Category: Gun Control

NYPD Warns Of Threats Against NYC Polling Places

NYPD Warns Of Threats Against NYC Polling Places

The New York Post reports:

The NYPD says “elevated vigilance” is needed during the upcoming midterm elections, as “hostile rhetoric” and “generalized threats” swirl on online forums, according to an internal memo obtained by The Post.

Officials warned that “malicious actors” in chat and messaging groups, as well as other forums, may create “echo chambers” that promote “false narratives” and “establish a permissive environment for violent action against election-related infrastructure and personnel.”

The memo cited calls on “far-right, ultranationalist, and QAnon extremist forums” for their followers to become “poll challengers” if they witness “fraud” and “cheating” at the polls.

Read the full article.

 

OT
Even Rick Wilson, no socialist him, doesn’t rule out that big corps are deliberately gouging the American people:

AyJayDee Todd20036 • 8 hours ago

Corporations with connections and that stay loyal to the regime do well. Corporations that lack connections or step out of line don’t. See also: Russia.

Lestat GlennF • 10 hours ago

If the corporations didn’t already own the legislatures, we’d have proper regulation of gasoline and food prices.

Ohbehr in Minnesota • 10 hours ago

Damn, it’s a national cancer. It’s even in NYC. Sheesh. I’m glad I voted by mail early. I was afraid that my local polling place in Minneapolis, which is across the street from me, might be visited by these thugs and goons since I live in a largely minority neighborhood. I hope they don’t shut down voting here or interrupt it. No one needs this shite. And they talk about fair elections. They want everyone to lose. Sad.

Elagabalus • 10 hours ago

The Trump / Republican mantra is essentially the same as Voldemort’s: “Might makes right.” Thuggery is the agency they deploy to make that happen.

Gosar Caught On Video Praising Shooting Of Migrants – JMG

Gosar Caught On Video Praising Shooting Of Migrants

Boing Boing reports:

Arizona Rep. Paul Gosar, the right-wing hatemonger who is loathed by his own siblings for his reprehensible actions, is seen in this video expressing his approval for two people pretending to be migrant hunters. After they tell him they shoot migrants who cross over to their family farm in Yuma, he responds, “Say a prayer because this country needs you. There’s a bunch of people that are ready to go into action.”

Read the full article. Watch the clip and read the text.

Gosar, you will recall, this year attended the convention of white nationalist neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes. Last year he posted an animated video depicting the murders of AOC and President Biden.

 

another_steve Sashineb • 8 hours ago

The very smartest political commentators make the point: today’s Republican Party has no “vision,” no lofty goals to better the lives of average Americans. They’re morally bankrupt when it comes to that stuff.

They stand for only the things listed in your graphic there.

Misutaa Roboto • 8 hours ago • edited

What gives them plausible deniability is that some people, at least, seem to have construed the Second Amendment to mean the right to shoot people who cross the border illegally (and/or are on your land, or for being a prominent Democrat or “RINO”, for that matter). Referring to the “Second Amendment” in those circles seems to have become a euphemism for shooting people you have dehumanized.

Reminds me a bit of this Onion headline:

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ken_lov Todd20036 • 8 hours ago

If Trump Republicans take back Congress, democracy in America will already have died. Democracy depends for its survival on strong majority support for certain ideals and values, not just on institutions and elections. Every vote for a Trump Republican is a metaphorical middle finger to democracy.

another_steve • 8 hours ago

So if you, JMG reader, know a registered Republican — a friend or co-worker or family member, for instance — ask them whether they appreciate the fact that their continued membership in that party adds number and heft to the party of Paul Gosar, Donald Trump, Steve Bannon and Alex Jones.

Tell them, remind them, that their “belonging” to that crime syndicate posing as a political party makes them complicit.

They are complicit in the ongoing, unfolding criminal nightmare.

Bilderbeck • 8 hours ago

Gov. Greg Abbott redirects $500 million from other agencies to fund border security mission through end of fiscal year

“Abbott said the money would be taken from the budgets of other Texas agencies, including nearly $210 million from the state’s Health and Human Services Commission over two years and about $160 million from the Texas Department of Public Safety.

https://www.texastribune.or…

https://www.propublica.org/…

BobSF_94117 Bilderbeck • 8 hours ago

He throws taxpayer money at the “crisis” in ways that accomplish nothing, except to swell the bank accounts of his supporters.

Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️ • 8 hours ago

REMEMBER:

Elected officials can suggest shooting unarmed people.
Unarmed people can’t suggest shooting elected officials.

Odd how the law works to protect elected officials. NO?

thatotherjean Max-1 🔫+cult(R)=☠️ • 7 hours ago

“Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.” — Francis Wilhoit

Trump is Concocting a Dangerous Plan to Contest the 2022 Elections—And Things Could Get UGLY

Trump and his cronies have devised legal and political strategies to contest elections that don’t go their way. They’re targeting multiple states, but Pennsylvania is their top priority, with plans to immediately contest the results if Dr. Oz loses to John Fetterman.

Struggling, trying not to totally freak out

While not the point this gets graphic at some points.   This is what I am going through today and my feelings.   Right now after I wrote this and sat here before I posted it, I realized this could really trigger some people.    I am also suddenly aware that there are people who could read this with my experiences and it would hurt them to read it.   This started as a way to express my losing my mind and going crazy with my memories and thoughts.    I ended up writing more of the abuse.   I helped me calm down and adjust.   Hugs and love to all, but some may want to skip this post.   

________________________________________________________________________________________

I am struggling not to lose my mind.   I can hardly function.  In my mind the abuse event I wrote about where one of the boys in the home I grew up in who I think was at least 6 years older than me violently hurt raped me.   It replays like a porn show in my head, a child rape movie only the star was me.   I am reliving the feelings, the pleading I did, the promises I tried to make, I am replaying every moment in my mind on a loop, the pain, what he said, and that it was not the first or last time he used me … and I may soon go crazy.    Most times I can push it back, push it away.  

I tried to push it away by diving into the news.    I couldn’t get out of bed this morning, Ron was stunned I was still laying there awake at nearly 8 AM.   I have tried leaving the computer to do housework, but … It is still there playing over and over and over.    My feelings of helplessness.   Not being able to change what I knew was coming.   How suddenly it happened that night, how angry he was.    I turned on the Majority Report to get progressive news to try to clear my mind and they had a segment on the republicans trying to introduce a federal don’t say gay bill based on the Florida bill.    It wouldn’t have protected me in anyway as a kid, but it would basically make me a gay man illegal in public.  

I have to look up the Florida ballot information because we are going to vote tomorrow.   I cannot think, I can’t process.   The feelings are surging and cascading over me.  Normally I could get him to let me use a lubricant like hand lotion or anything because he did not care as long as he got to fuck me and cum.    I don’t know what happened that day or night to him, but whatever it was he wanted me to pay for it.   Lucky for me it was not my first time with a hurt rape.  Hell not my first time with being raped, it happened a lot to me back then.   Shit what a statement to have to write.    And to tell the truth most of the time being raped with a chance to put something on it was better than being hit, better than having a belt used on me until I shrank as much into a corner or wall as best I could.   

One summer in Canada almost every afternoon I was locked in a barn and chased around by a couple with canes until they cornered me and hit me until I was curled up on the ground, then forced to give the man a blowjob.    I tried to cut out the beating but they wanted that part.  Every inch of me seemed to hurt that summer.   

 Once I couldn’t stop it and knew that pleas and promises wouldn’t change things … once I felt it start, I knew how to relax my anus, to try to keep it from ripping or tearing me.    It hurt and he wanted that, he wanted to see me try to hold in my pain and any scream.  For me to scream or yell would be worse for me, anyone who came to see wouldn’t help me and might join in.   In my mind I hear and feel every anguished cry that I struggled to contain.  My apple watch has gone off repeatedly today with alerts with high heart rates. 

I am calmer right now.     I am struggling to remember my age then, it was either 8 or 9 I think.   I want to sleep, I want my mind to stop.  Writing this post seems to have calmed me down some.  I am going to go empty the dryer that just went off and fold the clothing.   I am hoping desperately the memories will stop or change to something better.   I am not sure I can stand to keep living this.  I use to have a cat that would seem to know when I was having these memory loops and come be all over me.   I need him now.   Hugs

**edit note, before I posted this I went back and added a note at the beginning.   I don’t want to hurt anyone else who may also be suffering.    Hugs**

Arizona Police Guard Drop Boxes From Armed Cultists – JMG

Arizona Police Guard Drop Boxes From Armed Cultists

Need I really remind people that democracy and a government of the people for the people requires that people get a vote as their say in who is elected to office.   These people “protecting” voting spots are really trying to keep people from voting via intimidation and fear.   They don’t want democracy they want to rule.  They want to force others to live as they a minority demand they do.    They cannot win with ideas, they way the want everyone to live is not popular or supported by the majority, so they threaten violence to stop some from voting and force everyone to do as they demand.    Hugs

Politico reports:

The sheriff in metropolitan Phoenix said Monday he’s stepped up security around ballot drop boxes after a series of incidents involving people keeping watch on the boxes and taking video of voters after they were apparently inspired by lies about the 2020 election.

