Category: Crap For Brains

Mark McCloskey, Pardoned for Brandishing Guns at Protesters, Can’t Get the Guns Back

From [the 26th’s] Missouri Court of Appeals decision in McCloskey v. State, written by Judge James M. Dowd and joined by Judges John P. Torbitzky and Michael S. Wright:

This appeal arises out of a petition for replevin in which appellant Mark McCloskey sought the return of two firearms that police had seized pursuant to search warrants in connection with a June 28, 2020, incident in which McCloskey and his spouse exhibited the firearms as a group of protesters passed by their home. They were charged with felony unlawful use of a weapon punishable by up to four years in prison. McCloskey and the State reached a plea agreement whereby McCloskey pleaded guilty to misdemeanor fourth-degree assault and forfeited ownership and possession in the two firearms in exchange for the State dismissing the felony charge….

Soon after, the governor pardoned McCloskey and he filed against the State, the Sheriff, and the Mayor (Respondents) his underlying petition for replevin of the weapons in which he claimed the governor’s pardon gave him the right to their immediate return….

While we agree that the pardon restored all of his rights forfeited by the conviction and removed any legal disqualification, disadvantage, or impediment, Missouri law is unequivocal that a gubernatorial pardon obliterates the fact of the conviction, not the fact of guilt. Thus, McCloskey’s guilty plea, for which he obtained the benefit of the State dismissing a felony charge punishable by jail time, survived the pardon and importantly, with respect to the issue at hand in this replevin action, triggered the guns’ forfeiture. Therefore, since McCloskey’s guilt remains, it follows that he is not entitled to the return of the weapons….

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Analysis: A New Twist on the ‘Dangerous and Unusual’ Standard for Gun Bans

A Massachusetts federal judge upheld the commonwealth’s ban on AR-15s and similar rifles this week. His rationale for doing so relied on an idiosyncratic understanding of the rifle’s purported lethality and defensive utility.

On Thursday, U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV denied a motion for preliminary injunction against Massachusetts’ ban on “assault weapons” and ammunition magazines capable of holding more than ten rounds. He did so by putting a new twist on an old argument. He determined that modern laws banning AR-15s fit within the country’s historical tradition of regulating “dangerous and unusual” weapons.

“The banned weapons are ‘dangerous,’ because they are unreasonably dangerous for ordinary purposes of self-defense due to their extreme lethality and high potential for collateral harm,” Saylor, a George W. Bush appointee, wrote in Capen v. Campbell, “and they are ‘unusual,’ because it would be unusual for an ordinary citizen to carry such a weapon on his person on the street for self-defense, or to use it in the home to confront invaders or to protect against personal violence.”

While Saylor is certainly not the first to uphold a hardware ban since the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision, his analytical framework for doing so stands out among the rest for its emphasis on the “dangerous and unusual” standard and his understanding of how AR-15s fit in.

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OhMyGosh a SNIPER RIFLE!™ Aauugghh!

Sen. Susan Collins Pushing Gun Control for U.S. Troops

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) is putting together legislation to require the U.S. military to adhere to state-level red and yellow flag laws for troops.

A red flag law allows family, friends, and others, to seek a court order to have guns removed from someone they view as a danger to himself or others. A yellow flag law is more narrow, allowing law enforcement to seek the court order for firearm removal.

Collins bill comes in response to the October 25, 2023, Lewiston, Maine, attacks, which were carried out by a member of the U.S. Army Reserve.

The attacker used a sniper rifle which was legally purchased.

Maine has a yellow flag law, but although police were alerted that the Maine shooter could “snap and commit a mass shooting” in September, according to CNN, no yellow flag action was pursued.

Moreover, Breitbart News noted on October 26, 2023, police in New York took Card to a West Point hospital for an evaluation in mid-July 2023.

Card had caught the attention of military officials after “acting erratically in mid-July” while taking part in training at West Point, the Associated Press reported. Police in New York were called and Card was taken to West Point’s Keller Army Community Hospital.

