SEAN HANNITY: You know, I suggested, and I know some people think I’m crazy, let me lay out my case to you. I think you ought to bring back Gingrich. And let me make my case. Name me a more consequential, successful speaker in the last half century than Newt Gingrich – or longer. I can’t think of one, maybe you can. I don’t even think Tip O’Neill with all that he was able to do for liberal causes can match the real, genuine success of Newt. Newt made promises, 10 promises specifically, the Contract With America, and he kept his promises. Newt was willing to challenge sitting Democratic president, not unlike the situation we have now, and he actually ended up shutting the government down twice. It resulted in last balanced budget surplus we’ve ever had. He also reformed welfare, something we didn’t think a Democratic president would ever do. And we were better off because he was willing to lead the fight. I think he’s somebody of great intellectual firepower. I would argue that he is a wiser man than he was when he left in ’99. He’s a guy that has probably read a thousand new books. He has taken to his faith, which is Catholicism, in a huge way, I know that from personal experience with him. Just got back from Israel, he was there when the pope was in town, so I think he’s wiser, a little more humble. Add that to his intellectual firepower, and I think he’s the guy that could rally an intellectual charge against Obama and the Democrats and win. Am I wrong?
No, you’re right Sean. He’s the obvious choice to lead the Freedom Caucus:
On the call, according to three sources who were on the line, Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager, said that if the debate does not include opening or closing statements and is longer than two hours total, including commercial breaks, the real estate mogul would have to reconsider his participation.
Neither Lewandowski nor Trump’s spokeswoman, Hope Hicks, responded to a request for comment.
The fiery exchange was one of many on the 29-minute call, which the RNC abruptly scheduled after several campaigns complained a day earlier about CNBC’s planned format for the Boulder debate — particularly the stipulation that candidates not be allowed to give opening and closing statements.
Two top RNC officials, Katie Walsh and Sean Spicer, began the call by telling campaigns that Chairman Reince Priebus had been in contact with CNBC over the matter of opening and closing statements and by saying his job is to advocate for the candidates and that they wanted to make sure he was clear on what their demands were. RNC officials wanted to know what the “red line” was for each campaign, and whether crossing that line would mean they wouldn’t attend.
Then things went south.
First, Jason Miller, a top strategist for Ted Cruz, said his campaign would consider bailing if there weren’t opening and closing remarks. Then, Chris LaCivita, an aide to Rand Paul, chimed in: “If we don’t have opening and closing statements, CNBC can go f— themselves.”
After Lewandowski spoke, others chimed in — including Beth Hansen, who called the conference call a “debacle.”
Sarah Huckabee Sanders, an adviser to Mike Huckabee, expressed concern that not all candidates would have equal time to speak during the debate.
Then it was Marco Rubio campaign manager Terry Sullivan’s turn. Rubio would be present at the debate — he’d be in Boulder “hell or high water,” regardless of the final decision, but he wanted the campaigns to speak with one voice and agreed with other campaigns on the need for opening and closing statements.
Peter Flaherty, an adviser to Jeb Bush, voiced his position — that the former Florida governor intended to participate in the debate no matter what, but that he’d like there to be opening and closing statements.
Ken McKay, Chris Christie’s campaign manager, expressed concern about stating his position on an open conference call line.
Katie Walsh, the RNC’s chief of staff, tried to abruptly cut off the call. Before the call could end, Christian Ferry, a representative for Lindsey Graham, who’s been relegated to undercard debates, chimed in. If any of the top-polling candidates didn’t want to participate in the Colorado debate, Graham would gladly take their place.
Actually, this may be more appropriate when you think of the stakes:
It’s getting really hard to stand out as the wingnuttiest member of the pack these days. But Huckabee’s making a play:
Host Jan Mickelson began by bemoaning that the “criminal justice system has been taken over by progressives.” In order to fight back, he argued, conservatives should look to the biblical Book of Exodus. “It says, if a person steals, they have to pay it back two-fold, four-fold,” Mickelson explained. “If they don’t have anything, we’re supposed to take them down and sell them.”
Mickelson went on to argue why jails, which he claimed are a “pagan invention,” are inferior to slavery: “We indenture them and they have to spend their time not sitting on their stump in a jail cell, they’re supposed to be working off the debt.”
“Wouldn’t that be a better choice?” the host asked.
“Well, it really would be,” Huckabee replied without missing a beat. “Sometimes the best way to deal with a nonviolent criminal behavior is what you just suggested.”
From his first days as commander in chief, the drone has been President Barack Obama’s weapon of choice, used by the military and the CIA to hunt down and kill the people his administration has deemed — through secretive processes, without indictment or trial — worthy of execution. There has been intense focus on the technology of remote killing, but that often serves as a surrogate for what should be a broader examination of the state’s power over life and death.
