Reports are sketchy, but there’s a mass shooting happening in San Bernardino, California now. The sheriff’s department reports multiple shooters and casualties, according to CNN. Damn it.
ETA: I’ve mentioned before that there was a mass shooting in my office building many years ago. It’s weird to watch the coverage with that experience because I can so relate to the people trapped in that building. On TV now, news helicopters are hovering around the building. I remember watching helicopters hovering outside my 10th floor office window while my colleagues and I were holed up behind locked doors hoping the murderer wouldn’t find us.
A few minutes ago, CNN interviewed a father who was waiting outside hoping his adult daughter would emerge alive. She had texted him about the shooting, letting him know she was locked in her office waiting for the cops. He was distraught, of course. I remember calling my mom while I was hiding (no text back then). She was a nurse at the closest hospital, so I knew she’d hear about the incident, and I wanted to let her know I was in a safe place — and that I loved her very much.
It’s all so surreal and fucked up. Enough with these fucking gun nuts already. Enough.
Tim C.
More needless suffering and terror.
http://www.theonion.com/article/no-way-to-prevent-this-says-only-nation-where-this-36131
RandomMonster
Probably unrelated, but there is a PP not so far from that location, according to Google Maps.
Breezeblock
It’s too soon to talk about Gun Control. Let the families mourn the dead. /sick snark
east is east
What the fuck? Breaking down. This is out of control.
leeleeFL
Watching on MSNBC. They are not sure if shooter still active. Anyone know?
dlm
This is insanity.
kindness
Can’t snark to this yet. Too soon.
Kryptik
@RandomMonster:
PP employees there confirmed with MSNBC and CNBC that they’re not near the shooting, I believe, after Fox erroneously cited them as the location.
singfoom
Copy and paste what’s been said before. Sympathy for the victims and their families. Sadness that this keeps happening. Anger at those who insist this is the only way it can be. Anger at my helplessness to do anything to solve the problem. This is depressing.
Tao of Nope
It appears to be a rehab center for the developmentally disabled. Physical, speech, occupational therapy for people with CP, etc.
1-3 shooters with body armor.
What. The. Fuck.
Germy
@Kryptik: Fox is always erroneously citing. They always seem to get every fact wrong during an active situation, and then after the dust settles their analysis always sucks, too.
I’m check local news affiliates. So far it looks like 20 victims. Possible explosives?
Darkrose
@RandomMonster: I live a few blocks from a Planned Parenthood. On Saturday, I tried to find it on Google Maps and it’s not marked, which I thought was interesting.
Germy
@Tao of Nope:
Who are they declaring war on? Civilization itself?
scav
@Germy: Health / Obamacare?
Archon
@Germy:
Multiple shooters suggests political motive. For the life of me I don’t understand why they would shoot up a developmental disabilities clinic.
Scout211
It was at the Inland Regional Center. The Regional Centers in California provide diagnosis and treatment for developmental and other disabilities.
Lamh36
From twitter
Scapegoat
Tragic (again)…
The idea of a counter for gun deaths that is publicly displayed is a good one — sort of like the National Debt Clock in Times Square. Other ideas might be a mobile phone app or one add this to one’s homepage on Facebook or Google?
Anything to raise awareness and battle the gun-humpers.
WereBear
@Archon: What did the shooter in Sandy Hook have against first graders?
How horrible. And I never try to figure things out the first day. There’s no pressure to get it right, so they do not.
trollhattan
Horrid. I’ll add that a California regional center is as “soft” a target as a grade school, as the clients are developmentally disabled adults, possibly the most defenseless group one could conceivably attack outside of an advanced care senior center.
Whether the shooter(s) are attacking staff or clients would be my first question. Hopefully they’ve got the situation in hand. Welcome to the new America.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@Tao of Nope: Yes, who kills the disabled now? Beyond reason.
scav
@scav: Seriously, sounds like publicity. Kids alone won’t provide that anymore.
