats of the 1980s who didn’t own firearms were the ones who lived in safer neighborhoods.

The Democrats of forty years ago were seeing the weakening of the Soviet Union, and calling that a good thing, rather than electing socialists. They remembered the ‘Palestinians’ as terrorists who attacked Israelis at the 1972 Olympic games in Munich, rather than as somehow selfless martyrs and resistance fighters in Gaza.

Today we have the same party which has been screaming for more and more gun control buying more and more guns for themselves. They want to be able to defend themselves, not from evil reich-wing gangs, but criminals, criminals created and enabled by the Democrats own policy choices, but they have to mouth silliness about Republicans and conservatives to justify their own hypocrisy

 

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In the end, hiding from your enemies just doesn’t work The way to fight anti-Semitism is not to let the anti-Semites win!

In February of 1896, long before the Nazis, just a couple of months before Adolf Hitler’s 7th birthday, Theoror Herzl’s Der Judenstaat, The Jewish State, was published in Leipzig and Vienna by M. Breitenstein’s Verlags-Buchhandlung. Mr Herzl saw the persecution Jews were facing in Europe, where they had lived ever since their expulsion from the Holy Land by the Romans beginning in 70 AD. Jews, he believed, needed to live apart from the mostly Christian populations of Europe.

But even living apart, while in Europe, didn’t prove particularly safe. While the Jüdischer Wohnbezirk in Warschau, the Warsaw ghetto, was not formally established until November of 1940 by the Nazi occupation authorities, it contained those heavily Jewish neighborhoods which existed before the outbreak of World War II in Europe.

Now there’s this, from The Wall Street Journal:

Maybe It’s Time for Jewish Self-Segregation

The self-protective impulse is a healthy response to a wave of antisemitism.

By Joseph Epstein | Thursday, September 19, 2024 | 5:33 PM EDT

The recent and rampant rise in antisemitism is, to put it gently, disheartening. One finds it everywhere, much of it passing under the flag of anti-Zionism, criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and presumably sympathy for the Palestinians. Saddest of all is that antisemitism has cropped up so exuberantly among students in our elite universities. Apart from decrying it, calling it out for what it is, what are Jews to do to protect themselves from this recurring nightmare? Perhaps a jaunt down memory lane will help.

For those who don’t have my too-expensive subscription to the Journal, the OpEd can be accessed for free here.

I was 5 when I was first aware not only that I was Jewish but that being Jewish had consequences. My father asked me what I had learned in school one day, and I told him the poem “Eenie, Meenie, Miney, Moe,” which I began to recite. When I came to the n-word—before “tiger” had been substituted as a more appropriate alternative—my father angrily stopped me and told me I was never to use the word again, especially since our people, like the Negroes (as they were called then), had been long persecuted and called all sorts of terrible names.

A few years later, returning with my father from a Bing Crosby movie, “Going My Way,” I asked if we might have a Christmas tree. “No,” he said. Why not? “Because you are Jewish.” Case closed. Not long after that, my mother pointed out various Chicago neighborhoods and suburbs—Sauganash, Kenilworth—that were “restricted,” which meant no Jews allowed. Not only did being Jewish carry responsibilities; it also apparently meant being despised, at least in certain quarters.

After several more paragraphs, in which Joseph Epstein, the author, describes his life growing up, and in college, in mostly Jewish enclaves, we get to the meat of the column:

No one saw the current wave of antisemitism coming. Who thought Hamas would find supporters at Harvard, Columbia, the University of California, Los Angeles, and elsewhere? The country had known of this virus before, but it came not from crowds of thousands but from prominent people. Henry Ford was openly antisemitic. No Jew in those days drove his cars. Father Charles Coughlin, on his radio show in the 1930s, attacked what he termed “international bankers.” But those were largely isolated, the present strain more widespread.

Is self-chosen segregation among Jews a good thing? In one sense, it feels like taking a step backward toward a less open society. Yet when the politics of a country swing too far in either direction, antisemitism is almost certain to come in its train. The swing today is unmistakably and strongly leftist, and self-segregation strikes me as the first step in combating the attacks on Jews that attend it.

