Fifteen Years Later – Remembering the Attacks of September 11th

I got up, just like I do every September 11^th, and looked outside.

I like rainy days, over cast days, hot days, cloudy days, hazy days, every day other than the one I that is forever seared into my brain.

I got up this morning early, before the sun had come up, and stepped outside. Fifteen years ago I did the same thing, heading out of the house before the sun had come up to do my tour of duty as a city-election supervisor for the NYPD. That morning the air was cool and crisp, a nice respite from the dog days of summer we had just gone through.

As the sun came up over Brooklyn, the darkness was chased away by shades of gold, and red and orange. The rising sun turned the once black sky into a majestic blue, unmarred by any clouds. It was a rich shade of blue that I will never forget, a color that looked as if it had been pulled directly from God’s pallet.

Had I seen it before? Probably, but before September 11^th it meant nothing. Now, I will take the image to my grave.

So it was with trepidation that I stepped outside, feeling the coolness of the air. As I grudgingly watched, sipping my coffee, the sky once again began its transformation, chasing away the blackness. As the sun took hold, the dew on the blades of grass were transformed in to a field of sparking diamonds. Off in the distance the fog rolled across the tops of the corn fields. It was a scene that, on 364 other days, would be breathtaking in its scope and beauty. But this was day 365.

As I watched the sun rise, the sky once again has turned blue and, try as I might, I can’t find a single cloud in the sky.

As I write this, I watch the clock, ticking off in my head mentally where I was on that fateful morning. My travels will take my partner and I through the streets of Brooklyn to the hell that was Manhattan on the morning of September 11^th. Our conversation will go from typical morning banter, laughs as we search for the elusive ‘Vote Here – Aqui’ signs, which signaled our latest election poll target, to hearing the first calls over our portable radio, and, after realizing we had been attacked, heading in to Ground Zero, unaware of what we would face when we arrived and saying goodbye to one another, just in case.

In just under a half hour from now the 1^st plane will have struck the North Tower….. and so the memories will all come flooding back.

My partner and I were lucky that day. We were spared the fate that so many others faced, due in no small part to an elusive pack of cigarettes.

Today I mourn for my friends, co-workers, and all those lost, not just at the World Trade Center, but at the Pentagon and in the skies above Pennsylvania as well. I remember the bravery that came through in the days and months after the attack; my heart beaming with pride just because I was lucky enough that God choose me to be a member of the greatest police department in the world, the NYPD.  And I will forever carry in my heart and mind the Department motto: Fidelis Ad Mortem (Faithful Unto Death)

But I also mourn for those who died on the other September 11^th Attack.  And just as I will not forget the names of Moira Smith, John Coughlin, Joe Vigiano, Rodney Gillis and all the other members of the NYPD who died that day, I will also not forget the names: Christopher Stevens, Sean Smith, Ty Woods and Glen Doherty. Nor will I forget those who, laying aside everything else, rushed in to save them, accepting that it might be their last day as well.

Those of us who survive such things are torch bearers for the real heroes, the men and women who selflessly gave their lives for their fellow man. We must never forget them and we must never let their deaths be in vein.

So, today I will mourn, as I do every September 11th. I will thank God for saving me and my partner that day, thank him for having given me the opportunity to be a part of something so much greater than myself and to be able to share my story, so that the true heroes are never forgotten. On November 8th, 2016, I will honor those lost in Benghazi, making sure that they are Never Forgotten.

Someone recently asked me if I thought we had learned anything from the attack. Sadly, the answer to that question is a resounding no. Just like the warnings, the lessons are all there, we have just ignorantly closed the book. Blithely choosing to bury our heads in the sands of political correctness; believing that the old Beatles song ‘Love Is All You Need’ is the answer to all our ills. It isn’t. You don’t have to agree with me, but my opinions are based on cold hard fact, not fiction or personal desires.

God bless you all and may God bless America.

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The Aftermath of the Dallas Police Shootings - Violence Based on a Lie

As I sat in my hotel room up in Chicago, watching FBI Director James Comey’s testimony before congress Thursday morning, I could not imagine how my Monday morning blog could not be about Hillary Clinton. Sadly, the shooting of the police officers in Dallas, including five who died, during a Black Lives Matter protest later that evening would cause me to re-evaluate that idea.

I will save my response to Director Comey’s finding for a more appropriate time.  For now I want to focus on the social issues that are tearing apart the very fabric of this country. I am asking you to please consider everything that I am about to tell in light of the false narrative that you are being spoon fed by the politicians, pundits and so called community activists.

First and foremost is the chilling fact that: #BlackLivesMatter (aka: BLM), like its predecessor: #HandsUpDontShoot, is a lie.

Why do I say that?

Because, just like the real reasons behind gun violence, the people pushing this agenda are completely disingenuous and have no answers as to how to take action to save any lives, let alone black ones.

You know who does? The police.

Yes, those very same blood-thirsty, racist cops are the only ones who are proactively doing something to save lives, especially black ones.

You must be thinking to yourself that I have completely lost it and I can honestly understand why. It’s hard not to believe this stuff when you are being bombarded with it at every turn. Every day the media is reporting about the latest ‘murder’ of a black man by ‘racist’ cops. Hell, even Congress and the NFL got in on the act. But just because you are repeatedly being told something doesn’t make it factual. Consider this quote before you go any further:

“A lie doesn’t become truth, wrong doesn’t become right and evil doesn’t become good, just because it is accepted by the majority.” – Rick Warren

We have to move beyond the narrative and look at the facts. Now some people in politics and the media don’t want to do this because it is going to cast a spotlight on the fallacy of their claims. By creating this fictitious boogieman it serves four purposes:

• Makes someone else responsible for the problems
• Creates a sensational storyline that sucks in under-informed viewers / readers
• Provides a financial cottage industry to those willing to exploit it
• Unjustly demonizes a group of people they already do not like

Sadly, this is a classic case of a ‘Lather, Rinse & Repeat’ problem.

So what is the truth, you ask?

Well, much different than what they want you to believe.

The recent attack and assassination of the police officers in Dallas underscores the reality. Those officers were there to protect the BLM protestors. None of the officers in Dallas had been involved in any way with the recent shootings, yet they were being vilified as if they had pulled the triggers themselves. The fact is that the only one that went there with a hate-filled agenda was the shooter and when that shooter opened fired what happened? The police officers, the same ones being demonized by the crowd, rushed in to put themselves between the shooter and protesters.

Yep, sounds just like the blood-thirsty, racist cops we are being warned about.

So how did social media, that bell-weather for the state of decay that has become America, respond?  Not surprisingly, in typical BLM fashion:

• “Y’all pigs got what was coming for y’all.”
• “Yeah it's lit in Dallas fuck the pigs !!”
• “Next time a group wants to organize a police shoot, do like Dallas tonight, but have extra men/women to flank the Pigs!”
• “These fucking pigs deserve Dallas, and every incident after Dallas until reform. Fucking disgusting animals.”
• “Dude hell yeah someone is shooting pigs in dallas. Solidarity.”
• “DALLAS keep smoking dem pigs keep up the work.”

