“Investigators believe the young Army veteran who killed five police officers here legally purchased the weapons used in the shootings online or at a gun show,” wsj.com reports. Hold on a second there Pilgrim. Which one was it? Until the facts are known, that’s entirely unhelpful conjecture.
What the Journal’s really saying: Micah X. Johnson purchased his Izhmash-Saiga 5.45mm — or maybe an SKS rifle — from a private seller, doing so without a background check. Which is perfectly legal in Texas. As it should be.
But you just wait: the howls of righteous indignation from the Civilian Disarmament Industrial Complex, calling for the feds to close “the gun show loophole” and ban gun sellers from using the internet, will be long, loud and unrelenting.
Meanwhile, the “bomb making equipment” found by police investigators at Mr. Johnson’s house — and widely reported by the mainstream media — may not be quite as lethal as it was originally portrayed.
At the home he shared with his mother, investigators found two more rifles, as well as approximately one pound of Tannerite, an explosive powder, and a can of acetone.
That’s nothing compared to, say, the C4 explosive the Dallas police used to blow Mr. Johnson to smithereens. Tannerite fans note: you’re not the only ones looking at media vilification. Civilian firearms training — of all things — is sure to come under the gun, too.
From foxnews.com:
The Associated Press reported that Johnson received training from a private self-defense school that teaches firearm tactics, including “shooting on the move.”
A person who said he was in charge of the organization told AP that Johnson received instruction at the Academy of Combative Warrior Arts in the Dallas suburb of Richardson about two years ago. The man refused to answer additional questions and would not give his name.
The academy website refers to one of its courses as a “tactical applications program,” or TAP.
“Reality is highly dynamic, you will be drawing your firearm, moving, shooting on the move, fixing malfunctions, etc. all under high levels of stress,” the website says. “Most people never get to train these skills as they are not typically allowed on the static gun range.”
“Not allowed.” Why do those words give me a frisson of fear? Anyway, the gun control games continue, as the President visits the city to calm the racially charged atmosphere he helped create, and fan the flames of civilian disarmament.
Please also comment on the article’s characterization of the shooter’s rifle as an “AK variant”. I thought I read that he used an older rifle that pre-dates the AK’s, more of a Garand era tech rifle.
Nope, the press was wrong as usual. It was a Saiga that he modified back to pseudo AK74 form, sans full auto.
Shots of him and his rifle after a pound of C4 in proximity.
http://www.dangerandplay.com/2016/07/10/graphic-picture-of-micah-johnson-the-dallas-shooter-after-he-was-killed-by-a-robot-bomb/
well there you have it. the dipshit still lived with his mommy, tells you right there he isn’t stable. he’s a grown ass man still living with Mother.
Thumbs up!
I am a grown-ass man living with his mother. Or maybe she’s living with me because at 90 years old she can’t get around very well any more, I’m not sure.
At any rate, not all stereotypes fit.
Cliff, you are being a good son, honoring your mother, not mooching off of her. I lost my Mom when she had just turned 65, I wish I could have had her live with me at 90.
I still miss her, after seven years seldom a day goes by when I don’t think about her and how proud she would have been of her grandchildren.
I certainly did not mean to offend you. I’m sorry I did.
Robert E. Howard lived with his mother and he was perfectly well adjusted:-)
But only until she lived.
Howard was a lunatic who killed himself immediately following his mommy’s death-at age 30. His whole life was a “fantasy”…and why rag on crazy Micah? Lots of failed college grads go back home to live with mommy(or never leave). I can’t get my kids to ever leave either- I left at 19 never to return…
I’m not even a failed college grad and I’m back home living with mommy. It’s funny how $100k of debt really cripples your ability to move out but hey what do I know I am apparently unstable after all.
She was still alive when he shot himself. In coma and less a day away from death, but not quite dead. He had pretty cool fantasies too.
If you get out of school with more debt than your job (the one you went to college to get, presumably) allows you to afford, then something must’ve gone wrong somewhere in the process.
This is what results from the current obsession with “going to a good [translation: expensive] school” and college degrees for everybody. We’re selling kids a load of shit and saddling them with crippling debt so they can get a worthless degree and work at a low-paying entry level job, then we complain that a mechanic or an electrician charges us a hundred bucks for an hour’s work…
Gee Matt I got a 41 year old son who joined the military,served overseas,speaks Arabic and works for the pentagon-and no debt. Cry me a river…I didn’t make your ill-advised mountain of debt. But what do I know…
Who’s crying? I’m living the bed I made with no complaints or regrets. Just stating the facts: I’m in debt, didn’t fail out of college, live with my parents, and am not crazy or have some other unspecified mental or emotional issue. Guess I broke the mold then. I’m simply pointing out that not everyone sold the lie is a failure.
“…as the President visits the city to calm the racially charged atmosphere he helped create, and fan the flames of civilian disarmament.”
The second half of that statement is almost guaranteed to be true, the first part I’m not so sure about. There will be some turn of phrase that somehow shifts the blame to ‘social injustice’ or ‘inequality’. He may attempt to shift blame away from BLM and Black Panthers.
