Robert A. Heinlein.

Originally Posted by Bad Dog

Desperate to meet that quota. Contracting is now quite common in the military. RAH was big on farming out non-combat specialties to civilian contractors (see:Starship Troopers), and we can see just how well *that* turned out in Iraq/Afghanistan. Class A misdemeanors might get past some screens, but the State Of Texas *supposedly* revokes a CCH for such.

Normally though, any revocation of CCH permits I think would be done upon conviction.

Police arrested Alexis at the scene on suspicion of discharging a firearm in a municipality, a Class A misdemeanor. He was released from jail the next day, Tarrant County records show, and was never formally charged in the case.

Which, all things considered, I think is right. If it were just based on some accusation, then that could just as easily be abused. Need the conviction, which was not present here.

Originally Posted by Bad Dog

Desperate to meet that quota. Contracting is now quite common in the military. RAH was big on farming out non-combat specialties to civilian contractors (see:Starship Troopers), and we can see just how well *that* turned out in Iraq/Afghanistan. Class A misdemeanors might get past some screens, but the State Of Texas *supposedly* revokes a CCH for such.

According to Slate,

Alexis ... worked for a company called The Experts, a subcontractor to Hewlett Packard on a federal contract to work on the Navy Marine Corps Intranet network, according to a statement from Hewlett Packard. It was unclear if Alexis was still employed by that subcontractor, or if his work took him to the Navy Yard.

Anyone want to make bets on the future of The Experts subcontracting arrangement with Hewlett Packard?

Originally Posted by The Wonkette

Who or what is "RAH"?

Thank you, Jordan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_A._Heinlein

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starship_Troopers

Alexis was known to be crazy and should not have had a weapon.

Originally Posted by Eric the Green

Alexis was known to be crazy and should not have had a weapon.

He certainly should not have had a security clearance or have been hired to do IT work at a military facility.

Amazing how we are surprised at mass shootings and violence in our culture. No wonder, though. We have a government that thinks most of its problems can be solved with drones, and other weapons of mass destruction. Good example, wouldn't you say?

Originally Posted by Deb C

Amazing how we are surprised at mass shootings and violence in our culture.

Who was surprised? If anything, I'd have to say that the general lack of shock which greeted this news is sort of remarkable.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Who was surprised? If anything, I'd have to say that the general lack of shock which greeted this news is sort of remarkable.

Surprise was probably the wrong word. Wondering why mass violence continues to happen, is probably a better description.

Originally Posted by Deb C

Surprise was probably the wrong word. Wondering why mass violence continues to happen, is probably a better description.

Nah, I don't think anyone wonders that. They are far too busy being entertained by all the flashing lights and false news reports to wonder at all.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Who was surprised? If anything, I'd have to say that the general lack of shock which greeted this news is sort of remarkable.

H-m-m-m. Yes, the lack of shock is a bit scary. At the rate we're being desensitized, mass slaughter will seem banal in just a few years ... if that.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

H-m-m-m. Yes, the lack of shock is a bit scary. At the rate we're being desensitized, mass slaughter will seem banal in just a few years ... if that.

The Newtown shootings were a social moment, that showed that no matter how horrific the slaughter, the gun culture was going to be victorious. This just confirms it.

We are past the "moral event horizon" now.

Originally Posted by Deb C

Amazing how we are surprised at mass shootings and violence in our culture. No wonder, though. We have a government that thinks most of its problems can be solved with drones, and other weapons of mass destruction. Good example, wouldn't you say?

And a culture many of whose members think they themselves are entitled to own and use such weapons. And endless talk about black markets, hunters, freedom, self-defense and other claptrap. Keep it up guys; these events will just continue then. Nothing to be surprised or shocked about. You guys ask for it.

Originally Posted by Deb C

Surprise was probably the wrong word. Wondering why mass violence continues to happen, is probably a better description.

Surely you mean the LACK of wondering why mass violence continues to happen, yes. We've decided upon it.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

H-m-m-m. Yes, the lack of shock is a bit scary. At the rate we're being desensitized, mass slaughter will seem banal in just a few years ... if that.

That wasn't the way I was going at all. My thinking was, if the lack of freak-out meant that [finally] enough Boomers have been replaced by actual grownups that we can expect society to start behaving in noticeably more adult fashion. I'm sure it's just wishful thinking on my part, though.

Originally Posted by Bad Dog

The Newtown shootings were a social moment, that showed that no matter how horrific the slaughter, the gun culture was going to be victorious. This just confirms it.

We are past the "moral event horizon" now.

And let's not forget that the "gun culture" is embraced every bit as enthusiastically in Blue America - have you listened to any gangsta rap in the past 20+ years? - as it is in Red America.