Unfortunately, this vile, hate-filled rhetoric is nothing new. It wasn’t too long ago that we heard chants of: “What do we want? Dead cops. When do we want it? Now!” and “Pigs in a blanket, fry ’em like bacon!”

But surely if the problem is truly as bad as we are being told, then surely there is some emotional justification for all this, right?

The simple answer is no.

To be sure there was a time when racism was a very real problem in this country, but the same can be said with just about every other country in the world. The truth is that there will always be some form of racism and or discrimination. Do you think those comments above are any less racist just because they are directed at the nameless / faceless police?

If those in the BLM community have that much of a problem with the police, then why do they still pick-up the phone and call 911 when they need help? Not sure how to reconcile exactly how you can be so vehemently anti-police one moment, and then hide behind them the next.

Now I know there are those who will contend that the police killings of innocent black are of such epidemic proportions that it justifies some of this anger.

Once again, the truth is no.

To be fair, there are bad cops, just as there are bad politicians, reporters, community activists, doctors, lawyers, firemen, etc. and we should do our best to root them out, because they do a grave disservice to the vast majority who do their jobs with professionalism. But the lie of the epidemic of racist cops killing unarmed / innocent blacks is just that, a lie and just because a lie is told enough times doesn’t make it the truth. I don’t care who is telling you this, whether it is a politician, celebrity, pundit, or the person on the street corner, it will never be the truth and here is why:

The population of the United States is roughly 318 million people. Of that number, approximately 40 million are black. There are less than eight hundred thousand sworn members of law enforcement.

Let that sink in for a minute.

Law enforcement makes up just a quarter of a percent, 0.25%, of the population of the United States!
 

In terms of the black population it is a ratio of 50:1

So how many blacks have been killed by police so far in 2016? 123.

If you like math that is equal to 0.000307499% of the black population.

Just for comparison, there have been almost 250 blacks killed in the city of Chicago during the same time period.

Do you need me to do the numbers?

The reality is that, if you are black, you are twice as likely to be killed on the streets of Chicago then you are in the entire United States. Yet, I can’t recall ever seeing a single BLM march through the Chicago neighborhoods of Austin or Englewood. Guess they don’t like protesting in war-zones.

The truth is that while more whites are killed by the police (238 vs 123 YTD), blacks are killed by cops more often than whites, proportional to population, but the contrast in numbers is still ridiculously low: 0.0003% vs 0.0001%

This is what we are all up in arms about? 0.0002%

All lives matter, but we must consider what is really going on here.

I’m sorry, but I would really like to know how this adds up to systemic racism of epidemic proportions?

Where is the moral outrage at the murders occurring in Chicago? 

Where are the President, Attorney General, and all the other indignant politicians demanding a full Justice Department investigation into the atrocities being committed daily on the streets of that city?

Because the reality is that politicians have no response for the rise of inner-city crime, like Chicago. Murders there are truly at epidemic proportions. They know the problem, but it is the 800 lb political gorilla in the room that no one wants to talk about. They would rather talk about incarceration rates, yet make no mention of recidivism rates, or point out how blacks are stopped at disproportionately higher numbers than whites.  Call me crazy, but how many white people do you see walking down the streets of places like: Brownsville (New York City), Englewood (Chicago), Compton (Los Angeles), Sandtown (Baltimore), or Highland Park (Detroit). 

So who exactly should the police be stopping? Think about that for a moment. Should we have quotas based on ethnicity? A cop in Brownsville can only stop a racially diverse number of people per day? If you get robbed should the cops be prevented from stopping someone, who fits the description, because they have already stopped a person of that color earlier in the day?

We truly need to #WakeUpAmerica

The police are not the enemy. They are the ones you call when you need help, the ones who run toward the danger while the rest of society runs toward safety. Ask those innocent people trapped within those dangerous inner-city neighborhoods who they want to make things safer. It certainly isn’t the drug dealers or the gang members.

The thin blue line is just that, thin.

We are nothing more than a veil which separates the sheep from the wolves, but more and more it seems that there are many who want to tear that veil away. Through incendiary rhetoric and baseless accusations they castigate the very small fraternity sworn to protect them. They goad the masses into violent action and then feign surprise when they act on it. Each act, dismissed as ‘lashing out in frustration,’ only serves to further embolden the criminal element.

As a society, we are quickly approaching the edge of our own demise.

The calls for violence, the tacit approval of urban destruction, all in the name of a proven lie, is quickly undermining our very foundation. It is a self-fulfilling prophecy turning our society into an US vs THEM state, all because our elected representatives are more inclined to blame others instead of taking responsibility for the decades long practice of turning a blind eye toward the real problem.

The problem is that one day they will get their wish, and anarchy will become the rule. Then who will they blame for the continual carnage in the black community?

Baseless cries of racism mask the true problem. The true racism is the political one that contends that the system, not a lack of personal responsibility, is the problem; that the police, not the criminals, pose the greatest threat. Ask yourself why those who represent these inner-cities are always looking to blame someone else, instead of re-evaluating their decade’s long failures in government.

Where are the inner-city success stories? Where are the places that four to five decades of democratic control have: reduced poverty, lowered crime, raised education levels, and reduced the need for public assistance?

Anyone?

In 2014, Eric Garner died in New York City. Everyone seemed to jump on the ‘I Can’t Breathe’ bandwagon, yet everyone seems to miss the very point that Garner’s ability to utter the words ‘I Can’t Breathe’ negated that statement. If you can’t breathe, you can’t talk. Some have broken out their medical textbooks and tried to spin this, saying that even if you can’t breathe you can still utter some words, but Garner said ‘I Can’t Breathe’ at least eleven times while still continuing to resist arrest which occurred under the direct supervision of a female, black sergeant.

Eric Garner was not an innocent. He had a record of more than 30 arrests, dating back to 1980, on charges including assault and grand larceny. At the time of his death, he was out on bail after being charged with illegally selling cigarettes, driving without a license, marijuana possession and false impersonation.   Garner also did not die at the scene of the confrontation. He suffered cardiac arrest in the ambulance taking him to the hospital and was pronounced dead about an hour later. The 6-foot-3, 350 pound, man suffered from a number of health problems, including heart disease, severe asthma, diabetes, obesity, and sleep apnea.

Maybe, just maybe, he contributed to his own demise by engaging in criminal behavior and then resisting arrest? When the officer went to take him into custody Garner physical swatted the officer’s hands away from him, escalating the situation. He made that choice. If he had not resisted I imagine the outcome would have been completely different.

The question is what would you like the police to do? The cops are being blamed for enforcing laws that they didn’t create. How would citizens feel if they called 911 to report a crime only to be told ‘that’s been determined to be a minor crime and we no longer enforce them’?

