Althouse: At the Winter Prairie Café...

January 30, 2016

At the Winter Prairie Café...

... you can talk about whatever you want.

22 comments:

traditionalguy said...: The Battle for North America never ends. So far our flag is still there.; 1/30/16, 4:56 PM
David Begley said...: Saw Marco Rubio today. Marco has some mojo.; 1/30/16, 5:21 PM
madAsHell said...: Shilling for our hostess. I just made an Amazon purchase through this blog.

My daughter signed up for Amazon Prime, and allowed me to join under her account. I thought Prime would be a complete waste, but I do appreciate quick delivery.; 1/30/16, 5:22 PM
Bob Ellison said...: Looking up pop songs is still difficult. A local station plays a catchy tune with a 1-7-4-1 chorus and only one lyric that I can discern: "excite". I think that's what they're singing.

Gotta get Shazam.; 1/30/16, 5:23 PM
Ann Althouse said...: Thanks for using the Amazon portal!; 1/30/16, 6:09 PM
Michael K said...: Oxford, in a "panic" has decided not to remove Cecil Rhodes' statue after alumni threatened to cancel 100 million pounds of donations. Some may have already changed wills.

Lunatics are not the answer, apparently. I wonder if Mizzou and Harvard are listening ?; 1/30/16, 7:00 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: My cock too big, see.; 1/30/16, 7:17 PM
Guildofcannonballs said...: https://www.google.com/search?client=opera&q=uncle+john%27s+band&sourceid=opera&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

Vile slovenliness aside, OUGHT OTHERS LIKE YOU KNOW.; 1/30/16, 7:25 PM
Hagar said...: The nearest thing I can think of to what happened to Lavoy Finicum at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge last week I think is what happened to James Boyd here in Albuquerque in 2014.

Boyd was a mentally disturbed, but harmless, homeless man, well known to the police, since they had picked him up on numerous occasions. This time he had gone to camping up in the foothills and a resident in a nearby subdivision called in a 911 complaint about him for shouting at one of his neighbors.
This wound up with 20 or more, some say 40, police officers in a shouting match with Boyd for like 5 hours, and then a "take down team," I think it is called, of two officers and an attack dog moved onto Boyd, got him totally rattled and confused, he made a wrong move, and they shot him.

These two officers have now been charged with murder.

Now, I do not think it is the officers who ought to be charged for this. I think they followed "Department Policy" and their training and did as they were told, though some of the comments they are alleged to have made at the site do not sound good.

I do think that absent "Policy" and the fad for military style "SWATting," common sense policing would have resulted in the first officer to arrive on the scene and finding it was just Boyd again, calling the mental team to come pick him up again, as so often before, and that would have been it.; 1/30/16, 7:31 PM
MadisonMan said...: A warm day in late January - such a tonic! Most of the Christmas lights outside came down today.; 1/30/16, 9:05 PM
Unknown said...: I think their might be some money hidden next to one of those fence posts out there. It's marked by an ice scraper shoved into the snow....; 1/30/16, 10:25 PM
Bay Area Guy said...: I took my 14-year old (had kids late) to see 13 Hours. Outstanding movie. Absolutely shows the feckless behavior of Obama & Clinton (by omission and inference) and the extreme courage of the CIA contractors.

Anyone who said anything about some obscure movie being a cause of the assault is a flat-out liar.

Normally, I'd say that Hollywood, ideologically, is a Leftist cesspool. But with this flick and Bridge of Spies - I might have to calm down a bit.

The kid liked it too - now wants to join the Navy Seals.; 1/30/16, 10:27 PM
Original Mike said...: We got ice cream!; 1/30/16, 11:09 PM
Etienne said...: I watched the video about the LaVoy Finicum shooting, which was taken from a helicopter.

First, I must say the helicopter video is amateur at best. The camera operator is all over the place, and the pilot never could stabilize the platform. He ended-up flying around in circles. Definitely not Army trained.

If you skip everything else before, the fleeing criminal plows into the snow during his escape attempt at 00:34:51. Here, the helicopter camera operator thinks it might be a neat idea to pan away to some other car coming up. So we lose evidence at that point. Before he pans away, it looks like one of the agents tried to stop the truck by stepping in front of it. I never did see what happened to him.

Finally at 00:34:54 the camera is again in view of the criminal, who is now exiting the truck from the drivers seat on the left side. He immediately runs into the open with his hand stretched out. He never does stop moving though. If he would just stop I think it would be better for him.

One policeman starts to move forward from the pack with a rifle drawn at 00:34:59, and the criminal is still moving towards the rear of the truck, but out in the open. His left body appears to facing the policeman, and it looks like he is moving towards a small stand of trees.

At 00:35:01 he drops his hands and looks like he has chosen that spot to fight. At 00:35:02 the criminal appears to be reaching inside his pocket, and shortly after it looks like he might have a weapon (or it came out empty handed without the gun).