New York has a red flag law and the involvement of police in the West Point incident raised questions as to why the law did not come into play.

On December 22, 2023, WMTW pointed out that Collins “is working on a bill that would require branches of the military to utilize state-level weapons restriction laws, when appropriate, if they believe a service member poses a threat of harm to themselves or others.”

Incompetent ‘Contagious Disease’ Diagnosis for Guns a Prescription for Tyranny

“New Mexico Democratic Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham held a recent press conference to praise herself for implementing dubious gun control measures,” the National Shooting Sports Foundation reported. “‘I won’t rest until we don’t have to talk about (gun violence) as an epidemic and a public health emergency,’ the governor said.”

If a prominent politician declares an epidemic and imposes edicts and orders to enforce them, it’s fair to ask, “Where’s the science?”

“Lujan Grisham was born in Los Alamos and graduated from St. Michael’s High School in Santa Fe before earning undergraduate and law degrees from the University of New Mexico,” the governor’s official biography states. Neither her education nor her claimed career highlights show her qualified to make such a proclamation on her own, which makes it fair to ask, “Who’s advising her?”

That would be Patrick M. Allen, her New Mexico Health Department Secretary.

“In simple terms, violence, especially gun violence, behaves like a contagious disease,” Allen pontificates in his op-ed, “Tackling Gun Violence: A Public Health Challenge — DOH secretary says rapidly-spreading violence behaves like a contagious disease.”

“Imagine treating violence as if it were an infectious disease. Just as we study diseases’ origins to combat them effectively, we can apply the same approach to violence,” Allen proclaims. “How do we address gun violence as the contagious disease it is? Gun violence is a public health emergency.”

He sounds like he knows what he’s talking about, doesn’t he? The thing is, like the governor, the secretary in charge of the Land of Enchantment’s public health doesn’t have a qualified medical background, either.

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Massachusetts Assault Weapon Ban Ruled Constitutional by Judge

Massachusetts’ law prohibiting the possession and sale of some semiautomatic weapons commonly used in mass shootings is acceptable under a recent change to Second Amendment precedent from the US Supreme Court, a federal judge said Thursday.

The National Association for Gun Rights asked the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts to prevent the state from being able to enforce its law, claiming the weapons are protected under the Second Amendment because they were in common use at the time the Second Amendment was adopted.

The banned weapons “are unreasonably dangerous for ordinary purposes of self-defense due to their extreme lethality and high potential for collateral harm,” Chief Judge Dennis Saylor wrote in an order denying the gun rights group’s request to halt enforcement of the law.

This IS NOT the Bruen Standard.

The US Supreme Court held last year in New York State Rifles & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen that state governments must prove a regulation would have been consistent with the nation’s historical regulation of firearms.

Saylor’s decision helps build the jurisprudence for the types of state regulations that remain acceptable under the Second Amendment post-Bruen as many states grapple with challenges to their weapon laws. States like Illinois, California, and Connecticut have also been allowed to move forward enforcing their assault weapon bans.

“The relevant history affirms the principle that in 1791, as now, there was a tradition of regulating ‘dangerous and unusual’ weapons—specifically, those that are not reasonably necessary for self-defense,” the order said, and the current restrictions “pose a minimal burden on the right to self-defense and are comparably justified to historical regulation.”

THIS, is not the Bruen Standard either!

Saylor was not convinced that assault weapons are commonly used for self-defense, finding them “generally unsuitable” for that purpose because of their weight, size, and firepower.

“The features of modern assault weapons—particularly the AR-15’s radical increases in muzzle velocity, range, accuracy, and functionality—along with the types of injuries they can inflict are so different from colonial firearms that the two are not reasonably comparable,” the order said.

The case is Capen v. Campbell, D. Mass., No. 1:22-cv-11431, order 12/21/23.

New Mexico Anti-Gun Group Investigated for Breaking Gun Laws

Does everybody feel safer now? (New Mexicans to Prevent Gun Violence/Facebook)

Does everyone feel safer now?