This has long been a tricky discussion because, as this intro says, the technology has often been the focus and not entirely without some cause. There is something about remote killing that’s different and I think people are genuinely queasy about what this means for warfare and the relationship between governments and people. But in the end, the drone is still a weapon and the real issue underlying all this has been elided: the assassination program.
If I were to guess I’d bet that the American people think it’s just fine, frankly. I can’t imagine they’ll get worked up about the targeting of people halfway around the world who are suspected of engaging in terrorism — or even the people who are unlucky or foolish enough to live in countries where they might be targeted by mistake. After all, we are a nation that can’t do anything about armed gunmen mowing down American 6 year olds in their first grade classrooms. Indeed, gun proliferation advocates insist that’s a perfectly reasonable price to pay so that Americans can have unfettered access to deadly weapons. It’s hard to imagine a majority of Americans thinking that Yemeni and Afghan kids are valuable when they don’t even care about their own.
However, it is to be hoped that experts and commentators will at least ponder whether this assassination program is actually accomplishing what it is supposed to accomplish an whether it is actually making the situation worse.
The moral argument will probably fall on deaf ears — we’re not a very moral country. But the practical argument might make some headway. Maybe.
Update: For a little perspective, read this interview with David Talbot about his new book on the Dulles Brothers. Assassinations have been tools in the arsenal for a very long time.
The demonizing of the word “liberal” was one of the most successful campaigns in conservative movement history. It has many fathers, not the least of whom is Newt Gingrich, but the political strategist who gets the most credit for turning the word “liberal” into an epithet is a man named Arthur Finkelstein. In the wake of the legal earthquake known as Buckley vs Valeo, the Supreme Court case which first unleashed a flood of money into the political system back in 1976, Finkelstein created the first Independent Expenditure PAC, which he recognized could work outside the norms of partisan politics. His strategy was simple: associate Democrats with the word “liberal” and associate the word “liberal” with something deviant and un-American. It worked beautifully. By the 1990s, his PAC had been instrumental in deposing a number of Democratic office holders and replacing them with much more conservative Republicans. This had helped to drive what had been the political center inexorably to the right; the Democrats, determined to stay with the center, followed.
And it just kept going, with each election cycle seeing Democrats running from the “L” word and every association with it, and the party capitulating on one issue after another. The ostensible rationale they gave to the voters was that if only they could “get the issue off the table”, whether welfare reform or capital punishment or abortion rights or guns, then maybe they could finally escape the curse of the “L” word and there would be political space to start talking about… something else. This has been so much a feature of Democratic politics of the past three decades that mainstream Democrats running as much against the left as running against the Republicans was considered so natural that even liberals barely questioned it. They were basically considered irrelevant, a faction of the party often represented on a presidential debate stage by figures like Al Sharpton and Dennis Kucinich, stalwart liberals whom everyone agreed had as much chance of winning the race as some rich reality show gadfly. (Ahem.)
What a difference a decade makes. On Tuesday night, the Democratic presidential candidates not only openly identified themselves as progressives, they embraced gun control, support for Planned Parenthood, criminal justice reform, LGBT and immigrant rights, and a long, impressive list of progressive economic reforms. The moderators even asked if the candidates even considered themselves to be capitalists, a question so startling it would have drawn gasps from the audience in the not too distant past. Instead of rushing to defend their all-American capitalist bona fides as they once would have done, Bernie Sanders matter of factly said he didn’t consider himself a “casino capitalist,” and Hillary Clinton said she hope to save capitalism from itself. These comments from front-running Democratic candidates would have once been the headlines in the morning papers. Instead, it pretty much passed unnoticed. Indeed, it appears that even the word “socialism” is once again respectable, a development which would have caused the political establishment to collectively call for the fainting couch just a few years ago.
Read on. I go on to discuss the fact that the argument is now about how to synthesize the various strands of progressivism rather than how to run from all of them.
Arctic sea ice has lost two-thirds of its volume since 1979
by Gaius Publius
Animated visualization of the startling decline of Arctic sea ice, showing the minimum volume reached every September since 1979, set on a map of New York with a 10km grid to give an idea of scale. As it plays, note the sudden drops in 1992, 1995, 2006 and 2012. Collapses aren’t linear (source).
I’ve written before about Arctic sea ice and how the area encompassed by ice at the end of summer is shrinking. For example, in this piece, which contained this age-of-ice graphic:
Graphic showing that Arctic ice is getting younger and younger. Today there is much less ice in the Arctic that’s older than five years. Note also the difference in total extent (click to enlarge).
