Tag Archives: #SecondAmendment

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Los Angeles Times “diversity” columnist thinks white people won’t accept blacks legally carrying firearms

Erika D Smith, an opinion writer for what Patterico calls the Los Angeles Dog Trainer, writes as though there aren’t a lot of black people in city already carrying guns.

Is California ready for more Black people to legally carry guns in public?

by Erika D Smith | Monday, June 27, 2022 | 5:00 AM PDT

Nathan W. Jones leads the Bay Area chapter of the Black Gun Owners Assn. But until a few years ago, he wasn’t even into guns.

Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. And George Floyd was killed by Minneapolis police, sending racial justice protesters into the streets. And white supremacists trashed the U.S. Capitol in the Jan. 6 insurrection.

Suddenly, it seemed as if America was on the brink. And with the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe vs. Wade on Friday, emboldening a militant array of white Christian nationalists, we clearly still are.

So, on Thursday, while many were apoplectic over the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold the rights of gun owners to carry a loaded weapon in public — throwing gun control laws in California and New York into limbo at a time when shootings are increasing — Jones was thoughtful.

Here’s where the OpEd column veers off into the weeds. The author noted that shootings have been increasing, but that was before the Supreme Court’s ruling in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v Bruen, so the previous law wasn’t stopping shootings.

The ruling was a fairly simple one: it did not overturn New York’s law requiring people who owned firearms to have a permit to do so, but overturned the Empire State’s very restrictive requirements that the people needed a specific, approved reason to own a firearm, a reason that the state approved, and that a desire to own a weapon for self-protection was insufficient. The state can still require a permit, and laws which ban previously convicted felons from having firearms still apply, but the state cannot ban law-abiding people with ordinary reasons from obtaining such permits.

As we have previously noted, in Pennsylvania, where concealed carry permits are required, law-abiding people have been applying for permits at record-breaking rates because so many gang bangers have been carrying firearms, and have been killing people in record-breaking numbers.

On the one hand, he wants it to be easy for law-abiding citizens to be able to defend themselves “if and when the time arises.” But on the other hand, he’s a 50-year-old realist who knows that fear and hatred of Black people run deep in the United States, especially when we’re armed.

“There’s no overt racism when we go to the gun range, but we know how people are looking at us,” Jones said of the dozens of Black members who meet up to go shooting. “We know the things that people think.”

Setting aside Mr Jones exercise into mind-reading, the obvious point becomes: shouldn’t he want for the public to see law-abiding black citizens, to get people used to picturing black Americans as decent citizens? I am reminded of the Sacramento Bee putting into plain language its reasons for ceasing the publication of police mug shots, because they “perpetuat(e) stereotypes about who commits crime in our community,” by which they meant that black people are seen as criminals.[1]Erika Smith worked for the Sacramento Bee, but left before the Bee began that policy. Shouldn’t black Americans want to break that stereotype by showing themselves as responsible citizens?

Following a couple of paragraphs in which the author notes that Governor Gavin Newsom (D-CA) and the state legislature will have to come up with some form of permit process which meets the Supreme Court’s requirements, he continues:

But the governor and lawmakers could fail, and the Supreme Court’s ruling could stand. And then, California could be forced to confront a reality that has long made many self-proclaimed liberals uncomfortable: Black people — potentially a lot of us — legally carrying guns in public.

But that’s just it: a lot of black Americans, and white Americans, are already carrying guns in public, just not all of them legally. The various permit requirements didn’t deter the criminals; they only got in the way of law-abiding people, people who didn’t have the time to apply, or didn’t want to pay a fee, or, in some cases, such as in New York, knew that their reason for wanting a firearm just wasn’t special enough to get past the bureaucrats.

It’s simple: the black — and white — Americans who we don’t want carrying firearms in public are the one already carrying them, illegally, without bothering with any stinkin’ permits, because they are criminals, or punks looking to make a street name for themselves and become criminals. But if you’re a good guy, I don’t care if you carry a firearm; that’s your business.

And once more the author veers into the weeds:

Most who join say they bought a gun for self-defense, Choice and Jones agree. Many reach out after getting — forgive the phrase — triggered by high-profile racist incidents, including last month’s massacre of Black people at a supermarket in Buffalo, N.Y.