Navy Yard Shooting Seen Reviving Push for Background Checks
Tuesday, 17 Sep 2013 02:33 PM
from newsmax and bloomberg news

The deadly shooting rampage at Washington’s Navy Yard is prompting Senate Democratic leaders to consider a fresh attempt to advance legislation strengthening background checks for gun buyers.
Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, would be “open to” scheduling another vote on a background check proposal that stalled earlier this year, or a similar measure, “if there’s any indication of movement in votes,” Senator Richard Durbin of Illinois said today in an interview at the Capitol. Durbin is the Senate’s second-ranking Democrat.

Durbin’s comments come a day after a government contractor, Aaron Alexis, opened fire inside the Navy Yard complex about a mile from the U.S. Capitol, killing 12 people. He was then shot to death by police.

“Sadly, these tragedies so close to the Capitol remind us of our vulnerability,” Durbin said.

Four months after 20 school children and six adults were shot to death at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, the Senate on April 17 didn’t secure the 60 votes needed to pass the background check measure authored by Democrat Joe Manchin of West Virginia and and Republican Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania. It would have expanded mandatory background checks to include purchases from private dealers at gun shows and over the Internet.

Potential Backlash

Most gun-restriction measures are opposed by Republicans, while Democratic supporters haven’t won over some colleagues facing a potential backlash from the gun lobby and voters in their states.

“I hope that some members will reconsider their opposition,” Durbin said. “This individual appeared to have some background issues that should have raised some questions.”

The April background-check vote, the most significant gun restriction vote in 20 years, marked a sharp rejection of an Obama administration priority. It also countered 90 percent public support in some polls of mandatory background checks.

Five Democrats voted against the background-check measure: Max Baucus of Montana, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Mark Begich of Alaska and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota. Baucus announced soon after the vote that he will retire at the end of his current term. Reid voted no, allowing himself under Senate rules to seek reconsideration of the vote.

“If I read the reports, he bought his guns legally and had a background check, so the issue that that gentlemen had was mental-health issues,” Begich told reporters today at the Capitol, noting that he has introduced legislation that would have made sure Alexis “would have been in the background check system” when he sought to buy a gun.

2012 Re-Election

“That’s what we should be doing,” Begich said. “That’s what I’m for, and that’s what I’ve been trying to get the Senate to vote on.”

Pryor and Begich face re-election next year in states carried by 2012 Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

Newark, New Jersey, Mayor Cory Booker, a Democrat who leads state polls in a bid to replace the late New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg, said he hoped yesterday’s shooting “changes the conversation, especially on the mental-health issue.”

“We’ve seen now a few mass shootings where there were mental-health signs that I think should have prevented an individual from getting a gun or getting a weapon,” Booker, who is running in an Oct. 16 special election for the Senate seat, said today in an interview at Bloomberg’s Washington bureau.

Patience Thin

Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy, a freshman Democrat who pushed for tougher gun laws after the Newtown shooting, told reporters today at the Capitol that the public is running out of patience as Congress fails to act.

“The public is not going to sit by and allow this place to ignore mass shooting after mass shooting,” Murphy said. “There comes a time where the people have to get what they want in the Senate.”

Murphy said he hadn’t spoken to Democratic opponents of the background-check measure, and said that “no matter what state you’re in,” there was broad support for expanded background checks.

Senator Dianne Feinstein, a California Democrat who after the Newtown shootings pushed to reinstate the 1994 assault weapons ban, yesterday accused Congress of “shirking its responsibility” to strengthen gun laws and called for a fresh debate. The ban, which she authored, lapsed in 2004.

Massacre Litany

“This is one more event to add to the litany of massacres that occur when a deranged person or grievance killer is able to obtain multiple weapons -- including a military-style assault rifle -- and kill many people in a short amount of time,” Feinstein said in a statement. “When will enough be enough?”

Manchin told reporters today that it was too soon to say whether he would renew his background check expansion push.

“I haven’t heard all the reports, and I think we need to do that,” Manchin said. “It’s so wrong to keep talking about gun control. We should be talking about gun sense, and that’s all our bill did.”

Last week Colorado voters -- in an effort backed by the National Rifle Association, the nation’s biggest gun lobby -- recalled two state legislators who supported stricter gun laws. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is founder and majority owner of Bloomberg News parent company Bloomberg LP, poured money into opposing the effort.

Arizona Senator John McCain, one of four Republicans who supported the background check measure in April, said in an interview that the Navy Yard shooting shows a need to change gun laws.

“We should do what we can to keep weapons out of the hands of people who are mentally unstable,” McCain said.


© Copyright 2013 Bloomberg News. All rights reserved.
http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/alex...o_code=14E61-1

Originally Posted by '58 Flat

And let's not forget that the "gun culture" is embraced every bit as enthusiastically in Blue America - have you listened to any gangsta rap in the past 20+ years? - as it is in Red America.

Fortunately guns are not a cultural issue, but a public safety issue. And Rap does not represent Blue America. It is just depraved culture, or perhaps I should say a sore indication of a lack of culture.

