Hoffmania!

Terrorism

Call it what you want. Disgruntled citizen. Angry anti-governmentalist. Stressed out taxpayer.

It's terrorism. Flying a plane into an office building where hundreds of Americans are working with the intention of committing suicide and taking out federal employees is terrorism.

It's not "Islamofascism." It wasn't done by a Muslim. It was a pissed-off white guy furious with the government.

But it's still terrorism.

If he survived, do you think for one nanosecond the right wing would demand he not be read his rights and be tried in a military tribunal as an enemy combatant?

Please.

UPDATE: He had two terror targets. The building and his home where, it turns out, his wife and daughter were in at the time he set it on fire.

Eight Years Ago - We Remember.

Many have decided to forget what happened that day. Let us remind you of the leadership that was on full display while America was under attack.

Click to play

While we're remembering, will anyone thank President Obama for now officially keeping us safe longer than Bush/Cheney did in 2001? I won't hold my breath.

Ridge: Bush Pushed to Raise Security Threat Level During 2004 Election

Here is another reason Republicans have lost the right to make any fucking demands on us and to make any more decisions on national health and security. They must be marginalized and ignored until they actually contribute something useful.

Probation, if you will. Or must.

Former Bush Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge is releasing a book on September 1 titled, “The Test of Our Times: America Under Siege…and How We Can Be Safe Again.” U.S. News’ Paul Bedard reports that, in the book, Ridge reveals that he considered resigning because he was urged to issue a politically-motivated security alert on the eve of Bush’s re-election:

Among the headlines promoted by publisher Thomas Dunne Books: Ridge was never invited to sit in on National Security Council meetings; was “blindsided” by the FBI in morning Oval Office meetings because the agency withheld critical information from him; found his urgings to block Michael Brown from being named head of the emergency agency blamed for the Hurricane Katrina disaster ignored; and was pushed to raise the security alert on the eve of President Bush’s re-election, something he saw as politically motivated and worth resigning over.

Pentagon Warns of #GlobalWarming as a Security Threat

So...now the military can't be trusted, wingnuts?

The changing global climate will pose profound strategic challenges to the United States in coming decades, raising the prospect of military intervention to deal with the effects of violent storms, drought, mass migration and pandemics, military and intelligence analysts say.

Such climate-induced crises could topple governments, feed terrorist movements or destabilize entire regions, say the analysts, experts at the Pentagon and intelligence agencies who for the first time are taking a serious look at the national security implications of climate change.

Recent war games and intelligence studies conclude that over the next 20 to 30 years, vulnerable regions, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East and South and Southeast Asia, will face the prospect of food shortages, water crises and catastrophic flooding driven by climate change that could demand an American humanitarian relief or military response...

The Pentagon and the State Department have studied issues arising from dependence on foreign sources of energy for years but are only now considering the effects of global warming in their long-term planning documents. The Pentagon will include a climate section in the Quadrennial Defense Review, due in February; the State Department will address the issue in its new Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review.

“The sense that climate change poses security and geopolitical challenges is central to the thinking of the State Department and the climate office,” said Peter Ogden, chief of staff to Todd Stern, the State Department’s top climate negotiator.

Why We Like Shep, Vol. XII

The only voice of sanity on an insane channel. Shepard Smith's the sole humanoid in the entire building who's admitting that the DHS report on right wing nutcases had validity - much unlike the "yellow-orange-red" alerts that were hallmarks of the Bush era. The threats this warning warned about actually came true. Watch:

Another Horrible Act of Violence

Yes. We are outraged at this, too. A domestic attack on an American soldier (or any American) is an act of cowardice and terror...just in case anyone wants to pick a fight with us over this.

A 23-year-old man upset about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan opened fire from his truck at two soldiers standing outside a military recruiting station here on Monday morning, killing one private and wounding another, the police said.

The gunman, identified by the police as Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad of Little Rock, fled the scene and was arrested minutes later a short distance from the recruiting station, in a bustling suburban shopping center. The police confiscated a Russian-made SKS semiautomatic rifle, a .22-caliber rifle and a handgun from his black pickup truck.

The two privates, who were both from Arkansas, were in Little Rock as part of a recruiting program that typically uses soldiers recently out of basic training to promote the Army in their home regions, Army officials said.

“They were serving their country,” said Lt. Col. Thomas F. Artis, commander of the Oklahoma City recruiting battalion, which includes Arkansas. “They were just standing outside, just taking a five-minute break, just minding their own business — and this happens.”