Really? Maybe in the Pyrite State, I suppose, but the article I cited above, noting the great increase in permit applications in Philly was written on March 16, 2022, two months before the Buffalo killings. They were ‘triggered’ by 499 murders in the city in 2020, then 562 in 2021, and another 251 so far this year, more than half of 500 with less than half of the year elapsed. They were triggered by an even higher number of shootings in the city than on the same day last year, even though the homicide totals have decreased slightly, apparently because the gang-bangers are squeezing off more rounds, but seem to be worse shots. While it may be true that having a firearm makes it more probable that you will injure yourself, or a family member, than defend yourself from a bad guy, such statistics are of little comfort to people stuck in Strawberry Mansion or Kensington or West Philadelphia.

Much of the rest of the argument is that, even in “liberal California” white people are going to be suspicious of black Americans carrying firearms; it is an argument, at bottom, which says that white people will simply never trust blacks.

Well, I don’t buy it. There will always be some white people who will never trust blacks, but that can be minimized by black Americans not only being trustworthy but showing that they are trustworthy, and that includes exercising their Second Amendment rights responsibly. If black Americans are seen as fighting for safety in black neighborhoods, as not tolerating the gang-bangers who ruin things and shoot up mostly black neighborhoods, more white Americans will come to understand that black Americans are just like any other group, with some good people and some bad people.

Some of this comes from my personal experience. I spent much of my career — I’m retired now — working in an integrated working-class industry, ready-mixed concrete production and delivery. I worked with black drivers and white drivers, I worked with black plant managers and white plant managers, I worked with black quality control technicians and white quality control technicians, and they pretty much all alike: some good at their jobs and some bad, some who showed up and worked hard every day, and some who tried to make it through with as little work as possible. And I knew a couple who were packing heat every day.

And it just happened again in the City of Brotherly Love:

We don’t know that the residents of this house are black, but at least one of the home invaders was, and the address, 1606 South 10th Street is in a reasonably nice neighborhood, not far from Sts John Neuman, and Maria Goretti Catholic High School; the adjacent rowhouse, at 1604 South 10th Street is listed for sale at $750,000. This is not a particularly crime-ridden neighborhood.

While the Fox 29 tweet says that the invaders “forced (the) front door open,” The Philadelphia Inquirer’s story did not confirm that, saying only that:

Detectives on the scene declined to answer reporters’ questions about why the men were entering the home, who shot them, how many shooters opened fire, or what led to the bloodshed.

Both Fox 29 and WPVI 6 ABC News reported that the dead men were attempting to break into the house, but the Inky said that, as of 10:00 PM police were still saying that it was not clear exactly what happened.

From the 6ABC News story:

“This is surprising. This neighborhood is usually very safe. It’s a shock to see something like this happen. I live a block away,” said John Carrozza. “It’s sad. It’s a sign of the times, unfortunately.”

“I’ve been here for six years. I feel really safe. I just had my catalytic converter stolen, and I’m thinking maybe it’s time to move out – for something like this to happen in the middle of the afternoon…” said Mary Grace McHale.

As in maybe move out of Philadelphia entirely? South Philadelphia is supposed to be one of the safer areas in the City of Brotherly Love, and while a single break-in isn’t really indicative, the fact that Mrs McHale had her vehicle’s catalytic converter stolen shows that planned, not spontaneous, crime is moving into that area. Is it any wonder that people are seeking firearms to defend themselves. Whatever the story at the shooting, apparently the men inside the home had to take action before the police arrived.

Erika Smith’s column had the theme that even in her very liberal city, white Angelenos would fret that more black residents might be carrying firearms. That’s being forced on them, by their own neighbors. This white evil reich wing conservative has absolutely no qualms about law-abiding black Americans carrying firearms.

References

References
↑1 Erika Smith worked for the Sacramento Bee, but left before the Bee began that policy.
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Philadelphians are fighting back! When the city cannot protect the people, the people will protect themselves

We have previously noted that the law-abiding people in Philadelphia have been seeking concealed carry permits at a record pace. And we have seen stories about some of the bad guys in Philly being sent untimely to their eternal rewards.