Now comes information on Arctic ice volume, with a nice animation (see top) illustrating it. Greg Laden has more at his climate science blog. Fascinating reading (italics mine):
Every year the sea ice that covers the northern part of the Earth expands and contracts though the winter and the summer. The minimum extent of the sea ice is usually reached some time in September, after which it starts to reform.
Human caused greenhouse gas pollution has increased the surface temperatures of the earth, as measured on the land at about heat height with thermometers, and on the sea at the surface, mainly with satellites. Warming of the surface has continued apace for several decades, though with some expected squiggling up and down in how fast that is happening.
Greenhouse gas, mainly CO2, causes warming because of its heat trapping properties, and this warming (and the CO2 itself) set in motion a number of feedback systems that either push against warming or increase warming. Most of these feedback systems, unfortunately, are what we call “positive” feedbacks, though they are not “positive” in a good way. They are effects that increase the amount of warming beyond what would happen from just the CO2. One of the biggest global effects is an increase in the amount of water vapor carried by the atmosphere. Since water vapor is also a greenhouse gas, more CO2 -> more greenhouse effect -> more water vapor -> more greenhouse effect.
One of the bad effects of greenhouse warming is the melting of more ice in the Arctic during the summer. On average, less and less ice is left by the end of the melt season in September. Again, this amount squiggles up and down a bit, but it is a persistent downward trend. Since ice reflects sunlight away from the earth, a decrease in ice cover in the Arctic means more warming. This has both regional effects (such as an increase in melting of land-based Greenland glaciers) and a global effect. The regional effect is very important, because this has resulted in a phenomenon known as Arctic Amplification. This refers to the fact that of all the different regions of the earth, the Arctic is warming more than most other regions. The large scale systems of air movement that make up much of our climate, and thus control much of our weather, are shaped and driven in large part by the redistribution of heat form tropical areas (where the sun has a stronger warming effect) outward towards the poles. This redistribution shapes trade wind patterns and determines the location and strength of the jet streams. The relatively warmer Arctic has changed the basic shape and pattern of these major climatic features in ways that have caused significant changes in weather. The drought in California is caused in part by the persistence of a large jet stream meander caused, almost certainly, by Arctic Amplification and other changes in heat distribution in the northern latitudes. Another change is the increase in large scale precipitation events. Here in the twin cities, for example, the frequency of 3″ plus rainstorm over the year has changed from about one every two years to one every year, on average. Rainfall events of between 1 and 2 inches, and between 2 and 3 inches, have also increased.
There are two major properties of Arctic ice that should be considered. One, just discussed, is extent. Extent matters because of its direct effect on albedo, the reflection of sunlight back into space. Less ice extent, caused by warming, means even more warming. The other property is ice volume. Ice volume builds up over time. Thick ice includes ice from previous years that didn’t melt. The system is complex and dynamic, but a healthy Arctic ice ecosystem has a good amount of thick high-volume ice that persists through the melt season and forms the anchor against which annually re-freezing surface ice forms. The less ice volume, the less stable the Arctic Sea ice is, and the more difficult it becomes to reform. Exactly how this effect works depends on exactly which part of the Arctic one is in.
Over the last several decades, the volume of Arctic Sea ice has reduced by something like 80%. This is not good.
There’s more, including charts like the stunner below. I’d like to send you there to read the rest.
Arctic sea ice extent, month by month, for the ten most recent years. September is always the summer low. The dark black line shows the average for the years 1981–2010. The dashed line is 2012. When the September low reaches 1 million square kilometers (left scale), the Arctic is ice-free. (Click to enlarge.)
Notice in the text quoted above the relationship between feedbacks, that they piggyback on each other. For example, this one about water vapor: “Since water vapor is also a greenhouse gas, more CO2 -> more
greenhouse effect -> more water vapor -> more greenhouse effect.” Reduction in “whiteness” also increases the greenhouse effect.
It’s Coming, and It Won’t Be Linear
By “it,” of course, I mean the chaos caused by climate change, both physical chaos and social chaos. The maker of the video at the top puts complete loss of Arctic summer ice in the next few years:
Based on the rate of change of volume over the last 30 years, I expect the first ice-free summer day in the Arctic Ocean (defined as having less than 1 million km² of sea ice) to happen between 2016 and 2022, and thereafter occur more regularly with the trend of ice-free duration extending into August and October.
Meaning, if you live through the next two elections, you’ll see it. So will everyone else.
What about the rights of irresponsible gun owners?
by Tom Sullivan
This dropped into the in-box yesterday from MoveOn:
I’m a gun-owning evangelical Christian Republican. I campaigned against President Obama two times. But after the Oregon shooting, I agree with him: we need responsible gun legislation in America.