Also at this time, a policeman hiding in the woods comes into view of the camera. The first policeman has taken a firing stance.

At 00:35:03, the criminal appears to have become aware of this new man. The timestamp can no longer be read at this point as it is white letters on white snow, but the man in the woods engages the criminal by closing the distance.

The criminal is still moving and not surrendered, and the policeman out of the woods finally shoots him. The criminal falls backwards having been shot.

The policeman from the woods try's to escape behind the small stand of trees away from the others in the truck, the policeman from the road has lowered his weapon. Finally 00:35:08 the criminal extends his right hand, and the policeman from the woods is rapidly moving away from him, finding himself almost out of view of the camera, as he has the small stand of trees between him and the criminal.

At 00:35:27 it appears someone throws a flash-bang grenade. I see the flash, but I don't see where it is from. The criminal has not moved since extending his arm, and appears KIA.

At 00:35:35 a second flash-bang grenade goes off, and it appears to be located next to the right passenger side of the truck. At 00:35:45 a third flash-bang grenade goes off. At 00:35:55 someone shoots the right side of the truck, near the right front passenger window. At 00:36:23 another shot is taken at the truck, as the helicopter pilot finally clears the trees, but is still un-stabilized, and flying in circles like an idiot.

Finally at 00:40:22 someone opens up the left rear door of the truck. At 00:40:45 a man in a brown coat steps out of the truck with hands up and tosses his weapon on the ground. The helicopter fly's behind some tree's and evidence is lost at this point. At 00:41:41 with the helicopter pilot still out of control, a second person seems to emerging from the truck in a pink coat. At 00:42:52 a third person emerges from the same door, as the helicopter again fly's behind the trees. At 00:44:12 the police move in and appear to secure the truck.

Later people move in and begin processing the dead body. Tossing his cowboy hat aside and rolling him over. A man with a suitcase comes in and I assume begins preparing the body for the morgue.

My feeling is, that the guy who came out of the forest completely confused the guy, and he went from a confused man to a cornered rat. Then he reached into his pocket and died.; 1/30/16, 11:17 PM
rcommal said...: Bay Area Guy:

Perhaps your kid would be interested in the U.S. Naval Sea Cadet Corps. I have a niece who got triggered by something or another (but akin to that) when she was around-ish your kid's age, and so she got involved in that. Fast forward several years (and, of course, skipping details) and she's now out in California, having completed basic and other basic training and now well into her immersion training in, for example, languages to equip her well for intelligence and counter-terrorism analysis. Quite impressive, really.; 1/30/16, 11:29 PM
rcommal said...: [Full disclosure: My kid just recently got involved in CAP. Now, he's a bit older than his cousin was when she got started, and he's picked a different branch of that sort of endeavor (CAP is attached to the Air Force etc., as opposed to the Navy, etc.). He's interested in the physical search-and-rescue aspect and also in exploring opportunities for a career in combating cyber-terrorism (he's got an innate talent for eng/tech/comp sorts of skills, and God knows there's context for that as well). Who knows what he's going to choose, decide, do, just a few years hence;--I don't. No clue. I do appreciate that he's chosen yet another serious pathway of exploration, one that requires a great deal of commitment. I am all for that!]; 1/31/16, 12:11 AM
Saint Croix said...: Senator Sasse vs. Donald Trump -- I like those questions!; 1/31/16, 12:37 AM
Saint Croix said...: Marco Rubio on religious liberty.; 1/31/16, 12:46 AM
Saint Croix said...: Two flight attendants get in a fistfight at 37,000 feet. Plane has to make an emergency landing.

You kids! Don't make me stop this car!; 1/31/16, 12:57 AM
Nichevo said...: Coupe, you keep talking about the criminal. Where is Lon Horiuchi?

Police seem to be very good at triggering reactions in people they wish to act on.

...I couldn't imagine talking like that twenty years ago. Back then I thought they did good at Waco.; 1/31/16, 8:27 AM
Hagar said...: Indeed, the term in today's parlance is "the suspect," and actually it was Lavoy Finicum, a person they should have come to know by now.

What I see in the video is Finicum exiting the truck and stumbling through the snow with his arms up in a posture of surrender, two officers move towards him from opposite directions while presumably screaming and yelling at him, just like they do on telebishion, and a helicopter roaring close overhead. Finicum stops, disoriented, and reaches inside his coat, and they shoot him.

If the two cops of the "take down team" in the James Boyd case are being charged with murder, there appears to be an equally good case for charges here.; 1/31/16, 8:46 AM
Hagar said...: Waco was caused by ATF bumbling and media hoopla. The FBI was the guy with the open collar and sportshirt doing his best to dampen the circus down, but not to much effect.

Then I think what happened was that someone called called William Webster and told him to either put a stop to it - now! - or resign. So he gave the order for the final assault and Waco happened and then the Clintons fired Bill Webster anyway.; 1/31/16, 8:51 AM