“Pictured are unwanted firearms from one household in Farmington, NM,” New Mexicans to Prevent Gun Violence “Xed” Saturday. “Our gun buyback was cancelled by the City, but local residents asked us to show up anyway. So, we spent today dismantling guns house by house.”

This was their “after action report” for their “Guns to Garden” program, intending to destroy guns and turn them into tools, reported on AmmoLand on Dec. 6, with the title observing “New Mexico Gun ‘Buyback’ an Exercise in Contradictions.”

“What, no background checks?” this correspondent asked at the time.  “Will there be an FFL on the premises to record transfers?”

“We have been doing this for years,” NMPGV shot back. “Often, police give people our phone number when they want to turn in an unwanted firearm. This doesn’t violate any background check laws as there is no transfer of firearms.  We simply dismantle them.  All that is left is wood and metal.”

“So, you’ve been breaking the law for years?” State Rep. John Block asked. He’s got a point. How can you “dismantle” guns if you don’t first take possession of them?

Gun owners were quick to join in, pointing out the hypocrisy of gun-grabbers allegedly breaking gun laws they lobbied for and the delicious irony of the prohibitionists “hoist with their own petard.” And it turns out Lord’s concerns were prescient.

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“I’ll take ‘Totally Lacking Due Process” for $500, Alex

On Trump and Colorado

By now most readers will have heard that Donald Trump was disqualified from the ballot in the state of Colorado, by the Colorado State Supreme Court, for what amounts to a criminal offense neither proven nor charged. Fifth Amendment, Schmifth Amendment, apparently.

This is a major escalation of the lawfare phenomenon that’s zoomed from simmer to boil in the seven short years since Trump was first elected in 2016. The glee of #Resistance dolts like Robert Reich and Dean Obeidallah at this decision shows that this was a move dreamed up at the very center of the bubble-within-a-bubble-within-a-bubble that is the blob of the modern Democratic Party. Racket readers, I had a piece planned for later on a quasi-related subject, but I’ll try to get it out in the day or so now.

 

The Self-Described “Subversive” Dance Group the Bidens Invited to the White House.

Yesterday I posted a short note about the dance company that the Bidens invited to the White House to perform as part of their Christmas celebration. I simply linked to Jill Biden’s video of the performance with a short note that observed that this was how the Bidens, who profess to be Catholics, celebrate the birth of Christ. I had intended to let the video speak for itself and to let the viewers draw their own conclusions. I still want that. But I was prompted by a comment from one of my subscribers to do a little research into Dorrance Dance, the dance company featured in the White House performance. What I found was a surprise, although perhaps it should not have been.

I learned that the Dorrance Dance is not just another entertainment group that happens to specialize in tap dancing. Rather, it is an ultra-radical political organization that designs and intends its performances to be “subversive.” The company’s statements and recommendations on its website provide the context that explains what it means when it says that its dancing is meant to be “subversive.” I summarize this below.

Mrs. Biden’s post says that the video is a “playful interpretation of The Nutcracker Suite.” Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker Suite was first performed as a ballet in 1892. It was centered around a young girl’s Christmas eve and her adventures with her nutcracker doll, who came alive as a charming prince. With its performances including Christmas trees, toys, candy, snowflakes and, the joy in seeing a young child’s wonderment at the ideal of a symbol of love come to life, it naturally has become famous as a celebration of Christmas.

The abbreviated jazzed-up tap dance version of Tchaikovsky’s masterpiece performed by the Dorrance Dance company, and on display at the Biden White House, is not intended as a celebration of Christmas. Rather, it is intended to subvert traditional values, such as Christmas.

Don’t take my word for it – Dorrance Dance says on its own website that “At its core, tap dance is a subversive form.” “Subversion” has been defined by the Cambridge Dictionary as “trying to destroy or damage an established system or government.”

The White House almost certainly knew that Dorrance Dance was a subversive company and intentionally so. Public performers at the White House are vetted for security reasons. One of those reasons, presumably, is to identify potentially subversive actors who should be scrutinized closely. Certainly, at a minimum, the White House staff and Secret Service would scrutinize the web site of a company such as Dorrance Dance. They would want to know the identity and backgrounds of the performers who would be coming to the White House.

