Althouse: "One of the first teams of heavily armed police to respond to Monday's shooting in Washington DC was ordered to stand down by superiors."

September 19, 2013

"One of the first teams of heavily armed police to respond to Monday's shooting in Washington DC was ordered to stand down by superiors."

BBC reports.

21 comments:

Pierre said...: Well of course they were stopped OBAMA needs enough people to die to have a crisis to take advantage of in his never ending quest to destroy this ccountry.

how is that hope change working out.; 9/19/13, 9:54 AM
MadisonMan said...: Fights over jurisdiction can be so petty.; 9/19/13, 10:10 AM
The Godfather said...: Gosh, I hope that's not true!; 9/19/13, 10:14 AM
SomeoneHasToSayIt said...: Hey, I think we might have a good title for a future book looking back on the Obama administration: "Stand Down"; 9/19/13, 10:42 AM
Strelnikov said...: Remember, Bill Clinton issued an executive order in '93 insuring that an armed invader on any military base would not have to face armed resistance. This is the second incident wherein the perp could have stopped early - if our arm forces were allowed to be armed.; 9/19/13, 10:52 AM
Strelnikov said...: Remember, Bill Clinton issued an executive order in '93 insuring that an armed invader on any military base would not have to face armed resistance. This is the second incident wherein the perp could have stopped early - if our arm forces were allowed to be armed.; 9/19/13, 10:52 AM
SteveR said...: Not surprising at all. No situation could be more prone to this situation than a military installation in Washington D.C. Too many people in charge.; 9/19/13, 11:30 AM
ErnieG said...: Why do we always hear things like this from the Brits and not from our own media?; 9/19/13, 11:38 AM
khesanh0802 said...: Another case where citizens who might have legally been armed so they could protect themselves have been disarmed by a government which then refuses to protect them.; 9/19/13, 11:39 AM
Ironclad said...: It's actually getting worse. Today on the news I heard that apparently when the gunman had a run in with Rhode Island police they reported him to the Navy installation where he was working there. The Navy security personnel never followed up or flagged him to take a look at his security or access authorizations, which could have stopped him from getting into the Washington Navy Yard. Expect some negligence lawsuits to come out of this too.; 9/19/13, 11:55 AM
Anonymous said...: Blogger MadisonMan said...

Fights over jurisdiction can be so petty.

9/19/13, 10:10 AM
______________________________

Fights over jurisdiction can have deadly consequences.; 9/19/13, 11:58 AM
ErnieG said...: General Casey, Army Chief of Staff, made the following comment after the Fort Hood shootings: “Our diversity, not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse."

General Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was among those who decided a few years back to alter a mental health question on security clearance forms in an effort to de-stigmatize post-traumatic stress disorder.

I would call for resignations, or for both officers to be relieved, but I am afraid that the gesture would be futile. The pipeline is filled with officers who have been sucking the PC kool-aid because that's the only way to get a good review, and a promotion. Sadly, the best have been selected out.; 9/19/13, 12:32 PM
Anonymous said...: The police acted stupidly.; 9/19/13, 12:53 PM
Michelle Dulak Thomson said...: What ErnieG said. It's astonishing how often the UK press seems to be ahead of our own on our own business.; 9/19/13, 1:40 PM
William said...: In a chaotic, fluid situation, it is very easy to make the wrong decision. I wouldn't put this down to gross incompetence or stupidity just yet......I think one of the lessons from the Zimmerman case is that the flagging of a suspicious black man is a crime that every honorable citizen should make a conscientious effort to avoid. The system worked. A militant Muslim, two flaky intelligence analysts, and a paranoid black man were allowed to entertain and act on their beliefs without any interference from Big Brother. Proof positive that we live in a free country.; 9/19/13, 1:49 PM
Cedarford said...: Strelnikov - "This is the second incident wherein the perp could have stopped early - if our arm forces were allowed to be armed."

============
Bear in mind that most of the bullets used to mow down people came from the pistols of two NRA-blessed "Armed Heroes" Alexis walked up behind, killed with his shotgun, then got the pistols and extra magazines to start the serious shooting with.
Alexis used a classic gueriila technique...locate an armed individual or individuals and neutralize them to take their better weapons to use. Alexis didn't even need a shotgun to get them..he could have used a Naval Yard large rock or pipe and the element of surprise.

Sort of the problem of the gun lovers thinking the solution is more guns!! in the workplace, with "Armed Hero Volunteers" patrolling schools and hospitals - you probably know who they are if you are an "evildoer" ALREADY in the workplace. And you plan your attack to start with blindsiding them to get the weapons to do the killing.
Had the Newtown shooting happened elsewhere, Nancy Lanza would have been likely to be a happy volunteer to bring her trusty Bushmaster and two 30 round magazines to "protect the children" in the NRA strategy of volunteer gun-toting Heroes. Serving until the day her harmless little angel Adam stopped by the school with cookies he made for her and the kids he was so jealous of and she buzzed him in..."Adam, how sweet of you!" He slugs her down, grabs the mommy Hero's gun and is off to Mortal Kombat he has dreamed of in his basement for years..."pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow! pow!" (While elsewhere in the school two other armed heroes get a classroom door shut and bunker down calling 9/11 while angel Adam shoots up the rest of the place. "pow! pow! pow! pow! pow!pow! pow! pow! pow! pow!pow! pow! pow! pow! pow!pow! pow! pow! pow! pow!pow! pow! pow! pow! pow!"