The dead soldier was identified as Pvt. William A. Long, 23, of Conway, about 30 miles north of Little Rock. The other victim, Pvt. Quinton Ezeagwula, 18, was in stable condition at Baptist Medical Center, Chief Stuart Thomas of the Little Rock Police Department said.

As Stranger says, we hope action is as swift against Scott Roeder (and is also being handled as a terrorist act) as it is against Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad. Roeder has the luxury of having a less...strange name. Let's see.

O'Reilly's Complicity

Jed Lewison's compilation of the host's call to put a stop to Dr. George Tiller.

Freeper, Freemen Member, Convict, Paranoid

The Kansas City Star's Judy Thomas has uncovered a treasure trove of charming traits of one Scott Roeder.

Those who know Roeder said he believed that killing abortion doctors was an act of justifiable homicide.

"I know that he believed in justifiable homicide," said Regina Dinwiddie, a Kansas City anti-abortion activist who made headlines in 1995 when she was ordered by a federal judge to stop using a bullhorn within 500 feet of any abortion clinic. "I know he very strongly believed that abortion was murder and that you ought to defend the little ones, both born and unborn."

Dinwiddie said she met Roeder while picketing outside the Kansas City Planned Parenthood clinic in 1996. Roeder walked into the clinic and asked to see the doctor, Robert Crist, she said.

"Robert Crist came out and he stared at him for approximately 45 seconds," she said. "Then he (Roeder) said, 'I've seen you now.' Then he turned his back and walked away, and they were scared to death. On the way out, he gave me a great big hug and he said, 'I've seen you in the newspaper. I just love what you're doing.'"

Roeder also was a subscriber to Prayer and Action News, a magazine that advocated the justifiable homicide position, said publisher Dave Leach, an anti-abortion activist from Des Moines, Iowa.

Roeder, who in the 1990s was a manufacturing assemblyman, also was involved in the "Freemen" movement.

"Freemen" was a term adopted by those who claimed sovereignty from government jurisdiction and operated under their own legal system, which they called common-law courts. Adherents declared themselves exempt from laws, regulations and taxes and often filed liens against judges, prosecutors and others, claiming that money was owed to them as compensation.

In April 1996, Roeder was arrested in Topeka after Shawnee County sheriff's deputies stopped him for not having a proper license plate. In his car, officers said they found ammunition, a blasting cap, a fuse cord, a one-pound can of gunpowder and two 9-volt batteries, with one connected to a switch that could have been used to trigger a bomb.

Jim Jimerson, supervisor of the Kansas City ATF's bomb and arson unit, worked on the case.

"There wasn't enough there to blow up a building,'' Jimerson said at the time, ``but it could make several powerful pipe bombs...There was definitely enough there to kill somebody.''

We also know he was User 2261860 at the delightful Free Republic, which has purged all of Roeder's posts.

Dr. George Tiller - Terrorism is Terrorism

The in-church murder of abortion doctor Tiller Sunday morning is sending shockwaves through the nation - and the so-called pro-life faction is shaking in its boots. Good. It's time for them and the world to realize they're not the squeaky-clean ones in the never-ending abortion debate.

It's bringing out a flood of very strange reactions. Here's one which takes on an oddness in the context of the ongoing torture debate:

“I think he (Tiller) was a lawbreaker,” said Rep. Scott Schwab, an Olathe Republican who supports more abortion restrictions. “But this is not how you win … you win by winning hearts, not by stopping them from beating.”

Andrew Sullivan recounts the fanning of the flames against Tiller by Fox News (who really has to take a ton of responsibility in Tiller's notoriety among anti-abortionists). Think Progress is keeping an eye on the far right's atriocities. We're thinking perhaps the most fascinating reaction is that of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder:

The murder of Doctor George Tiller is an abhorrent act of violence, and his family is in our thoughts and prayers at this tragic moment. Federal law enforcement is coordinating with local law enforcement officials in Kansas on the investigation of this crime, and I have directed the United States Marshals Service to offer protection to other appropriate people and facilities around the nation. The Department of Justice will work to bring the perpetrator of this crime to justice. As a precautionary measure, we will also take appropriate steps to help prevent any related acts of violence from occurring.

Bravo. U.S. Marshals dispatched to protect high-profile abortion clinics. There's going to be a huge cryfest from the right over this, but cry away. An act of terrorism has occurred. If al Qaeda killed an American in a church, you can bet the right would demand a lockdown of the country.

