Scott Israel incompetent fired desantis broward parkland
Former Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel (AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee)
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The rolling, never-ending clown show/tragedy/farce that is the entire Parkland shooting and its aftermath took a couple of more turns this week. The good news is that the citizens of Broward County Will be safer due to the Florida Supreme Court’s decision regarding feckless, dangerously incompetent ex-sheriff and politicized hack, Scott Israel.

At least for now.

As ABC New reports . . .

Florida’s highest court agreed that Gov. Ron DeSantis was within his authority to suspend Scott Israel as Broward County sheriff earlier this year. The justices noted that under the Florida Constitution, the state Senate is responsible for deciding whether the removal should be permanent.

“Today’s Florida Supreme Court opinion leaves no doubt of my authority as governor to suspend a government official for neglect of duty and incompetence,” DeSantis said in a prepared statement. “Scott Israel failed in his duties to protect the families and students of Broward County, and the time for delay tactics is at an end. I look forward to the Florida Senate resuming the process of formal removal.”

Broward residents will no doubt sleep more soundly.

In the mean time, an attorney for one of the Parkland victim’s parents is making some allegations about the kind of mental health treatment the shooter had been getting in the years leading up to the massacre. Here’s the AP’s report . . .

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. (AP) — An attorney representing the father of a victim in last year’s Florida high school massacre told a judge that mental health counselors must share the blame, because they knew Nikolas Cruz was “a ticking time bomb” long before the mass shooting, and their actions sped up the explosion.

Cruz’s counselors supported his use of violent video games, and even suggested he get a punching bag and do target practice with non-lethal guns in hopes of containing his violent tendencies, according to the lawyer representing Andrew Pollack, whose daughter Meadow Pollack was among the 17 people killed.

The South Florida Sun Sentinel reports that attorney David Brill argued on Tuesday that Henderson Behavioral Health, which had treated Cruz for years, should remain as a defendant in Pollack’s lawsuit.

Brill said the records show that Cruz’s treatment wasn’t effective. His late mother called sheriff’s deputies often because he punched walls, destroyed parts of the house and hit her with a vacuum hose after being diagnosed with numerous emotional and behavioral problems and depression.

“They’re not effectively treating the conditions. They’re in fact exacerbating, fueling them, contributing to them,” Brill said.

Henderson attorney Joshua Walker said many of the allegations are false or mischaracterized, but privacy laws prevent him from going into details in open court.

Circuit Judge Patti Englander Henning is determining whether Henderson should be dismissed from a lawsuit filed by Pollack against it, other mental health providers, Broward County school and sheriff’s office employees and others. The ruling will have ramifications, as other families have filed similar lawsuits against Henderson and others.

According to documents obtained by Brill, teachers were concerned about Cruz playing violent video games. He had a history of inappropriate behavior at school and was often assigned to a school for children with emotional and behavioral problems. He was briefly allowed to attend Stoneman Douglas before he was kicked out a year before the shooting.

Brill said Henderson counselors supported Cruz playing the games, seeing them as an outlet for his anger and a way to calm him when he was upset or overwhelmed. They also supported him taking target practice with nonlethal airsoft guns that shoot plastic or resin pellets, he said.

“It was a big focus of his frustrations because he wanted one so badly,” Brill said, noting that a Henderson counselor in 2014 spent at least 20 minutes watching Cruz target shoot with one.

Cruz stopped his Henderson treatment about a year before the massacre, when he turned 18. It was about that time that he bought the AR-15 semi-automatic rifle that investigators say he used in the shooting.

Cruz, now 20, has pleaded not guilty but his attorneys say he would plead guilty in exchange for a life sentence. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

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124 COMMENTS

      • Not really. This is the natural progression of feelings > facts. Incompetence becomes celebrated, while responsibility is shunned. Then people die and suddenly everyone wonders ‘how did this happen?!?’

        • I think it goes a bit farther than that but generally I agree.

          Of course there’s always the question of what exactly we mean by “competent”. Competent to do what? These people might have been competent for day to day activities (ahahahahaha!) in certain areas but not day to day activities in others. Or they may have just been faced with a situation so far past their experience level that they collectively shat the bed.

          Either way, time to clean house. Especially in light of Israel’s complete inability (?) to admit that any mistakes were made on his part or the part of his department.

      • In my own observations most mental health counselors have as much or more problems than those they are trying to “counsel”. Keep your kids away from “the-rapists”

      • @STRYCH9,WELL IF YOU THINK THIS IS BAD JUST WAIT NOW THAT SCOTT PETERSON HAS BEN ARRESTED ON MULTIPLE COUNTS THAT HE WILL SIGN LIKE A BIRD THIS WHOLE DAM THING WAS A SET UP BY MANY PEOPLE INCLUDING SHERIFF ISRAEL.THE COPS WERE TOLD NOT TO GO IN FOR A REASON AND AN AGENDA.THEY KNEW CRUZ WAS A TICKING TIME BOMB AND THEY USED HIM TO DO THEY’RE DIRTY WORK,SAME WITH MOST THESE OTHER MASS SHOOTERS BEING TRIGGERED BY SOME UNSEEN FORCE, THEY SAYING THEY HEARD VOICES THAT TOLD THEM TO DO IT,I BELIEVE THEY DID. THIS IS ALL AN AGENDA TO DISARM AMERICANS,LOOK AT WHAT GOVERNMENTS ARE DOING TO THEY’RE PEOPLE THAT HAVE NO WEAPONS TO DEFEND THEMSELVES,THAT’S WHAT OUT GOV IS AIMING FOR,TO ROLL IN THE NWO ANTI CHRIST SYSTEM,THAT’S WHY THEY WANT TRUMP OUT SO BAD,BECAUSE HES STANDING IN THEY’RE WAY,I HOPE AMERICANS WAKE UP BEFORE ITS TO LATE.

    • But the Dem voters reading this from ABC, what’s their take away? It better be, “oh, so gun control wouldn’t have prevented this, maybe we need to not be so focused on one solution (gun control) and look at all the main contributuin factors, moving foward.” The left media cannot hide from the truth all the time.

      • I get your point. But most any News outlet is out to get viewer ratings. The better ratings you have then the better commercial revenue you can generate and that is why you are in business. So different networks, different market niche’s; Left wing, Right wing; Pro current issue or Anti current issue, etc. At the end of the day they want people to go home and watch that news at 11. So of course they are going to spin it for there audience. Yes there are other factors but they don’t drive the market the way guns can. Gun control is a big fad right now that is perpetuated by both sides. People either love guns or they love to hate guns and they will pay a lot of money to have that known. Like all things, people will eventually get tired of hearing about it and much like the Nam war it will become trivialized. The single best thing that could possibly be done is to stop these isolated mas-murder/suicides by the awkward teen psycho down the street or the mentally disturbed gambler with a traveling armory.
        The sad thing for us is that once upon a time the NRA would stand up and denounce people like this and the use of cheep gimmick toys like Bumpstops making every effort to disassociate them from the rest of the lawfully good gun owners and members. Now it seems like they will support anybody with a gun regardless how it makes the rest of us look. Sometimes there is a certain amount of belligerence towards the reporting of some terrible crimes. Anyway, Good Night and Good Luck!

        • What do bump stocks have to do with the Stoneman school shooting? Where is anyone from the NRA defending the psycho who shot up the school?

      • “The left media cannot hide from the truth all the time.”

        Oh yes they can, and *will*, if it’s politically expedient.

        And for a Leftist, politics are first and foremost…

      • @SoJackCal & Harry: I think you both are on-target.