Look for bans on firearms training, coming soon from a congresscritter near you
Yup, because why would they want us well regulated?
Dude, you come up with some of the best snark evah.
To be followed by a training requirement for ownership. They sure do love those catch-22s.
And more calls for bans on body armor.
Our side gIves the slavers debate ammo when we support “background checks”.
While the NRA and some other groups support background checks as some sort of compromise, many commenters on this site, and RF himself, are steadfast in the belief that the NICS system is prima facie unconstitutional, as in “…shall not be infringed.”
The only thing that needs to be changed in the Second Amendment is to add an exclamation point at the end: “…the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed!”
As for NICS: “If you concede that the very government the Second Amendment was intended to protect you from has the authority to create, maintain and enforce a list of persons who, in the opinion of that same government may not exercise their natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms, how will you keep your name off of that list?” – Cliff Heseltine (No copyright – feel free to quote and copy)
Skip the NICS. Build your own gun. Not that difficult.
80% lowers for ARs and 1911s are available.
I see that my apprehension about how the conjecture spouted by media talkers of this case would be used as the rope to hang gun culture with by the anti’s was well founded. The repition of SKS as the weapon used is going to be the new anti gun front against surplus military rifles ie, Mosin’s and such. The inclusion of private training as the “culprit” for Johnson’s movements during the attack will be another front with which the calls for, “No one needs these courses cause they only teach killin” will be heard long and loud from now on.
And yet, perhaps I am alone in my trepidation in the use of the bombing of this killer settting the precedent in which the use of this tactic on American soil against an American citizen will not be the last time it happens? I see the tactics of the Obama drone policy brought home, perhaps that does not bother some of you but it should, greatly. The push by Democrats to equate “suspects” with actual criminals is a dangerous overstep of our Constitutional protections (No Fly/Buy). The exploding of suspects before they can be captured and broght to trial in order to reveal their guilt completely to society is dangerous as hell because it leaves a new door open for the state to walk through in which if say WE get put on that list in future, then we could be blown to bits. In the drone program, “Mowing the Lawn” by killing the family members of “suspected terrorists” to ensure they don’t rise up against America in future is a practice, I pray that in future that policy is not simply brought home, my prayers hinge on “could”; and that is scary stuff.
This is a bit different from some of Obama’s previous execution of American citizens without trial by drone strike, or even others by drone strike. This guy was basically an active shooter, held up behind a barricade, refusing surrender. I don’t see much difference between shooting him and blowing him up under the circumstances. I’m sure some creative application of technology could have made it possible to subdue the guy using a robot without killing him. Perhaps that’s worth looking into in the future. However, I doubt the Dallas PD had such means available to them.
As to using such tech on people while they are mowing their lawn, if a government entity decides to go that way, the specific means they use (drone vs. sniper vs. team of thugs throwing people in a black van and “dissapearing” them) would scare me far less than the fact that they would have the will to do it.
Gotta agree with you on this. This guy had plenty of chance to surrender and was an immediate threat if he got away from where they had him cornered, bomb or bullet from sniper was the only way to stop him from attempting to harm additional cops or others.
If the government decides to take out American citizens here at home by rolling a bomb up to a suspects front door to save from potential confrontations, then I have a major problem with that as would any American who wasn’t a brain dead statist nitwit. I would hope the cops would arrest any chief or politician who ordered that for attempted murder, but after Hillary skated on clear violations of the handling of classified material I no longer believe in equality under the law. It will always be one law for the rich and powerful and another for the rest of us peons.
How about just waiting him out? Why does everything have to be done in a rush. Sooner or later, unless he kills himself, he will get hungry, have to relieve himself or just plain old get tired of hanging around waiting for something to happen. What’s the rush? Is there some deadline on out waiting a cornered suspect? The cops are on overtime, so they shouldn’t be in a rush. They can always bring in a second, third, fourth fifth etc. shift to keep the suspect pinned in place. It’s not like he has a bunch of hostages.
While I don’t have a problem with killing a killer, I don’t see the need for the rush to do the act.
All for the quick resolution than the circus of 5+ years before he goes on trial.
You forget he broke the cardinal rule. Kill a cop they kill you, period. That was the rush.
How long until we see riot cops behind their Lexan shields confront an unruly crowd, but instead of firetrucks with high pressure hose they will be preceded by a phalanx of small tracked robots mounted with claymore mines?
I would see that as an act of war, one that would be worthy of the kind of actions taken by “Mr. Dallas.” Ideally by a much larger and coordinated group of Patriots. I would have no sympathy for those who would deprive citizens of our right to assembly or ANY other rights… Constitutional civil rights all seem to be on a hit-list right now.
Something like this:
http://img.ifcdn.com/images/4741f52236921cc7743ebaa05dcce12c36e436008caec0b0e2ada12f3bbde001_1.jpg
Awwwww. It’s so cute! But I doubt that he deals with 1oz. slugs any better than flesh and bone does.