This is no different. A faction which is world famous for being gun crazy and known to make overt threats to abortion clinics (not to mention having a history of bombing, committing arson and otherwise attempting sundry destruction to abortion clinics) has spawned a terrorist who killed one American and endangered an entire congregation of church-going Americans.

Let's see if - where terrorism is concerned - the right is willing to put their money where their big fat yaps are when it comes to terrorists from their own side of the issues, and not just the William Ayreses which they still like to throw into the discussion.

Most of all, let's make sure we continue to label this as a terrorist act, and show how deadly the extreme right really can be. Not that they'd ever do that to us...

Savage Yelled "Fire" in the Theater Once Too Often

Man up, Mikey. Take some responsibility for your hate. It's time you learned there are consequences to threatening groups of people under the banner of "free speech."

The British Home Secretary is standing by the ban on allowing Michael Savage to enter the country.

Speaking during Home Office questions, Jacqui Smith insisted she was right to stop Michael Savage from entering the country.

Savage, who hosts the Savage Nation radio show, has threatened legal action against the government following the decision to refuse him access to the UK.

In the Commons, Michael Fabricant (Con, Lichfield) criticised Smith's ban as "ludicrous".

"Do you realise the disrepute you have put this country in the eyes of many right-seeing people, and left-seeing people, in the US?"

But Smith replied: "Frankly if you believe it is appropriate to use words about Muslims like 'I said so kill 100 million of them then there would be 900 million of them, I mean would you rather us die than them?' then you have a different set of values than I have and I want to make sure that those are implemented into the decisions we make about who we do and do not allow into this country."

And she insisted that "where people preach hate, where they foment hatred in the way in which has happened here, where they provoke others to serious violence... it is right we should express our view about that".

"Coming to this country is a privilege and we will express our values in those we exclude," Smith added.

Glad We Went Into Iraq

The Taliban is back big. Thanks, President Bush! Thanks, Dick Cheney!

Jane Harmon, This Is Your Petard. Petard, Meet Jane Harmon.

They've gotten to know each other well today.

Heart of Gold and Luggage of Explosives

[Guest post submitted by Mark Richards]

Mother: Accused Marine has 'heart of gold'

The mother of a US Marine arrested at Logan International Airport for allegedly smuggling weapons in checked luggage described her son today as a dedicated patriot and loving husband.

"I guarantee you he didn't mean anyone any harm," the mother, Sandra Reed, said today in a telephone interview from her home in Winfield, Mo. "This is just a big misunderstanding. I know I’m his mother, but he's got a heart of gold."

Police arrested Marine Corporal Justin W. Reed during a layover Sunday when federal baggage screeners discovered undeclared semiautomatic weapons, ammunition, and bomb-making materials in his checked baggage. Sandra Reed speculated today that her son must have inadvertently packed the weapons, noting that he works with explosives in his military training. The Marine Corps confirmed today that Reed worked with explosives in his position training infantrymen at Twentynine Palms military base in California.

(Read more)

What a story!

"They put it on the baggage carousel as if he was staying in Boston," Davis said. "Because it was placed on the carousel, which introduced it into a public area, that required TSA to screen it before it was allowed back on a flight."

and..

"The materials in his bags apparently eluded detection at the Las Vegas airport and were discovered in Boston only because baggage handlers inadvertently routed his arriving luggage to baggage claim rather than onto his connecting flight, Transportation Security Administration spokeswoman Ann Davis said."

If we were to take a stab at translation, the story seems to read "All these weapons traveled across the country on a commercial airliner undiscovered until someone made a mistake."

Ergo, the TSA works best when it screws up.

We should all now relax with a deep feeling of security.

I'm no Columbo, but how many brain cells are required to figure out that as the bags were out of the suspect's direct custody anything could happen?  Were they his bags?  Were they tampered with?

Davis makes a wide sweep with "apparently eluded detection".  If the materials were detected, we wouldn't be reading it in the Globe.  If the items were there in the first place: big blunder, as ridiculous as a similar airport security screening in the film "Airplane".  It's apparently difficult for the TSA to admit that they must have screwed up, despite how juicy it might be to hang this fellow.

There is no "apparently", unless detection occurred and the bags were allowed through anyway.  (On the second point, although it seems illogical, anything's possible with the TSA).

--

Now, all that said, one might wonder if the fellow is one of these right wing psychopaths, bringing the insanity of the latest war back home?

Shudder to think how many more soldiers have been permanently destroyed - turned into nutcases - for Bush's war.

-Mark