In 2015, Freddie Gray died in Baltimore.

Baltimore is a city comprised of a 63% black population.  It has a black mayor, black police chief (at the time of Gray’s death), black state’s attorney, and a predominantly black city council presided over by a black council president.  The last four out of five mayors have been black and the last four out of six police chiefs have been black. The police department is a majority-minority department. It is a city that has been controlled by democrats for eighty-four of the last one hundred years and yet Gray’s death was somehow made out to be racist, even though three of the six officers involved were black.

Really?

To be sure, all lives matter. The officers involved didn’t set out that day to kill someone. If you believe that then I truly feel very sorry for you. Of the six officers involved, only one officer had a disciplinary record, stemming from a domestic incident.

Not exactly the picture of the racist cops everyone tried to portray.

Understand that Freddie Gray was also not an innocent person. He had a criminal record that included drug charges, parole violation and other crimes. At the time of his death he had five active criminal court cases pending. He had also served four years in prison. At the time of his arrest he was in possession of an illegal knife. The state’s attorney, Marilyn Mosby, tried to muddy the waters by saying the knife was legal in Maryland, but ignored the fact that it was actually illegal in Baltimore.

What the state’s attorney also didn’t want you to know was that three weeks prior to the incident, she had requested enhanced drug enforcement efforts at the corner of North and Mount, the area where Gray was arrested.

The truth is a much different picture than is routinely portrayed.

In the case of the recent shooting of Alton Sterling, the police were called after someone said Sterling had threatened them with a gun. Upon arrival of the police a struggled ensued and Sterling was subsequently shot. He was in fact armed with a gun.

An examination of his criminal history shows thirteen arrests including: Assault, Juvenile Sexual Offender, Burglary, Weapons Possession, Narcotics, Resisting Arrest, Domestic Abuse….. Not exactly the poster child for: ‘I was minding my own business and the cops attacked me for no reason.’

Once again we have a criminal, engaging in criminal behavior and armed with a weapon, yet it is the fault of the racist police.

As I previously wrote about, the New York Times did a story that documented seventy-three fatal police shootings over the course of a 1 year period, from August 2014 to August 2015, throughout the United States. In all but three cases, the shootings where the end result of what started off as some type of criminal activity. Perhaps it isn’t about racist cops, but about the criminals and their behavior?

So why do these false narratives continue to persist? For the reasons I outlined at the beginning:

• Politicians, who bear a substantial responsibility for the decay of our inner-cities, blame someone else. They elevate themselves as the people’s champion, in order to get re-elected, to continue fighting to correct some fictitious problem.
• Pundits sensationalize erroneous storylines because, truth be told, bad news sells. They look at the same impartial data, but then cherry pick it to support their pre-determined conclusion. Add to the fact that violent protestors and property destruction draw viewers who stay glued to their TV sets and increase ratings.
• The activists realize that there is fame to attain and money to be made.
• And finally, there is a certain segment of society that is anarchistic in nature and is exploiting the situation to justify their desire to simply destroy things. They want to speed up the confrontation.

This country will never be able to move forward until we begin to embrace the truth and not the stories we are being told. The problem is that this will require us to educate ourselves and not believe the lies. It will require us to expect more from the politicians we elect to represent us.

Until then, the police will continue to do their job; putting their lives on the line to keep the citizens of this great nation safe, even when those same citizens are protesting and shouting ‘Fuck the Police.’

“Violence multiplies violence. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” - Dr. Martin Luther King

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Benghazi: Lies, Misdirection, Silence and the 2016 Presidential Race

I write books. They are mostly mystery / thrillers with a healthy dose of political intrigue thrown in for good measure. I get a lot of enjoyment in spinning a tangled web of lies and deceit, but lately it seems that my fiction is taking a back seat to real life.

In the latest installment of: ‘What did I do to piss you off this time?’ I think it is time we re-visit the whole ‘Benghazi Thing.’ I say this, because there are some people who still just don’t get it.

I read a post on Benghazi that went something like this: “I would love a debate about policy. Or we could say just vote democratic because of the thirty embassy attacks when Bush was president and the hundreds that died.”

<Squinting> Huh? Are You F’ing serious?

You see, this is the bullshit they do. They, as in the poorly uninformed, have learned it from the politicians and pundits. Don’t argue the actual point, just change the narrative. As if the attack on Benghazi was just another terror attack, or the lives lost were somehow the same as the ones killed

in other attacks.

Here is a newsflash: The Benghazi attack was a completely different animal because, when the attack occurred, the government failed them and then lied to us.

I read a CNN article the other day which said: “House Republicans capped a partisan, two-year investigation of the Benghazi terror attacks Tuesday with a report that faults the Obama administration for security lapses that led to the deaths of four Americans, but contains no revelations likely to further damage Hillary Clinton.”

Let that sink in for a moment.

No revelations likely to further damage Hillary Clinton?

As opposed to all the other stuff that has damaged her, but yet we somehow still want to believe she is capable of being President.

Fine, whatever, here’s another glass of Kool-Aid, drink up.

And why exactly was this ever partisan to begin with?

Investigations, especially ones dealing with a terror attack in which an Ambassador and CIA contractors are killed, should never be partisan, they should always be a search for the truth. What is sad to me is that a large group of people are making partisan political comments without knowing any of the facts. The majority of Americans have no clue about what happened at Benghazi, either before, during or after the attack. They have relied on carefully crafted talking points instead of actually researching it for themselves. I’d venture to say that almost no one has actually read the 800+ page report.

In a way, it’s kind of like that whole Affordable Care Act debacle.

In case you’d like to take a walk down memory lane, here’s a piece I wrote right after the attack when they were pushing the video and spontaneous demonstration theory. You remember that lie, don’t you? Consider that the first of many to come.

As I mentioned before, most American’s have no clue as to what they are talking about. They couldn’t even begin to tell you how long Libya has been an independent state; let alone what the state of the country was leading up to the attack. Fortunately for you, I have written a Libya / Benghazi primer course for you, to bring you up to speed.

Bear in mind that these posts tend to be a bit long, but that’s the key. They are not your cliché riddled talking points.

You know, I’ve lost count of the number of times I have heard people say: “It wouldn’t have mattered if they sent troops; they wouldn’t have gotten there in time.”

Really? And exactly how did you, or they, know just how long the attack was going to last for?

I guess using that analogy, the next time you’re the victim of a violent crime, don’t bother calling the police because chances are they won’t get there in time either.

13 Hours: Paramount Pictures

Making a cavalier statement like that is fine, in hindsight retrospection, but I can tell you that in the middle of an attack no one knew how long it was going to last…… 13 HOURS is a long time to wait for help. If you feel the need to make a flippant comment on this topic, I highly recommend watching the movie, 13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi, or read the book, 13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi,  by Mitchell Zuckoff, before you do.