Scout211
@trollhattan:
Children and adults with disabilities.
beltane
Every bad guy with a gun was once a good guy with a gun.
RandomMonster
@Kryptik: Didn’t get it from a news source, I had just checked on the map out of fear that it was a copycat situation to the last mass shooting. Now I can be relieved that it’s just some other horrifying, needless source of gun-related violence.
Germy
@beltane:
Very briefly.
Mike J
I’ll bet when it’s over it was only one shooter. I certainly hope that’s the case. It’s fairly common for panicked people to think there’s more shooters than there are, and then the cops have to proceed on that assumption.
Matt McIrvin
@Archon: Culling the unfit, perhaps? The disabled were one of the major groups the Nazis were keen on exterminating, along with Jews, gays, Roma, etc.
The Golux
@Archon:
Probably three a-holes who were tired of seeing the center’s clients bagging groceries at the local Ralph’s.
Thanks, NRA!
Suzanne
Christ almighty.
There are days that I’m done. This is one of them.
I hate that I have to be so numb just to make it through the day.
trollhattan
@Scout211:
Will speculate on a weekday the clients would be primarily adults, as school districts must “reasonably accommodate” kids with disabilities and school is in in session. I’m basically hoping here, simply because I am sickened even more (if that’s possible) whenever a child is victimized.
Brachiator
It’s insane that news stories now almost casually mention “reports of an active shooter.”
KABC TV is reporting up to 12 people killed.
trollhattan
@Mike J:
That does seem super-common during these events. From the cops’ perspective I think they’re being prudent presuming more than one so long as witness accounts lend some credibility. The other thing is they watch for are shooters trying to leave amongst the innocent.
I think I’ve attended too many active shooter trainings.
beltane
@Germy: Maybe they were good guys for only moments or for decades. All that matters is that up until they kill lots of people, the NRA wants them armed and dangerous.
goblue72
@Tao of Nope: Ditto times 1,000.
Its far past time to take everyone’s guns away. I am willing to compromise though. They can keep their guns. But we get to take all the ammunition away.
bemused
Who will be the first rightwinger to say something hideous.
Germy
@bemused: I’m sure they’ve already begun mouthing off.
trollhattan
Like this NPR disclaimer at the bottom of their (brief) report.
“…will later turn out to be wrong.” about sums it up.
D58826
During the early days of the Ferguson disorders there was lot of criticism of the militarized police. Now the targeting of peaceful protesters with sniper rifles was beyond the pale but given the number of mass shootings maybe the cops do need some of this heavy duty military equipment. It is a sad commentary on America but this is becoming as common as dandelions on the lawn. But we must protect the angry white man with his guns.
Seems that the building involved works to hook up folks with handicaps to needed services. Clients ranges from infant to 60. Obviously people in wheelchairs are a threat to the natural order of real Murkin life. Cops are reporting multiple victims and up to three shooters.
bemused
@Germy:
Whoever does can’t call themselves human.
Brachiator
@goblue72:
There are too many guns in the hands of people who are determined to keep them. You are never going to take them away.
I’m not even sure that there is a way to keep guns out of the hands of people who have documented mental problems.
rikyrah
@Tao of Nope:
Cause it takes real men with death weapons to go search out the disabled…
But…
lone wolf and all…
beltane
@bemused: They’re already saying that it’s nothing compared to the millions of babies killed by Planned Parenthood. Right wingers are humans whose humanity has been aborted.
Mike J
@bemused:
Free Republic commenters already complaining that the developmentally disabled victims weren’t packing heat.
D58826
possible IED’s as well
Tao of Nope
@goblue72:
Amen. I never thought I’d come this far, but I’m there.
My kid goes to a place like this 2+ times a week, so I’m not distanced enough right now, but Jesus Christ.
goblue72
@Brachiator: I am more than happy to vote for a constitutional amendment legalizing a door by door search of every person’s home for all the guns.
