November 25, 2022
Afternoon Update:
David Goodman of the New Your Times: "The Walmart supervisor who shot and killed six of his co-workers at a store in Chesapeake, Va., late on Tuesday purchased a pistol only hours before the massacre and left a note on his phone, in which he described how he planned to target some colleagues and spare others, according to new details released by the Chesapeake police on Friday.... The new details released Friday indicated the ease with which the gunman had purchased the pistol used in the killing, a 9-millimeter handgun. 'The gun was legally purchased from a local store on the morning of Tuesday,' the city said in a statement. 'He had no criminal history.'"
Dinner at Mar-a-Lardo. Jonathan Swan & Zachary Basu of Axios: "Former President Trump dined and conversed with white nationalist Nick Fuentes and rapper Ye at his Mar-a-Lago resort on Tuesday night, according to two sources familiar with the matter.... Trump's direct engagement with a man labeled a 'white supremacist' by the Justice Department, one week after declaring his 2024 candidacy, is likely to draw renewed outrage over the former president's embrace of extremists. Fuentes, who frequently promotes racist and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, had been spotted with Ye at Mar-a-Lago, but reports erroneously suggested he did not have dinner with the former president."
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Brad Dress of the Hill: "President Biden on Thursday said he would try to pass a bill banning assault rifles during the lame-duck session before the next Congress forms, despite long odds due to Republican opposition. Biden spoke to reporters Thanksgiving morning, coming after a week that saw three mass shootings in the U.S. Biden said it was 'ridiculous' that red flag laws -- in which law enforcement officers can seize firearms from individuals deemed a threat to themselves or others -- were not being enforced across the country. 'No. 2, the idea ... we still allow semi-automatic weapons to be purchased is sick. It's just sick. It has no, no social redeeming value. Zero. None. Not a single, solitary rationale for it except profit for the gun manufacturers,' he said."
Larry Neumeister of the AP: "A writer who accused ... Donald Trump of rape filed an upgraded lawsuit against him Thursday in New York, minutes after a new state law took effect allowing victims of sexual violence to sue over attacks that occurred decades ago. E. Jean Carroll's lawyer filed the legal papers electronically as the Adult Survivor's Act temporarily lifted the state's usual deadlines for suing over sexual assault. She sought unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for pain and suffering, psychological harms, dignity loss and reputation damage.... Previously, Carroll had been barred by state law from suing over the alleged rape because too many years had passed since the incident."
Taylor Lorenz of the Washington Post: "Elon Musk plans to reinstate nearly all previously banned Twitter accounts -- to the alarm of activists and online trust and safety experts. After posting a Twitter poll asking, 'Should Twitter offer a general amnesty to suspended accounts, provided that they have not broken the law or engaged in egregious spam?' in which 72.4 percent of the respondents voted yes, Musk declared, 'Amnesty begins next week.'... The mass return of users who had been banned for such offenses as violent threats, harassment and misinformation will have a significant impact on the platform, experts said." The AP's report is here. ~~~
~~~ Jennifer Rankin of the Guardian: "Twitter has disbanded its entire Brussels office, according to media reports, raising questions about the social media company's compliance with new EU laws to control big tech." Twitter still has its European HQ in Dublin, Ireland, although 50 percent of the staff has been cut. MB: Ireland is part of the EU.
Beyond the Beltway
New York. Sarah Nir of the New Your Times: "On Thursday, the 96th annual Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade wended its way across the West Side of Manhattan once again. Its retinue of giant helium balloon characters, from SpongeBob SquarePants to Bluey the dog, bobbed across a perfect blue sky. Beneath them trundled elaborate floats...." With photos.
Way Beyond
Ukraine, et al. The New York Times' live updates of developments Friday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here. The Guardian's live updates for Friday are here. The Guardian's summary report is here.
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Reader Comments (10)
Another mass shooting at a Thanksgiving dinner in Houston. It's
definitely a black Friday for that family. It's thought to be an ex-
husband of one of the attendees. Glad I don't have an ex.
This looks to be a record year for mass murders, and probably a
record year for gun sales.
No link; heard it from a friend in Houston.
@Forrest Morris: This is probably the mass shooting your friend was talking about. It doesn't "count" as a mass shooting because two of the four victims survived; what the authorities have agreed in a mass murder is that at least four people die. There are thousands of multiple murders we -- on a national level -- don't hear about each year. Some of them are classified as mass murders, but like this one, they're all in the family.
I live in a state, it turns out, that has more guns per capita than any other state except Texas. And there are essential no gun laws: you can buy a gun without a permit, & you can openly carry a gun without a permit. I feel like a target every time I leave the house. That helps explain why for the past five years I have bought only four tanks-full of gas a year. I stay home. Not that some idiot can't shoot me dead through the window.
@Marie: If you live in rural New England, do NOT just stay in your house. Get out often and go to innocuous places, including the town hall. The hills have eyes and ears; it is wise to be seen and known as a calm friendly person who is busy doing (anything). That will mute most malicious gossip, because there will always be someone who "knows" about you, and will say something nice. Having a neighbor you can trust is a plus. If you don't hear lots of rifle fire during deer season, you're probably safe.
What Biden said re: the insanity of our gun laws. Those in the legislature unwilling to confront this, need to explain their positions. Keep pounding away at the GOP's not giving a rat's ass about all the deaths due to these guns–––THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT YOU– although we warned early on about Fatty's not caring and that didn't make a difference. So––maybe the only thing that will change is if some sick fuck kills someone like Cruz, his wife, children and his dog.