The fact is that when word of the attacks reached the Embassy and the CIA Station in Tripoli, in less than an hour, they managed to assemble a response team and acquire an aircraft for transport. The team, dubbed Team Tripoli, consisted of four Tripoli Station GRS members, one of whom was Glen Doherty, two Defense Department special operators, and a CIA linguist. An hour after they got to the airport in Tripoli they were in Benghazi.

So much for not being able to get there in time.

Now, Hillary Clinton, the woman at the heart of the Benghazi attack, who is looking to be our next president, is telling the world that there is nothing more to see here and that we simply need to move on.

Really? Must be nice to be able to lie to the American people, including the families of those four dead Americas and then tell them to move on.

 Here is what we know:

The Ambassador, as well as the folks doing protection, requested additional manpower and resources which were routinely met with no response or were refused by senior officials in Washington.  I’m not talking 1-2 requests, but nearly 600 security requests / concerns from January through September 2012. While some were acted on, the majority, including the requests for additional manpower, were not. In fact, manpower was reduced leading up to the attack. Clearly there were issues going on!!

Say what you will, but when an Ambassador, the President’s personal representative to a foreign nation, requests additional security, that cannot be overlooked, nor should it be dismissed by underlings sitting in a cushy office in D.C.  When everything is said and done, the Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, dropped the ball. It was her agency and even the State Department ARB said security was ‘grossly inadequate.’  If you don’t believe that she was responsible, then you need to stop blaming Bush for everything because apparently the ‘buck’ really doesn’t stop anywhere in Washington.

The fact is that the State Department assessment of Benghazi in 2011 and 2012 noted rising crime and a high-risk of militia violence left by the toppling of Gaddafi. The precarious security situation was exacerbated by inadequate security at the Benghazi facility, which was plagued by equipment failures, a lack of manpower and relied too much on unreliable local militia for protection.  Ironically, one of those Washington State Department bureaucrats, Charlene Lamb, had the audacity to say: “It is very unfortunate and sad at this point that Ambassador Stevens was a victim, but that is where ultimate responsibility lies."

Wow, the State Department denied additional security, but it’s really the fault of that poor schmuck who died.  Oh, it should be noted that, while denying the requests for security, the State Department, through their spokeswoman, Victoria Nuland, emailed Stevens to ask how to describe the security incidents in 2012

Really, Vickie?

I would like to imagine that Steven’s reply was something like: “They just attempted to assassinate the British Ambassador with an RPG. I guess you could say all’s well. Wish you were here, darling.”

One of the things that has always troubled me about this attack was our response or lack thereof.  On the night of the attack did the President issue Cross Border Authority? If you don’t know what CBA is, then click the link. The Congressional report now presents a distinct dilemma that no one seems to be considering or even talking about. 

According to the report, the military did not carry out then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's order to deploy U.S. forces to help rescue Americans under fire in Benghazi. If this is correct, and the President gave CBA, then we have an act of gross dereliction of duty on the part of senior members of the military. Or, as is most likely the case, we are not being told the full story, yet again.

I’m sorry, but I simply do not believe anything that comes out of the mouths of those inhabiting that cesspool known as Washington, D.C. As someone who has served under a chain of command, I know that there are consequences to failing to take action as directed by a superior, especially when four Americans die in a terror attack.

Consider the following and ask if you think this is plausible:

The President directs the Secretary of Defense to take action.

The Secretary of Defense notifies the Pentagon which in turns notifies the Commanding General of AFRICOM, General Carter Ham. 

By all accounts, General Ham immediately began directing / assembling units for deployment, a deployment that never occurred.

Shortly after the dust settled, General Ham announced he was retiring, for personal reasons, after only serving ½ of his scheduled rotation as head of AFRICOM and only a few years shy of mandatory retirement.  When announcing Ham's replacement, his X.O. at AFRICOM, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta praised Ham's service. A report from the department said leaders remain "fully confident" in Ham's performance. Even Pentagon Press Secretary George Little said that Ham “has the full confidence of the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.” Little attributed the change to Ham's "decision to retire," which he described as "an entirely personal decision."

Now, Congressman Trey Gowdy, who led the Congressional investigation into the attacks, states that Carter Ham acknowledged that he altered President Obama and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's order to deploy to Benghazi to rescue American personnel, and redirected the deployment to Tripoli, Libya instead.

Wait, how does a commanding general, who acted in contradiction to the direction of the President and Secretary of Defense, still enjoy 'the full confidence of the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff?'

I’m sorry, but I call bullshit. That would fall under Article 92 UCMJ: Failure to Obey Order or Regulation and is a Courts Martial offense.

In October 2012, General Ham told Rep. Jason Chaffetz that after the 9-11 Benghazi terror attack he was never given the order to secure the consulate in Benghazi.

Wait, he was NEVER given the order? Yet we are also being told that he was ordered, but that he  redirected the troops, from where they were being requested, to a city over 400 miles away.

Add that to the fact that Leon Panetta testified that: “The President made clear that we ought to use all of the resources at our disposal to try to make sure we did everything possible to try to save lives there.” He further testified that within an hour of his return to the Pentagon, he issued an order to deploy the identified assets. “My orders were to deploy those forces, period.…It was very clear: They are to deploy.” Yet it took nearly two more hours before the Secretary’s orders were relayed to those forces and then several more hours before any of those forces moved.

But how does this even make sense, considering the statement in October 2012 by Panetta where he said: "The basic principle is that you don't deploy forces into harm's way without knowing what's going on; without having some real-time information about what's taking place. And as a result of not having that kind of information, the commander who was on the ground in that area, Gen. Ham, Gen. Dempsey and I felt very strongly that we could not put forces at risk in that situation."

So now the Secretary of Defense says they decided not to take action.

Not sure what he meant by not knowing what was going on, as I think it was pretty clear from the drone flying above, the calls from the Benghazi facility, and the reports at the CIA Annex as to what was going on.

If all of this seems confusing and convoluted to you, imagine how the folks on the ground felt.

Kris ‘Tanto’ Paronto, one of the CIA contractors who went to the aid of the Benghazi facility, said “I asked for the Spectre and ISR [an armed Predator drone]. At midnight, they told us they were still working on getting us that Spectre gunship. Not that it was not available, but that they were still working on it.”

According to Paronto there were two AC-130H Spectre gunships on call that night, both within range of Benghazi. One of them was a six-hour flight away, co-located with a U.S. special operations team in Djibouti, and the other was at Naval Air Station Sigonella, in Sicily. In addition, the European Command (EUCOM), Commander’s In-Extremis Force, was on a counter-terrorism training mission in Croatia. A three-hour flight from Benghazi.

Paronto says that he knew people in that unit and when he spoke with them, after he and his security team got back to the CIA Annex from the diplomatic compound, he was told that “they were loading their gear into their aircraft and ready to go.” Later, they informed him that they had been shut down sometime after midnight.

All evidence now points to a specific stand-down order issued by Secretary Clinton, since the Libyan facilities came under her direct authority. Without a specific request for assistance from the State Department, the Pentagon was powerless to act.