That’s why I’ve decided to team up with MoveOn. And boy, I didn’t see that coming. But I believe MoveOn has the guts and grit it’s going to take to reach and mobilize responsible gun owners across the political spectrum, including more than 22,000 MoveOn members, to rally support for executive actions by President Obama that could reduce gun-related tragedies.
Now wait just a gosh-darn minute. Isn’t it the American Way, isn’t it our God-given right to be irresponsible gun owners, to go out in a blaze of glory or with a hearty, “Hey, watch this!”? Because Freedom?
If you haven’t noticed, David Waldman — @KagroX, über-patriot — has been celebratin’ the heroic exploits of uninfringed Real Americans in his Twitter feed under the hashtag #GunFAIL. It just seems fitting to acknowledge the fine job he’s doing. Irresponsible gun owners have 2nd Amendment rights, too.
And, God Bless America, there is more on a regular basis over at David’s Daily Kos page:
ANGIER, NC, 9/27/15: The Wake County Sheriff’s Office is investigating after a man was wounded Sunday afternoon at a home on Cow Trail north of Angier. Investigators said the man’s brother was disassembling a gun and didn’t realize it was loaded before it went off. It happened around 12:15 PM. The wounded man was identified as 22-year-old Jesus Padron Jr. The brother was identified as 20-year-old David Padron. Padron Jr. was take to WakeMed.
GLEN HOPE, PA, 9/27/15: An accidental shooting incident occurred Sunday on Front Street in Glen Hope Borough. The incident remains under investigation at this time, state police said.
GRUNDY CO., TN, 9/27/15: A deadly hunting accident in Grundy County is now being investigated by the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation. Grundy County Sheriff Clint Shrum says deputies were called out to Northcutts Cove Road for a hunting accident. “When deputies arrived they found one man giving another man CPR, asking for help, just didn’t know exactly what was going on at the time,” said Sheriff Clint Shrum. They found 44-year-old Chad Killian with a gunshot wound to his upper body. Killian was taken to the hospital and later died from his injuries. Sheriff Shrum says he was with another man at the time of the accident. 45-year-old Robin Smartt told deputies Killian was shot during a hunting accident, but the Sheriff says “not all of the facts add up,” and now wants the TBI to investigate. “The initial story that we got was that somebody may have fallen out of a tree stand,” Sheriff Shrum said, “Once we got into the investigation we found out that that was not the case.” Smartt told another deputy they were hunting coyotes that were killing their chickens. So with conflicting stories, The TBI is taking over the death investigation, and the TWRA is looking into the fact that guns were being used during archery season. “That’s why we contacted TWRA because there was shotguns involved,” Sheriff Shrum said, “So we have them looking into that side of why these men were in the woods with shotguns.” Channel 3 spoke to family members at the home on Northcutts Cove Road. The family hopes the TBI’s investigation brings them some more answers, and brings the family peace.
EMILY, MN, 9/27/15: A shotgun blast grazed the side of an 18-year-old Shakopee man’s head Sunday morning while duck hunting in Crow Wing County, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources reported. When the DNR and the Crow Wing County Sheriff’s Office arrived, several first responders were working on the man identified as Derek A. Bonsante. Bonsante was talking and interacting normally and it appeared he had a grazing head wound from a shotgun blast. Bonsante was transported by ambulance to Cuyuna Regional Medical Center in Crosby, where he was treated and released. The incident was reported at 7:23 AM near Emily. According to the report supplied by the DNR, there were five hunters and two of the hunters were in the canoe with Bonsante at the time of the accident. The hunters said some ducks were flying towards them. One hunter said he was going to shoot, and when he stood up to shoot, Bonsante stood up in front of him in the line of fire. The hunters said when they realized Bonsante was shot, they called the other hunting members and headed towards shore to call for help. The hunters said they heard a shot, then heard someone scream shortly after. Bonsante told the DNR that when he saw the ducks coming, he thought everyone but himself had shot. He said he was grazed by a shot and it was really loud, the report said.
WENATCHEE, WA, 9/27/15: A 76-year-old Stanwood man accidentally shot himself in the hand in the WalMart parking lot on Sunday afternoon. Wenatchee Police Tim Lykken said the man and his wife had been camping in their motorhome in the store’s parking lot and were preparing to leave. He was unloading his 9mm semiautomatic pistol and storing it for travel when it discharged, striking him in a finger, Lykken said.
POLLOK, TX, 9/27/15: A 13-year-old Angelina County boy was in critical condition at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston on Monday afternoon following an accidental shooting that occurred Sunday at his home in the Pollok area, according to Capt. Alton Lenderman of the Angelina County Sheriff’s Office.