I am not Jewish, and I live in an area with very few, if any Jews, so perhaps I just don’t understand, but this seems to me to be an advocacy of surrender, and not even an effective one. If American Jews self-segregate, into small, mostly Jewish communities, are they not simply gathering in a smaller and more confined target area for any violently antiSemitic ‘mostly peaceful protests’? We have already seen ‘protests’ at synagogues and Hillel Centers on campuses. Self-segregation, self-isolation doesn’t work when those who hate you still know where you congregate and live.

Israel is, of course, Mr Herzl’s dream, even if he never saw it; he died in 1904, at a very young 44 years of age, though he is now buried in Mt Herzl, on the west side of Jerusalem. But look at the situation today. Israel is the self-segregation of millions of Jews in the modern world, yet we see not just the Arabs — who can always be counted on for hate — but millions of people reared in Western civilization nations who don’t want the Jews to have even that small nation.

Self-segregation counts on the tolerance of others to allow your segregated communities, and we aren’t seeing much of that tolerance by the supporters of Hamas and the ‘Palestinians.’

In the end, hiding from your enemies just doesn’t work.

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The blinding brilliance of the United States Navy

Command Senior Chief Grisel Marrero

The United States Navy is a hugely expensive, and believed to be an extremely capable fighting force, able to project American power around the world, but sometimes things happen which are just do f(ornicating) stupid as to make me wonder just what we actually have for defense in this country. With the build up of China’s navy, and the increasing threats to Taiwan, all while the US has sent tons of military supplies to Ukraine, just what capabilities do we really have?

How Navy chiefs conspired to get themselves illegal warship Wi-Fi

By Diana Stancy | Tuesday, September 3, 2024

Today’s Navy sailors are likely familiar with the jarring loss of internet connectivity that can come with a ship’s deployment.

For a variety of reasons, including operational security, a crew’s internet access is regularly restricted while underway, to preserve bandwidth for the mission and to keep their ship safe from nefarious online attacks.

But the senior enlisted leaders among the littoral combat ship Manchester’s gold crew knew no such privation last year, when they installed and secretly used their very own Wi-Fi network during a deployment, according to a scathing internal investigation obtained by Navy Times.

As the ship prepared for a West Pacific deployment in April 2023, the enlisted leader onboard conspired with the ship’s chiefs to install the secret, unauthorized network aboard the ship, for use exclusively by them.

So while rank-and-file sailors lived without the level of internet connectivity they enjoyed ashore, the chiefs installed a Starlink satellite internet dish on the top of the ship and used a Wi-Fi network they dubbed “STINKY” to check sports scores, text home and stream movies.

There’s more at the Navy Times original, about how then-Command Senior Chief Grisel Marrero arranged for the purchase of the Starlink system, got it covertly installed, and distributed the system among the ‘chief’s mess,’ the grouping of the chief petty officers on a ship.

I first saw this story, from another source, while I was in France, and thought about how stupid it was, but then I got more on it Wednesday evening, and I marveled at the utter stupidity of it all. Chief Marrero was the Chief of the Boat on the USS Manchester (LCS-14), the senior enlisted person on the ship, and is expected to advise the commanding officer and executive officer on all subjects.

That’s the part which really caught my eye: the COB simply can’t be stupid, but Chief Marrero apparently is, as are all of the other chief petty officers aboard the Manchester. All of the chiefs knew of the wifi system, and attempted to keep it a secret, but, as is the case in any small and closed community, the secret didn’t stay secret. Rumors started floating around, the CO called in the COB to question her about it, and Chief Marrero did what so many do when caught with their hand in the cookie jar: she lied through her scummy teeth!

You can read the sordid details in the Navy Times original, and I’ve no reason to repeat them here. The COB and her fellow conspirators conspired to keep the secret once they heard of rumors about it, when the real thing to do, if they’d had any sense at all — that is: assuming some sense other than installing the stupid thing in the first place — would have been to toss any evidence of it overboard. But no, they changed the name of the system to that of a wireless printer to try to conceal it, but kept the thing running. What a great way to get yourself caught!

In the end, Chief Marrero was court martialed, while the other chiefs underwent administrative punishment via a Commodore’s Mast. Chief Marrero? She was sentenced to a reduction in rank, all the way down to E-7, just one grade lower.

She’s still a chief petty officer!

