Tag Archives: FBI

International news, military news

ISIS leader becomes new No. 1 target

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Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has become a marked man.

Who is this guy? He is the leader of the Islamic State. He heads the world’s most formidable terrorist organization.

What if we get him? Will it mean the end of the organization. Probably not by itself, but it would cripple the Islamic State in a way that all the bombs and missiles we’re dropping on the terrorists.

This is a big deal at many levels.

According to Bloomberg News Service: “Eliminating Baghdadi is seen as a particularly important goal, the official said, because he holds a unique role in being able to inspire and organize extremists beyond the territory held by the group. While declining to compare the effort to the operation that led to the killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in 2011, the official said the U.S. has a proven track record of finding a top target once it sets its sights.”

President Obama and Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced recently the deployment of a special operations team that is set up to help Kurdish and Iraqi forces fighting ISIS units. The team is expected to deploy teams acting on intelligence gathered by CIA operatives, the National Security Agency, the FBI, Navy SEALs and Army Delta Force commandos.

These folks all are quite good at what we ask them to do.

Which is to hunt down and eliminate bad guys.

 

national news

What harm do background checks bring?

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gun-control

I am a law-abiding, taxpaying, loyal American patriot, who once wore my country’s uniform and went to war to protect it.

I also own a couple of rifles. They’re hidden away. I don’t take them out very often.

But as the nation today ponders the impact of the latest mass shooting by a maniac, this time at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Ore., I am compelled to ponder: What would happen if I went to a gun store to purchase a firearm and was forced to wait a few days while the government performed a background check?

President Obama has called yet again for more stringent laws that might help prevent future maniacs from getting their hands on a gun.

Gun-rights groups — chiefly the National Rifle Association — will argue against any such action, contending it would violate the Second Amendment guarantee that Americans have the right to “keep and bear arms.”

Suppose we had mandatory background checks.

I’d go into the gun store. I’d select my weapon of choice. I would pay for the firearm. But I couldn’t take it home. Why? The business owner would submit my name to, say, the FBI or the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms for that mandatory federal background check.

I would wait a number of days. Let’s say it’s a week.

The check comes back. I’m clean. I can then pick up my firearm, take it home … and perhaps store it along with the two rifles I already own.

Have my Second Amendment rights been “infringed”? Have I been denied the right to “keep and bear arms”? Is the government going to disarm me?

No to all three things.

Why on God’s Earth can’t we enact a law that might prevent someone else from committing the kind of dastardly act that took place today in Roseburg?

 

medical news, military news, national news

Shooter was a drugged-up nut case?

The man who killed those five U.S. servicemen in Chattanooga, Tenn., now appears to have been a disturbed fellow who might have had a drug problem.

Police killed Mohammad Abdulazeez after he gunned down four Marines and a sailor.

CHATTANOOGA SHOOTER: ON ANTIDEPRESSANTS, SLEEPING PILLS, MUSCLE RELAXANTS

He was a Muslim, which of course brought out the usual calls for doing such things as banning all Muslims from entering the United States.

However, the FBI has not yet found a single terrorist link to the young man. What’s been learned instead is that he was a deeply troubled fellow with a history of emotional trauma and drug abuse.

Indeed, his medical condition sounded like it could be anyone capable of doing what he did.

It’s depressing enough that someone would kill five American servicemen in cold blood. It’s made even worse when we start jumping to conclusions that seek to intensify an already-intense worldwide situation involving international terrorists.

Abdulazeez likely wasn’t a terrorist. Yes, he committed a despicable act. However, until we find evidence that he was involved with terrorist organizations, we ought to stop the demagoguery until we collect all the facts.

national news, religious news

Free speech does have its limits

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Garland police officers responded as they should have when two gunmen opened fire at a “contest” to draw the Islamic prophet Muhammad.

They shot the men dead.

http://dallasmorningviewsblog.dallasnews.com/2015/05/be-thankful-innocent-people-didnt-die-but-dont-tell-me-the-garland-conference-was-about-free-speech.html/

Now the debate has ensued. Were the provocateurs — the folks who sponsored a contest they knew would provoke that kind of response from Muslims — merely exercising their rights of “free speech”?

My answer? No.

They knew that illustrating the prophet is offensive to Muslims. Indeed, the group that sponsored the “contest,” an outfit called the American Freedom Defense Initiative, has been identified as an extremist anti-Muslim group.

So, do you think these folks knew what to expect when they staged this event? My guess is that they knew.

The shooters were described as Islamists. One of them, Elton Simpson, allegedly wrote a good-bye note to his friends and family before he started shooting. He knew he’d meet his end in Garland.