GARFIELD, MI, 9/27/15: A shot fired through a Grand Traverse County apartment. Everyone is okay, but the people living there are lucky they literally dodged the bullet. They say their neighbor was cleaning his gun when it went off Sunday night. The bullet went right through their wall and across the room of the Sugar Plum apartment unit in Garfield Township. Steve was sitting on this couch playing video games when he heard a noise that sounded like a firecracker go off late Sunday night. “At first I thought maybe an outlet blew,” said Steve. The noise was a gun that went off next door. “It flew not even a foot past my head and like I said it was loud,” said Steve. “I didn’t see it go past me because I had my eyes on the TV screen, but I heard everything It was loud and woke everybody up.” He didn’t find out what it was until his friend Mathew woke up the next morning and saw the holes. “The lights were off. At first I thought it was a spider. I looked at it and noticed there was a hole and debris was coming out,” said Mathew Baker. Then there was another hole across the room. Baker says that was not the only unusual thing that happened. “Then we got a fire over our bathroom,” Baker. Baker says maintenance was fixing a heat lamp in the ceiling. “He went in— he popped the breaker on it—- then he clicked it back in. All of a sudden I heard a big spark,” Baker. Both say after an unusually dangerous day– they are happy everyone is okay. “I feel blessed to be here today,” Steve. “I’m just happy to be alive– it could have been totally different.” The Grand Traverse County Sheriff’s Department is requesting a weapons offense charge against the neighbor whose gun went off.
ESSEX, MD, 9/27/15: An Essex man falsely reported to the police that he was a victim of a shooting. Baltimore County Police responded to 22-year-old Davantay Maurice Sanders’ distress call from the corner of Middleborough Road and Hartland Road on September 27. Sanders told police that he was standing at a bus stop when he was shot by someone he did not know. After an investigation, detectives found that Sanders had accidentally shot himself and wanted medical attention. He was later charged with false statement to an officer, handgun violations and several counts of reckless endangerment.
NORTH LITTLE ROCK, AR, 9/27/15: Not long before Stephanie Hernandez’s death Sunday in North Little Rock, Ark., she Snapchatted a series of photos. One showed a handgun with loose ammunition. Another showed her with a gun’s laser sight blinding the camera from behind. A third seemed to show her boyfriend aiming it at her head, with the caption “strap chat?” stretched across the image. Hours later, police said Hernandez, 21, was found dead from an apparent gunshot wound to the head. Roommates told police the man in the photos, 20-year-old Rafael Gonzalez, “accidentally shot Hernandez in the head,” according to an arrest affidavit obtained by The Washington Post. He has been arrested and charged with first-degree murder, according to booking records. North Little Rock police were called Sunday night to Hernandez’s home, not far from the Arkansas River. Gonzalez’s male roommate told police he had seen Gonzalez crying, claiming he had accidentally shot Hernandez, before he fled the scene, according to court records. The roommate reportedly told a female roommate, “There is blood everywhere, there is blood everywhere. You need to get out of here because I am about to call the police,” according to the documents. When officers arrived, they found Hernandez’s body. Police said she was bleeding from the head and pronounced dead at the scene. Friends and family said the inside of the home was a disaster. Friends and family told local news media that Hernandez and Gonzalez had an on-again, off-again relationship that made them nervous. Last year, Gonzalez had been convicted of a felony — theft by receiving — meaning he is not permitted to have a firearm. A roommate told police that Gonzalez “routinely plays around with the pistol and would stick it to the front of Stephanie’s head and to her temple,” according to court records. “The place is ransacked. There is blood all over the floor. It’s clothes everywhere,” Jaquinlan Davis told ABC affiliate KATV. “I really can’t believe it is true,” she said. “I was just here with her yesterday. I hadn’t seen her in about two months.” “I knew his history and everything, and I knew he was a bad influence,” Davis told KATV. “I wanted to tell her. I wanted her to come with me actually when I left.” “Then … this happened,” Hernandez’s sister, Camryn Startz, said. Detectives found a loaded .45 caliber pistol and bullets under a shed near the near, according to court records. Gonzalez was arrested Monday and appeared in court Tuesday. It is unclear whether Gonzalez has an attorney. Hernandez had two daughters — an 8-month-old and a 3-year-old, Startz said. The hardest part, she said, will be explaining their mother’s death to them. “My nieces have been crying all night. It’s just real hard,” she told KATV. “I haven’t told my 3-year-old niece anything yet. She knows something is wrong because she wants her mom.”