Why do I say this?

Because, in 2015, the State Department released an email that was sent at 7:09 p.m. EST (1:09 a.m. Benghazi time) from Jeremy Bash, an aide to the Secretary of Defense, directly to Hillary Clinton’s office, informing them of the various military assets that were “spinning up” to deploy to Benghazi. Among those assets were Special Forces operation specialists (C-1/10), the In-Extremis Force Paronto talked about, stationed in Croatia, along with two U.S. Marine Corps Fleet Anti-terrorism Security Team (FAST) platoons based in Rota, Spain, the Spectre gunships, armed Predator drones, and possibly elements of Marine Expeditionary Units in the Mediterranean and the Red Sea.

We know this is accurate because, in preparation for deploying the C-1/10 directly to Benghazi from Croatia, General Ham, issued orders transferring authority for C-1/10 to him from European Command (EUCOM). General Ham was actively beginning to stage units to rescue those in Benghazi.

The email further states, and this is VERY important: “Assuming Principals agree to deploy these elements, we will ask State to secure the approval from host nation. Please advise how you wish to convey that approval to us.”

To date, the State Department has not released any reply from Mrs. Clinton’s office to Bash’s email request. Why?

What we do know is that the top U.S. diplomat in Tripoli at the time, Gregory Hicks, testified that the State Department NEVER requested country clearance from Libya for any U.S. forces that night.

And whatever happened to the C-1/10 in Croatia?

When orders finally went out from Panetta’s office, an hour later, they included a re-transfer of C-1/10 from AFRICOM back to EUCOM, along with orders for the unit to deploy to Sigonella, Italy, the NEXT DAY, and hold in place. 

C-1/10, the Special Forces team that is actually trained to conduct hostage rescue and high-profile missions was activated to respond and then told to stand down.

Have you read that and let that really sink in?  Are you getting these flip-flops?

Are you seeing that there was never going to be a rescue?

So what exactly did the President authorize that night? Again I ask: was Cross Border Authority ever issued? But, like the former Secretary of State famously said: “What difference does it make?”

The presumptive democratic nominee,  along with the majority of democrats in Congress, are telling you to move along; that there is nothing to see. I don’t know about you, but the only thing I’m not seeing here are real answers, except from those who were on the ground in Benghazi, and those answers paint a sordid picture of lies, treachery, treason and deceit. Not exactly the qualifications I find particularly pleasing in a Presidential candidate.

We, as American’s, now have the government that we allowed. Our leaders no longer respect us nor do they believe they have to answer to us. That is sad and it is the primary reason we are in the state of division that we are. We have to wake up and take back our country one election at a time. We can have civil discourse and we might not always agree, but the time has come for us to educate ourselves and not rely on what we are being told.

The truth is that, from the very beginning, they lied to us about what happened in Benghazi. Now the question is how many more lies were told. To determine that it is up to us to research the facts and vote accordingly.

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2016 United States House of Representatives Gun Control Sit-In

The Democrats staged a congressional sit-in over failure to pass new gun legislation.

Seriously? This is what allegedly passes as 'adult' leadership in this country, a sit-in? What the hell are you, children? This is the idiotic thing we see kids do in high school?

Is there any wonder why the overall approval rating for Congress is abysmally low? 

See this for what it is folks, a political publicity stunt, and I am begging you not to fall for it. The fact is that they could not care less about you. It's like Charlie Rangel saying to a reporter how he (and his fellow lawmakers) deserves protection, but apparently you and your family; not so much. Have you ever stopped to wonder why places like the White House, the U.S. Capitol, and Federal Court House’s, are all gun-free zones, yet they surround them with armed protection, but our schools, which hold our most precious assets, are labeled as gun free zones and give no protection? How does that make any sense?

First, let's be clear that the measures put forth didn't pass because they were ill-conceived, knee-jerk reactions. It has gotten to the point in this country that our representatives don’t look to actually fix anything, they just want to slap a Band-Aid on it and ignore the real problems. Seriously, have you heard anyone call for actually fixing the highly problematic terrorist no-fly list?

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

No, right from the beginning all you hear about are calls for re-instituting the ‘assault weapons ban’ and how these horrific weapons of war don’t belong in civilian hands, unless they are in the hands of those protecting the politicians.

In terms of the latest gun fix we have this pesky little thing called due process, which for some strange reason doesn’t seem to matter to certain elected officials who are charged with: (repeat after me) ‘Upholding the Constitution.’ I can only assume that they believe the laws only apply to us lowly rabble.

Now I know a lot of folks think our Constitution can be a tad bit difficult to deal with, or even understand, sometimes. Especially when it comes to that damned 2nd Amendment, but consider that the Constitution states only one command twice. The Fifth Amendment says to the federal government that no one shall be ‘deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of law.’ The Fourteenth Amendment, uses the same eleven words, called the Due Process Clause, to describe a legal obligation of all states. Yet our vaunted representatives want to be able to toss you onto a list, without any evidence or due process, and let you fight with the government after-the-fact to get off said list. 

Did you know that the Orlando terrorist, Omar Mateen, was on not one, but two terror watch lists? He was subsequently removed from them in 2014, after twice being interviewed by the FBI, in 2013 and 2014, for potential terror ties.  In theory, for an individual to be included on the no-fly list or selectee list, additional evidence of his threat to aviation security and clear identifying information is needed above and beyond the standard of reasonable suspicion. I say in theory, because the list has included such notables as the late Senator Ted Kennedy, Congressmen John Lewis and Don Young, Journalist Stephen Hayes, not to mention a number of Federal Air Marshals. You know the guys who are supposed to keep us safe in the skies! Even poor David Nelson, or Ozzie & Harriet fame, was on the list and don’t even get me started on the young children who found themselves listed. One Canadian businessman went so far as to legally change his name, in order to avoid being delayed every time he flew.

Ladies and gentlemen, we have the Constitution in this country for a very good reason. It arose out of a need to protect us from things that were actually happening to us when we were under British rule. Yet now, we are seeing our very own government begin to act in the same way.

Trust me people, we are heading down a very slippery slope here and we really need to proceed with extreme caution. There is a lot going on that doesn’t make the news, but should give you pause. It is also one of the topics which I am currently writing about in my latest book. I’m sure no one reading this would be okay if the feds just seized the property from your home, without any explanation or court order, and told you that it was up to you to prove your innocence.  Yet the minute it becomes about evil guns, a large swath of society seem okay with that very premise. Perhaps many of the younger generation need an overall refresher course on American History.

Despite what they will say, the problem is not a gun control issue. As someone who spent over two decades in law enforcement I can speak on this subject from actual real-world experience. The truth is that we have tons of gun laws, already on the books, that either not being prosecuted or are simply plea bargained down for a quick conviction. 