Could he have passed an NICS check if he tried? I don’t remember reading anything about a criminal history. If so, then what the hell point are the hysterical liberals trying to make?
I think it’s still unclear as to whether his discharge from the military was honorable or not.
I’m sure he’ll be PTSD and under treatment by the VA. I’ve heard that if you go the PTSD route you lose your gun rights?
No you do not. If the VA deems you unfit to manage your finances, they will submit your name to the NICS.
It was a negotiated honorable discharge.
Negotiated? What, we’ll let you go home if you do a job for the evil (D) in Dallas in the Summer?
Becha he was evil (D) because they are probably trying to tattoo an elephant on the corpse as I type this.
This is classic [evil] (D) blue on blue violence. If they can blame guns and the NRA, then it’s (D)’s fault..
I haven’t seen anything thus far that indicates he would have been denied a firearm going through a background check. If the piece of human debris in the Fort Hood shooting could lawfully purchase a firearm, because the Army ignored or covered up the complaints against him, than this guy could get one with mere allegations of sexual misconduct.
He purchased it under the watchful eye of the government, sworn to protect us from the hate group that he joined, with the governmental agencies, and local cops, that can’t seem to protect themselves lately.
The shit storm has just begun, how deep does this rabbit hole go… It’s going to be a long summer my friends….
I bet he had “steel core” ammo too. I thought he used an SKS? I’m still intrested in hearing about the people who showed up wearing tac-gear and gas masks carrying AR’s who “ran away” Kinda sounds like somebody watched “the professional” and used that as cover to escape? Too many werid things in one story.
Like I said before…Way to much funky stuff going on here in the good Ole US of A…Almost like Globalists /Big Brother kind of “put-up-jobs ” going throughout our country…To me it just rings of “a high degree of strangeness.” Like something is a foot…Incidents and excuses to upset the fine balance of our social order, our Civil liberties, etc…
““Reality is highly dynamic, you will be drawing your firearm, moving, shooting on the move, fixing malfunctions, etc. all under high levels of stress,””
Except for the “under high levels of stress” part (depending how nervous you are maybe the first time), this describes every IDPA match in the country…in the world.
And other shooting sports.
So, are they going to go after the shooting sports along with this vilification of “training?”
Well, crap. I sure hope he bought it online and had a background check. I’m all for private citizens being able to sell their property without the government intruding, but if he bought it without a BG…this will be the end of that. If he bought it with a BG, it strengthens our argument.
It doesn’t matter, because there would have been no reason for his BG to come back denied, seeing as how he had no significant criminal record.
You’re using facts and logic. All the anti’s need to hear is he bought a “weapon of war” without a background and it’s off to the races.
Gun-grabber horror: the Dallas attacker had training with firearms and that training (allegedly) enabled him to kill all those police officers.
Real-world horror: we can say the same thing about hundreds of skills that involve heavy or fast objects, chemicals, poisons, explosives, pressurized liquids, hot materials, cryogenic materials, electricity, heights, heavy machinery, hacking/database manipulation, dangerous animal handling, etc.
Just a few examples:
(1) A person with electrical training could energize railings or door knobs with deadly voltages.
(2) A person with chemical training could rig chemical explosions or exothermic reactions that cause fires.
(3) A person with heavy equipment training could use that heavy equipment to destroy occupied buildings.
(4) A person with heating and ventilation training could rig a boiler to explode or vent carbon monoxide in an occupied building.
(5) A person with hacking/database manipulation training could alter patient records/charts to specify deadly medications or doses … or alter traffic controls so that busy intersections have green lights for all directions at the same time.
(6) A person with dangerous animal handling skills could set dangerous animals loose in an occupied building.
The world is a safe place only to the extent that people act with prudence and respect for human life.
Training and skill only makes things more efficient and reliable.
In truth, any idiot can kill if he desires to do so.
The entire debate is pointless.
Alternately, a person with brain damage, a third-grade education, and a five-dollar bill could buy a gallon of gasoline and set a school on fire.
The world is a dangerous and scary place. Always has been, always will be.
A CAN OF ACETONE!
Clearly this man was too dangerous to be loose in society.
He probably just liked to change his nail color often.
Acetone? Really?
I got jugs of that, mineral spirits, lacquer thinner, MEK, denatured alcohol and dozens of other household solvents. Guess what so does millions of other americans.
What next? Surely he had a bunch of mason jars in the cabinets, or beer bottles in the recycling bin, matches and a tank of gas next to his lawnmower?
Why not spin it to he had molotov cocktail making material.
They are really reaching with the whole bomb making stuff.
If a can of acetone is “bomb-making material”, then Home Depot isn’t a hardware store, it’s a munitions factory.
So they want to ban firearm training now???
He was in the army, do they not do training anymore? Barry will be calling for a straight up ban on vets having weapons, rather than the piecemeal approach they’re using now.
So are they any facts or just guesses? Wasn’t it reported he was a felon? They can’t legally buy no mater what