White House defends Obama’s gun comment after Dallas – “The White House on Friday defended President Barack Obama’s decision to lament the availability of “powerful weapons” as he made his first public statement about the shooting deaths of five police officers in Dallas. ‘I think the president was quite direct in his comments today indicating that our thoughts first and foremost are with the families of those who lost loved ones, and there is never a justification for carrying out acts of violence against law enforcement officers,’ press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters during a briefing at The Westin hotel in Warsaw, Poland, where Obama was attending a NATO summit.” Never let an atrocity go to waste.
Not that it matters…it’s still an “assault rifle” to them: Dallas suspect said he wanted to kill whites – A law enforcement source told CBS News that Johnson had a SKS semi-automatic assault rifle and a handgun, Milton reports. The suspect also wore body armor, the source said.
More police officers die on the job in states with more guns – “They then compared officer fatality rates in the eight states with the lowest public gun ownership rate (13.5 percent, on average) against officer fatalities in the 23 states with the highest gun ownership rate (52 percent, on average). The states with the lowest rates of gun ownership tended to be high-population places such as New York, while the highest rates of gun ownership were in low-population places such as Wyoming. So the researchers compared the 8 “low” states with 23 ‘high’ states to arrive at comparable numbers of law enforcement officers employed in each group over the study period.” Following that?
Gun-Rights Activist Says He Was Defamed by Dallas Police – “(Mark) Hughes said police questioned him about why he wanted to shoot officers, adding that they told him witnesses saw him firing the rifle. That ‘is a lie,’ Hughes said. Hughes told CBS 11 that he was ‘defamed’ by police. His identification as a person of interest has resulted in “thousands” of death threats on Facebook, he added. Reached by The Associated Press late Friday, Saputo said Hughes hasn’t ‘ruled out’ taking legal action against Dallas police.” ID’ing and questioning him seems reasonable, given the circumstances.
Cops: Tennessee shooter targeted white victims, similar to Dallas ambush – “Preliminary findings indicate (Lakeem) Scott may have targeted (white) people and officers after being troubled by recent events involving African-Americans and law enforcement officers in other parts of the country. Investigators spoke with Scott Friday morning. Agents say ‘the work to develop a thorough understanding of his motivation for this incident remains central to the ongoing investigative work.'” So…he’ll be charged with a hate crime?
FPC Urges Law-Abiding People To Arm Themselves – “Last night, five law enforcement officers were killed and others were wounded in what is being reported by the mainstream media as a planned attack during an otherwise-peaceful “Black Lives Matter” protest in Dallas, Texas. FPC warned that the news and political establishments will undoubtedly leverage the events of the past 24 hours to promote their total disarmament agenda. The grassroots group said that people should expect more calls for bans on Constitutionally-protected firearms, bullet-resistant personal protective equipment, ammunition, and potentially even bolt-action hunting rifles the media sometimes mistakenly calls ‘sniper rifles.’” See Tennessee story, above.
I wonder what the appropriately named Tavis Smiley [above] at Time meant when he wrote this:
America is sick, and we cannot afford to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.
When my grandmother wanted me to do something urgently, she’d intone that she wanted it done, “Not now, but right now!”
America, the time is ripe for us to do what’s right. Not now, but right now.