On Friday, deputies responded when two masked people carrying guns and wearing bulletproof vests showed up at a drop box in Mesa, a Phoenix suburb. People watching the boxes and voters showing up to vote have covered their license plates, according to photos shared on social media.

The secretary of state said her office has received six cases of potential voter intimidation to the state attorney general and the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as a threatening email sent to the state elections director.

Read the full article.

 

DevilDog • 3 hours ago • edited

Isn’t it illegal to cover a car’s license plates? And aren’t these masked vigilantes the same people who, during the worst part of Covid, screamed that wearing a face mask somehow impinged on their freedom?

TexasBoy DevilDog • 3 hours ago • edited

It’s OK if you’re a violent Trumpanzee intimidating voters.

Rex • 3 hours ago

How long until someone is shot to death casting a ballot?

Extremists Spark Violence At OR Drag Event [VIDEO]

Extremists Spark Violence At OR Drag Event [VIDEO]

What more to say.   US system at work, right wing domestic terrorist.   They did this same thing to shut down abortion centers and it worked for them, so they will try it again against legal events that the right has targeted.   Where is the police protection for citizens going to a legal event?   Dogs that love gravy, this is the 1960s race attacks, it is the 1970s / 1980s attacks on gay bars and night clubs.   This is Nazi thug enforcers for the hateful right wing party, supported by red state governors.   Where is the outrage from the left?  Why are the rights of normal people being trampled on with impunity?   Notice that some of the ones trying to force their regressive views on everyone else were members of a church.    I am so tired of the right / republicans / fundies churches targeting the LGBTQ+ because of their book written 2,500 years ago.  This is 2022 so get over it, live the way you want but let others do the same.   Again notice that the protestors equated drag which is simply dressing up in costume with trans people.    The performers normally are cis.     Hugs I agree with this comment I posted below.

Serene Pumpkin  16 hours ago

The next moral panic will be all drag shows.

Then all public LGBTQ events, especially Pride.

Then LGBTQ content in libraries (already happening), online, and on TV.

Then pro-LGBTQ policies in the private and public sectors.

Then LGBTQ health care.

The fascists want us invisible, broke, and sick.

We’re about to find out just how deep our allies’ support is.

 

The Daily Beast reports:

A drag-queen story hour starring an 11-year-old performer at an Oregon pub was targeted by Proud Boys and neo-Nazis, some of whom hurled heavy rocks and smoke bombs during fiery clashes outside the event.

Police in riot gear ultimately had to intervene to stop the mayhem at Old Nick’s Pub Drag Queen Story Time Brunch on Sunday.

The Eugene Police Department said in a statement that it was well aware ahead of time that the event had “drawn polarized attention” across the state.

The Torch reports:

Witnesses stated that at one point the detractors had attempted to enter the pub through a side door but were pushed back by supporters. These anti drag queen detractors were made aware of this event by Andy Ngo, a right wing journalist who considers himself an expert on Antifa and the “militant left”.

Ngo tweeted about the event on Oct. 17, calling attention to Vanellope personally by posting pictures of her. The supporters of Old Nick’s were local community members who brought snacks and water for the allies and protected families as they entered the pub.

Some of the protestors were identified as Proud Boys and members of Rose City Nationalists were present. David Loveall, Springfield’s new county commissioner was there protesting the drag show along with members of the Crossfire Christian Church.

 

Sam_Handwich • 16 hours ago

I’m so sick of this horseshit, as if drag is some exotic new phenomenon. Fuckin idiots.

Bruno Sam_Handwich • 16 hours ago

Drag hasn’t changed. These people are just emboldened by Dump and MAGAts.

David Brian Holt Sam_Handwich • 15 hours ago

All of these “Drag Queen Story Hours” were started very innocently by public librarians as a way to encourage children to read more. At its heart, it is a very wholesome endeavor.