The news stories about this don’t tell us much about what happened to the other chiefs who were in on the deal, but non-judicial punishment is still a limited thing. Chief Marrero loses the rocker above the chevrons, but a top enlisted person, charged with advising her CO and XO, will still be a top non-commissioned officer, and entrusted with duties requiring trust and good judgement. To me, this calls into question not just the intelligence of Chief Marrero and her fellows in the chiefs’ mess aboard the Manchester, but that of the Navy brass, who were tolerant enough to allow her to stay in the Navy, and retain a responsible position. If the Navy brass are that stupid, how can we ever expect them to carry out their duties the way we expect if they ever find themselves in a war again?

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Live by the gun, die by the gun A public service homicide

Yeah, I’m treading on Robert Stacy McCain’s “Aspiring Rapper Update” turf with this one, but it was a Philly story, so I can call dibs.

Abdul Vicks, 25, had some sort of rap career as “YBC Dul”, and Philly Crime Update told me that he had “millions of streams” for his ‘songs,’ if rap can actually be called a song, and I don’t think it can.

Popular rapper who prosecutors say was ringleader of violent gang was fatally shot in Olney

Abdul Vicks, who performed as “YBC Dul,” was fatally shot on the 5500 block of North Sixth Street, just after 3:30 p.m. Friday.

by Ellie Rushing and Robert Moran | Saturday, August 23, 2024 | 7:14 PM EDT

A popular 25-year-old rapper — who prosecutors say was considered the ringleader of a notoriously violent West Philadelphia-based gang — was shot and killed Friday afternoon in the city’s Olney section, a law enforcement source said.

I’m shocked, I tell you, shocked, that The Philadelphia Inquirer, which told us that there are no gangs in the city, just “cliques of young men affiliated with certain neighborhoods and families,” who sometimes had “beefs” with other cliques, used the word “gang,” especially when one of the writers of this article, Ellie Rushing, was also the first name in the byline of that September 19, 2022 article.

Police said the shooting occurred just after 3:30 p.m. on the 5500 block of North Sixth Street. The victim, who was identified as Abdul Vicks, was taken by private vehicle to Einstein Medical Center, where he was pronounced dead at 3:55 p.m.

The newspaper’s source remains anonymous, because he was not authorized to speak to the press about the case. As of the writing of this article, no arrests have been made.

Prosecutors say Vicks, who performed as “YBC Dul,” was considered the ringleader of the West Philadelphia-based gang called YBC, or Young Bag Chasers.

Also see: Robert Stacy McCain, “‘Public Service Homicide’ in Killadelphia“

Philly Crime Update also told us that young Mr Vicks, who will never become the elder Mr Vicks, was also known by a gang name, “Mr Disrespectful.” It appears that someone else has “disrespected” Mr Vicks.

Earlier this month, 22-year-old Quamere Hall, a Vicks associate, was arrested at the Criminal Justice Center and charged with the shooting death of a 34-year-old man last year.

Hall, another rapper who performs as “Mere Pablo,” was at the Criminal Justice Center to show support for Arshad Curry, a fellow YBC member who was scheduled to be sentenced for shooting five people, three fatally, in 2021. Curry was sentenced to 42½ to 85 years in prison.

Last year, three other YBC members were convicted of killing two teens.

Let’s tell the truth here: other than for the families of the Young Bag Chasers, this is all pretty good news. Mr Vicks, the supposed ‘ringleader’ of the gang, has been taken off the streets, permanently. Mr Hall has been arrested for murder.

Arshad Curry, a.k.a. “Most Wanted,” Raheis Sherman, street name “F5ive,” Zaire Crawford, a.k.a. “1k” or “Murda K”, Yaseam Miles, a.k.a. “Baby Wick” or “Ya Ya”; and Semaj Nolan, a.k.a. “Reek12Hunnit,” some of them with the Chaser’s allied gang, the Young Face Arrangers, are all behind bars, most for decades. How can it be a bad thing when bad guys are off the streets?

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What could possibly go wrong?

Illinois goes by the nickname “Land of Lincoln,” because that was where the Kentucky native became an adult and built his legal and political career. Mr Lincoln is known, among other things, for his folksy witticisms, including the famous, If you call a tail a leg, how many legs does a dog have? The answer is ‘four,’ because calling a tail a leg does not make it so.