Why are people in the City of Brotherly Love arming themselves? When there are innocent victims being gunned down for no apparent reason, when it’s not just the gang-bangers shooting other gang-bangers, and the city has a George Soros stooge ‘progressive’ District Attorney who likes to set the captives free, a whole lot of Philadelphians have gotten the message: you are on your own!

But today’s surprise is that The Philadelphia Inquirer has actually reported on it!

As more people get guns and carry permits, Philly sees a sharp rise in homicides ruled justified

More people in Philadelphia are legally arming themselves and shooting their armed attackers amid a violent crime spike.

by Mensah M Dean | Monday, June 20, 2022

In May, a South Philadelphia man stepped out of his house for a smoke when police said a gun-wielding man rode up on a bicycle and demanded money. The homeowner dropped his cigarette, pulled out his licensed gun, and fatally shot the would-be robber in the head.

In March, an assistant manager at a Dollar General store in North Philadelphia used his legal gun to shoot a man who police said burst into the store in a ski mask, demanded money, and threatened to kill the cashier. “I’m opening up the register for you, sir,” said the manager, who instead pulled his own handgun and shot the robber in the head, killing him.

The same month, a customer with a carry permit inside Max Food Market in the Yorktown section fatally shot a gunman who tried to rob him while he was playing a video poker machine. “You have to defend yourself,” said Maximo Torres Rodriquez, the store’s owner. “You have to do it.”

The three would-be assailants died from their injuries and in all three cases authorities brought no charges against the shooters. These sorts of deadly clashes in which the intended victims survive and assailants die are rare in Philadelphia, but are becoming more common as a growing number of people have legally armed themselves amid rising numbers of carjackings, shootings, and homicides.

Mr Rodriquez put it exactly right: sometimes “You have to defend yourself. You have to do it.”

Also read: Jennifer Stefano: The case for impeaching Larry Krasner

We’re not supposed to say it, but sometimes a homicide is a public service. When the Dollar General assistant manager shot and killed the would-be robber, perhaps the robber would have been satisfied with the cash and left without hurting anyone, but as crooks get successful, they are also emboldened, and the odds are extremely high that he’d have attempted to knock over another store and another store, and eventually someone would get shot, and possibly killed.

Justified homicides jumped 67% from 2020 to 2021 ― from 12 to 20 according to the Philadelphia Police Department. An additional six have been ruled justified by the department but are awaiting the District Attorney’s Office to sign off. In 2019, there were 10 justified killings, six in 2018 and eight in 2017, the department said.

So far in 2022, victims have shot at least eight armed assailants to death, with more than seven months remaining in the year.

“The total number of shootings and the climate of gun violence has gotten more severe,” said District Attorney Larry Krasner. “So I would expect that there would be more situations involving self-defense.”

As Krasner said, the surge in justified shootings reflects the general rise in gun violence in the city. With unjustified homicides hitting a record total last year, with 562 victims, self-defense killings climbed too, though only slightly as a percentage of all homicides.

Let’s do the math:

  • 2017: 315 murders + 8 justified homicides = 323 total, 2.48% justified.
  • 2018: 353 murders + 6 justified homicides = 361 total, 1.66% justified.
  • 2019: 356 murders + 10 justified homicides = 366 total, 2.73% justified.
  • 2020: 499 murders + 12 justified homicides = 511 total, 2.35% justified.
  • 2021: 562 murders + 26 justified homicides = 588 total, 4.42% justified.
  • 2022: 230 murders + 8 justified homicides = 238 total, 3.48% justified.

The trend worries some analysts and gun-control advocates, who say civilians who buy guns for protection may be putting themselves and others at more risk, not less. They cite studies showing that legally purchased guns are more likely to be fired in accidental shootings, during domestic disputes, and in suicides than in self-defense.

721 West Butler Street. Click to enlarge.

Of course, the Inquirer article let us know that more law-abiding people obtaining weapons is a bad thing, stating that they are more likely to be discharged in accidents, domestic disputes and suicides, offering several paragraphs of statistics.

There is one thing that the article did not include, perhaps because it simply isn’t quantifiable. We have previously published several street scene photographs of Philadelphia, showing how many residents have put themselves in jail, barring up their porches and windows, to try to defend themselves from the thugs. There is an attitude of fear, fear! permeating the city, a fear that at any time your number could come up, and that is due to the city not protecting innocent people. When you have a district attorney like Larry Krasner who largely refuses to prosecute illegal firearm possession cases, who doesn’t like to enforce the laws already on the books, who metes out slaps on the wrists for even violent crimes, coupled with a homicide rate higher than Chicago’s, of course people are going to be worried. People are buying firearms for the protection of their families and themselves because it has become blatantly obvious: the city isn’t protecting them.