BUTTE, MT, 9/28/15: Butte-Silver Bow police said they responded to the 1000-block of Missoula avenue in Butte to a Montana Tech apartment housing building. College officials said a 21-year-old student accidentally shot a .44 Magnum revolver into his apartment floor while he was reloading the gun. Police said he had just finished cleaning it and was heading to target practice. They said around 7:30 Monday night the 61-year-old Montana Tech employee who lived in the apartment below came home and noticed drywall debris and a hole in his ceiling. They said he called security who called Butte-Silver Bow police. The apartment building houses 60 units of students, faculty, staff and families. Montana Tech Dean of Students Paul Beatty said the accidental shooting happened on property owned by Montana Tech. Beatty said while the college does allow students to check their guns into campus storage facilities, this incident has caused them to rethink certain policies about campus property living. “Historically, we’ve allowed families and the residents up there to store their hunting rifles, usually in their own apartments, but due to this latest incident, we’re going to look at that policy to see if that needs to be updated,” Beatty said. The state of Montana is one of 23 states that allow the universities to make the decision of whether firearms are allowed on campuses. The Montana legislature has tried twice in recent years to pass a law that would allow students to carry concealed weapons on Montana campuses, but right now they are still banned. Montana Tech’s 2015-16 student handbook reads: “No guns are allowed on campus except for police or similarly authorized personnel. Proper storage and control of hunting rifles only may be arranged with the Residence Life Office. Guns are not allowed under other circumstances including classroom demonstrations. Explosives of all types, including firecrackers, may not be stored or used on any property of the college.” Beatty added that the student and the school are both fortunate that no one was injured. He said he spoke with the student who fired the gun who said he is apologetic for the mistake.
NASHVILLE, TN, 9/28/15: A man admitted to shooting and killing his 36-year-old girlfriend Monday morning in South Nashville, claiming he thought she was an intruder, Metro police said. Samantha Crumpton, a mother of two teenage children, was fatally shot inside her apartment in the Waterford Crossings complex of Old Franklin Road, said police spokesman Don Aaron. Crumpton’s boyfriend, Marcus A. Lewis, 35, admitted to shooting her, but claimed he did not know she was in the apartment. Aaron said Lewis told police he thought that he was confronting an intruder when he fired the shot. Officers responded to the apartment about 9:15 AM after a neighbor reported hearing a gunshot and a call for help. Detectives learned that Crumpton dropped her teenage daughter off at high school early Monday and, at some point, returned to the apartment. Lewis told officers that he was in the bedroom when he heard a noise, armed himself with a gun and went to investigate. He said he watched a figure exiting the kitchen area and fired one shot. Crumpton was struck in the shoulder and was taken to Vanderbilt University Medical Center where she later died. Lewis, who police said is unemployed, said he believed that Crumpton was at work at the time of the shooting. Crumpton’s two children, ages 17 and 14, who were in school when the shooting occurred, received support from police chaplains, Aaron said. Lewis was in police custody Monday and, Aaron said, detectives are expected to charge him with homicide sometime later in the day. Police obtained a search warrant so that detectives and crime scene specialists can process the apartment for evidence, Aaron said.
CORPUS CHRISTI, TX, 9/28/15: A 14-year-old boy was accidentally shot Monday in the stomach when his mother’s ex-husband was handling a 9 mm handgun. The 45-year-old man told Corpus Christi police he was replacing hand grips on the Beretta handgun about 11:50 PM in an apartment in the 3300 block of South Alameda Street. The man thought the gun wasn’t loaded, police said, but the pistol discharged and struck his former stepson in the stomach. The boy’s mother and several other family members were in the apartment. The 45-year-old man administered first aid until emergency medical services arrived. The boy was taken to Christus Spohn Hospital Memorial and is listed in stable condition as of Tuesday morning.
PORT ARTHUR, TX, 9/28/15: A 19-year-old Port Neches man is charged with murder after police say he shot a man three times over a botched drug deal and dumped the body behind a Pot Arthur furniture store. Logan W. Carter is accused of shooting Michael Blanchard, 42, who fought with Carter’s friend in the back seat of a vehicle over a deal, police said. Blanchard’s body was discovered Tuesday morning by a delivery truck driver at Royal Furniture. Carter’s friend went to a Port Arthur hospital with an apparent accidental gunshot wound to the arm several hours before Blanchard’s body was found. The probable cause affidavit in the case states Blanchard suffered one gunshot wound to his right shoulder, another to his right chest and one to his right leg. A pistol believed to be the murder weapon was recovered. Carter is being held without bail at the Jefferson County jail.
PHILADELPHIA, PA, 9/28/15: Three people, including an 8-year-old girl, are recovering after a man accidentally fired a gun inside a home in the Feltonville section of the city Monday night, investigators said. Police say the unidentified man picked up a gun outside a home on the 5000 block of Boudinot Street around 8:30 PM The gun then accidentally went off and entered the front bedroom of the house, according to officials. An 8-year-old girl was grazed in the left leg, a 22-year-old woman was struck in the thigh and a 26-year-old woman was grazed in the back. Police say the man, who they also believe is the boyfriend of one of the victims, then grabbed the gun and fled the scene. All three victims were taken to the hospital and are currently in stable condition. Police continue to search for the man.