Sadly, the Prairie State doesn’t seem to be living up to its other nickname, because our 16th President would have said that a man calling himself a woman doesn’t make him a woman.

Transgender Pedophile Who Sexually Assaulted His Children Now Being Held At Illinois Women’s Prison

By Reduxx Team | Monday, August 19, 2024

James, not Michelle, Blessent. Photo by Bloomington, IL, Police, and is a public record.

A transgender pedophile in Illinois is being housed in a women’s prison after being found guilty on multiple counts related to the sexual assault of his two children. Michelle Blessent, born James, is being held at the Logan Correctional Facility in Lincoln, Illinois.As previously reported by Reduxx, Blessent, 35, was initially arrested in April of 2023 in a file which included five counts of predatory criminal sexual assault of a victim under 13.

But on November 15 of that year, three more charges were applied, including one additional count of predatory criminal sexual assault of a victim under 13, one count of grooming, and one count of exploitation of a child. In a public notice posted to their official Facebook, the Bloomington Police Department confirmed that the new charges were related to the original victim. During the course of the trial, a second young victim under the age of the 13 was named. Both of the victims are reported to be Blessent’s biological children – a boy and a girl.

At the time of his original arrest in April, a public information officer with the Department admitted that they were treating the arrest as that of a woman because of Blessent’s “gender identity.”

Which only goes to prove that the state of Illinois is run by idiots!

Mr Blessent applied to legally change his name to Michelle in July of 2022, and completed that process in December of that year.

On June 26, Blessent was sentenced to 42 years for each of two counts of predatory criminal sexual assault of a victim under 13, as well as three years for a count of grooming. The sentences will run consecutively, totaling 87 years. Under Illinois law, Blessent must serve at least 85% of the time for the counts of sexual assault, meaning he will not be eligible for parole until 2095, at which point he would be 106 years of age.

Part of Mr Blessent’s defense was that he had been taking estrogen, which he claimed made it difficult for him to get and maintain an erection, but that also means that he’s a physically intact man male. Nevertheless, he is being incarcerated at a women’s prison.

What could possibly go wrong?

In 2019, the Illinois Department of Corrections approved the transfer of a transgender inmate from an all-male prison to a women’s prison after he claimed he’d been the victim of sexual harassment and abuse. Janiah Monroe, born Andre Patterson, had successfully obtained transfer with the assistance of various trans activists and law firms, while claiming he had been struggling with PTSD from his initial placement in a men’s prison.

Monroe, who had convictions on several felonies including second-degree murder, was later accused of raping a female inmate at Logan, sexually harassing female inmates, and threatening staff members.

Though the IDOC attempted to move him back to the men’s estate, Governor Pritzker’s office overruled the decision and allowed him to remain at the women’s prison. Pritzker is known for being an ardent supporter of trans activism, and is the brother of Jennifer Pritzker[1]Mr Pritzker was named James by his parents when he was born., a trans-identified male billionaire who frequently funds trans causes.

So, what could possibly go wrong? Andre Patterson showed Illinois what could go wrong, but it seems that the state didn’t learn its lesson. Will Mr Blessent try the same thing now that he’s locked up, for the rest of his miserable life — or at least until he turns 106! — what more could the state do to him if he chose to rape a female inmate? The Land of Lincoln does not have capital punishment, so Mr Blessent cannot be punished more severely than his current sentence, though solitary confinement is a possibility.

Even that might be ended, as the state House passed the “Nelson Mandela Act“, which greatly restricts the use of solitary, 73-40, on May 24, 2024, and it has been sent to the state Senate. If this passes, there would be almost no in-prison discipline that the state could impose on Mr Blessent should he assault a female inmate.

This guy is clearly mental! He sexually abused his own children, so what mental reservations can he be said to have when it comes to sexual abuse. He may have been taking estrogen, but he’s still a man male, which normally means that he could overpower most women.

Today’s American left seem to have adopted the furthest left positions when it comes to anything even remotely connected to sex, and if transgenderism is the reductio ad absurdum of the sexual spectrum, the left don’t seem to recognize the absurdity of it. In their desire to be all inclusive of any and every sexual perversion, they have even attacked those liberal women who reject transgenderism as real and rational.

References

References
↑1 Mr Pritzker was named James by his parents when he was born.
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Man, that Larry Krasner and his office are really stupid!