        Where mental disease seems to be a factor, is there a preponderance of those: who suddenly exhibited severe problems; or, left an observable, escalating, trail of signs of severe problems? I’ll suppose it’s the latter; in which case, it could be addressed.

        Do the mental health authorities (psychiatrists through beat cops) have evidence-based protocols for detecting patterns of escalating violence? If they don’t yet have such protocols then this is where the work needs to begin.

        Once we have protocols proven and deployed throughout all the mental health authorities, what do we do to take effective action? Now, we need a legislative and judicial solution that encourages, persuades and coerces those in need to get treated. This needs to be respectful of due process, not ex parte. And, the accused needs recourse to a jury of his peers.

        In criminal cases our jury system takes the ultimate power to find a fact (guilty) OUT of the hands of government. The accused may invoke his right to have his alleged behavior judged by laymen. This same jury system could be the ultimate safeguard of the right to remain at liberty. We do not trust “expert” cops, prosecutors or judges; we are prepared to be judged by fellow members of our community.

        Our problem is, I think, that the criminal justice system is compelled to “look the other way” when they recognize that someone is in need of treatment – especially custodial care. The supply of public resources (beds in state mental institutions) pales in comparison to the demand. What’s the “system” to do? It’s only practical choice is to cite some pretext upon which to release the obviously sick individual back into the streets. An example of this is the Ft. Lauderdale airport shooter.

        What is the “real” problem – as distinguished from the “designated” problem? Is it keeping artifacts out of the hands of those obviously prone to violence? Or, is it supplying those with an adequate supply of suitable resources (treatment, custody or both)?

        We the PotG need to understand the problem we are facing and begin to formulate an alternative solution. Merely saying that guns (the artifact) are NOT the problem is ineffective. Instead, we need to point to plausible solutions that will be palatable to our audience: the voting population.

        Voters have some sympathy for the homeless and the mentally ill. Indeed, it’s pretty clear that homeless is largely a mental illness problem and poverty, per se, is a relatively minor part. If voters’ sentiment is that we really “OUGHT” to do something to help the mentally ill then reducing the risk of violence by the few mentally ill having that propensity is a side-effect.

        The “artifact” point is that we have to treat/hospitalize the mentally ill (or those with violent propensities who are not apparently mentally ill) to solve the violence problem. Removing one artifact from access by the violent doesn’t solve the problem. There are too many artifacts: cars; explosives; cutlery; clubs; . . . the list goes on.

        But first, we have to put a proposed solution on the table. Without that, we are howling at the moon.

  1. Bring back the Draft. He would be a great mine detector. We as a people have lost our way. I thank God I’m at the end of my run.

      • As a believer in Christ, I suggest we fight the good fight as long as we live on this earth. Yes, our culture is going down the toilet, but we don’t have to let it. At 45, I plan to live another 40-50 years, should the Lord tarry. Let’s be faithful while we live.

        Good riddance to Sheriff Israel. He is a wicked man.

        • I’m at the 60 mark myself. Good words and thanks for the encouragement my brother.

          This is all part of the Lord’s plan; we don’t have to understand it but he knows exactly what he is doing.

    • If the “way” is to be found by mass enslavement of our young, maybe we shouldn’t be looking for it to begin with. You can take your “draft” and stick it.

      • 2 final semesters at minimum wage working for local government, parks, roads, washing trucks and police cars, cleaning out the station would be a good start for those who do not know how to work. Of course, if they have another job or want to enlist, that would fulfill that requirement. Work experience and a HS diploma should be enough to give a leg up to an inner city kid and wouldn’t hurt the white millennials either.

        The military is not for everyone and they don’t want to babysit those that do not want to be there either.

        Of course, the civil service unions would be up in arms.

  2. Human garbage like the Parkland Shooter (I won’t repeat his name) is why I will always support the death penalty. He has earned death and I hope he finds it sooner than later.

    • The ethical and moral ability to kill someone without violating dearly held principles has nothing to do with what that person has “earned” or “deserves”.

      We’re supposed to have a Justice System, not a Vengeance System. You can’t complain about the current flaws in our legal system with a straight face and still support violating the basic principles of Western ethics and morality.

      You also can’t support it and still talk about individual rights in a serious manner.

      • To that end than what is just in this case? Is an eye for an eye not just? Should we turn the other cheek and let the maniac continue with life like nothing ever happened? The same for the sheriff, officers, councilors, or anyone else that had a direct impact of how this cluster ended up? I don’t believe in killing for the sake of killing but rather killing for the greater good. To end the shooters life would indeed be for the greater good. For the victims families and the tax payers.

        • Uh, lock him up and throw away the key or see if he can be rehabbed like Hinckley.

          Unless you can make a convincing case that he continues to be a threat to society while locked in a cage you have no argument to justify taking his life. He’s not some kingpin who can call shots and run a criminal/terrorist organization from behind bars so he can’t be considered a threat and, if the threat is over we stop shooting for a reason. Same thing here.

          Regardless of whether or not he’s given psychiatric treatment, it’s quite literally an attack on the very underpinnings of Western philosophy to support killing him. It’ also a statist attack. Any argument about “society” being better with him dead is completely identical to a grabber argument that the “rights” of other people to be safe trump your right to self defense so no gun for you. What you’re saying is that if we get a big enough group of people to agree that your natural rights are void then you don’t get those rights anymore. That’s grabber 101.

        • Okay, and breaking Israel on the rack would be a great signal for LEOs who think they are big political shit, so they do not have to do their damn JOB!

        • Why is that Strych? Our culture is built upon a system of justice so what exactly about western philosophy precludes sitting him down in old sparky?
          I see no requirement to “rehab” him.

        • Strych your full of shit and an ignorant person. You know nothing of history. Your leftist professor would be proud.

        • Ansel:

          The whole concept of violence in Western thought is that violence is acceptable in self-defense. That is, effectively, the only time that you can justify using force against another person. There are reasons for this but to not end up writing a book I’ll simply say that some really smart people realized that if we went past allowing just self-defense then we ended up with a lot of hairsplitting over who lives and who dies and often also ended up with a punishment that doesn’t fit the crime like cutting off a starving person’s hand for stealing food when what they really need is some help and an adjustment in their behavior. That line of thought is how you end up with the Hammurabi code or modern China or Iran. That’s not a justice system. It’s a system meant to control people via intimidation or provide for our basest instincts for vengeance which is exactly what an actual society is meant to prevent us from acting on.

          This is why in Western thought it’s legal, ethical and moral to shoot someone who you can rationally say is a threat to you via their actions but it’s not legal to shoot someone, wound them, then walk up and give them a coup de grace after explaining to them that they fucked up. If your first set of shots killed them then that’s the breaks of the game. They died doing something stupid but once they stop doing that stupid thing and no longer present a threat to you or someone else you don’t have a justification to take their life if they’ve survived your first round of gunfire.

          Now, there are some cases where you can morally and ethically act preemptively but these are comparatively rare and generally we don’t let you shoot your neighbor because he said some shit that one day and got you all scared that he might come after you. That’s a route to law enforcement via snowflakery.

          So, unless we have ongoing threatening behavior we cannot justify killing someone. Hence a terrorist, gang leader or mafia type who can order hits or attacks from prison and shows some motivation to do so can morally and ethically be put down but some guy who has no such connections cannot. We can restrain the regular criminal’s freedom until we have some idea that they would no longer engage in the behavior that is immoral/unethical that landed them in hot water originally but we can’t just morally and ethically haul off and kill them because we’re mad/it’s convenient.