When the Secret Service and the White House staff checked out Dorrance Dance, this is what they would have found (among other things) that provides the context for its pledge to be “subversive”:

· “It is our job to tell the history of tap dance as a celebration of Black culture and also the never-ending struggle against systemic racism and white supremacy in this country – the origin story of appropriation in American culture.” [All bolded emphasis is added.]

· “The answer to police violence is not ‘reform.’ It’s defunding.”

·     White people should “Join fights to defund the police.”

And statements by the founder of the company, Michelle Dorrance:

·     “I am a white tap dancer with Black cultural ancestors in a society that privileges white people and whiteness.”

·     “It is from this place of white privilege that I invite you to join me in lifelong antiracism work. Understanding how deeply embedded white supremacy, racism, and colonialism is in our culture is paramount to understanding our role (as white people) in perpetuating it and embracing our job to dismantle it.”

In short, even a casual look at Dorrance Dance’s website would have revealed its constant references to “whiteness,” “white privilege,” “white supremacy,” “systematic racism,” and the like. Any reviewer also would see that Dorrance Dance has sounded the call to do away with prisons and policing, and that it has endorsed the likes of Ibram A. Kendi “(who has argued that “The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.”), as well as racist ideas such as the 1619 Project (which has been discredited for, among other things, its false argument that one of the principal reasons for the American Revolutionary War was to preserve slavery). All this makes clear that its agenda is one of radical and political activism and the “subversion” of traditional – and necessary – values and institutions (such as the police!).

We must presume that the Secret Service brought these red flags to the attention of the President, the First Lady, and/or their senior staffs. There is no other possible conclusion other than, perhaps, sheer incompetence. Yet, they went forward with the Dorrance Dance performance anyway. Why? Because it is what they wanted.

The Bidens and their staffs plainly agreed to a White House Christmas celebration that was intended to be “subversive” of traditional American values.  That should not be a surprise because it was a decision aligned with numerous other well-documented Biden policies and initiatives that are trying to subvert — “to destroy or damage”— the traditional American “system,” — a system that has brought unprecedented wealth and security to millions of people of all races and origins.

Bill to Ban Gun CAD Files Nears Vote In The Senate

A bill to ban computer-aided design (CAD) gun file sharing could be voted on in the United States Senate any day.

The bill reads: “It shall be unlawful for any person to intentionally distribute, over the internet or by means of the World Wide Web, digital instructions in the form of Computer Aided Design files or other code that can automatically program a 3-dimensional printer or similar device to produce a firearm or complete a firearm from an unfinished frame or receiver.”

Senate Bill 1819 is known as the 3D Printed Gun Safety Act and was introduced by Senator Edward Markey (D-MA) and co-sponsored by 28 other Democrats, including Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Chris Murphy (D-CT), and the late Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). It also has support from most of the other Democrats in the Senate.

“Let me be clear: We aren’t just talking about water pistols here,” said Co-sponsor Senate Kristin Gillibrand (D-NY). “We’re talking about real, fully operational semi-automatic firearms like AR-15 rifles and Beretta M9 handguns. Because many of the 3D printed guns are made of plastic, they can bypass metal detectors commonly used at…secure public areas. People are going into these public spaces and using these ghost guns to commit crimes, and law enforcement is finding it more and more difficult to stop them.”

The bill will prevent the sharing of gun CAD, which is hosted on sites such as Defense Distributed’s Def CAD website. The CAD files let anyone with a 3D printer print a firearm receiver. The affordability of 3D Printers that can be purchased for as little as a few hundred dollars has led to an explosion of DIY gun builders that design and print firearms. The 3D print revolution has made gun laws obsolete.

Due to the lack of action in Congress, President Joe Biden ordered the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to issue a rule banning 80% kits and changed the classification of unfinished frames to be considered firearms. The ATF rule change did not address the 3D printing of guns.