This is an 'individual' problem and they refuse to acknowledge or address it. It is the reason why murders in Chicago, a city with some of the most stringent gun laws in the nation, has had 313 killed so far this year, yet NO ONE will address this problem because they have no answer for it. Likewise, they have no answer for why other U.S. cities, with a comparable population, have relatively low crime numbers.

At every turn they have coddled, praised, and emboldened criminals and so-called activists, while calling the police brutal, racist and stupid. Guess what, I imagine things will get a lot worse in the country, but don't worry, your petulant elected leaders will all be fine, surrounded by armed officers to protect them while they 'sit-in'..... You? Well, I guess you're pretty much on your own.

Oh, and as for the ‘sit-in’ that the Democrats engaged in, you’ll be happy to note that there bold statement was used as a fundraising solicitation. That’s right; the Orlando terror attack was hijacked to raise funds for the party!

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) sent out an email, signed by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, which read: "This is an historically important moment! John Lewis has been leading a sit-in on the House floor for 11 long hours now. We’re fighting to prevent gun violence. The Republicans refuse to lift a finger. It’s shameful. I need your help to defeat them once and for all." The email asks for 6,000 donations and provided several options to donate amounts between $1 and $250. It was at least the sixth such email from the DCCC, which also included several that were signed by sit-in leader, John Lewis.  

But hey, it really is about those evil guns……. So will that be MasterCard or Visa?

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Irony, Stat's, & Gun Control - Why the Anti-Gun Folks Just Don't Get It.

The appreciation of sarcasm is being lost at an alarming rate these days. There used to be a time when people understood you were being sarcastic, now you have to actually explain things to them or use one of those stupid symbols……  Being a NY’er, I despise this. If you've read any of my books, you'll know that my characters of quite fond of it as well.

The same hold true for irony. Some folks just don't seem to appreciate just how ironic they really are.

If you have turned on a TV, read a paper, logged onto Facebook or Twitter lately, you would see irony, in all its glory and pageantry, on full display, but at the same time being missed out on by so many who just don’t get it.

Examples are things like:

• Black lives matter……. Because, you know, all the other lives don’t.
• Be a champion of the climate change agenda, but fly across the ocean in your private G4, to accept an award, then immediately fly back to party in Caan.
• Christianity, which follows the tenets of Jesus who says to love one another, is bad. While Islam, which advocates killing in the name of Allah, is good….. You know; the whole religion of peace thing.
• No one under an FBI investigation should ever be able to purchase a gun, but you can still run for President if you’re under an FBI investigation.

I don’t know who originally coined the phrase ‘Word’s Matter’, but they do. Just like our President admonished us in a campaign speech back in 2008: “Don't tell me words don't matter. ‘I have a dream.’  Just words?”

IRONICALLY, he was accused of plagiarizing that, from a speech Deval Patrick made in 2006, by none other than Hillary Clinton. Oh well, like they say, politics make for strange bedfellows.

The problem I have with all of this is that we have stopped reading words, in the form of actual research, and have begun to accept talking points and snippets as actual truth. They are not.

Take statistics for example. Everyone loves to flaunt them, because they allow you to use evidence to support your argument, but are they really that good?

How about this little gem, stripped from the pages of that vaunted newspaper, the New York Times (Hint: insert Sarcasm symbol here), which authoritatively asserted the following: ‘In the United States, the death rate from gun homicides is about thirty-one per million people or the equivalent of twenty-seven people shot and killed every day.’

Just to drive home the point, they included a graph with more statistics, showing just how blood thirsty we Americans are. Seriously, it was like we are up here (hold your left hand up high) and they are ALL down here (hold your right hand down really low). Wow, that’s ominous……. 

It’s not accurate mind you, but very ominous, which is exactly the point.

You see the pundits and politicians don’t want you to know the truth, they just want you to accept their facts.

For the better part of my law enforcement career I was an investigator. Show me a stat and the first thing I want to know is: what was your methodology? What’s that? you ask.

Well, methodology is the systematic, theoretical analysis of the methods applied to a field of study. Or, as my astute boss once told me: garbage in, garbage out.

Too often we take the stats being offered as honest representations of the facts. They aren’t. In fact they are skewed to make you support what is being offered to you. So take the New York Times article, what should we take away from it? Well, number one would be that the United States is pretty damn violent and, number two that only rich, Western countries, with a GDP per capita over $25,000.00, matter.

Why is this significant? Because they want you to believe that we really are that damn violent.

The New York Times is anti-gun. Asking them for the unvarnished truth on guns is like asking the Devil to cite the benefits of Christianity. But let’s not bash on the Times alone. How about this from CBS News:

“Murder is the second leading cause of death among Americans aged 15 to 24, the study found. The research also showed that murder was the third leading cause of death among those aged 25-34. Compared to those in the same age groups in other wealthy countries, Americans aged 15-24 are 49 times more likely to be the victim of a gun-related murder. For those aged 25-34, that number is 32 times more likely, the research revealed.”

So, are we really that violent? Well, let’s look at some real numbers.

For the moment, let’s ignore the age groups. I’ll get back to them later. For now, let’s accept that there are roughly 320 + million people in the United States. We are number three in the world, but we only make up about 4 ½ percent of the population. In fact, China and India both beat us soundly by about one billion people EACH. That’s a pretty sobering stat, isn’t it?

Of those 320+ million, there are roughly 270 million guns owned by citizens. I’m not going to give you the stat, because I’m really not that good with math, so I will just say that we, collectively, have a LOT of guns. In fact, according to the Geneva based Small Arms Survey, the leading source of international public information about firearms, the U.S. has the best-armed civilian population in the world, with an estimated average of 90 firearms for every 100 residents.  If you like Wikipedia, that number jumps to 112.6. Why the disparagement in numbers? Statistics!

So, given either of those statistics, you would think the United States would lead the world in gun violence….. Right? The truthful answer is, No.

You see, many people like to pick and choose their stats. A methodology I prefer to think of as never having to say you’re wrong.

Most research focuses around what is best described as high income countries. Why? I don’t know. Last I looked bullets didn’t seem to discriminate along sex, race or religion, so why financial? I’m sure that there are some socio economic indicators that they will spout-off to validate their claims, but that’s kind of silly.  It’s also called cherry picking your data, which they seem to love to do. Guess diversity only matters some of the time……… How ironic.

So, with that many guns one would certainly be within their mathematical rights to extrapolate that the United States would obviously be the world’s murder capitol….. Right? And the answer is: No.

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime the country that leads the world in intentional homicide is: Honduras, that socialist enclave in Central America, which has a rate of 84.6 per 100,000 inhabitants, despite restrictive civilian ownership of guns. Its fellow socialist and gun restricting neighbor, El Salvador is number two on the list.

Hmmm, corrupt, socialist government’s which don’t like guns, what a novel idea.

Well, surely the United State is high up on the list…… right? And the answer is still: No.

Scrolling through the list one finds that you have to go all the way down to number 108 (out of 218) to find the U.S. According to the U.N., statistically, you are more likely to die visiting a tropical resort in the Bahamas than you are in the United States.