Starbucks Asks Customers to Leave Guns at Home
Wednesday, 18 Sep 2013 10:13 AM
from newsmax
http://www.newsmax.com/Companies/Sta...o_code=14E99-1

Coffee chain Starbucks Corp. has asked U.S. customers to leave their guns at home after being dragged into an increasingly fractious debate over U.S. gun rights in the wake of multiple mass shootings.
While many U.S. restaurant chains and retailers do not allow firearms on their properties, Starbucks' policy had been to default to local gun laws, including "open carry" regulations in many U.S. states that allow people to bring guns into stores.

In August, this led gun-rights advocates to hold a national "Starbucks Appreciation Day" to thank the firm for its stance, pulling the company deeper into the fierce political fight.

Locations for Starbucks Appreciation Day events included Newtown, Connecticut, where 20 children and six adults were shot dead in an elementary school in December. Starbucks closed that shop before the event was scheduled to begin.

Chief Executive Howard Schultz said in an open letter to customers late Tuesday that Starbucks Appreciation Day events "disingenuously portray Starbucks as a champion of 'open carry.' To be clear: we do not want these events in our stores."

The coffee chain did not, however, issue an outright ban on guns in its nearly 7,000 company-owned cafes, saying this would potentially require staff to confront armed customers.

The Seattle-based company hoped to give "responsible gun owners a chance to respect its request," Schultz said.

The CEO told Reuters the policy change was not the result of the Newtown Starbucks Appreciation Day event, which prompted the Newtown Action Alliance to call on the company to ban guns at all of its U.S. stores. Nor was it in response to the mass shootings this week at the Washington Navy Yard.

"We've seen the 'open carry' debate become increasingly uncivil and, in some cases, even threatening," Schultz wrote, noting that "some anti-gun activists have also played a role in ratcheting up the rhetoric and friction," at times soliciting and confronting employees and patrons.

"We found ourselves in a position where advocates on both sides of the issue were using Starbucks as a staging ground for their own political position," said Schultz, who in the past has willingly waded into the public debate over the U.S. national debt and gay marriage.

Schultz said more people had been bringing guns into Starbucks shops over the last six months, prompting confusion and dismay among some customers and employees.

"I'm not worried we're going to lose customers over this," he told Reuters. "I feel like I've made the best decision in the interest of our company."

Starbucks' request does not apply to authorized law enforcement personnel.

© 2013 Thomson/Reuters. All rights reserved.



Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Companies/Sta...#ixzz2fGQgx800

Originally Posted by Justin '77

That wasn't the way I was going at all. My thinking was, if the lack of freak-out meant that [finally] enough Boomers have been replaced by actual grownups that we can expect society to start behaving in noticeably more adult fashion. I'm sure it's just wishful thinking on my part, though.

So casual acceptance of the occassional mass killing is grown-up behavior? Really? At what point is not acceptable ... to you, personally? Is there a magic threshold?

If you want to live in a violent and viscous world, you may get the chance.

Originally Posted by '58 Flat

And let's not forget that the "gun culture" is embraced every bit as enthusiastically in Blue America - have you listened to any gangsta rap in the past 20+ years? - as it is in Red America.

I don't put gangsta rap in the political realm. The practitioners are mosly apolitical, though, apparently, highly greedy.

Originally Posted by Marx & Lennon

So casual acceptance of the occassional mass killing is grown-up behavior? Really? At what point is not acceptable ... to you, personally? Is there a magic threshold?

Who said anything about "casual acceptance"? I was talking purely about the lack of freak-out. Refraining from doing that is most definitely grownup behavior.

Originally Posted by Justin '77

Who said anything about "casual acceptance"? I was talking purely about the lack of freak-out. Refraining from doing that is most definitely grownup behavior.

Shocking things should be shocking, not just serious. Eventually, repetition makes the shocking only serious and the serious, mundane. We may be nearing that point. It's similar to the attitudes of people who live in high crime areas. They may remain wary, but mostly, they're numb. I don't classify that as grownup behavior.

Originally Posted by Deb C

Amazing how we are surprised at mass shootings and violence in our culture. No wonder, though. We have a government that thinks most of its problems can be solved with drones, and other weapons of mass destruction. Good example, wouldn't you say?

Nitpick. Weapons of Mass Destruction is most commonly used to reference nuclear, biological or chemical weapons. However, the phrase is not definitively defined. The FBI after the Boston Marathon bombings tried to call a pressure cooker bomb driven with match heads and fireworks a weapon of mass destruction. It seems to me that modern drones are intended for precision strikes against valued targets, but none the less the civilian casualties might often be comparable to a 'terrorist' pressure cooker bomb.

In general, the traditional use of WMD for nuclear, biological or chemical attacks seems to be proper. Next thing you know, shotguns or assault rifles with large magazines will become WMDs.

I read a comment once that nerve gas is considered to marginally fit the category.