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The abomination of ‘red flag’ laws It's OK if we suspend your constitutional rights for just a little while, right?

Governor Tom Wolf (D-PA), who will be leaving office at the end of the year, tweeted out a nice little graphic of what happens under the so-called “red flag” laws. Due process of law, he tells us, is part of it.

But look at the graphic.

Jane’s social media contact, Randy, posts photos of guns & cryptic messages.

Followed by:

Jane calls the police to report the posts.

What does “cryptic” mean?

adjective Also cryp·ti·cal.

  1. mysterious in meaning; puzzling; ambiguous: a cryptic message.
  2. abrupt; terse; short:
  3. a cryptic note. secret; occult:
  4. a cryptic writing. involving or using cipher, code, etc.

So, if Jane simply doesn’t understand Randy’s message, Governor Wolf wants her to call the cops!

Then follow the next steps:

The police petition in court to temporarily remove Randy’s guns.

Police provide evidence that Randy is a danger to himself/others.

The court agrees to a temporary removal of Randy’s weapons.

You know what you don’t see in there? You don’t see any notification to Randy, and presumably Randy’s attorney, that he is under investigation to see if he “is a danger to himself/others,” because, just like any search warrant, the court and the police do not want the subject of the warrant to know the police are coming to enter his home and seize evidence. Due to Jane’s puzzlement over Randy’s message, the police show up, enter his home, possibly forcibly, and seize his property, all without Randy having had a chance to defend himself before the court.

Now, up to this point, Randy has committed no crime! Rather, because Jane is worried about him, she has sicced the cops on him, and don’t fool yourself: while police officers are normally more politically conservative than liberal, there’s nothing the police, or at least police chiefs, like more than a disarmed public. As they view Jane’s complaint, if they are going to err, they are more likely to err on the side of wanting Randy’s guns removed.

There’s even an incentive there: if they don’t try to have Randy’s firearms taken away, and it turns out that he does commit a crime, or even suicide, with his weapons, and it comes out that the police had Jane’s complaint and didn’t try to take Randy’s guns, they, or their city or jurisdiction, could be held liable in a civil suit. But Jane, doubtlessly, will be shielded from legal action for calling in a genuine concern, and I can see the red flag laws the left want passed keeping her identity confidential.

The police are not the only ones who do not like an armed citizenry; prosecutors don’t care for it much, either, so persuading the prosecutor or city attorney or whomever needs to petition the judge for the removal order might not be difficult. Judges, though not liable for the consequences of their decisions, might well feel their own internal pressure to prevent a tragedy.

So, what’s missing in all of this? As Jane, and the police, and the city attorneys, and the judges, several people, are all at least somewhat motivated by the idea that they could prevent a tragedy, there’s no one involved to protect Randy’s rights.

Enter Jeff Goldstein, and Robert Stacy McCain’s story on his problems:

Crazy People Are Dangerous (and the Problem With ‘Red Flag’ Laws)

Saturday, June 18, 2022

You haven’t forgotten Deb Frisch, have you? In October 2018, Frisch — whose harassment of Protein Wisdom blogger Jeff Goldstein lasted a dozen years — was finally sentenced to four years in a Colorado prison. When last we heard about her, in August 2021, she had been denied parole after ranting insanely at her parole board hearing.

This morning, I noticed I’d gotten some extra traffic to one of my posts about Frisch, and investigation led to Not The Bee: If you need a reason to oppose“red flag” gun laws, this writer’s harrowing 12-year tale of terrifying stalking and harassment might just do the trick.

To cut a long story short, the lovely Miss Frisch became obsessed with Mr Goldstein for some insane reason or other, and when things didn’t go the way she wanted, she started attacking, online, of course, not physically, Mr Goldstein and his family, in particular his then two-year-old son. Miss Frisch made baseless accusations that Mr Goldstein was molesting his son, all of which had to get the attention of local law enforcement; allegations of child sexual abuse are always things which trigger law enforcement investigations.

