This CNN report on a street shooting in Oakland provides no information whatsoever as to who’s shooting whom for what reason. If this is a gangland style execution—and why wouldn’t it be—surely the Chicken Noodle News should, I dunno, mention it. You know, in passing. If it wasn’t so sad, the producer’s attempt to provide some justification for airing contextless bang-bang would be hilarious. “We’re locking people up instead of giving them some help,” Contee Vility pronounces, “giving them some hope.” Anyway, should CNN have showed the coupe de grace? [h/t DrVino]
If it bleeds, it leads.
Oakland? As in California? But I thought everybody had to have a background check for all gun sales there. Surely you’re mistaken, Robert.
There are no gun stores in Oakland and those of us that live in Alameda county cannot buy ammo at the walmarts because of Oakland. Ammo cannot be delivered to Oakland off the internet either.
Oakland is literally a gun free paradise. This is how slow joe, difi and barry want the rest of America to operate.
Now why in the world would those in power want Oakland in particular to have less access to firearms and ammo than other parts of the already prohibitively restrictive state?
I’m guessing those laws were made in the 60’s by St. Reagan and his “freedom loving” ilk.
No, they’ve been more recently applied. Reagan wasn’t the only wrong pol in our history.
Actually, no, there’s a bill sliming through the legislature RIGHT NOW that would allow even more restrictive laws just in Oakland.
http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=201320140AB180
They’re showing it to… you know, STOP GUN VIOLENCE. Although the ratings would have gotten a bump if it had been a pitchfork instead…
I guarantee you they weren’t thinking of the children when they aired this. They were thinking of their dismal ratings and how they could increase viewership with controversy.
That’s what it really comes down to- the news-tainment industry isn’t just about money, it’s about people that lust for attention. Because they probably didn’t get enough hugs growing up. Or they got too many hugs. However that works.
The official term is info-tainment, but news-tainment works
You’re right. Potayto, potahto.
I sure wish the press would learn what “point blank” means.
+1
I though point blank was the look on Katie Couric’s face.
In the modern days of the internet, you just have to know where to look to find the uncensored news. For those of you who don’t know already know, you should be able to find the non-edited version of this video within the next day or two on http://www.liveleak.com. There you will also find all the unadulterated actual event videos you can dream of. Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, and everything else in between. Think of it as a repository of everything that the mass media is now too scared to show, but used to show before the end of the Vietnam war. You’re welcome, but be warned, that site is not for those with weak dispositions.
there are other sites that make liveleak look tame.
Link please….
Am I the only one who was impressed / worried to see what looked like at least halfway decent firearm control? He didn’t even hold it sideways…
I noticed as well. Pretty solid isosceles stance from the shooter.
I noticed that too. He was not a new shooter.
i think that the sideways gun is a mistaken stereotype. if they shoot sideways the brass will hit them in the face. i think shooting with a sideways gun would/should be a one time mistake.
Sure, the MSM should show the kill shot. Not the one in the street. The one in San Quentin with a big whiff of gas.
Like that’s going to happen.
+1
Unless the video was edited, they don’t show the guy being killed, which sort of negates the entire point of this post…
I think you have a case of reading too fast. Robert is asking whether CNN should have shown the final frames of that sequence.
It would have been so great to see the victim on the ground reach up and shoot that dude at point blank. Or perhaps, a customer in the diner step out the front door and smoke that dude.
I’m positive CNN wouldn’t have included a civilian gun use in their news.
Imagine a 17 yr old gang-banger killing another one in CA.? What is the world coming to? A soldier in the Royal Queens Guard BUTCHERED by a nigerian. Bombs being set off in Boston, a scum bag raghead sits in jail while getting full pay as a Maj. Ragheads allowed special treatment in Quantanamo Bay, IF a guard enforces the rules they complain and that person then faces a Board on Inquiry, and possible Court Martial. Does any of this sound wrong, or am I just being a RACIST?
You’re not wrong on the general points, but it’s undermined more than a little by the fact that yes, you’re acting like a bigot.
I don’t know if you’re actually a bigot. Or a racist. But it does appear that at this moment that you are acting convincingly like a racist bigot.
What? You asked…
Alpha, in near-Oakland Berkeley and in Oakland Hills residents have banded together to hire private patrols. Burglary has apparently gone over the top. Do you happen to know if those patrols are armed? Do locals consider the situation in Oakland Jerry Brown’s fault to some extent? Is governing CA easier than changing the culture of Oakland? Or is it just about the money, i.e. Californians simply couldn’t be bothered to pay for intensive policing in Oakland?
Just saw this, hopefully you’re subscribed for follow-up notifications.
From what I know (and I’m no authority on this) the patrols are not armed. Typical California security theater. Fortunately many California petty/property-crime criminals (note: excluding the violent-assault types) are easily frightened off, however temporarily, by the appearance of a “professional witness” who’s ready to dial 911 at a moment’s notice.