There is also the matter of gun lovers ignoring economic realities - assuming businesses and money-strapped schools and services that are having tremendous problems hiring more productive workers due to costs - can afford a Professional Armed Hero or two to sit on his or her ass 40 hours doing nothing in stores or each work center where each other employee is sweating workforce reductions..

Sure, in hot zones like Afghanistan, it makes sense to have weapons at ready on base with everyone on edge ready to shoot if one of Bush's "Afghan Freedom Lovers" goes jihad or a Muslim within American ranks does the same.
But stateside? Buying several hundred thousand extra Berettas or full-auto M-4s and giving them to any E-2 on any base - locked and loaded?? No commander wants that, not even lifetime NRA membership military colonels..Lose an hour a day of work issuing then colecting weapons of personnel reporting for duty...or worse...sending those E-2s and Majors with MDs out into the civilian population with military issue weapons?? A nightmare.

All of it foolish gun lovers dreams..; 9/19/13, 1:51 PM
damikesc said...: Cedarford, clearly, leaving people unarmed is not a terribly effective strategy. And mass shootings don't seem to occur on gun ranges, where guns are readily available.

Can you explain why?; 9/19/13, 3:44 PM
khesanh0802 said...: @ Cedarford

What do you suggest then? It will be interesting to hear who the guards were who were disarmed. Doesn't sound like they were either well trained or alert. Sort of goes along with the inadequacy of the screening process performed by our very efficient government.

"Gun lovers", as you call them, don't want everyone armed. What they want to be able to do is protect themselves and their families and not rely on a poorly trained, inattentive, ultimately ineffective, hired hand.; 9/19/13, 4:44 PM
The Godfather said...: I believe in free speech. I wish we could make an exception for Cedarford. But I guess he's part of the price we pay for freedom.; 9/19/13, 4:58 PM
Unknown said...: Strelnikov et al who continue to fall for the "Clinton did it" nonsense, even the NRA is admitting the error.

From MediaMatters-NRA News host Cam Edwards issued a correction the day after after Breitbart.com’s A.W.R. Hawkins claimed on his show that the mass shooting at Washington Navy Yard “happened because Bill Clinton mandated that” military bases “be gun-free zones.” In truth, the policy cited by Hawkins to support this claim allows guns to be carried on military bases under a substantial number of circumstances and was actually enacted during the George H.W. Bush administration.

Here’s Edward’s admission.

EDWARDS: So we should correct the record. I think we’ve corrected the record on our Twitter feed but I hadn’t done it on the show. That’s, that’s my–

MILLER: Are you sure that’s correct before I change it too?

EDWARDS: That’s what The Blaze had reported.

MILLER: I was going to say, because I don’t believe anything Media Matters says.

EDWARDS: No, the directive was done in 1992, but I believe it was done before — it was done during ‘92 so we think of Clinton, but it was still George H.W. Bush. And then it was renewed in 2011 during the Obama administration, but there you go.

MILLER: Alright.

EDWARDS: So, anyway, that’s what I got wrong.

MILLER: Now here’s the other thing, that’s really huge [laughter] that really affects the public’s knowledge of the issues and what happened on Monday. I’m being sarcastic.

EDWARDS: I know, I know. No, but I’ll admit to what I got wrong.
NRA News

From The Navy Yard News-The Navy Yard shooting exposes a fallacy in that argument. A military facility, the Navy Yard had plenty of good guys with weapons who were nonetheless were unable to stop Aaron Alexis, the alleged shooter, from killing a dozen innocent persons. In the coming weeks, we’ll learn more about Navy Yard security and how Alexis was able to thwart it.

You might also Google “Army Regulation 190-14″ to confirm.

As Ryan Kearney of The New Republic’s points out, that the rule result of a 1992 Department of Defense directive that was issued during the presidency of George H. W. Bush as you can verify by searching dtic.mil, pdf file # a272176.

But I'm not meaning to point at Pappa Bush as this was a Department of Defense directive from people who know a great deal about things like, uh, guns and the people that use them.

Also, from a Yahoo News article: Steven Bucci, a foreign policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank and a former Army Special Forces officer, said he doesn’t believe there was “ever an open carry law” on any military base in the country in recent history. “I don’t know where people got this idea that military guys are always carrying around weapons,” Bucci said. He said that in 1973 while stationed at Fort Bragg, he was required to keep his privately owned firearm stored in an arms room while on base.

The former Pentagon official said he personally supports the weapons policy.

“The idea of everybody carrying a weapon because they’re somehow associated with the military, no I’m not comfortable with that, and I’m very much in favor of gun rights,” Bucci said.; 9/19/13, 7:39 PM
The Godfather said...: Bush 41 was one of my favorite people to hold the presidency, and maybe it made sense in 1992 to ban possession of firearms on military bases in 1992. After Fort Hood and the Navy Yard it doesn't make sense any more. Change the rule.

Do you remember From Here To Eternity (the novel)? When the Japs attacked Pearl Harbor, the old-timers grabbed machine guns and BARs and went up on the roofs to take pot shots at the attacking aircraft. JHC! Has the military gotten so politically correct that they can't shoot at enemies on American soil?; 9/19/13, 10:03 PM