VANCOUVER, WA, 9/28/15: Scanner: Man shoots off toe with .45-caliber handgun near Mill Plain and SE 152nd; triage in progress. #Clark911 MORE: Re: Shot off toe from 1500 – Gun actually fired between man’s toes. Minor injuries. (1/2) MORE: (2/2) Gun fired as man was holstering gun; not clear how. VPD officer: “He couldn’t of aimed it any better than that.” No citations.
CHICAGO, IL, 9/29/15: A 2-year-old boy was grazed by a bullet inside a South Shore neighborhood home early Tuesday. The boy suffered a graze wound to the leg about 1:45 AM when a gun accidentally discharged in a house in the 7000 block of South Harper, police News Affairs Officer Amina Greer said. He was taken to University of Chicago Comer Children’s Hospital, where he was listed in good condition, Greer said. Detectives were questioning a male relative of the boy in connection with the incident Tuesday morning, Greer said.
OMAHA, NE, 9/29/15: There was, police say, no confrontation Tuesday afternoon in a north-central Omaha park. An assailant did not shoot a 21-year-old man, did not get into a black Dodge Durango with three other men and drive away. There was no need, it became clear later, to lock down two nearby schools. Keenan Wynne shot himself in the leg, then told an account of how it happened that was not true, police said. Wynne was taken to the Nebraska Medical Center with a serious injury that is not life-threatening, police said. Police found Wynne at Bowling Green Park, at 70th and Blondo Streets, about 2 PM. He told officers a man confronted and shot him as he was walking through the park, a police spokesman said. Officers set up a perimeter around the park looking for assailants. St. Pius-St. Leo Elementary and Creighton Prep were locked down, though dismissals were not delayed, police said.
CHEEKTOWAGA, NY, 9/29/15: A 25-year-old man is expected to recover from a gunshot wound to the abdomen that reportedly occurred while he was cleaning a handgun, Cheektowaga police said Wednesday. Police were dispatched to 208 Steven Drive shortly before 6:30 PM Tuesday, when a man reported he accidentally shot himself, police said. Assistant Police Chief James Speyer said the man told police he was cleaning his handgun. “He was home alone when it happened,” Speyer said. “He said it was an accidental discharge.” The man was taken to Erie County Medical Center, where he was listed in fair condition Wednesday morning, according to the assistant chief. Speyer withheld the man’s name, citing the ongoing investigation of the circumstances of the shooting. The legal status of the handgun also is under investigation, Speyer said.
LOGAN, UT, 9/30/15: Officers are searching for an armed man after they say an accidental shooting led to a SWAT situation overnight. Authorities are looking for 31-year-old Ryan Joe and they said he is believed to be armed and dangerous. Officers said the situation started when they were called to the Black Hawk condos near 1700 S. and Talon Dr. at about 10:30 PM Wednesday. Neighbors called to report hearing screams and gunshots. Police found a woman bleeding from the head, who they said is Joe’s ex-girlfriend. She told police the gun accidentally went off when the suspect hit her in the head with it. Police said Joe ran south through the complex and that is when SWAT was called in to help.Now officers are searching for the armed man. Officials said Joe has a criminal history, however, the are not aware of any domestic or armed incidents. The woman was treated at the scene and is expected to recover.
HILLSDALE, MI, 9/30/15: A 46-year-old Hillsdale woman is recovering at home after she was accidentally shot by her daughter Wednesday, Sept. 30. Deputies with the Hillsdale County Sheriff’s Department responded to an accidental shooting at 3776 W. Bear Lake Road at roughly 4:11 PM Wednesday, Sept 30, and found Jennifer Nayback, 46, suffering from a gunshot wound to her chest, a news release issued by the department said. Nayback’s daughter, Aleeah Wayne, 27, told investigators she was shooting steel targets with a 9 mm handgun when “a bullet ricocheted” off and struck her mother, Hilldsale Sheriff Stan Burchardt said. Nayback had been walking down the road at the time of the incident, while the steel targets were placed on the ground in the woods, according to the release. Nayback was treated at the scene and subsequently flown to St. Vincent Mercy Hospital in Toledo. She has since been released from the hospital and is currently recovering at home, according to Burchardt. Although the case will be forwarded to the Hillsdale County Prosecutor’s Office, Burchardt said he does not expect any charges to be issued. There were no other injuries reported in the incident.