I haven’t heard anything about this being Gov Brown’s fault. If anything he did a better job of holding together the fraying edges of law enforcement in Oakland than the current crop of semi-competent strivers running the city.
Is governing CA easier than changing the culture of Oakland?
Apples/oranges — completely different dynamics.
I think Brown is better equipped to run things at the state level than he was in Oakland, which frankly was more of a “keep the lid on and don’t let it get any worse” type situation. He seems to be doing a pretty good job of quietly managing CA out of fiscal crisis mode.
Or is it just about the money, i.e. Californians simply couldn’t be bothered to pay for intensive policing in Oakland?
Oakland has plenty of LEOs, IMHO, and they’re more active and visible than the patrols in other Bay Area cities. I don’t think it’s necessarily a law-enforcement problem at this point. (Yes, you can always throw more cops at a problem, but at a certain point, your citizen-to-cop ratio == police state, and a pure guns-and-badges approach to Oakland would likely end up there…)
The problem is that the entire city of Oakland is basically the ghetto of the Bay Area. The grindingly relentless cycle of urban decay, poverty, illiteracy/innumeracy/ESL and crime mean that Oakland is ground zero for producing criminals. Those predators then roam a 50-mile radius outside Oakland, including my own city of Fremont. I have personal experience with this phenomenon, unfortunately.
It’s an ugly dynamic and I don’t profess to have the answers as to how it should be addressed. Even if a genetically engineered plague wiped out every community in Oakland that’s a significant source of street/violent crime, within a generation it would be backfilled with the detritus of the lower-income groups that we rely on to work menial jobs.
If it helps just one person realize that the bad guys have no compassion and that we good guys need to “tool up”, to be prepared to meet the threat with equal or greater force, then showing that video is the right thing to do.
I’m not sure I understand where that woman was coming from – we lock people up instead of giving them hope? Was the shooter shooting because he lost hope after being locked up? Apparently he wasn’t locked up long enough.
Since the parties involved were most likely all drug and/or gang related, she is probably referring to those drivers of violence. If that is the case, I can’t really disagree with her.
At the end of the day, everyone is responsible for their own actions. But the environment one is raised in surely helps shape them, and much of Oak town is less than nurturing, starting largely with broken families.
The whole thing is such a waste.
actually, what they are doing is releasing habitual offenders into the community then taking away our right to self defense. brilliant, I know.
Should have been a DGU.
^^^ this. nobody there with the nads to help that young man. what a great community.
What does it matter if it was shown? You can easily find worse online.
But for the most part, you have to *find* it. If it airs on CNN, it finds you. Assuming you’re watching, that is… I quit watching Celebrity Nincompoop News (along with all the other national mass media outlets) a long time ago.
She’s not wrong about getting people help. The gang members involved in this are probably too far gone to help but if our government shut down the phony drug war, legalized drugs and pumped the added tax revenue into underfunded schools and social programs, in a few years we’d see a big difference in our country.
Nope. Sorry. The politicians will find a way to waste the money. Remember the “Peace Dividend” that we were going to enjoy after the end of the Cold War? Didn’t happen.
I’m totally in favor of ending the War on Drugs. I just don’t expect any financial benefit.
I generally don’t agree with a lot of your comments, Ralph, but I have to say you’re probably right.
But, is there hope at all?
There are appropriate warnings advising of the specific nature of the footage as it is. Those are sufficient to show the unedited total footage, too.
It’s a guy with a mask on shooting people. What do you think the context is?
People should see what real street violence out there looks like and what we in the pro-rights crowd are talking about when we advocate for firearm and self defense freedoms.
So what do you suggest? Do you have a better self defense solution than immediately returning accurate fire, or are you trying to insinuate that we knuckle draggers on TTAG only advocate self defense because we are ignorant of street level violence?
As for me, I’m going to return fire. I’d rather the chalk outline surround the gang banger than the other way around.
(In)Accur81? Seems you failed reading comprehension somewhere along the way.
First, I’m not “suggesting” anything. I came right out and said it, that they should show it in total so people {CNN viewers, who are likely ignorant of street level violence and not exactly down for the 2A struggle} will know what the reality of crime is and what those of us who carry for self defense are up against.
Second, the “we” in “we in the pro-rights crowd” is ME, YOU and presumably the bulk of TTAG’s readership and writers.
Where you went off on a hypersensitive, misguided rant and started imagining some non-existent attack on you or “knuckle draggers” is your own your own business and has nothing to do with me.
Unless it isn’t. If you’re that prone to misreading a blog post, one wonders the limits of your street level situational awareness, and whether over reaction with a firearm is but an innocent bump into you away.
Be safe out there.