JCF David Brian Holt • 15 hours ago

And drag queens, who wanted to give back, as a public service. To inspire closeted children among them? Yeah, sure. But that was never the PRIMARY point.

clay JCF • 5 hours ago

It was about the importance of imagining, particularly about one’s self.

JCF Lestat • 16 hours ago

Drag is just pantomime and has been around, WITH children, FOREVER.

CarterDK JCF • 15 hours ago

Well, female drag at least. You know what we call male drag? It’s women at the grocery store in a t-shirt and jeans. Because no one bats an eye today if a woman wears mens clothing.

Serene Pumpkin • 16 hours ago

The next moral panic will be all drag shows.

Then all public LGBTQ events, especially Pride.

Then LGBTQ content in libraries (already happening), online, and on TV.

Then pro-LGBTQ policies in the private and public sectors.

Then LGBTQ health care.

The fascists want us invisible, broke, and sick.

We’re about to find out just how deep our allies’ support is.

Russian TV Host Calls For Drowning Ukrainian Children

Russian TV Host Calls For Drowning Ukrainian Children

The Daily Beast reports:

Pro-war commentator Anton Krasovsky was speaking with sci-fi author Sergei Lukyanenko about the writer’s first trip to Ukraine in 1980, when local kids told him their lives would be better if Moscow wasn’t occupying their homeland.

“They should have been drowned in the Tysyna [river],” Krasovsky said. “Just drown those children, drown them.” He added that the children could have been forced into huts and burned.

During the same interview, Krasovsky also laughed about reports of elderly Ukrainian women being raped by Russian troops. “Those grannies would spend their burial savings to get raped by Russian soldiers,” he said.

Read the full article.

 

MartyP • 21 hours ago

So, tell me again, how this is all about Russia freeing the Ukrainians from a Nazi-like government? Monsters.

Gregory In Seattle • 21 hours ago

Wow, and I thought US Republicans had no vestige of humanity within them, and then this. No wonder the GOP wants so desperately to emulate Russia.

IamSmartypants Gregory In Seattle • 20 hours ago

Republicans are certainly advocating policies that threaten the lives of LGBTQ kids and they have committed to introducing national “Don’t Say Gay” legislation. A lot of them want us dead.

Kieth Gregory In Seattle • 20 hours ago

They are closeted monsters for now. What do you think people like Ralph Reed and Stephen Miller daydream about if they ever gained total control over this country

AyJayDee Todd20036 • 20 hours ago

But that’s perhaps about one-third of American society that has outsized power because of our political system. In Russia it’s much more pervasive and is the result of a deep well of chauvinism and a history of imperialism, colonialism and white supremacy that the country has never confronted. What’s happening in Ukraine is consistent with how Russia has behaved for centuries (a good example is the Circassian genocide).

AyJayDee • 21 hours ago • edited

I’ve said before and I’ll say again: Cold-blooded murder of innocent people and rape of women is a long-standing pervasive problem of Russian military culture, and apathy toward it – if not outright support – among much of the public is a problem of Russian society. RT may have fired him, but it’s purely for optics.

Russian soldiers raped women with abandon as they “liberated” Poland and invaded Germany (including my then teenaged grandmother) and mutilated resistance fighters in Latvia – just as they’re doing in Ukraine now.

Friday’s_cat • 21 hours ago

US cable and satellite providers will carry RT as long as there’s a dollar to be made.
Time for some anti trust action breaking TV and ISP providers into separate businesses.

Armed Vigilantes Caught “Guarding” Arizona Voter Drop Boxes

Armed vigilantes say they are “monitoring” ballot drop boxes in Arizona. Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur discuss on The Young Turks. Watch TYT LIVE on weekdays 6-8 pm ET. http://youtube.com/theyoungturks/live Read more HERE: https://www.axios.com/2022/10/23/mesa… “At least two people in tactical gear and masks and allegedly armed with weapons were watching over a drop box for mail-in ballots in Mesa, Arizona, on Friday, the Maricopa County Elections Department said Saturday. Why it matters: At least two voters have filed complaints of voter intimidation to Arizona Secretary of State Katie Hobbs (D) in the past few days, including one claiming “camo-clad people” of taking pictures while an early ballot was dropped off outside the Maricopa County election headquarters, according to KNXV-TV, an ABC-affiliated station in Phoenix.”