As Jim Mitchell of the Dallas Morning News writes in his blog: “Islamic extremism is a global curse. Cartoon contests in Garland aren’t going make a bit of difference in combating it. But insensitive contests like the one yesterday will provoke lone wolves and insult an entire religion. And I ask, to what purpose? This wasn’t discourse; it was a opportunity to draw offensive cartoons for the sake of drawing offensive cartoons. My idea of defensible free expression has a higher and more noble purpose.”

It’s widely established and known around the world that Muslims don’t react well when Muhammad is depicted in cartoons or illustrated simply for the sake of producing a worldly image. Do non-Muslims agree with this religious tenet? No. But it’s not non-Muslims’ place to judge how those who worship a certain religion are supposed to believe.

We should be grateful that the FBI had tipped off the Garland Police Department.

Its officers responded correctly.

State news

Group stains secessionists' name

Texas secessionists have enough of a negative reputation that they don’t need another stain on their soiled reputation.

But by golly, here comes a group that takes the argument a nonsensical step farther.

The “Republic of Texas” says the state, which joined the Union in 1845 after being independent for nine years, never really became part of the United States of America. This group meets monthly in what it calls a joint session of congress. It manufactures its own money.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/secede-%e2%80%98republic%e2%80%99-claims-texas-never-joined-us/ar-AA9yzL9

These yahoos even claim some type of diplomatic immunity by presenting ID cards to police officers who stop them for committing infractions of various natures.

The Republic of Texas went too far, according to the FBI, in ordering a judge in Kerrville to appear in a “court hearing” involving his foreclosure order on a Republic member’s home. The FBI broke into a meeting the group was conducting, didn’t arrest anyone but made it known that the federal agency took a dim view of the stunts the group is trying to pull.

Interestingly, the disruption of the meeting apparently ginned up some support for this fringiest of fringe groups. Amazing, indeed.

Man, I don’t know how to process all of this. We live in crazy times, I suppose. Any group can do just about anything, short of advocating for the violent overthrow of the government — which always has been the case, given our First Amendment rights written into the U.S. Constitution.

However … why this group? And why in Texas, for crying out loud?

Our state has enough public relations issues with which to deal without having to answer for the shenanigans of these loons.

 

national news, political news

Hit the road, Gov. Kitzhaber

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It’s looking like lights out for Oregon’s embattled governor.

John Kitzhaber is now getting the word from top state Democrats — his own partisans — that it’s time for him to go. A growing ethics scandal involving his fiancée, Cylvia Hayes, is now threatening to overwhelm his ability to govern his state — my home state.

It’s not looking good for the governor. He can’t possibly hang on.

http://news.yahoo.com/oregon-governor-planned-quit-changed-mind-074856606.html

His fiancée has been implicated in a scheme in which she funneled state business to her lobbying firm, allegedly using her connections as the state’s de facto first lady to fatten her wallet/purse.

As for Kitzhaber’s role in this, well, he is the governor and his fiancée allegedly was acting as the state’s agent.

It’s bad, man. Real bad.

As for state Democrats telling the governor it’s time for him to quit, this has a Watergate-ish ring to it.

Flash back to 1974. President Richard Nixon was in deep doo-doo over the Watergate scandal. It was revealed that he had told the FBI to back off its investigation of whether the president’s re-election committee was complicit in the break-in at the Democratic National Committee offices at the Watergate office complex.

The U.S. House Judiciary Committee then approved articles of impeachment against the president.

It was then that none other than Republican Sen. Barry Goldwater led a GOP delegation to the White House to inform the Republican president that he was toast, that he couldn’t be acquitted in a Senate trial. “You have to quit, Mr. President,” Goldwater said.

Nixon did resign a few days later.

History is sounding as if it’s repeating itself in the Oregon State Capitol Building.

You have to quit, Gov. Kitzhaber.

 

local news

Amarillo not No. 1 … and that's a good thing

It’s said occasionally that Texans like to brag about their state, their cities and towns and, oh yes, their athletic teams.

We’re No. 1, yes?

Well, a report from the FBI has given Amarillo a pass on a category that most of us wouldn’t just as soon let slide. We’re not in the top 20 most crime-ridden cities in Texas.

http://texaspolicenews.com/default.aspx?act=Newsletter.aspx&category=News+1-2&newsletterid=50330&menugroup=Home

The FBI Uniform Crime Report lists Weslaco, in far South Texas, as the most “dangerous city” in Texas. Your chances of being victimized by a criminal is one in 12. That’s the “best” ranking of any Texas city.

Only one West Texas city made this infamous Top 20 list. That would be Lubbock, which ranked No. 6; you’ve got a one in 16 chance of being hit by a criminal.

How did the big cities — the really big cities — fare? San Antonio ranked No. 5, Houston was No. 7, and Austin was No. 12.

Amarillo is in some pretty heady company by failing to appear on this list. We’re right up there with Dallas, Fort Worth, El Paso and Corpus Christi, none of which made the list either.