LOWELL, MA, 9/30/15: Police say a city man pointed a loaded rifle at his pregnant former girlfriend that discharged during a struggle, blowing a hole in his apartment floor. Gabriel Roberts, 33, of 696 Merrimack St., Apt. 1, then fled the city, getting on a bus headed to New York. When police spoke to Roberts via cellphone, he allegedly said the woman broke into his apartment and tried to stab him. “You have no idea how crazy she is, that’s why I did what I did,” Roberts allegedly told police. “I used the gun to protect myself.” Roberts pleaded not guilty in Lowell District Court on Friday to charges of assault and battery on a pregnant woman, assault and battery on a family member, assault with a dangerous weapon, discharging a firearm within 500 feet of a building, possession of a firearm without a firearms identification card, and possession of ammunition without an FID card. He was ordered held without bail pending a dangerousness hearing on Monday. Defense attorney Kevin Barron, who represents Roberts, said this is a case of revenge by an “angry and jealous” ex-girlfriend, who sent his client threatening text messages and then broke into Roberts’ house with the goal of hurting him. Lowell police report in court documents that the 33-year-old woman, who is seven months pregnant with Roberts’ child, told police on Sept. 30 that earlier in the day, she went to Roberts’ apartment to try to “make amends.” The couple, who had been dating for two years, had been fighting over Roberts’ alleged infidelities, according to police. Police said the woman walked into Roberts’ apartment about 9:30 AM, when Roberts, sitting on the couch, pointed a rifle at her head and told her to leave. The couple started a verbal argument that turned physical with pushing and shoving, as Roberts pointed the rifle at the floor, police allege. At some point, the weapon accidentally fired, sending a bullet through the kitchen floor. No one was injured. Police found a loaded Marlin .22-caliber rifle with a cut-down stock hidden in the drop ceiling of a rear bedroom. The rifle was loaded with 11 live rounds. Police also found a shell casing for another bullet near a hole in the kitchen floor, according to court documents. Roberts allegedly admitted to police that he fired the gun into the floor, but he stressed that discharging the firearm was an accident. Barron told the judge that Roberts, an Iraq War veteran, runs 100 Sports, a nonprofit sports organization, out of his Lowell apartment. While there is little information on the Internet about 100 Sports, the information available states that it is a nonprofit that raises money for “youth development.” According to a filing with the Secretary of State’s office, the charity began operation in March.
LUFKIN, TX, 9/30/15: A man checked himself into CHI St. Luke’s Health Memorial emergency room Wednesday night with a gunshot wound to his left thigh, according to a Lufkin police report. The man said he was cleaning a .22-caliber revolver when he pulled the trigger, believing the gun was fully unloaded.
MARION CO., TX, 9/30/15: Authorities in Marion County, Texas are investigating a shooting that left one man injured. It happened around 6:40 PM Wednesday on Marion County Road 3215, about 4 miles east of Jefferson. When deputies arrived on the scene, they found a man with a gunshot wound to his face. The man, whose name has not been released, was airlifted to Good Shepherd Medical Center in Longview with what are described as non-life threatening injuries. According to Marion County Sheriff David McKnight, preliminary reports suggest the shooting was accidental and no foul play was indicated. The incident remains under investigation.
HOUSTON, TX, 10/01/15: Police say an intoxicated man playing with a gun accidentally shot his wife. The shooting happened overnight at a home on Bostic and West St., in north Houston. Investigators say the man was playing with the gun when it went off. The bullet went through the wall, striking his wife. She is in stable condition. The man was arrested on assault charges.
Heller, yes! If those two dozen cases of gen-yoo-ine freedom haven’t misted up your progressive lenses, there is plenty more at the link. There’s an honorary, lifetime NRA membership in David’s future, don’t you think?
Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s (R) office said Tuesday that he filed his first criminal voter fraud charges since being granted the authority to prosecute such cases earlier this year.
Kobach’s office on Friday filed complaints in Johnson County that accused Betty M. Gaedtke and Steven K. Gaedtke of “voting without being qualified,” a misdemeanor, during the 2010 election. A third complaint filed in Sherman County accused Lincoln L. Wilson of election perjury, a felony, as well as voting without being qualified in three elections between 2010 and 2014.
An attorney for the Gaedtkes did not immediately respond for a request for comment. Wilson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Kobach has been a lightning rod in the Sunflower State when it comes to voting rights. His critics say he greatly exaggerates the prevalence of voter fraud in the state and pushes new laws that restrict access to voting, particularly for people who tend to vote for Democrats.
Gov. Sam Brownback (R) in June signed legislation that granted Kobach the authority to pursue criminal charges in voter fraud cases even if local prosecutors opted against advancing those cases. Prior to that expansion of his authority, Kobach was compelled to refer voter fraud cases to local prosecutors.
I’ve written a lot about Kobach here on the blog and also over at Salon. He is a truly malign force in American life. Keep your eyes on this. He’s often in the vanguard.