Joy Reid had a good time with the "walk on by guy" after Hershal, during an interview on Fox, said "erections" instead of elections. Poor Walker be real mad about Joy's comments so he says, " Girl–I challenge you to a debate." So Joy says "you betcha, boy" but she hasn't herd from him since.
As for Marie galavanting all over town, I'm prone to wanting her to stay put and maybe get a pit bull; yet Victoria's suggestions sound like a lot more fun.
My closest and only encounter, so far, with a concealed weapon
happened some 5 or 6 years ago. We were blowing leaves out of
a clients yard in the neighboring village when the man who lived
across the street came over and asked us if we could maybe do that
later since his wife had been ill and was trying to sleep.
We agreed to do that. Had lots of other jobs to do anyway.
When he turned to walk away we saw that he had a gun tucked in
the back of his pants.
If we had protested would he have shot us? Who knows.
Anyway, that client sold her house shortly after that and the man
across the street moved outside of town.
Connections
Yes, I think Victoria’s suggestion does sound eminently reasonable (and fun, even). But we live in unreasonable, insane times. Plenty of these GQP-NRA second amendment heroes don’t need a reason to shoot you. Maybe they’re pissed because they heard TuKKKer screaming about how there are those out there who need to be punished, maybe some cashier at the grocery store declined to go out with them because they were weird and creepy, maybe the wait in the drive through was too long and they were all out of secret sauce.
The problem is that so many of THESE types of guys, those always on the edge, always angry, always believing what they hear on hate radio that they are victims and maybe those who despise them need a little second amendment medicine, own stockpiles of weapons, or can get a deadly weapon in seconds at the local Walmart.
Right wingers have always loved stoking the flames of hatred, chaos, and instability, because it gets them listeners and it doesn’t require any evidence or rational thought. Rational though is their enemy. Irrational, unreasonable hatred and fear is what they live for. It gives them power, and power over everything wrong in their lives is what they crave. Or maybe, maybe, they were just clinically crazy to begin with, and who are we to tell this guy he can’t own a shitload of guns and ammo?
And speaking of being outside, plenty of times I walk out in my yard and I hear gunfire. It happened yesterday. It’s not at all unusual. My first thought, often, is that some local kid has just been given his first rifle and is out with dad or some brother or uncle, shooting at trees. Then I think “Great. This idiot will fire into the woods around my house and hit me.” It can just be a stupid accident.
Is it likely? No. Possible? Oh yeah. But the more guns that are out there, the more likely it becomes that you get shot. By accident, or just because some unhinged Trump voter woke up pissed and has nothing in his life but rage.
And guns.
Years ago I was watching a great BBC series on PBS called “Connections”, created by science historian James Burke. The show identified the way certain discoveries or changes in conditions could effect other previously unexpected aspects of society. So back in the 14th and 15th centuries, foundries turning out church bells discovered they could make a lot more money by retooling their bell making technology into turning out cannons. As Burke put it, “All the heads of state in Europe wanted get in on this very fun way of killing lots of people”. So, in battle, instead of killing one or two guys with swords or unreliable, single shot guns, you could mow down dozens with one shot, from a great distance. What fun! The cannon is what turned the Hundred Years War into the bloodbath it became.
And today, every unstable maniac out there has to get in on the great way of killing as many people as possible by owning as many weapons as possible.
But our deniers of modern social trends insist there are no Connections between the flood of weaponry in this county and the everyday carnage in the streets. None at all.
Because they would make them mad. And you don’t want to make these Nimitz mad, that’s their job.
Otto Correct got me again.
How “nuts” became Nimitz, I don’t know. Also how affect got changed to effect.
Nonetheless, I’m sure you got the point, and the connections. Btw, “Connections” is still available on YouTube. It’s a fabulous show, and Burke is one of my all time favorite writer-hosts.
I was guessing "nimrods", but I suppose Otto is not familiar with the Bugs Bunny oeuvre.
World class, self-promoting genius Elon Musk’s sad protestations that Twitter will continue to be adequately moderated sets new records in high jump risibility.
Attend ye to deeds not words.
Saying don’t make it so. It’s all in the doing.
And shuttering offices dedicated to moderating hate speech on the platform across huge swaths of Twitter’s global footprint, coupled with a blanket invitation for those previously banned for uncontrolled attacks, trolling, and spreading of misinformation, do not sanguinity invite.
Add to this Musk’s promise to abide by local governmental strictures, meaning that he might very well decide, in the interest of his pocketbook, to comply with requests by authoritarian governments to release the names of local dissidents to their rule. Musk is, after all, much more than a nascent authoritarian himself.
And even if his promise to maintain moderation were sincere, how is that accomplished when three guys in Palo Alto are tasked with moderating tweets in a country whose language and customs are entirely unknown to them?
And this is worse than some naif stumbling around in the dark down corridors he should never have attempted to explore. This guy has an agenda. A political and economic agenda.
He wants what he wants, and like too many other narcissistic authoritarians, he’ll break shit if he has to in order to achieve his goals.
The problem here, however, is that people could be placed in serious jeopardy, up to and including death, while Musk is figuring out what’s best for him.
Patrick,
Haha. Yeah, “nimrods”, at least in its Warner Bros. cartoon connotation would have been fine. Funny how the biblical name for a great hunter became associated with Elmer Fudd type losers. Maybe that makes Otto a nimrod!