Ethan Crumbley admits guilt to murder in Oxford High School shooting

https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/oakland/2022/10/24/ethan-crumbley-guilty-plea-live-updates-trial-oxford-school-shooting/69584505007/?utm_campaign=snd-autopilot

I read this quote in the story.

“It was cold-blooded what he did,” Mueller said.  “While he may have been dealt a bad set of cards with the parents, it’s still a choice that he made to do the harm and bring the tragedy to Oxford.”

I have mentioned on my other blog about after having been raped violently with no chance to get lube because my sibling from hell of my adoptive parents wanted me to feel as much pain as possible because I was not a real member of his family.   He then did something that to this day hurts more than the rape, after he was done and got what he wanted he rolled over in my tiny bed and fell asleep.  He slept in my own bed! (Later he claimed the excuse he had been drinking and I should just forget it) Something broke in me.  I did something I never did before.  Looking back, I am not sure what I felt, but I got up out of the bed and went through the mobile home to the adoptive parent’s room and took the 30 30 gun off the rack and opened the drawer in the bedroom I knew the bullets were in and left.  Unlike the other hell spawn, I never had gotten to use or learn the guns, but I understood enough from watching the others.   I never woke anyone.   I loaded the gun on the way back to my room.   I went back to my room and put that gun to that male sibling’s head and went to pull the trigger, his goading words ringing in my head as the pain from what he did rang though my body making every step a fresh prodding of the wound.      To this day even as an atheist / nonbeliever in the supernatural I will swear under oath what happened next is true.   I am not saying it is supernatural, but I am saying this is my memory of the event.

As I put the gun barrel to his head and prepared to take my revenge on that drunken asshole who had just gloated as he hurt raped me, I heard a voice.  I think all the things the voice said I don’t remember clearly these days.   But the voice started with a strong “No, Don’t! Stop”! Then continued with “This is not who you are, not what you will be”!   “Don’t let them make you what they are, be the person you can be”!  There were more words in my head and to tell the truth at my age they are tending to blur out.   But the voice was pleading with me to not pull the trigger and to not be what these hateful bastards wanted to make me. 

 I made a decision that night that I have never regretted.  I put the gun back after emptying the bullets, put everything back and vowed I would never be like the vindictive hurtful people who adopted me.   I would take everything they forced on me and I would still become the kind of person I wanted to be, the kind of person I respected.    I tell this story because we really don’t know what the full story is of Ethan Crumbley and why he felt such a need to take others’ lives.   Was he also being hurt raped?  Was he being kept hungry while others ate?  Looking at my own life I could have been him, as if I had pulled that trigger that night why would I have stopped at just the one in my bed, why wouldn’t I have gone after all of them.   Do you see why I have sympathy for this kid?  We don’t know what was going on in his life.   We do know what his parents did, they lied, ran and tried to escape justice by hiding.   

OK I have to get away from this and from these thoughts.   I have decided to make a red sauce for spaghetti tonight.   Ron has tried to help direct me toward that and I will do so as it is a good Idea.   The combination of my old memories (for those that think the pain or humiliation fades, for me it doesn’t.  In my nightmares that Ron tries to wake me from they are as fresh as the times it happened) and the loops in my head are threatening to bring the vortex in, something I really cannot afford.   So Ron will make a pork loin to go with the stuff I make.    Hugs, loves, and so many thanks to everyone.   

 

Michigan School Shooter Pleads Guilty To Murders -JMG

Michigan School Shooter Pleads Guilty To Murders

The Detroit Free Press reports:

Ethan Crumbley, who 11 months ago penned in his journal “I will cause the biggest school shooting in Michigan’s history. I have fully mentally lost it,” pleaded guilty Monday to first-degree murder and terrorism charges for the bloodshed he vowed to carry out at Oxford High School four days after his parents bought him a gun.

In a packed courtroom filled with the victims’ grieving families, Crumbley, 16, took responsibility for the murders of his classmates, Tate Myre, 16, Madisyn Baldwin, 17, Hana St. Juliana, 14, and Justin Shilling, 17, and the injuries he caused to seven others who were struck by his bullets.

In entering his guilty plea, Ethan dropped a bombshell that may hurt his parents in their separate criminal case, telling the judge that the gun he used in the shooting was easily accessible. “It was not locked,” Ethan said in court, contradicting his parents’ claims that the gun was properly stored in a secure area.

Read the full article. Crumbley’s parents, you will recall, let authorities on a manhunt after the shooting.