          Attempting to follow the morals and ethics of Western philosophy yet still execute people for crimes which we know they cannot commit again due to incarceration is exactly why death penalty cases are usually way more expensive than life in prison. Because in some weird attempt to vindicate the system of capital punishment, rather than reserve it for those who are still a credible threat to those outside the penal system, we just try to “get it right” and end up spending tons of time and money on appeals. It would be cheaper, simpler and in line with Western ethics, particularly Judeo-Christian ethics flowing from Egyptian philosophy, to simply say that the number of people even eligible for the death penalty is incredibly small compared to the current population on death row and that ONLY those who can be convincingly said to be an ongoing threat while incarcerated are eligible for execution.

        • By this logic my observation that anyone connected to this cluster should be held accountable like the actual shooter. The law enforcement that could have administered justice in the form of defense failed miserably. The dispatchers that did nothing after getting the reports of the shooting are just as guilty. Same for the councilors that promoted the focus of violence rather than the direct opposite. The argument that this kid was alienated by his peers and community making his actions somehow acceptable makes me want to go on about how much a a candy ass our society has really become. Life is tough cupcake suck it up and drive on because it doesn’t get much better. It is what it is and that is usually what you make of it. I don’t live my life to be accepted by any man. Accept me or not is irrelevant to me. As far as caging an animal, at what point does an animal stop being an animal after being caged? Once in the cage and poked enough times you either leave it in the cage indefinitely or you kill it. Anything else and you just as well have sealed yours or someone else’s fate. An animal is an animal by its very nature and no cage is going to change that.

        • “The whole concept of violence in Western thought is that violence is acceptable in self-defense. That is, effectively, the only time that you can justify using force against another person.”

          That’s flat out fucking made up.

        • Grid:

          The fact that you bother to post what you’ve posted here tells me two things.

          First, you have no argument.

          Second, this is so far over your head that you’re getting scared and lashing out.

        • @strych9 We the People gave government the authority to carry out vengeance in our stead because it tends to tamp down inter-clan feuds. If the government doesn’t even come close to quenching The People’s thirst for vengeance, then The People will take the law into their own hands. Irish Democracy.

          Vigilantism is not pretty. Therefore, the government must at least make a semblance of justice.

        • Go suck a dick, strych. Scared? Yes. I’m so scared. I’m so scared you’re going to what? Come find me and kill me with your retarded logic?

        • Perry:

          Effectively you are correct. That doesn’t mean it’s not a mistake that should be rectified.

          I don’t get super deep into the really hardcore libertarian philosophy on this but I would say that “We give the government” sounds a lot like “consent of the governed” but only to a point. At a certain point we’re giving the government something we don’t have and therefore cannot give.

          Say, for example, you and I have a disagreement and you key my car because I said something nasty to you. In a rage I find you and stab you to death. That’s murder. Clearly that’s murder. Vengeance, sure, Justice, no and therefore it’s a crime. But what if I have a lot of friends who are equally angry that you keyed my car? Does 10 people agreeing with me that your brutal killing was justified due to your actions make my actions right? What about a 100 people or [insert ever larger numbers here].

          No. It’s still murder, it’s a complete overreaction and it’s still wrong even if I managing to convince enough people that it’s right to get it made legal. It’s still morally and ethically wrong for me to stab you to death for keying my car.

        • @Grid That’s a despicable way to engage in a debate with someone that only attempted to present his argument. “Go such a dick.” How exactly does this particular outburst lend credence to the notion that anything you say will have value and that one should intellectually spar with you? Strych has a point and he didn’t say that killing wasn’t necessary. He said that it should only be done when it satisfies an extremely narrow set of conditions. I’m genuinely puzzled as to why you reacted the way you did instead of presented a counter-argument. Perhaps, strych is correct and you have no argument, after all. I see no other explanation holding under strict scrutiny.

        • While you are right, let us not ignore the elephant in the room. Personal attacks are forefront when someone doesn’t go with the status quo in the comments here. I have experienced those same personal attacks on assumptions alone. No real information just assumed conclusions because of not liking another’s opinion. Which I find childish and why I changed my screen name to Happily Irrelevant. I was told I was essentially irrelevant or would become irrelevant here. If being relevant means I have to go along with the general consensus than I don’t want to be relevant. The long and short of it is you have your opinions, I have mine, and every other individual has theirs. There is absolutely nothing that says we have to agree and nothing says because we don’t agree that one opinion is more important than the next. If we are to be denied our right to something as simple as an individual opinion than we are to be denied so much more.

        • Death would be an easy painless way out for him. He will be to dead to realize why it would suck. He would never be able to ponder what he is missing. Or breakdown emotionally when his girlfriend presses her boobies against the glass during visiting. He obviously suffered while in society, I suspect that it would only be worse for him in prison. Death row gets better treatment because they have to keep them healthy for execution day. A life sentence will mind fuck him forever.

        • That is no different than the argument posed here against the death penalty. If the death penalty is vengeance than your stated opinion is the evidence of the very same vengeance by other means. How is ending a life as punishment for ending a life any more barbarack than putting someone in a cage and poking them with a stick mentally? There’s absolutely no difference, one just lasts longer.

        • I don’t give a flying Fuck what the General consensus here is about anything. Strych struck stroke whatever is simply one of those philosophical douchebags who’s so intellectually above us all we can’t dare question his personal opinion on the superiority of western society. Which he’s simply wrong about. The west had a very long and time honored tradition of execution. That only changed in the last ~50 years. If you think the last 50 years of western society is the west at its “best”, well, then there’s nothing left to say. Have at it.

        • Suck a dick? Really, that’s your argument Grid? Oh, wait… you go further… let me read, analyze and marvel at your thoughts here… Ah, yes, I’m going to find you and harm you because you insulted me on the internet over your own lack of ability to articulate a point…. Accusing someone of something they never said or thought that’s the pinnacle of rational argument right there. Goddamn bro, you might just be a philosopher.

          Wow. No, really, let me catch my breath here, I mean, DAMN that is fucking deep! I mean, a dick, in a mouth, two dudes… this is fucking genius. Subtly insulting my sexuality in some minor sort of way that a kid might find amusing but an adult would just roll their eyes at but not really because you’re too frightened to call me a “fag” straight out cause deep down PC Principal is your hero. This isn’t just amazing on a philosophy level, the literary skill used here to express your dislike but do so in a way that’s not really very offensive… wow…this dwarfs Shakespeare too!

          Seriously, what are you, like six years old? You’re fucking clown shoes bro. The best compliment I could give you at this point without lying is that you’re a lulzcow. The really sad thing is that if you were six your behavior would be understandable, in need of correction but understandable. The fact that you’re probably over 10 years of age makes you fucking pathetic.

          Honestly, just one serious question for you here: Does your mom know that you’re using the internet without NetNanny enabled?

        • “Regardless of whether or not he’s given psychiatric treatment, it’s quite literally an attack on the very underpinnings of Western philosophy to support killing him.”

          Up until just recently, Western Society would have hanged any murderer, rapist or child molester.

      • By your “argument” incarceration is “vengeance”.

        If we can’t kill murderers, by what right do we imprison them?

        If taking away Djokar Tsarnaev’s right to vote in prison violates his “rights”, doesn’t putting him in a cell (merely for murdering children) violate his rights even MORE???

        You remind me of the woman who used to call local Cleveland radio talk shows who hated the parents of the Curley kid for suing NAMBLA for his rape and murder (not necessarily in that order).

        • If we can’t kill murderers, by what right do we imprison them?

          I came to ask the exact same question.