Mr McCain concluded:

The way our legal system operates — the built-in prejudices of courts, based on decades of precedents intended to “protect” the rights of the mentally ill — it is very difficult to get a dangerously deranged person locked up. Whenever a mentally ill person commits an atrocity (or gets shot by the cops), you’ll see commentators saying that this shows problems with our nation’s mental health system, when in fact it was liberal judges in the 1970s and ’80s who decided it should be nearly impossible to keep crazy people locked up in lunatic asylums, where they belong. These same judges, however, will probably be willing to sign “red flag” orders based on unproven claims, without due process for those targeted by such orders.

According to Governor Wolf, the gun owners do receive due process, even though they don’t get any chance to defend themselves until after their homes have already been invaded by the police and their legally-owned firearms seized, all on the word of someone who doesn’t like a “cryptic” message.

Now, there’s a difference between Jane, who thought Randy’s social media posting had a “cryptic” message, and Miss Frisch, who accused Mr Goldstein of child sexual abuse, but the result is the same: without any actual evidence of a crime beyond someone’s stated ‘concern,’ both “Randy” and Mr Goldstein had to defend themselves through the legal system, costing them expensive attorney’s fees — Mr Goldstein specifically mentioned that he’d had attorneys — to regain their weapons. The fictional Jane in Governor Wolf’s tweet might have had motives as pure as the wind-driven snow, but Miss Frisch’s were wholly malevolent, and (seemingly) driven by obsession and mental illness.

But the police and the courts have no choice but to take allegations of child sexual abuse seriously, and the same will be true of “red flag” law accusations. How can anyone know, prior to an investigation, whether the accuser or ‘tipster’ is being either deliberately fraudulent or simply concerned, but they’ll have to act.

It could be an estranged husband or wife, trying to gain leverage in child custody or support. It could be someone who can’t stand the thought of Bambi getting killed who calls the cops on a guy just before deer season. It could be one gang trying to get another gang disarmed. Or it really could be a concerned citizen who believes he has seen something of legitimate concern. The trouble is that you can never know unless the police actually investigate, and that means records and trouble and quite possibly a suspension of his constitutional rights for an innocent civilian, along with possible attorney’s fees.

The real secret is actual law enforcement. Remember Nikolas Cruz, who killed 17 people and wounded 17 others in the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting? There were continual warnings about him, and at least 23 incidents where the Broward County Sheriff’s Department had calls about him, but nothing was done. Had the Sheriff’s deputies done something really radical like arrested him and charged him with crimes, he could have been convicted, and barred from buying a weapon. The Broward County schools knew of his behavioral problems, transferred him from school-to-school, but, in an effort to keep him out of the so-called ‘school-to-prison pipeline,’ did not notify law enforcement when he assaulted another student.

If law enforcement had done their job, Mr Cruz would not have been able to buy, legally, the weapons he did. If the school district had done their jobs, he would have been reported to law enforcement in a manner which could not be ignored.

So, because the people who are charged, under the law, with notifying law enforcement about someone like Mr Cruz haven’t been doing their jobs, Governor Wolf and the left want ordinary citizens like the fictitious “Jane” to do the job, and to create a system where Jane’s speculation and word have legal weight. After all, it’s for people’s safety, right?

Well, there are a lot of constitutional rights which could be ignored, to improve public safety! We could do away with the need to prove guilt, and just imprison, or execute, anyone we just “knew” was a bad guy. We could suspend the rights of free speech and free association, to keep the bad guys apart. Given that half the country seemed to think that the right of free association and assembly could be suspended over COVID-19, and a bunch of state governors got away with it, well surely that right isn’t really important, right?

Benjamin Franklin once said, “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” It seems that a whole lot of Americans have decided that they deserve neither liberty nor safety.

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Weak-kneed Republicans are going to assist the Democrats in restricting our constitutional rights

They’re going after our constitutional rights again!

Senators strike bipartisan gun deal, heralding potential breakthrough

By Mike DeBonis and Leigh Ann Caldwell | Updated June 12, 2022 at 5:41 p.m. EDT | Published June 12, 2022 at 11:08 a.m. EDT

A bipartisan group of senators announced Sunday that it had reached a tentative agreement on legislation that would pair modest new gun restrictions with significant new mental health and school security investments — a deal that could put Congress on a path to enacting the most significant national response in decades to acts of mass gun violence.