And if that means armed standoffs with gun-nuts who then get firebombed into the hereafter by the FBI and ATF that would make Waco look like Disneyland, I have no problem with that.
Matt McIrvin
@D58826:
It’s not clear to me this follows. Military weapons are designed to make it easy to kill everyone in an area. That’s what the police should be trying to stop, not what they should be trying to do.
BruinKid
Not again. Goddamnit, not again.
pat
msn reports there might be an explosive device. WTF?
Oh, and let’s just be terribly afraid of 3-year-old refugees.
Wonder if this is some sort of workplace dispute. Remember when the expression “going postal” was in vogue?
Punchy
My guess is that this is the act of a bunch of transsexual liberal activists. Fits the profile.
D58826
some body is asking why three guys with heavy weapons and body amour are attacking this type of facility. This could be terrorism according to the talking head.
It’s not terrorism it is simply true Murkins exhibiting their 2nd amendment rights.
Roger Moore
@Tao of Nope:
Early reports are always confused, and the police tend to go with the worst case so they don’t get surprised. My guess is that it’s one person but different witnesses gave sufficiently different descriptions that the police can’t rule out multiple suspects. Same thing with body armor: maybe the guy is wearing it and maybe not- more likely if it’s a heavily planned thing- but it just takes one report of it for the police to assume that’s the case.
pat
reports of 12 dead (crooksandliars)
goblue72
@trollhattan: I wouldn’t be surprised if its:
1. Disgruntled former employee who got fired. The prototypical Going Postal.
2. Dude who attempted to date an employee and got turned down. Prototypical Red Pill Woman Hater.
3. Nihilists nut jobs who wanted to go out in a blaze of gunfire and picked a target that would get them the most media coverage. Prototypical Columbine types
4. ISIS types – Been lots of chatter post-Paris attacks that an attack in U.S. was going to happen.
Germy
@goblue72: I would bet it’s not #4
I would bet #3.
A jilted boyfriend would target the object of his “affections” not 12 people.
JPL
The news is reporting that they wore masks.. This is so sad and George on ABC is already saying isis sympathizers is always a possibility.
mai naem mobile
I.hadn’t been around any.news stuff for a few hours and went on twitter onto the trending hashtags and I saw San.Bernardino was one. It didn’t say San Bernardino shooting, just San Bernardino and I knew without even clicking on it, that it was a mass shooting. There was a false one this AM at UNC. Same thing happened with that one too. WTF? This is crazee. BTW one of the first tweets I saw was some RWNJ saying the shooter’s name was Abdul Syed – stereotypical musleemy name. I saw the same thing on Friday during the Colorado Springs shooting.
beltane
@goblue72: The Guardian is reporting that the shooter/s opened fire in a conference room. This implies that staff were being targeted.
D58826
news shows are going to have to revamp their formats. There is the lead story, the mass shooting story, sports, weather, business and even later mass shooting story. Yes that is very very very bitter angry snark. Report of up to 30 victims. Sanjay Gupty is talking about how hospitals are now training for these shooting events and they are setting up plans for what would be called a MASH unit if this was a military operation.
SiubhanDuinne
@Archon:
I don’t mean to connect dots, but I do think it’s interesting that the leading GOP candidate, just days ago, openly and cruelly mocked a disabled person. And I don’t think most people of a mentality to reach for guns would make much of a distinction between developmentally and physically disabled.
SiubhanDuinne
(Completely off-topic: Thank you, thank you, site design people, for making the formatting buttons readable once more. And brilliant idea to turn them red while they’re open — nice reminder to close the tags.)
Face
@beltane: And I bet the conference room had a “No AK-47 Zone” policy. Stupid Cali libs.
Germy
@SiubhanDuinne: But why is all the side info at the bottom of the page? (like Cole’s tweets, random quote, etc.)
patrick II
@D58826:
The police do need to be more heavily armed in the current anything goes gun environment — which means more profit for gun manufacterers. The town next to mine spent $250,000 dollars on upgrading their cruisers to have AR-15’s from shotguns after evaluating what their officers need to stop a now all to common mass shooting. And that is just one town. Think of the $ involved as that plays out nationally.