This site has previously noted the charges against former Philadelphia Police Officer Mark Dial. Officer Dial shot and killed criminal Eddie Irizarry when he believed that Mr Irizarry was reaching for a weapon.

The city’s George Soros-sponsored, police-hating and criminal-loving District Attorney charged Officer Dial with “first-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter, aggravated assault, and related offenses,” though, as you can see from Pennsylvania Title 18 §2502 above, first-degree murder was never an appropriate charge.

An at least reasonable case could be made for charging PA Title 18 §2503 Voluntary Manslaughter, a first degree felony, but there’s a high bar for the prosecution to surmount.

  • 18 §2503(b) Unreasonable belief killing justifiable. — A person who intentionally or knowingly kills an individual commits voluntary manslaughter if at the time of the killing he believes the circumstances to be such that, if they existed, would justify the killing under Chapter 5 of this title (relating to general principles of justification), but his belief is unreasonable.

Mr Krasner would have to prove that Officer Dial had an “unreasonable” belief that he was justified in shooting Mr Irizarry. Mr Irizarry had been driving erratically, and when he finally pulled over, he kept the car window up, was non-compliant, and raised his hand while holding a knife.

A Philadelphia judge dismissed all charges against Officer Dial, ruling that the prosecution had not presented evidence that a crime has been committed, so naturally the Usual Suspects decided that a riot was in order. Naturally, Mr Krasner refiled the charges, including first degree murder, and Mr Dial was rearrested, and denied bail.

Now, after nearly a year in prison, without having been convicted of anything, the former Officer is once again free on bail.

Mark Dial was released on bail after the Philly DA’s office dropped his first-degree murder charge

Dial had been in custody since last fall after he was charged with fatally shooting Eddie Irizarry in a traffic stop in Kensington.

by Chris Palmer, Ellie Rushing, and Rodrigo Torrejón | Thursday, August 9, 2024 | 10:50 AM EDT

The District Attorney’s Office has withdrawn a charge of first-degree murder against former police officer Mark Dial, a decision that prosecutors were effectively forced to make by a judge after failing to tell Dial’s attorneys about a key piece of evidence they intend to use against him at trial.

The decision, made Thursday, allowed Dial to be released from jail on bail to await a new trial date, now with a lead charge of third-degree murder. His case — which had been scheduled to begin in September — will now go before a jury in May 2025.

Dial’s bail was set at $200,000, and he paid the required 10% to secure his release shortly after noon Thursday, court records show.

The development served as the latest twist in the high-profile case, one that has taken an unusually circuitous path through the courts. Dial is accused of fatally shooting Eddie Irizarry during a traffic stop in Kensington last year, and his prosecution has now been tossed out, reinstated, and downgraded over the last 11 months.

Just what kind of ineptitude infests the District Attorney’s Office that they first made a mistake which got the charges dismissed, and now, if the first paragraph in the Inquirer’s story is accurate, they f(ornicated) up again. “(A)n unusually circuitous path”? That’s a polite way of saying that the DAO has been completely inept.

What was this whole charade other than an effort by Mr Krasner to punish Mr Dial pre-emptively, in case he couldn’t actually win a conviction?

Prosecutors months ago had hired an expert to prepare a report on whether Dial violated Pennsylvania’s use-of-force law for police when he shot Irizarry, a question that goes to the heart of the case and will determine whether Dial should be convicted. But prosecutors told Dial’s attorneys about the expert’s report only this week — something Dial’s lawyers said was unreasonable, and didn’t give them enough time to prepare a rebuttal.

Common Pleas Court Judge Glenn B. Bronson agreed, and said he did not want to delay the case and keep Dial incarcerated for months over an issue that prosecutors had effectively created.

“Why didn’t you tell them you were hiring an expert?” he said in court this week, later adding: “You sat on this for 10, 11 months.”

Judge Bronson offered the compromise, to reduce the top charge to third degree murder, which made Mr Dial eligible for bail. Prosecutors then urged the judge to restrict Mr Dial to house arrest, to punish him further, but the defense noted, to the judge’s satisfaction, that Mr Dial did not pose a flight risk.

All of the charges should be dropped, and Mr Dial compensated for the time he spent behind bars unjustly, and that compensation should come from Mr Krasner’s personal wealth.