          When a criminal’s actions are extremely heinous, such as the school spree killer that is the implied subject of this conversation, justice demands the criminal’s life. Saying it another way, the criminal lost their right to life when they set out to do something so awful, so dastardly, and so indefensible.

          The reasoning that a victim cannot legally walk up and execute their attacker after incapacitating their attacker is because the victim is biased an acting passionately in the heat of the moment and, as such, is not trustworthy to deliver impartial justice. That is the job and decision of the jury and judge, who are much more likely to act impartially.

          You can also think of the death penalty as a way to satisfy the anguish of the loved-ones of the victim/s — it is torturous to think of your loved-one’s murderer getting three nice meals a day and unlimited access to educational resources even if he/she is imprisoned. After all, the murderer afforded no such niceties to his/her victim. And implementing the death penalty provides permanent closure for the loved-ones of the victims.

          We could also talk about the deterrent effect of the death penalty. That is an interesting topic for a different discussion.

        • The new software for TTAG is a bit overprotective and won’t allow a long post on this so I’ll try to cut it up here.

          This actually gets at the heart of the issue of criminal justice. However, we can do that without throwing away our logic or our sensibilities and do so with a few different arguments depending on how you prefer to view the world. I’m not even touching on JWM’s point about trusting the State to use the death penalty correctly.

          1) Prison is corrective. It’s a learning system meant to rehabilitate people. Like spanking a child, a punishment is inflicted to correct bad behavior. Hopefully the subject learns that bad behavior gets them an outcome they don’t like. The death penalty cannot be said to be this way because a dead person is incapable of learning.

          2) The person in question has committed an act which, without necessary corrective teaching, we might assume they would commit again. Until we have reason to believe that they have sufficiently learned this lesson we can curtail their freedom to be around other people who do not have the same “attitude adjustment issues”. This actually dovetails nicely with the 2A (those Founders actually kinda thought about this stuff) concept that if someone is safe to release back into society they should get all their rights back and if they’re not safe enough to have all their freedoms back then they shouldn’t be among us. Like putting a child in the corner to think about what they’ve done. Not as harsh as spanking but also maybe not as effective. Depends on the kid.

          There are others but these kind of suffice to make the point. Someone needs to learn not to steal, not to be put in a state where we can be assured that they would never steal again because then we would just kill everyone for every crime no matter how minor. Speeding, well it could cause a wreck and harm innocent people, yeah, that’s not an argument for a roadside summary firing squad.

        • Part 2:

          Also, if these points are incorrect then there is no point in a prison system at all because it is not corrective, and therefore it’s purpose is a lie. If we’re going to have prisons and parole then we must accept this logic (or be illogical). If we’re going to be logical and not accept that prisons work then we should kill everyone for any infraction. This one, unfortunately, is kind of black and white. You either have a system that never works and is pointless or it does work enough that it has value as what they call it: “corrections”.

          Now, with particularly heinous crimes, such as Uncommon mentions we run into a logistical issue. At what point does this person obviously surpass normal corrective teaching and pose such a risk that they can never be let go? That’s an open question and it’s why Manson has yet to get parole. This leads down a variety of rabbit holes but one of the things I would suggest is that we not kill the person but rather, kind of like Hannibal Lecter, study them to see if we can find a flaw in them that makes them what they are so that it can be corrected in others later on.

        • Part 3: (Jesus, hyper protective, not just overprotective).

          However, something we should also examine here is the logic behind laws on self-defense and how that applies to society defending itself from a criminal who’s, well, murderous.

          The major reason you’re allowed to kill someone who presents a serious and credible threat of death or grave bodily harm to you is this: Because no court can give you back what that person takes from you. If they simply steal your wallet or TV or they defraud you a court can make them pay you for what they’ve taken and you are whole again. If they cannot pay they can be made to perform a service, given currency for that service and that currency can go to you. If you’re dead or crippled this is not possible. So, the court allows you to take reasonable action to protect yourself when such an outcome is a reasonable assumption based on the circumstances.

          That’s the logic and the philosophy behind lethal self defense (take note GridSquare).

          So part of the way a Justice system functions is to try to ensure that we have situations where recompense can be given for wrongs. But what happens when someone is a victim of that system? Well, we pay them because it’s the best we can do. Wrongful convictions for lengthy sentences are rectified by 1) release of the victim and 2) payment to the victim.

          How do we rectify killing an innocent person via the death penalty (which demonstrably has happened, and which that entire appeal system is imperfectly set up to try to prevent)? We cannot, and since we already have them locked in a cage where they are no longer a threat to society at large, we have no justification to kill them in terms of self/societal defense. That means that as a society we have no self-defense justification for killing this person and if we made a mistake we cannot rectify it because they are now dead, quite literally murdered by the State and society which by logical extension makes us all guilty of murder. That sucks. Avoid that. Only kill people who can credibly be said to be a continuing threat to people outside the prison system.

          And what of the people in the prison system who might be victimized by this horrendous person? Well, the easy answer is to say that mostly prison is a self-selected group of people. They have freedom of association and hanging with the wrong crowd can be hazardous to your health.

          Of course, that doesn’t cover those in prison for something they didn’t do. Unfortunately that’s part of the human condition (to err), so as much as possible we try to make them whole for what society has taken from them in error. Hence the money people get paid when they’re released after it’s discovered they didn’t do the crime but did to the time. It’s shitty but we cannot take back time.

          Regardless, the point overall in terms of the death penalty is that some people are asking for the right to use lethal force against a person who is no longer a threat to them. That’s no different than wounding a home intruder and then planting one in their brain-case while whispering “You deserve this”. You’re going to prison for that and rightfully so.

        • “If we can’t kill murderers, by what right do we imprison them? ”

          Well, as it is now, it costs far more to execute than to incarcerate.

          So, off the top, incarceration costs the taxpayer less. That makes my fiscal conservative side as happy as a giggling schoolgirl.

          The next is what clinched it for me – Jon Wayne Taylor changed my mind.

          A nation should not be in the business of killing its citizens. The more you think about it, the more sense that makes.

          And for a cherry on top, wrongful executions still happen. If you never kill them in the first place, the error rate drops to *zero*. You can’t argue with a perfect record…

        • Strych9 – Prison isn’t corrective. In its current incarnation it is punitive. The model has moved between punitive to rehabilitative to punitive over time. Also, the State has a duty to punish an individual based upon how heinous the crime, as a proxy for the citizen, thus justifying it as moral over vengeful. The state legitimizes the act. This precedent goes back far beyond the beginning of our republic.

        • That is quite a tautology.

          That is like arguing that if the police are disarmed, the error rate in police shootings drop to zero.

          That is like arguing if the state did not use automobiles, the auto fatality rate by government employees drops to zero.

      • “We’re supposed to have a Justice System, not a Vengeance System.”

        Revenge is an appropriate motivation to punish offenders. There’s nothing wrong with it, and it is in no way unseemly.

        • Retribution is a completely logical frame of mind when it comes to things like this. There’s nothing inherently communist about that. Calling everything you personally don’t think is “western” communist, is, communist. You communist.

        • It’s not that I’m strictly against the death penalty. I once worked at a prison and know the folks held there well enough.

          I’m just nervous giving the state the right of life or death for its citizens. Seems to me like it can easily be misused.

        • No Grid, retribution is not an acceptable framework because we’re then getting into relative questions that we cannot answer.

          All of a sudden “I was in a bad mood so I shot the guy who cut me off” becomes an actual fucking argument because “retribution” is completely in the eye of the person getting it, it’s just a synonym for “vengeance” which, by definition avoids the key components of justice which are that justice is “fair” and “reasonable”..