My friends at the Amarillo Police Department know how I feel about them. I am one of their more ardent fans. The police put their lives on the line every time they suit and hit the streets. We have an active Crimestoppers program that produces results. The city’s PD is a progressive outfit.

TexasPoliceNews.com released the study report and did so with an important caveat: “We realize that this topic is inherently controversial in nature and hits close to home. We are aware that there are many different ways to present this data, but when compiling this list we chose to consider not just murder rate, but both violent and property crimes.”

I am not going to infer that the cities that did make the list are unsafe or are havens for bad guys.

I’m just grateful that Amarillo has avoided this bit of public-relations smudge.

national news, political news

Congressman Felon ready to quit

Well now, it turns out that the latest case of congressional corruption is going to end the right way for Americans who actually expect their elected representatives to behave legally and ethically.

Rep. Michael Grimm, R-N.Y., who had pleaded guilty to tax fraud, mail fraud and assorted other felonies, is now set to quit his congressional seat.

Good deal. No, it’s a great deal!

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/12/michael-grimm-resignation-113867.html?hp=l1_3

Grimm is a back-bench member of Congress who once served in the FBI. He campaigned for Congress on a platform of crime-fighting and getting rid of corruption. Then it turns out he’s one of them, one of the bad guys.

And when a reporter had the temerity to question Grimm about the charges hovering over him, the congressman threatened to break the reporter in half and toss him over the railing to the floor of the House of the chamber several dozen feet below. Oh yes: This was captured on video, as the reporter works for a TV station in Grimm’s congressional district.

As Politico reported: “Grimm, a 44-year-old former FBI agent, admitted a week ago to failing to report more than $900,000 in revenue from a Manhattan restaurant, Healthalicious, that he owned from 2007 to 2010.”

Could this man vote on tax policies affecting all Americans — including those who live far from his Staten Island district? Of course not. Good riddance, young man.

 

national news

Shooting shatters 'profile'

When news broke of the shooting at the Marysville, Wash., high school, and it was known that the shooter was a student, one of my first thoughts became: What kind of loner/outcast would do such a horrible thing?

Then the second shock arrived. The shooter was a freshman at Pilchuck High School who was popular with his peers, an athlete and a young man who’d just been named homecoming prince.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/washington-school-gunman-was-homecoming-prince/ar-BBaYo33

Then I watched a former FBI profiler, Clint Van Zandt, tell MSNBC that this case arguably is the most “baffling” he had seen, given that Jaylen Fryberg was the quintessential non-stereotype we’ve attached to individuals who do these kinds of horrifying deeds. Van Zandt essentially said you could throw the profile book out the window.

Fryberg killed himself after shooting another student to death and injuring four others, three of them critically.

The argument will rage once again over how this young man obtain possession of the weapon he used to bring such destruction to the school just north of Seattle.

***

We’re going to hear from gun-owner advocates that no laws could have prevented this from happening. Gun-safety advocates will argue the opposite.

And look and listen for the National Rifle Association — among others — to proclaim that the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment is so sacrosanct that to touch any part of it would render it utterly meaningless.

Interestingly, Washington state voters are going to decide a referendum on the state’s ballot that expands background checks to include all gun purchases.

It’s fair to ask: Would such a provision have kept the weapon out of Jaylen Fryberg’s hands? Probably not.

It also is fair to ask: Do such laws make it just a little harder for nuts to obtain guns … and do they infringe on legitimate gun ownership?

“Yes” to the first part. Absolutely “no!” to the second.

national news, political news

No 'terror link' in beheading

This finding from the FBI is going to get the chatterers going great guns.

The FBI says it has found “no terror link” to Alton Nolen, who beheaded a female co-worker in an apparent act of rage in Moore, Okla.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/219342-no-terrorist-link-to-oklahoma-suspect-authorities-say

OK, I’ve heard some discussion on conservative talk TV — Fox News, to be specific — that debunk this notion. The talking heads and the experts say the act by itself constitutes a terrorist act. The FBI says otherwise, that it is a “workplace incident.”

Of course, let’s introduce the Muslim element here. Nolen had converted to Islam, so that makes him a terrorist — yes?

Of course not.

The FBI reportedly has gone through several electronic devices in Nolen’s possession and can find no apparent link to known terrorist groups. That’s why it is declining to define the hideous murder as a terrorist act.

According to The Hill newspaper: “Officials have said the Oklahoma attack at Vaughan Foods was likely triggered after Nolen was suspended from the job for making a remark disparaging white people. After learning that he was suspended, officials said, he went to his home to pick up a kitchen knife and returned to the plant.”

Does that sequence sound like an act of terrorism, or is it the action of someone with a serious mental disorder?

I’m open to some discussion on this one.