Some states have proposed radical laws to try to cut down on the printing of firearms. New York has proposed a law that would require background checks to buy a 3D printer. Anyone the government prohibits from owning firearms would also be prevented from acquiring a 3D printer.

The proposed federal law raises constitutional questions beyond just the Second Amendment. Many believe that computer code is protected speech, and this law would run afoul of the First Amendment. Many books and resources exist that teach people how to make drugs and bombs, like the Anarchist Cookbook. Some in the gun community reason if that is protected by freedom of speech, then computer code that allows someone to make a gun must also be covered by the First Amendment.

A companion bill in the House of Representatives is currently in the House Judiciary. The House bill is expected to fail due to a lack of support from Republicans. It is doubtful that the Senate bill will have enough votes for a supermajority, but the Democrats have been able to pressure the Republicans into passing anti-gun bills such as the Bi-Partisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA).

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”
– George Santayana

1-in-5 Young Americans Say Holocaust Was a Myth, Twice as Many Democrats as Republicans

A new poll sheds light on why so many college-aged Americans aren’t worried about expressing antisemitism: Twenty percent of those between the ages of 18 and 29 believe the Holocaust is a myth.

Specifically, as The College Fix reports, the YouGov/The Economist poll shows eight percent of that age group “strongly agrees” that the World War II Nazi  Jewish genocide program is bogus, while 12 percent “tend to agree.”

Thirty percent neither agreed nor disagreed the Holocaust happened, The Hill reports.

In addition, twenty-three percent said the Holocaust “has been exaggerated,” and 28 percent believe Jews “wield too much power” in the U.S.

More blacks and Hispanics than whites agreed with the three statements, and the Holocaust “myth” results held steady across all education levels.

In comparison, no Americans over age 65 said the Holocaust is a myth, only two percent “tend to agree” it’s exaggerated, and six percent believe Jews have too much power.

“Why do some young Americans embrace such views?” The Economist asks.

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Biden/Buttigieg DEI Policies Endanger the Country. They Don’t Care.
The FAA is seeking people suffering from “severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities” to be air traffic controllers.

The country currently is in the throes of an epidemic of mass insanity and irrationality. The manifestations of the disorder are too numerous to cite, but the explosion of the DEI plague being pushed by the government, many businesses, and the intellectual pigmies in most of the media, must be included in any list of the most egregious. As currently advocated and practiced by our leftist “elites,”1 it is incompatible with rationality, common sense, and morality, among other things, and, as the Wall Street Journal, not to mention the Supreme Court, have pointed out, the U.S. Constitution.

There is a brand of this particular wokeness that is relatively unknown to the general public, but that is particularly irrational and dangerous.  It is the Federal Aviation Administration’s relatively young DEI mandates. These Biden/Buttigieg DEI commands now apply to the employment of FAA air traffic controllers in an insidious way, a way that threatens the safety of our skies and of anyone who flies.

WHAT DO AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS DO?

To understand how insidious and dangerous the FAA’s DEI policies are, it is necessary to examine briefly just what air traffic controllers do and the nature of the job. The description that follows includes some detail about their tasks. Bear with me because it shows that being an ATC is not a job for dummies, or even for intellectual giants who cannot make crucial decisions in a short amount of time while under great stress.

First, just to be considered for possible employment, an ATC candidate must first pass a battery of seven tests covering numerical calculations, progressively difficult memory tests, problems involving rapidly changing image relationships, visual computer problems simulating collision avoidance, reading comprehension, logical reasoning, and a personality test. A description of the tests and sample problems are here. Take a stab at some of the sample problems to see how difficult they are and the built-in time limitations and pressures.

By the time they finish their training, ATCs must be experts in a number of areas that affect safety. These include weather, types of aircraft and their characteristics, navigation and the use of multiple types of navigational aids, effective communications with pilots, and radio and radar operations. To ensure pilot and passenger safety, ATCs must be skilled in, among other things, math, including the ability to make quick calculations in a dynamic environment, problem-solving, effective communication, and split-second decision making.

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This CNN Reporter Just Had a Come to Jesus Moment About Hamas.