          Again, justice is the aim. Not making you feel better. Fuck, the last time I had to get a lawyer involved in something I’d have felt better if the lawyer somehow let me burn the motherfucker’s house down. But that would have been a bit OTT, and it would have been vengeance not justice.

          While you might consider it “fair” to take a life for a life (or lives) doing so in this manner is not reasonable for the reasons I’ve explained.

      • I’m a little surprised by your position. He has already earned death. And with that in mind and because can’t guarantee that he won’t reoffend while in custody, our society has a responsibility to guarantee it for us. This long term imprisonment as alternative punishment is a relatively new fangled, liberal concession (within the last 50 years). Now they’ve moved on from that claiming the long terms are unjust. Take a look at the European examples. Rapists and murders regularly get sentences that don’t exceed 10 years. Soon they’ll want to allow these animals the right to vote. No, seriously. I know it seems ridiculous. But hear me out. I bet we aren’t far from these leftists suggesting that these people deserve the right to vote. Never mind. After typing the words I realize how crazy that’s sounds. That’s even a bridge too far for the bleeding heart domestic enemies.

        • You’re not wrong. Once the death penalty is gone then life in prison is now considered to harsh. Then sentences over 30 years. Then solitary confinement. Then you’re Norway, where someone can kill 71 children and catch only a 20 year sentence, at a boys club.

        • Several Democrat presidential hopefuls already claimed support for voting rights of convicted prisoners. Yes, including mass murderers like Tsarnaevs.

        • My position is that society, if we are to claim to be such a thing, has to be consistent to the philosophy that brought us this far or have a logical and well thought out argument for a major change. If you believe that the Western world is superior to other choices, then you have to take it warts and all.

        • “Then you’re Norway, where someone can kill 71 children and catch only a 20 year sentence, at a boys club.”

          That’s not etched in stone. Those are the ‘guidelines’. Anders Breivik will never walk free again. The public will never allow it, due to the notoriety. The politicians there are just as influenced by those who elect them as they are here.

          He’s in an easy prison, by US standards, but he will be in there until he draws his last breath…

      • How in the fuck not? The 8th amendment says no cruel and unusual punishments. Which meant no wierd shit like the British were famous for like drawing and quartering. The founding fathers said NOTHING about no death penalty, and they themseleves were A OK with hanging. Which is what this boy needs. A short drop and a sudden stop.

        This modern facts over feelings shit about the 8th amendment needs to die.

        • The SC has long held precedent that capital punishment is completely Constitutional as long as certain due process is strictly adhered to.

        • TrueBorn:

          The SCOTUS has also long held that without permission slips you may not have certain “dangerous” items in the world of firearms. Nor can you just go out and buy a tank or artillery piece. SCOTUS has said a lot of things about a lot of topics and often gone and reversed itself later. Both decisions can’t be correct in those cases.

          While I agree that the SCOTUS sets the context of reality in terms of how we have to operate politically it doesn’t mean they always get everything right.Just check out Korematsu v. United States (1944) to see how wrong they get things.

      • Strych, I can accept all you said with a caveat, and that would be the taking of another life. You can’t walk that back with rehab.

        • Ansel:

          I’m not saying that you can right the wrong of someone having taken the life of another for no real reason. However the fact that we don’t possess “pre-crime” or time travel doesn’t mean we have to compound the error with yet more unethical behavior IMHO.

          I’d give you a decent explanation but every time I type it out now TTAG blocks the post as possible spam. Suffice to say, Western Civ’s foundation is built of certain things and I don’t think it’s wise to simply start ignoring them.

        • I’ve always thought you might be a Klingon serge. Some of the stuff you say would be perfect if it were said on the bridge of a Bird of Prey. Heck, many times I agree with it too.

        • If Serge ever wins the powerball, I can easily see him buying an old Mi-24 Hind and naming it “Bird of Prey” (хищная птица)…

      • I strongly disagree. Putting a mad dog down shouldn’t require an endless discussion on philosophy. Capital punishment serves a purpose, and we have lost our way. It’s a shame that Cruz wasn’t shot down like a mad dog, instead of being captured.

        • But a person isn’t a dog and Cruz was captured. It might not be ideal but it is the reality.

          The fact that you might not be happy as a clam about the outcome is irrelevant. Doing the wrong thing because it “feels good” is still doing the wrong thing and sometimes doing the right thing feels wrong the entire time.

          I know it did for me when the last jury I was on let a guy who was probably a child molester go. Fortunately I didn’t have to stand up against stupidity there. All 12 of us agreed on the first vote that, yeah, the guy probably did it but the state failed to prove it’s case so “not guilty” is the verdict even though we KNOW we’re probably letting a monster off the hook.

          It was still the right call because “probably” isn’t a good enough reason to send some old guy off to die in prison (dude was like 73 and the mandatory minimum was 20 years) when the standard is “beyond a reasonable doubt” for a very good reason. .

        • That argument doesn’t apply in this case though. This clown is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt and by his very actions no better than a wild animal intent on death and destruction. Do we not hunt down and kill wild animals that do the same thing? How does being human some how make the same behavior tolerable? In my mind it doesn’t. Children are untouchable in my opinion and anyone that would do otherwise deserves death. Children are to be cared for and guided not abused and killed because some candy ass can’t handle the rigors of life. By your very estimation people like Hitler, Mohammed Farrah Adid, Sudam Hussain, and many others should still be with us today having had the chance of rehabilitation. Nope there is no rehabilitating an animal. These individuals got what was coming to them. While their death doesn’t undue their killing it absolutely guarantees they won’t do it again. Their death also guarantees that the society they preyed on will not have to house, feed, and clothe them for the rest of their lives. Death is guaranteed but how we meet death does come from choices.

        • The point isn’t guilty or innocent.

          It was an illustration that sometimes you do the right thing even though you don’t want to because what you want doesn’t much matter in comparison to doing the right thing. While conversely, it’s doing the wrong thing that is often easy and feels good but that doesn’t make it the right thing to do.

          It’s easy to nail someone to a cross when the mob is howling for blood. Especially if you don’t like the person that’s getting crucified. Pounding in the nails might even feel great to you. That doesn’t mean that what you’re doing is correct.

          The entire point I’ve been making is that the actions being asked for in most death penalty cases are not correct. They’re easy and politically salable but they are unethical and logically incompatible with the root ideas of ethical and moral use of force in Western philosophy, which is what our entire society is based on. The notions here are some of the worst ideas from Hobbes, ideas which Locke correctly pointed out the error of.

      • Have to disagree. We have a justice system that guarantees due process.

        At some point that due process may include loss of life. We regularly incarcerate people as punishment for bad behavior. If we incarcerate someone without due process it would be kidnapping.

        Regardless, I could make your argument against the death penalty extend to incarceration. You have stripped away the rights of the individual to punish them. This is also a function of the state. Juries are also an arm of the state and render verdicts every day in our country.

        And while i favor the death penalty in clear cases, I have no problem with life sentences for those convicted on circumstantial evidence. And perjury in a capital case should be a capital offense.

        I also believe that capital punishment should always be considered terrible and distasteful. It should always be a difficult task approached with sobriety and resolution. We should never seek vengeance and we will never have justice. We cannot undo the wrongs done by an individual.

        • Circumstantial evidence isn’t suppose to be convicting evidence. Life imprisonment for such would holding someone against their will based on how the wind arouses us that particular day. Circumstances do not always point to hard undeniable evidence. They point to the possibility. Possible and probable are two very starkly different things.