Twenty senators — 10 Democrats and 10 Republicans — signed a statement announcing the framework deal. The move indicated that the agreement could have enough GOP support to defeat a filibuster, the Senate supermajority rule that has impeded previous gun legislation.

“Families are scared, and it is our duty to come together and get something done that will help restore their sense of safety and security in their communities,” the statement read in part. “Most importantly, our plan saves lives while also protecting the constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans.”

Under the tentative deal, a federal grant program would encourage states to implement red-flag laws that allow authorities to keep guns away from people found by a judge to represent a potential threat to themselves or others, while federal criminal background checks for gun buyers younger than 21 would include a mandatory search of juvenile justice and mental health records for the first time.

The only provision of this I can support is that prospective firearms buyers have their juvenile justice records checked as well. And I cannot see why such a provision would apply solely to prospective buyers ages 18-20; the juvenile record search should apply to everyone.

Other provisions would prevent gun sales to domestic violence offenders beyond just spouses, closing what is often called the “boyfriend loophole”; clarify which gun sellers are required to register as federal firearms dealers and, thus, run background checks on their customers; and establish new federal offenses related to gun trafficking.

“(D)omestic violence offenders”? If they have actually been convicted of a crime, that should already be part of their records, and prevent them from buying firearms. If they have only been accused by someone, and never have actually been charged and subject to normal bail restrictions, then no, we cannot and should not prohibit a free American citizen from exercising his rights just on someone’s say-so. The Johnny Depp-Amber Heard fiasco ought to demonstrate to us that disgruntled spouses and former spouses can and will say anything to get back at their exes.

The agreement does not include a provision supported by President Biden, congressional Democrats and a handful of Republicans that would raise the minimum age for the purchase of at least some rifles from 18 to 21. Handguns are already subject to a federal 21-and-older rule.

I suspect that our only hope is that the left try to festoon this ‘compromise’ with enough stupidity that it loses enough Republican support to allow it to be filibustered successfully.

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More on the South Street gunfight Businessmen want 'broken windows' policing; Philly Mayor and District Attorney don't want that at all!

Laughing out loud! Philadelphia District Attorney won’t even prosecute people for illegal firearms possession, yet business owners expect the city to enforce “anti-nuisance laws”?

Rudy Giuliani was unavailable for comment.

Business owners say weak enforcement is emboldening the violence on Philly’s South Street

Several South Street business owners cited a climate of “lawlessness” in the city. The lack of enforcement is creating a climate of impunity that climaxes in lethal force.

by Joseph N DiStephano | Tuesday, June 7, 2022

Ron Dangler served two tours in Iraq — where he was “a door-kicker,” a cavalry scout at the front of a dangerous patrol in Ramadi in 2005 and 2006.

So it wasn’t the first time the Philadelphia native who owns Dobbs, the rock club at 304 South St., had heard gunfire, when shooters blasted each other and a crowd of people in the street on Saturday night, leaving three dead and 11 wounded. Continue reading →

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The left love to blame Republicans for the actions of the Democratic base

Adopted Philadelphian Amanda Marcotte doesn’t normally write about the City of Brotherly Love, but with the gang gun battle on Sunday, even she had to pay attention. From Salon:

U.S. gun laws are causing mayhem and mass murder — and Republicans couldn’t be more thrilled

Crappy gun laws cause our crime problems. But Republicans blame liberal prosecutors and make racist arguments

by Amanda Marcotte | Monday, June 6, 2022 | 1:30 PM EDT

After reassuring multiple people by text that my partner and I had been tucked safely in bed at 11:30 on Saturday night, I finally cracked and posted a general reassurance on Facebook. No, we had not been near the shooting on South Street in Philadelphia, where we live, that resulted in 3 deaths and 11 major injuries. But people’s concerns weren’t misplaced. We had been at a party in that neighborhood just the night before. Saturday’s was the ninth mass shooting in the city this year alone, according to the Gun Violence Archive. There have been shootings at train stations and house parties. One group of victims was going to the prom. These things really are a matter of luck in a society that’s swimming in as much gun violence as ours.