A veteran CNN Middle East reporter with two decades of experience now admits that “too many of us treated the group more like an opposition party with occasional violent outbursts than a terrorist organization.”

“Journalists working in conflict zones,” Ilene Prusher wrote in a CNN op-ed this week, “too often pull punches in the interest of appearing neutral, or perhaps to ensure that they stay in the good graces of the gunmen in charge.”

Prusher concludes that “if journalists continue to interview members of Hamas, we should report their words more critically and not take their comments at face value. We should provide context that notes how unverifiable their information is and how poor their track record for accuracy has been.”

There’s a word for that: journalism. Let’s give Prusher two cheers for encouraging her colleagues to actually commit some for a change.

I might fairly ask Prusher, “What took you so long?” It isn’t as though she were ignorant of the Middle East and its major players. But since it’s my policy never to interrupt someone when they’re busy talking their way over to my side of an issue, I’ll leave her be.

“By and large, we reporters ate it up,” she explained without prompting, in no small part because “Our editors wanted us to have access to this shadowy group.”

What is access, anyway?

Last month when I was in Miami for the previous GOP presidential debate, Yours Truly (and the rest of the Townhall crew in town that night) were granted access to the post-debate spin room. That meant we would have the chance to speak one-on-one with the candidates or maybe their managers and surrogates.

Please note: It’s called the spin room because that’s where the candidates, their managers, and their surrogates go to put their spin on what just happened. Spin can be anything from putting a friendlier face on a fierce debate performance to literally (not really) polishing a turd and hoping some know-nothing reporter will pick it up and run with it.

But getting and keeping access can be a whole lot more complicit than anything that happens in a spin room between candidate and reporter.

Infamously, CNN used to downplay Saddam Hussein’s atrocities against the people of Iraq to maintain the network’s access to the Hussein regime. That was a case where the appearance of reporting the news — “Hey, we’re talking to all these Iraqi officials, so it must be real news!” — was more important to CNN than actually reporting the news. They were happy to be lied to and to repeat those lies because it filled airtime and sold commercials.

The mainstream media’s dirty little secret is that so much reporting involves little more than getting and maintaining access to important people by giving them the airtime they desire.

And yet, “How often did that stop us from reporting what they told us?” as Prusher asked in her come-to-Jesus column. “That dynamic was on display last month when many mainstream media outlets immediately repeated Hamas’ claim that an Israeli air strike had devastated a hospital and killed a big round figure of 500 Palestinians.”

Prusher and so many others are — or in her case, was — happy to trade integrity for the allure of access to a “shadowy group” who expertly preyed on their vanities.

Except, of course, for the mainstream media’s reporters and stringers who are all-in with Hamas to begin with and never had any integrity to begin with.

What we know about the deceased UNLV gunman, ABC News reports
ABC News reports that 67-year-old Tony Polito is the gunman who killed three and hospitalized 1 at UNLV.

LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — 67-year-old Tony Polito is the deceased gunman of the UNLV shooting that took place Wednesday afternoon, ABC News reports.

ABC has been able to verify a LinkedIn page and a website that is believed to have been operated by Tony Polito.
ABC says Polito is the gunman, armed with a handgun, who killed three and hospitalized one. The news outlet says there are multiple victims of the shooting. Reports came around 11:59 a.m.

Polito’s home is believed to be in the 300 block of Arroyo Grande, where the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department was granted a search warrant to continue investigating.

ABC says detectives have retrieved his phone and are now examining it for contents of clues about what could have motivated the killer’s attack. Since the victims killed were not students, it suggests to investigators that the rampage was not random and could have been targeting certain people because of some previous relationship or interaction.

AP reported that Polito unsuccessfully sought a job at the school.

Polito is said to have ties to North Carolina and Georgia, where he previously worked as a college professor.

On his personal website, Polito has published a 15-page document on the Zodiac Killer, claiming to have decoded some of the cryptic messaging from the Zodiac Killer. The website also lists the various courses he seems to have taught, with syllabi and schedules, the most recent one being a Business class from 2017 at East Carolina University.