        • Specialist:

          I’ve covered this above in reply to Chris Morton. There is a giant chasm between incarceration and killing someone. So big in fact that TTAG’s new antitomfuckery software made me break that post into three parts.

        • Irrelevant
          Most case are solved with circumstantial evidence.

          DNA is usually circumstantial evidence.

          Someone can put my DNA at most any crime scene if they decide ro.

        • Which is why circumstantial evidence isn’t convicting evidence. Your DNA at a crime scene doesn’t make you associated with the crime just because your DNA was there. Your DNA found on or inside a rape victim directly after the rape on the other hand is incriminating evidence and therefore ceases to be circumstantial. Circumstantial evidence is evidence that can be explained away by suggestive argument. Incriminating evidence is just that evidence that proves guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

        • Strych

          Yeah….I read it…..all of it.

          With incarceration, you want to take them out of the social pool. And justify inflicting them on the incarcerated pool ( as well as guards). There is a system and it is not perfect. I would rather 10 guilty men go free than 1 innocent go to prison.

          But when you can place the killer doing the deed, they need to be removed from the gene pool as well as the social pool. Since we can never replace what murder or forcible rape takes from us, it speaks to society if we tolerate their existence.

          So I continue to disagree. In Brazil, Most convicted of murder under the age 18 spend less than 2 years in jail (They are just kids, right?) Lesser offenses dont even rate jail time. Crimes of all sorts are increasing exponentially as a result.

          We see the same push here…the DA in TX refusing to prosecute crimes valued less than 750 dollars. … will have an effect on the lawless attitude of the masses.

          At some point there has to be an ultimate penalty.

        • Specialist:

          Aprechiate that you bothered to read that mess and I understand you point. I just disagree about it.

          On the Dutch side of Sint Maarten the average for 1st degree murder is 7 years and the prison regularly riots over the flavor of ice cream being served. At no time have I suggested that this is an appropriate way to go either. It turns things into Chicago pretty quick.

          That doesn’t mean however that I’m going to support biting away at the supports of our entire system of government and society, at what I generally term “Western Civ” like some sort of termite. That’s what this does. It’s logically inconsistent with exactly the lines of thought that have propelled us to where we are. You cannot be a Christian and attack the idea of Jesus or a Muslim and attack the idea of… [insert goat joke here]. You can’t do that with Western Civ either and I’m not accusing anyone of doing that intentionally, other than maybe some politicians, I just don’t think people realize and obvious logical paradox that this creates.

          Playing to the mob and it’s baser instincts, IMHO, is unwise and while politically expedient it is ultimately self-destructive. Without a threat a killing is murder or negligent homicide. That rule applies to the State as well as Her citizens. Since an execution is no accident, unless the person can be shown to be an ongoing threat, then this is state sanctioned murder and those doing it are no better than the “animal” they put down. Worse, in fact, for wrapping themselves in the cloak of some sort of morality while doing it.

          I find the whole thing rather Hobbian and disturbing in the way it vests what I consider to be an unnatural power in the State. But that’s just me.

          Now, of course there’s an entirely different argument to be made about efficacy, one which you touch on. There are some valid arguments contained in that set of ideas. I just tend to think that doing what’s been the “right thing” forever is probably better than gaining a bit of efficiency for the sake of making some people feel better. Again, that’s just me. I’m not personally opposed to killing people per se, but I am selective about the ways I think it should be done and under what circumstances lest we end up looking more like Iran than the USA.

        • “I’m not personally opposed to killing people per se, but I am selective about the ways I think it should be done and under what circumstances lest we end up looking more like Iran than the USA.”

          Have you ever been asked to kill outside the realm of self defense? By that I mean have you been engaged in such a way that you are not acting to defend yourself fot the sake of defending yourself but to defend others in the process of defending yourself? Police chasing down a violent criminal having to kill that criminal in their own defense didn’t start as self defense initially but defense of others. The same can be said of a soldier sent off to war. The initial reason for killing wasn’t self defense but rather war itself. Killing no matter how ugly is indeed necessary at times. Regardless of fortune or unfortunate sometimes killing must be done outside the venue of self defense. Now would I prefer that someone, anyone have put 2 in the chest and at least one in the head of the school shooter while in the act? Absolutely! Happily even! Unfortunately that isn’t how it played out. Regardless that doesn’t mean the subject doesn’t deserve the same fate. If anything it means he deserves the same fate even more. He was too much of a coward to continue his assault on those that had the means to fight back. Whether we make choices that we have to live with or make choices we have to die with, either way choices are at the heart of both.

        • Happily:

          Personally, no I have never been tasked with killing someone else in an active manner. However, at one point in my life that was a consideration before moving forward and I have actually thought about it.

          In response to your two questions of profession here:

          The police are not being sent to kill. They’re being sent to apprehend someone and then put them into the legal system. If the person resists attempts to take them into custody and forces the police to defend themselves against aggression on the part of the suspect then that is self-defense. I have never heard, at least in this country, of a police force being sent out as assassins.

          Further, in the context of a war, soldiers follow orders and do what they are told a necessary part of military cohesion and doctrine. The military, generally does what the politicians tell it to do. They take offensive action to be sure. I was never asked to do so but I was well aware that this could happen when I signed an enlistment contract. However, again, the nuance that no one wants to talk about is present here. Soldiers are supposed to be used in cases of “national defense” not invasions of, say Poland a la 1939. Again, soldiers, Marines, airmen and sailors don’t really get to make the choice. They step up to defend the nation and if their armed service is abused by politicians they get pretty much no say in that matter.

          I would point out though, that “national defense” is legitimate and falls squarely under the doctrine of “defense of self or others”. Like our reaction to the actions of the Empire of Japan on December 7, 1941. We didn’t fight a war of aggression, we were attacked, declared war on Japan which caused Germany and Italy to declare war on us in response due to their alliance with Japan.

          I would also point out that earlier I said that there are exceptions were preemptive action is both necessary and within the confines of Western thoughts on both ethics and morality. It gets sticky on the personal level of self-defense but it’s been a widely accepted doctrine that is common at the national level and has been for centuries. At the personal level, I can’t think of a case like this off the top of my head but I can imagine situations where it might be applicable. Generally though just because you think someone might come after you doesn’t mean you have a license to hunt them down and kill them.

          Neither the police killing someone who fights an arrest with potentially lethal force nor a soldier on a battlefield has, in my mind, any serious ethical concerns about inflicting death on others. They are both defending themselves against death or injury (or defending others) in a situation in which they have been placed by decisions made by others (criminals on the one hand politicians on the other but maybe that’s redundant). You can see this kind of ethical thinking taking place in the Denver PD’s SWAT team walking out of the whole Ruby Ridge thing saying that Reno and her FBI guys were unethical nuts hell bent on murder rather than justice.

        • I didn’t imply police were assassins but that doesn’t mean that police don’t always act in direct response to self defense but rather their initial response to defense is in defense of others. I think we also agree that killing does indeed happen at the behest of other people (right or wrong is of no consequence because it does not change the outcome). All this being said I think it is reasonable for a society to deem it fit for judge and jury to put someone to death for crimes that warrant such a sentence. While the judge and jury may not be in the direct act of self defense, they are acting in the defense of others. I honestly believe General William Garrison said it best, “There are some people that don’t deserve to be here.” He said this speaking Mohamed Farrah Adid and the need to remove him from his mantle of power by force to include his death if necessary. The difference between the school shooter and Adid is semantics. They are both cold blooded killers.