It’s interesting that the author lives in Philadelphia, but cites The Washington Post. Perhaps she doesn’t subscribe to her hometown newspaper?

I get it: Miss Marcotte isn’t really interested in digging more deeply into a story, if the surface fits Teh Narrative she wishes to use. The “group of victims” going to prom”? There was one male targeted, because some other people wanted him dead, and the other three were simply in the way. This was gang violence, but that’s not something she wishes to discuss. Continue reading →

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It’s always the gun’s fault! For the left, the bad people using firearms can never be blamed!

As of 11:59 PM EDT on Thursday, June 2nd, the Current Crime Statistics page of the Philadelphia Police Department reported that there had been 211 homicides in the City of Brotherly Love. That page, which is not updated on the weekend, finally shows that as of 11:59 PM EDT on Sunday, June 5th, the number of murders had soared to 218.

The Philadelphia Inquirer, our nation’s third oldest continuously published daily newspaper, had told us about the killing of a pregnant woman in her early twenties in Port Richmond, and how doctors at Temple University Hospital had managed to save her unborn child. And the gang gunfight that left three people dead being described as a “mass shooting” was all over the newspaper’s website, but that’s ‘only’ four homicides reported, four out of the seven the police department has now totaled. A search of the newpaper’s website main page and crime page on Monday morning at 8:09 AM EDT found nothing on those other three homicides.

Perhaps previously wounded people expired since early Friday morning; we just don’t know from the Inky. But we do know that the same failed and tired leaders of the city are making the same failed and tired statements: Continue reading →

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Why won’t anybody tell the truth about South Street

There were fourteen people shot, three of whom died as of Sunday afternoon, in what is being called a “mass shooting” by just about everybody, and The Philadelphia Inquirer was kind enough to give us their definition:

The Inquirer defines a mass shooting as one that occurs in public and kills three or more people. Definitions of mass shooting vary, with no single consensus. The FBI has classified mass murder as four or more deaths in a single incident; Congress has used the definition of three or more.

The Gun Violence Archive, a nonprofit that tracks mass shootings, defines them as any incident in which four or more people are injured or killed, a classification some national media outlets also use.

But “mass shooting” invokes images of the Uvalde or Parkland or Sandy Hook school massacres, especially with Uvalde and the Buffalo shootings fresh in people’s minds.

However this was not some kook with an AR-15 who set up and planned to kill a bunch of people. No, this was a gun battle between at least two groups “beefin'” with each other. To the right is a screen capture from the Inquirer taken at 4:20 PM EDT, one which happened to occur in a large crowd, and in which innocent bystanders were wounded and killed.

Commissioner Danielle Outlaw on Sunday called Saturday’s mass shooting on South Street an “atrocity,” and police said at least five guns were fired in the incident as dozens of people tried to flee or navigate chaos that spanned several blocks.

At least one of the slain was an innocent bystander: Kris Minners, 22, a second-grade boys’ resident adviser at Girard College, a well-known Philadelphia boarding school, died from his injuries at Jefferson Hospital.

Officials said the investigation into the incident remained in its early stages, and several questions remained unclear. Police officials said no one had been taken into custody, and investigators were still seeking to piece together video, ballistics, and other evidence.

Outlaw said officers assigned to the 200 block of South Street heard gunshots on the 400 block around 11:31 p.m. When the officers arrived, Outlaw said, they saw several people with gunshot wounds and began giving first aid.

One of the officers then noticed a man on the 200 block, near an intersection with American Street, firing into a crowd, Outlaw said. The officer fired several shots, some of which Outlaw said likely hit the suspected shooter, but the man ran away.

Chief Inspector Frank Vanore said all of that likely came after a fight on the 200 block of South Street. Police believe that brawl, which began as a fistfight, may have been the incident that initiated much of the gunfire. As the fight progressed, two men pulled guns and shot each other, police said. One of the men died.

In the aftermath, Vanore said, another three guns were fired along South Street across several blocks. The officer also shot at the man near American Street.

Well, it’s good that at least one of the dead was one of the instigators!

Video shows gun drawn before fistfight erupted between men on South Street

by Max Marin and Aubrey Whelan | Sunday, June 5, 2022

Cell phone footage circulating online, and corroborated by The Inquirer, shows a fistfight that led to gunfire on South Street on Saturday night.