On the website, Polito also has writing about Las Vegas; although it is not clear when these were written. He wrote that he had the pleasure of making more than two dozen trips to Vegas in the last 15 years.

He also shared numerous links to news articles and references to travel guides for Vegas on his website.

On LinkedIn, Polito describes himself as a “Semi-Retired University Professor” living in Las Vegas. His most recent and only listed position is an Associate Professor at East Carolina University, where he listed that he worked between 2001 and 2017. Polito has also listed his Ph.D. in Philosophy and his Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Georgia and Duke University, respectively.

He has numerous endorsements from his colleagues at East Carolina University for his skills in student affairs, public speaking and teaching.

Channel 13 is working to confirm additional information about the four known shooting victims.

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Biden Just Kneecapped Israel and Gave Hamas New Life on Ceasefire

Even as hostages were finally released on Friday, marking the start of a four-day ceasefire, President Joe Biden was already hard at work kneecapping Israel and giving Hamas new life.

Hours after a press conference in which he claimed Hamas attacked Israel on October 7th because he was about to secure peace in the Middle East, Biden spoke to reporters again. This time, he directly stated that the first ceasefire was “just a start” and claimed that there was a “real” chance the truce could be extended.

US President Joe Biden said Friday’s release of a first group of hostages taken by Hamas was just a “start” and that there were “real” chances to extend a temporary truce in Gaza.

Speaking to reporters in Nantucket, Massachusetts, where he was spending the Thanksgiving holiday with his family, Biden also said it was time to “renew” work on creating a two-state solution to achieve peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

In other words, Biden is now pushing for an outcome that would allow the remnants of Hamas to escape Northern Gaza and regroup to carry out new attacks. Any long-term truce is simply a new lease on life for the terrorist government.

Biden’s choosing to promote such nonsense has given Hamas the green light to pursue a strategy of trickling out hostages in order to keep a one-sided ceasefire going for possibly months. The ultimate goal would be for the fighting to stop long enough that international pressure would prevent Israel from reigniting the fight to finish off Hamas.

Long story short, Biden is a coward. He does not have the stomach to finish off Hamas, and he wants to prevent Israel from doing so in order to secure his domestic political fortunes. His base of far-left, pro-Hamas lunatics has been screaming bloody murder for a month-and-a-half, and the president is trying to find a way to give in to them but save face at the same time. A prolonged ceasefire that preserves Hamas gives him the out he needs.

As to this “two-state solution” nonsense that the administration keeps pushing, there can be no two-state solution with Hamas. Anyone continuing to suggest that is either a mental invalid or being deeply dishonest. The idea that Israel could allow a terrorist state to exist on its doorstep is laughable given what happened on October 7th.

Hamas leaders have pledged to keep attacking until they kill all the Jews in the area. They aren’t going to stop, and they certainly aren’t going to accept a “two-state solution,” even if Israel were dumb enough to offer it. All Biden had to do was stand strong here, but he doesn’t have it in him. He’ll always try to take the easy way out to save his own skin. Hopefully, Israel tells him to pound sand.

No one needs an AR-15 for protection

Dear Editor: At the front and center of the debate on firearm possession and use is the AR-15 style weapon, where a line of demarcation has been drawn.

One side wants to own and use those guns publicly. The other side wants them banned publicly and for protection purposes. The AR-15 style weapon is essentially a weapon for war. There is no war in our country. No one needs to have those guns for protection.

I ask myself why proponents for owning a weapon of war deride a ban of those weapons. Is there an invisible war? And I seriously doubt they really believe a second ban of the AR-15 style would just be the beginning of a new assault on the Second Amendment. Nor that 77,000 newly hired IRS agents will be coming to take their guns.

This leaves me to think they just do not want anyone telling them what guns they can have, how they use them or the qualifications for possession.

Public safety and gun laws play second fiddle to unfettered want of individual liberty. I don’t know about you, but it sure seems to me the anarchy movement is alive and well in our country.

Bill Walters
Fitchburg