So what is the problem?

Well, the problem is that no one wants to address the actual problem.

Awhile back there was a meme that pointed out that both Honduras and Switzerland had the same population, yet Honduras, with their gun laws, led the world in murder, but Switzerland, without the same strict gun laws, had one of the lowest murder rates. Everyone jumped on that saying that it was a flawed argument. 

Remember before that I said some would point to socio economic indicators to validate their claims? Well, the truth is that they want to cherry pick every form of data so that it validates their claims. They will tell you that you can’t factor in certain things because they are not relevant to the equation. Such was the case with Honduras. The experts claimed that you couldn’t equate the two because of the cultural, political and socio economic factors that play into gun violence, or a lack thereof.

Here is the problem I have with this argument:

• In 2016, Omar Mateen murdered 49 people in Orlando. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2015, Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik murdered 14 people in San Bernardino. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2015, Robert Lewis Dear murdered 3 people in Colorado. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2015, Christopher Sean Harper-Mercer murdered 9 people in Oregon. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2015, Mohammod Youssuf Abdulazeez murdered 5 people in Tennessee. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2015, Dylann Storm Roof murdered 9 people in South Carolina. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2014, Elliot Rodger murdered 6 people in California. The left immediately blames guns.
• In 2014, Nidal Hassan murdered 3 people in Texas. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2013, Aaron Alexis murdered 12 people in Washington, D.C. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2012, Adam Lanza murdered 27 people in Connecticut. The left immediately blamed guns.
• In 2012, James Holmes murdered 12 people in Colorado. The left immediately blamed guns.

The left will tell you that we should not consider certain factors, yet every time they focus solely on one factor: Guns. Let me tell you what they don’t want you to consider: the individual.

You see, they have no answer for the individual. They can’t explain to you why one person breaks the law and another person doesn’t. They come up with every excuse in the world as to why inner-city places like: St. Louis, Detroit, Philadelphia, Chicago, New York City, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Newark, New Orleans, Oakland, and Washington D.C. have such high crime rates, yet cities in the gun-crazy state of Texas, like Plano, El Paso, Arlington, and Austin don’t.  

Ironically, the left will tell you that you cannot factor some countries, because they have certain socio economic factors at play, yet they will tell you that you must include all U.S. cities, that have those very same socio economic factors, when you are talking about gun violence in the United States. Well, that’s so dumb it makes me squint. What would happen if you did a side by side comparison, you know like Honduras and Switzerland?

Well, Detroit and El Paso have almost the same identical population, yet Detroit has a murder rate of 43.5 while El Paso has a murder rate of 3.1. Heck, Fort Worth, which has a substantially larger population than Baltimore, is only 6.1 compared to the latter’s 33.8.

Shootingtracker, the site everyone goes to in order to document all the horrible mass shootings, listed an amazing 332 mass shootings for 2015, but when you research it a bit further you notice something unusual. Some of the urban cities, like I listed above, also have a larger percentage of the shootings. Call me crazy, but I don’t think it is legal gun owners shooting things up in Detroit, NYC or Baltimore.

Could it be the individual? Could it be that 15-24 and 25-34 demographic? Perhaps they might even be criminals? Or worse yet, actual radical Islamic terrorists? (Gasp)

So what do these vaunted cities have in common that makes them so vastly different?

• St. Louis - 1949
• Detroit – 1962
• Philadelphia – 1952
• Chicago – 1931
• New York City – 1971
• Baltimore – 1967
• Cincinnati – 1979
• Newark – 1953
• New Orleans – 1870 (Seriously? WTF?)
• Oakland – 1977
• Washington D.C. – NEVER

The numbers next to each city is the last year that they had a Republican mayor. Think we might have hit on something here?

To be fair, I did not count the Rudolph Giuliani era in NYC as it was more of an aberration. The old saying in NYC was that Christ himself couldn’t get elected mayor of NYC if he was a Republican. Truthfully, the last true Republican in NYC was Fiorello Laguardia in 1933. Giuliani won simply because the city hit rock bottom and had finally stopped digging. Michael Bloomberg was never a Republican, as evidenced by his own anti-gun / liberal policies, and John Lindsey was what would best be considered a RINO.

In my adopted home state of Illinois, every Monday brings another report of the weekend murders in Chicago. Over the Father’s Day weekend there were thirteen people killed and at least forty-two others wounded.  One weekend!  So far this year there have been 280 people killed and another 1,520 wounded. Do you even wonder why they call it Chiraq? In Chicago a person is shot, on average, every two hours and murdered every thirteen. You have a better chance of dying on the streets of Chicago then you do in Baghdad!

There comes a time when you have to stop blaming things and start blaming people.

The lefts clarion call for more gun control is a façade.  A dog whistle designed to focus your attention away from the real problem which is a complete breakdown in society. The cities with the highest violence are the same cities with the biggest ‘socio econimic’ problems and they are the same cities were Democrats keep getting re-elected.

The truth is that the politicians and pundits don’t have an answer for the individual, so they default back to gun control. They wring their hands, blame legal gun owners, pass even more restrictive gun laws (which only legal gun owners will obey) and then feign shock when things don’t change.

Here’s a newsflash, criminals really don’t care how many gun laws you pass……. They’re criminals!! Which is precisely the reason why those silly little ‘no gun’ placards have zero impact.

This is like a social experiment go awry, political correctness run amok.  We now live in an age where personal responsibility is in the middle of its death throes. Forty percent of all births are now to unmarried woman. Education levels are plummeting, incarceration rates are rising, and more people can’t find full-time work. Criminals are viewed as victims, while the police are viewed as criminals. We redefine terrorism as a hate crime, to make it seem more palatable, so we can turn away attention from the abject failures of the government. We are developing a mindset that we need the government to care for us from cradle-to-grave. Welfare is viewed as a right, while Social Security is viewed as an entitlement program.

But no, really, guns are the real problem.

We need to wake up and realize that we have been betrayed.

I remember back during the riots in Baltimore where a mother, Toya Graham, was caught on film slapping her son, after she saw him with a mask on and a brick in his hand, and pulling him out of a protest. I use the word protest loosely, because that’s the word the media used to explain the utter lawlessness that ran rampant through the city. I remember hearing a number of people calling for her to be investigated for what she did. Imagine that, a mother trying to get her child to act properly was going to be investigated. The media even asked her if she was concerned that she had embarrassed her son. Ms. Graham’s response: “Not at all, he was embarrassing himself by wearing that mask, that hoodie and doing what he was doing."

It’s amazing to me that, as we watched the city burn, the media’s concern was of a mother embarrassing her child by trying to get him away from the problem. Where are the rest of the Toya Graham’s of the world? Why have we abandoned the concept of personal responsibility? When did it become okay to blame the gun, but not the shooter?

As I said earlier, it is estimated that there are anywhere between 90 and 112 firearms per 100 people in the United States. The truth is that if gun owners were really as bad as we are made out to be, you’d know about.  