      • @ Strych9

        “But what if I have a lot of friends who are equally angry that you keyed my car? Does 10 people agreeing with me that your brutal killing was justified due to your actions make my actions right? What about a 100 people or [insert ever larger numbers here].

        No. It’s still murder, it’s a complete overreaction and it’s still wrong even if I managing to convince enough people that it’s right to get it made legal. It’s still morally and ethically wrong for me to stab you to death for keying my car.”

        Morals and Ethics? Really Mr. 9? Since when are morals and ethics part of the “social media” society? It’s what you can prove in court – period. It doesn’t matter if YOU think it’s right or wrong. If my attorney can justify it, YOU LOSE.

        You want to preach to people that MS13 is a good gang because well, they’re not responsible for raping and murdering because well, it’s their environment that causes them to do such evil… Oh no, don’t defend yourselves from these animals unless they’re actually RAPING AND MURDERING you and your family… Whew, AOC please come save us.

  3. Sounds like a lot of people dropped the ball on this cluster. The sheriff shouldn’t be the only one canned. Any officer that knew about the incident as it was happening should be canned. This should also include any one that took calls reporting the incident. The councelors should be implicated because of the encouragement to use violence as a release rather than taking focus away from violence. Being an outsider looking in I would agree that the shooter was a ticking bomb and ultimately he was wound up at set loose on those people at the school. His actions are a direct reflection of people though not guns. The failure of others doesn’t excuse the shooters actions but their failures shouldn’t get a pass either. In the courts blame is often shared by percentage. This blame percentage should apply here as well.

  4. To say that his treatment was “ineffective” is a long way from concluding that it made him worse–which is nothing but an argument by a plaintiff’s attorney, not a statement of fact. The research, afaik, on video games is mixed, with the worst that can be said is that games might temporarily exacerbate violent tendencies, but no evidence that they cause of contribute to outbursts. In any event, the duty the counselors owed was to the patient, not to anyone else, and no one else can sue if they were negligent in their treatment. Second, it is unlikely that a court will conclude that a mental health counselor, whose communications with a patient are both privileged and confidential under HIPAA, had a duty to violate the law and disclose to the community at large, to the police, or to the school that he was a potentially dangerous individual. The counselors certainly owed no individual duty to any of the students absent specific threats of harm to specific individuals, of which no evidence exists at the current time.

    But good riddance to Israel. Hopefully the Senate will go along with the Governor on this one.

    • I think there is laws saying that you must report if a patient is dangerous or harmful. You also can’t hide crimes being committed by the patient.

      There was evidence of him saying he wanted to shoot kids at a school. There was a lot of evidence of criminal activity and violence. They were notified of him harming himself and attempting suicide. They knew he was killing animals. A person warned the police about his plan to attack the school and how he was going to do it. He openly threatened to kill various people.

      Everyone knew he was a danger. They were not surprised it was him. The kids even warned the school staff about him being a school shooter.

  5. Parkland was the Perfect Storm convergence of incompetence at an unbelievable number of levels in an unbelievable number of agencies including multipe law enforcement agencies, mental health professionals, the entire school system, and others.

    No ONE failure accounted for the outcome, but they all contributed to it, each compounding the failures of the others.

    • And each one of these “contributors” considered themselves to be the best at their game.
      From the incompetent Sheriff to his officers that couldn’t or wouldn’t act at each opportunity to end the killer’s activities.
      The school District and school’s administrators that wouldn’t follow their own security procedures because they valued convenience over security.
      The FBI who blew off the crystal clear warning and then there’s the mental health “professionals” whose quackery enabled if not encouraged the POS to become the cowardly murderer he became.

    • Everyone points a finger at any person somehow tied to the Parkland shooter EXCEPT the kids of Stoman Douglas. I’m not talking about David Hogg and his possie or the victims themselves, but when people found out the identity of the Parkland shooter, no one was surprised. It was a school-wide joke that if anyone was to be a school shooter, it would be him. He was ostracized and shunned by the entire (or damn near entire) student body. I grew up 5 minutes away from Stoman Douglas so trust me when I say that a lot of Douglas kids are assholes.

      Bullying (along with “gun-free zones”) has been the common denominator in the vast majority of these mass shootings.
      Perhaps no one blames the kids because some might consider it to be victim-blaming, but to just completely ignore bullying as a contributing factor isn’t gonna solve anything either.
      There should be more effort placed on cultivating an anti-bully culture within schools (and on social media), establishing outreach programs to help kids fit and teaching kids how to grow thicker skin and be resilient to bullying if and when it does occur.

      • Education should start at home. Parents should not rely on the government school to raise their child for them.

        Most of the life long behaviors kids pick up comes from the parents before the child becomes old enough to go to school.

        I try to teach the kids about morals and principles before they go into an environment of corruption (such as public schools). If you do not teach your child to be a good human being before they interact with bad children, they are very likely to become corrupted to fit in. I notice how the children change once they go to kindergarten. At that point you are trying to throw off all the bad crap other kids’ parents have passed along to your kids through theirs. If you do not raise your kid well in those few years you could have a problem up until they are in their late teens or early twenties.

        There is no excuses… Doesn’t matter if you work a lot. No excuses.

        • Agreed! My wife and I home school our daughter for several reasons. First 80%+ of what a child learns they learn at home. The public school system around here is absolutely horrible. Bowing to the whims of a few while violating the rights of free speech and freedom of religion of others. My wife says it keeps me out of jail too. She is probably right considering I don’t take kindly to incompetence and then blaming it on someone else. Which is something schools now days are good at.

    • The scope of the disaster was *at least* increased by the total lack of teachers who were willing and prepared to defend the students who were entrusted to their care. Had they been armed and ready, the assault would likely have not even happened. Saying “there was no one failure which caused this” is a bit of a stretch.

  6. I think just about every boy I grew up with played violent video games as a teenager. Might as well blame his dysfunction on junk food or masturbation. Still sounds like his therapists had some pretty sorry ideas about what to do about a violent psychopath.

  7. Since it was decided long ago to let the mentally ill run free, including the dangerously mentally ill, I hope these councilors are nailed to the wall.

    • No, we are supposed to and meant to defend ourselves. There were no police for decades after 1776 and they really stop nothing except motorists.
      Asking government for help is where things start going wrong. Police are obligated to protect but only enforce laws and arrest criminals or suspected criminals. hey did not punish the guy for hitting his mother a damaging her property so the courts failed and we do not need courts either.
      Why do you pay tax for police? Crime is not stopped is it? Police forces get bigger and crime goes on while citizens lose Rights.

      • The police have no obligation to protect the individual but rather to protect the greater good. That being enforcing the will of the government independent of the will of the people. This is a decision made by our very own Supreme Court. Fortunately for the people there are law enforcement officials that seek to refuse the establishment if only to be incarcerated themselves. Should that happen what will we do for those that stand for us? Sit back do nothing as we predominantly do nothing for ourselves? To that I say to them that stick their neck out for me thank you and offer any and all support I can muster. To those that sit back doing nothing but complaining I poopoo them.

        • “To those that sit back doing nothing but complaining I poopoo them.”

          Oh, give me a fucking break.

          When LE fucks the dog big-time, we should just sit down and shut up?

          Fuck that noise. They get *zero* ‘extra’ consideration just because they are LE. If anything, they get additional scrutiny. It’s a part of the job description. Don’t like it? You should have chosen a different career. And if you can’t see why that’s a problem, you’re a part of the problem. Or a majority of it.