Ughhh that witness smiling while describing it was pretty disturbing… Reminds me of Clinton smiling and laughing while taking blame for Benghazi.
That’s a pretty natural reaction to being in an uncomfortable situation.
Black males are responsible for 50-75% of all gun murders each year and every year. Suicides account for over half of all gun deaths. We don’t have a gun problem, we have a suicide and black male problem. I’m not afraid to speak the truth, but most of you are.
Lars; Laughnor, Lanza and the Joker where spree killers. They were also white. We don’t have a spree killer problem, we have a white male problem. The rest of you are afraid to speak the truth, but I’m not. Also check out the IGOTD awards.
Ted Bundy, John Gacy, Gary Ridgeway, Jeffrey Dahmer, Joel Rifkin, Robert Hansen . . . all white.
See, Ralph ain’t afraid to speak the truth either.
I believe the “spree” killings are about 1-2% of gun murders?? If that…?
Steel, how much damage to the 2a cause is done by a black guy in Oakland Killing another black guy in Oakland? Now how much damage is done to the 2a cause when a white guy shoots a bunch of kids in a whitebread community like Newtown?
And how much damage is done to the 2a cause by guys posting comments like Lars does. After all, this is TTAG, not Stormfront.
We had hoped that the killing of those babies in Newtown would make a difference. I’m not so sure that it has made the difference that we wanted it to make.
It is a nice question, whether there is some reason that 21 Newtown babies should make more difference than 21+ every week in gangland. But here’s a reason to face the reality: The politicians leading the gun confiscation drum beat for all of the US primarily are those representing Chicago’s South Side, Oakland, and the Bronx. “Physician, health thyself” was the ancient admonition. The real people who live in the gang-infested neighborhoods are suffering because national anti-gun groups suck all the oxygen out of the focus on solutions that work for the neighborhoods where, by the numbers, most of the suffering occurs. I agree with the the drug legalization + clinics. Anyone who still turns to violence after that should be pulled off the street for a very long time.
So all these people saw it (“It was beasty”) and did nothing. hmm. Yes, the shooter had no regard for life, but looks to me like there is plenty to go around in that neighborhood.
All of those people are unarmed. What are they supposed to do to a violent criminal who is armed and shooting people, give him a stern look and threaten to call the police? Well actually that is exactly what the Progressives want but it is (a) extremely dangerous and (b) totally ineffective.
If you are unarmed and an armed violent criminals is launching lead, your only course of action is to extricate yourself and your family members as quickly as possible.
In the states with the most prolific concealed carry, only 1 out of 15 or so adults has a concealed carry license. And on any given day, maybe half of them are carrying. That means that about 1 out of 30 adults are “legally” armed in those states. Not exactly bad odds for a violent criminal with a gun who was the element of surprise. Now imagine if about 1 out of 8 adults are carrying on any given day. That would make violent criminals’ livelihoods a lot more dangerous.
There is another problem. An armed citizen should never shoot at another person unless they saw that other person attack someone. Just because you see a person shooting doesn’t mean they are the attacker. They could simply be an armed victim who happens to be shooting back.
I’d say the community members did right — except for voting for disarmament politicians.
that only explains that moment. Why don’t they take more initiative for the next time? I think at the end of the day, they don’t want to get between rival drug gangs shooting each other. They don’t want to carry because it’ll make them a retaliatory target. I think that their attitude boils down to: let them shoot each other and leave me out of it.
dwb, it’s Oakland in Alameda county. Nobody on that street would have had a carry permit no matter how clean their record. I live in Alameda county and in December I passed an FBI background investigation. I can’t get a permit here either.
so you are telling me that if suddenly CA became shall-issue, these people would take up arms and drive the gangsters out? Don’t misunderstand me, I am strongly pro-2a, i am just trying to be realistic about how much shall-issue can fix in these these neighborhoods. Even the woman putting the flowers down was not particularly angry. thats a deeper problem than gun rights.
No dwb, that’s not what I’m telling you. But if people had the option to legally carry that would be one more tool in the tool box. We can’t know what those people would do cause they don’t have that option.
let them shoot each other and leave me out of it.
That doesn’t sound like an unreasonable position to take.
They should have shown the kill shot. Also they should have shown an introspective into the life of the victim including all of his extra-curricular activities, text messages, social media, rap sheet, etc.
The duty of the news is to provide all information and facts that they have available to them in an unbiased manner.
Just random, unknown violence in Oakland. Or we are supposed to think.
If the lady in the interview has issues with her neighborhood she should ask herself if the leaders in office are part of the problem through a myriad of failed approaches and policies that result in a shooting like this.
Hint: it’s not easy availability of guns, mag limits, or lack of regulations causing the problem
“Mother and her children hid and cried.” This is what happens to a disarmed populace.