A recent report said that, over the past decade (2005-15), there were just over three hundred thousand gun related deaths in the United States. I think most people would agree this is incredibly high number, at least until you consider that it comes out to about thirty thousand a year. Of that number, less than 1/3 are attributable to homicides. Suicides and accidents comprise the other 2/3’s.

So what about the big bad Assault Rifles? Surely they must be responsible. I mean we are constantly being told that they are evil weapons of war that the politicians and media tout at every opportunity.  Well, beside the fact that they aren’t even actual Assault Rifles, the truth is they aren’t even used all that often. Of the roughly 8-9k gun related homicides each year, only around 300 were used. That’s all rifles, not just the evil AR-15 or AK-47. In fact, you have a better chance of being killed by knives, blunt objects or physical assault, than you are by a rifle.

“But, but…. I just heard that the American Medical Association called gun violence a public health crisis and has asked the CDC to research it.”

Well If I was the AMA I would as well, that’s because they probably don’t want you looking at them.

Why you ask? Because what you probably don’t know is that each year there are an estimated quarter of a million deaths from medical malpractice. Some reporting agencies put the number as high as nearly half a million. Let that sink in for a moment the next time you go see the doctor. You are far more likely to die this year, as a result of medical malpractice, then you are in over a decade of all firearms deaths.

The truth is you are far more likely to die from: Medical Errors, Hospital Infection, Alcohol, Tobacco, Motor Vehicle Crashes, Suicide, Drunk Driving, Poisoning (unintentional), Accidents (unintentional), than you are by a firearm. Consider only rifles used in homicides and you can add walking, drowning, fire, malnutrition, and falling out of bed to the list of things that are more dangerous.  This doesn't even include the usual medical issues of: Cancer, Obesity, Stroke, Diabetes, Pneumonia, etc.

Perhaps we should ban all assault fast food....

So why all the screaming and gnashing of teeth then? Because they don’t like them.

That’s it, in a nutshell.

For a moment, I want you to take a long hard look at the media. I want you to make a mental note of each time you hear a report about guns. Are they reporting the news, or are they telling you a story? Once you realize just how widespread this anti-gun bias is, you’ll be shocked.

Just recently, the darling child of the media, Katie Couric, was investigated over a gun documentary she did. Rather than just present the show, in its entirety, Ms. Couric’s crew selectively edited it. When Couric asked the group a question, regarding the ability of convicted felons and those on the terror watch list to legally obtain a gun, there was dramatic eight-second silence, as the camera panned the faces of the gun owners,  implying that the group had no answer. The truth was that they had immediately responded to the question. Simply put, the documentary was craftily edited to make the pro-gun group look bad and to present you with their anti-gun agenda.

Immediately after the Orlando terror attack, the media was dispatched in droves to seek out the horrific weapon of war and show how easy it is to buy one. In their zeal, some took it a bit far. Several reporters gleefully recalled how they could purchase one. Of course no one had a criminal record, so it was tantamount to someone over the age of 21 proclaiming they had just purchased alcohol. I’m not sure what is so amazing about purchasing something legally. A CNN reporter confronted Florida Governor Rick Scott with this question:  “Yes, ISIS, terrorism could be to blame for this, but can you accept any responsibility for the gun laws here in Florida?”

Seriously? ‘Could be?’ What does it take for them to call this horrific act terrorism?

Once again we see that it is not about terrorism, not about the individual, but all about those bad scary guns.

A New York Daily News reporter went so far as to describe his shooting of an AR 15 as: “It felt to me like a bazooka and sounded like a cannon. But mostly, I was just terrified.”

Awesome,…… Just for the record, my kids enthusiastically shot them (along with that evil AK-47) as they were growing up, but not this middle-aged man who gleefully added: “The recoil bruised my shoulder, which can happen if you don't know what you're doing. The brass shell casings disoriented me as they flew past my face. The smell of sulfur and destruction made me sick. The explosions — loud like a bomb — gave me a temporary form of PTSD. For at least an hour after firing the gun just a few times, I was anxious and irritable.”

PT FUCKING SD? Seriously?  

The writer then had to do a follow-up article, apologizing for his rather huge PTSD leap, which he then promptly used as a platform to attack those who called him out on his nonsense.  I’m sorry, but he knew what he was doing in his original article and the second was no better, but that’s the real problem. You see they just don’t like guns. They have this exaggerated fear of something and that is enough for them to decide that you can’t have it. If you disagree with them they berate you, or, as in the case of the reporter, if you call them out on their nonsense, they cry foul and run to the nearest safe-space. Sorry, you don’t get to have it both ways.

I spent over two decades in law enforcement, twenty with the NYPD, and I have owned firearms for over three decades. I have trained on and fired just about every handgun / rifle caliber from .22 to .308. I am also an NRA certified instructor. So who out there on the left is going to tell me that I don’t possess the pre-requisite capabilities and training to own these firearms? You would think that someone with my background would be opposed to these horrific weapons being in the hands of mere citizens, but you would be wrong. Gun ownership is a serious thing, but I firmly believe in the 2^nd Amendment and the people’s right to keep and bear arms.

I often hear people saying “you don’t need guns like that.” I’m sorry, but where did you become the arbiter of such matters? Did they offer that as a minor study in your Social Justice Warrior degree program? Again, why are we taking advice from people who have no clue about what they are talking about? Whether you like it or not the 2^nd Amendment really is about those guns.

Unlike you, I know the dangers we truly face in this world. Protection is just an illusion and one I witnessed first-hand on the mean streets of New York City. There were times when we would have four cops on patrol, two cars, for an area that had over a hundred thousand residents. Most crimes are reported, very few are actually stopped. Despite what a lot of people want you to believe: Safety is Not a Right. I’m not sure where this erroneous thought process ever arose, but even the courts have ruled that the police do not have an obligation to protect you. The 2^nd Amendment however is an actual RIGHT, and it is precisely this right which allows you, the individual, to protect yourself from someone who means to do you harm.

I saw one Rolling Stone (you know, the same Rolling Stone that elevated Boston Marathon Bomber, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, to rock star status on its cover) reporter opining that: “Just think of what would have happened in the Orlando night-club Saturday night if there had been many others armed. How would it not have devolved into mass confusion and fear followed by a large-scale shootout…”

That’s liberal, gun hating, logic on full display. No, it was so much better for the unarmed victims to all huddle together, in a state of panic, while the only person with a gun, a terrorist, casually slaughtered them. How foolish of me.

It’s almost as ironic as Presidential pal, and domestic terrorist, Bill Ayers, a co-founder of the Weather Underground Organization, calling for more gun control. Hey, Bill, give us a call when you look to sponsor bomb control.

If you don’t like guns, then don’t own one, but don’t tell me that I can’t, because then we are going to have a problem. Like the old saying goes: “You can give peace a chance, I’ll cover you in case that doesn’t work out.”

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