In one video, two men appear to exchange words with a third man in front of Rita’s Water Ice between Second and Third Streets. The two men then slowly descend on the third — one of them drawing what appears to be a handgun as they advance. A fistfight ensues.

People standing nearby begin to panic when they observe the drawn handgun. “They about to shoot!” a woman said.

The men trade blows and wrestle with each other for less than 15 seconds, moving into the middle of South Street, when a volley of gunshots rings out, at which point the video cuts away. The footage conforms with another video of the events viewed by The Inquirer.

More than two dozen gunshots ring out in quick succession.

A trail of blood snaked along the sidewalk outside Rita’s after the shooting. On Sunday morning, the police chalk outlines for more than a dozen shell casings were still visible on the nearby sidewalks.

In a separate video posted online, which occurs sometime after the shooting ended, a group of women is seen huddled above a bleeding woman who lies in the southside crosswalk of Third and South — the same spot a nearby bar owner told The Inquirer he saw a woman collapse last night.

Blood had stained the white striping of the same crosswalk when a reporter arrived on scene around 1 a.m.

Of course, the Inquirer, which said it “corroborated”, was quickly made public, and Steve Keeley of Fox 29 News tweeted it:

Naturally, the Inquirer didn’t want to tell readers that it was two black men appear to exchange words with a third black man.

Of course a race-baiter styling herself PJ had this to say:

#WhiteSupremacist attacked downtown #Philadelphia last night.

Over 14 people shot, by a fully automatic #AR15 machine gun.

Yet this is normalized in #america thanks to the GOP and NRA. Time to abolish and confiscate! #GetOutTheVote

#Pennsylvania #Pittsburgh #BLM #Pride

I regret that I sometimes take too seriously an account that simply has to be a parody, because no one could really be that stupid.

But what is that stupid are all of the Democratic politicians crying out for gun control, when it’s obvious that no gun control measures would have stopped this. At least one of the guns recovered had an ‘extended magazine,’ which is illegal. Eventually we’ll find out that none of the weapons was legally possessed by any of the gang-bangers who started shooting up South Street. But that doesn’t matter to the gun grabbers who want to disarm all law-abiding people, thinking that will somehow disarm the criminals. George Soros’ stooge District Attorney, Larry Krasner, tweeted:

The terrible crimes last night on South Street tell our Pennsylvania legislators it’s time for real action. Boycott NRA lobbyists, boycott NRA donations, and bring real common sense gun regulation to Pennsylvania. Now.

We remember, of course, how the distinguished Mr Krasner, who could have has Hasan Elliot locked up on a parole violation, who could have had him behind bars, just let him go, and Mr Elliot then killed Philadelphia Police Corporal James O’Connor IV. Mr Krasner has Corporal O’Connor’s blood on his hands!

The left won’t want to let this ‘crisis’ go to waste, but it’s always the same thing: their response to criminals is to assail the rights of law-abiding people.

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The math of school shootings

I know, I know, the math doesn’t match Teh Narrative, but sometimes it is necessary to do the math.

The Washington Post has published yet another school shooting scare story, but it’s entirely propaganda.

As we previously noted, the Post reported that there have been 185 people killed in schools since Columbine, 185 in 23 years, or 8.04347826 per year. With a public school population of 50,700,000, that works out to a homicide rate of 0.0159 per 100,000 population. Students, teachers and administrators are far, far, far safer when they are in school than when they are out in public.

Even the Post’s story was propaganda, because while the 185 killed number appears to be solid, they claimed that “more than 311,000 students have experienced gun violence at school since Columbine”, but were counting the entire school’s attendance when things like one student shooting another in the bathroom as “students experiencing gun violence at school”.

Philadelphia suffered through 562 homicides in 2021, with a guesstimated population of 1,576,251, yielding a homicide rate of 35.65 per 100,000, almost all with handguns. Washington DC, with a 2021 population of 670,050, saw 226 murders in 2021, for a murder rate of 33.73 per 100,000 population. Even much safer Lexington, Kentucky, with 37 homicides in 2021, spread over a population of 321,793, had a homicide rate of 11.50. Compare that to a homicide rate of 0.0159 per 100,000 for school shootings! Continue reading →