          And based on your track record here in TTAG, I called it right on you when you popped in here thumping your chest and loudly proclaiming yourself to be Mr. Hot-fucking shit…

        • First I’ve never claimed anything about myself. If you took anything I said as evidence of that than that’s on you not me. It is laughable at best to think you have me pegged on anything. You know less than nothing about me except for what little I’ve shared because of people attacking me because they didn’t or don’t like what I had to say. Tuff shit! I don’t like what a lot of people have to say sometimes but that doesn’t remove their right to say it. That sounds exactly how a liberal would respond especially if they are the majority. As for law enforcement choosing to stand with the people instead of against them, I’d say that earns them the same type of support. While I agree that the man chooses the career not the career chooses the man. That doesn’t change the fact that law enforcement are going be on one of two sides. The government or the people. Unless you are a government elite I would think that you would want as many law enforcement on the people’s side as possible. Maybe not.

  8. Golly when I was in high screwal they didn’t put up with BS like the Cruz cretin. We had race riots 3 out 4 years in my town. No one got shot. No one killed. They didn’t try to “understand” violent felons. They kicked their azz to the curb. No intervention 39 times in Floriduh…fry this worthless boy.

    • “Race riots”? That would be the media and police term as in the “Watts Riots”. Actually those events are in actuality “revolts”, and close examination will reveal all are triggered by police presence

  9. Mental Health, Red Flag laws, Constiutuonal Rights???? It’s a mess. A direct result of family member requesting mental health intervention repeatedly and nothing being done, led to the death of one individual and life in prison/nuthouse for the other( a direct family member of mine). It could have been stopoed with one simple visit because the guy was nutz.T wo months ago my son was attacked by his girlfriend with scissors, out of her head and out of her meds,, he called the cops, pressed charges, The charge: Domestic Disturbance unsupervised probation. Is this another time bomb? One week ago, an individual was standing in the street screaming he was going to burn this apartment complex down and kill everyone in it. Cops were called, the individual was talked to, and remained at the apartments. We were told Mental Health eval Monday. No show so far. Is this another time bomb? It’s confusing. . That Boward County Cop , wow talk about FUBAHope

  10. -Hey guys! This kid is crazy and dangerous. He is planning to commit a massacre. What should we do?

    -Let’s tell his mom to allow him to desensitize himself with FPS games and buy him some training guns. Then we will watch him train to kill children. We can make sure he isn’t arrested, put in a mental facility or on a prohibited person list.

    -Sounds great. We don’t want the kid to be locked away from society just because he is violent sometimes. That would be so sad for him and his adopted mother. We just need to show him love and give him what he wants. In return he will behave and become a nice peaceful crazy person.

    *The patient carries out his crime after years of planning. Killing many innocent people at a school like he was dreaming and writing about.*

    -After all that work we did. The kid still went out and murdered people like he told us he was thinking about doing. We were doing so well with him up until that stupid evil black weapon of war took over his soul. If it was for those stupid guns he wouldn’t have killed all those people.

    -Yeah! We really need to get rid of these device of corruption. They cause our youth to turn into crazy mass murders. If the government would ban all of them we wouldn’t have these mass murders, we would just have harmless crazy people in the streets.

    -We need to get the Republicans to pass more gun control in Florida.

    -Agreed. They will support our wishes. They are on our side at the end of the day, if they’re not we will make sure they are.

    *Florida Republicans vote for and sign gun control into law. The President of the U.S. passes gun control and calls for more. The NRA also comes out to call for more gun control.*

  11. I was curious about the Henderson Behavioral Health angle. The ABC News link isn’t working now. Was the psycho prescribed anti-depressants?

    It has been a standard side-effect warning for a long time, that some of these drugs can cause “suicide ideation.” I’m sure it’s a complex issue, but we never seem to get prescription data on these shooters, even the dead ones.

    • I suppose it depends upon how you define “work”.

      It was pretty effective in Armenia during WWI, in Ukraine in 1932-1933 and in Poland between 1940 and 1945.

      Of course that’s not the sort of efficacy that gun controllers (with the possible exception of Eric Swalwell) want to talk about.

      To paraphrase Hillary Clinton, “Genocide is the things we choose to do together”…

  12. I wish the arresting office had dropped him with three rounds. Look at the money saved. Death penalty right there on the cheap.

    • Actually, I’m ok with capturing these guys alive. At least we get a chance to uncover motives, etc. I believe that it’s important for the survivors and the families to get closure. Then, I’ve got no problem Publicly executing him, immediately. I’d even put it on pay per view with the proceeds going towards the victims. Tell me you wouldn’t pay $30 to watch him get the needle. Maybe $75 for a hanging. $100 to get broken on the wheel. Heck, I’d pay a few grand if I could participate. Not kidding.

      • They had people lined up for days to volunteer for Gary Gilmore. Could be a financial viable opportunity. DFG Game tags maybe ?…and we can put some grandstands up in the sun and do the killing right down on highway 61.

  13. Strych9, you’re over thinking everything. Some people just need killing. If you go to the scene of a school shooting and personally view the aftermath, all your arguments will go out the window. Trust me.

  14. So Strych9 has co-opted the discussion and feels the need to hold court. Well my 2 centavos,

    I don’t see much good happening in Western civilization.
    We worry about what bathroom transgenders can use while gays are thrown off roofs in Muslim countries to deafening silence from western “activists”
    Thousands of people cross our borders daily to receive endless benefits(at US taxpayers expense) and no one in charge will do anything.
    The only solution any politician will support to the problem of the Nicholas Cruzes of the world is to disarm me.
    Criminals on the left are almost never punished (Clinton, Waters, Rangel, McCabe, Comey, AOC, Smollett, Ellison, the Lt. Gov of Virginia whose name escapes me, Sharpton……….)
    Free speech is now effectively curtailed on campus.
    Voter fraud is widespread.
    Candidates for president think the Boston marathon bomber should have a vote. Nicholas Cruz I bet too.

    Your treatise on violence and western civilization rings hollow to me. Leave Nicholas Cruz alone in a room full of parents of kids he killed and let them settle it.

    This was effectively done to Germans (not all Nazis) at the end of WW II and no one seemed too broken up about it and Western civilization did not seem to skip a beat.

    • Truth. Strych sounds like somebody who has spent too much time in the world of academia. And my four years was too much time.

  15. The Parkland kids were failed a dozen ways, and continue to be.

    Yes, Sheriff-Lyin is a boil that needs to be lanced. But, he’s a symptom. The disease is that school board, school system, county govt, commissions authorities and agencies, all wrangled to do something other than take care of the kids.

    The kids are funding-tickets; tokens to trade for resources and attention. That commerce after the killings is just continuation of what went on before.

    And the cause of the disease is the shallow, self-righteous citizens n activists who just want to feel good about themselves — a moment on camera, Bloomie’s anti-boom bucks, the frission of spewing a hot take, n they’ll sell out their own children.

    They’ll sell out their own children for the relevance-kibbles of pretend doing big things. They shouldn’t be trusted to run their own neighborhood association; we’ve seen what happens when we let them run schools.

  16. And anyone who looks at what happened before, during, and after the Parkland shooting and still says we need the Government to fix something really needs a good boot to the head.

  17. The gun controller’s motto:
    “We don’t have to protect you and we won’t let you protect yourself. “

  18. There is all this talk about the shooters mental health problems and past history in a number of these recent shootings. It follows that he should be afforded an insanity plea. Most states still have the insanity plea still on the books but it hardly gets invoked these days. There is a misconception that the offender “gets off on insanity” but he or she is held until they are no longer a threat. I would press for treatment rather than punishment.

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