When there is a mass shooting, we see crisis the NRA sees opportunity.
Mike J
@Germy:
My theory is that they’re trying to move the code to the bottom of the page and reposition them with css, which makes things nicer for people with screen readers. Then they got halfway done.
D58826
@Roger Moore: some of the reports are coming from folks who were in the building and they are either tweeting or talking to family members. Still very early to make firm statements about anything
The one thing that seems reasonably certain is the shooter(s) left the scene in black SUV. Given how the police are evacuating people in buses and a triage center being set up in the parking lot, the cops must be pretty certain that the shooters have fled the scene
Tao of Nope
@SiubhanDuinne:
This crossed my mind as well.
Amir Khalid
@mai naem mobile:
None of the gunmen have been arrested or killed that we know of, so how would this person know a name? It’s a transparent and despicable attempt to stir up anti-Muslim bigotry. I trust the authorities will have someone in custody (or in a body bag) soon enough, and then we’ll know who was involved.
Brachiator
@beltane:
It’s really too early for speculation. And local news reporters here in Los Angeles are known for mis-reporting the facts when things like this happen. There is always a “rush” to fill the newscasts no matter how little is actually known about what has happened.
Waldo
@Roger Moore: That’s my hunch, too. I remember how much time and effort was wasted looking for the nonexistent white van linked to the D.C. sniper shootings. The killers’ vehicle, a blue sedan, was spotted by police at several shooting scenes and was even ticketed two hours before one incident, but the cops never connected the dots because it didn’t match the early eyewitness descriptions. That mistake cost some lives.
Roger Moore
@beltane:
I think the NRA wants them armed and dangerous even when they’re busy killing and after. Fear is their #1 marketing tool, and regular shootings build that fear. They’re also supporters of restoring gun rights to released felons, so they are either willing to let bad guys have guns or they have a very broad definition of who constitutes a good guy with a gun.
Betty Cracker
@efgoldman: Scary. I’ve experienced that helpless feeling as a parent too on the several occasions when my middle- and then high-school kiddo has texted me that her school is on lock-down. This is what passes for normal now.
President Obama has been angrier at each post-mass-shooting statement — he gets how fucked up and stupid this is. What will he say this time? I hope he starts naming names, beginning with Wayne LaPierre.
pat
The Guardian has live video from a helicopter.
John
I grew up in San Bernardino. It’s kind of a shithole, and the city government has a long history of corruption. Given that the target is a center for the developmentally disabled, I could definitely see the shooter being someone with mental issues. The issue is the massive availability of military-style weapons. Whether the shooter was insane or evil or both, the wide availability of guns is what enables this type of bullshit.
San Bernardino is also home to Patton state hospital, which, when I was growing up, was where the truly disturbed violent criminals who were too mentally disturbed to stand trial ended up. My junior high school shared a (very tall, razorwire-topped) fence with Patton. I have no idea if that facility is even still open.
It is odd how much different I feel about this one. I get mad every time there is a mass shooting, and madder when I hear assholes like Ted Cruz try to spin it. With this one, I am just hoping I didn’t know anyone there. First thing I did was call my mom to make sure everyone in the family is clear of there. Not really sure why my mom would know any more than me.
I’m not the praying type, but this makes me wish I had that sort of comfort available.
Brachiator
@Roger Moore:
If you want to restore voting rights to felons, why deny them the right to own guns?
Yutsano
It’s frustrating. The worst part is 12+ people have now lost their lives and have no idea why. Right below that is that it will make exactly ZERO difference. Gun nuts will still get their penile replacements. The NR will lobby for more lax gun laws. And Americans will shrug and move on.
Denali
Why is this not terrorism?
Germy
@Betty Cracker:
Jeff Chu ✔@jeffchu
What @POTUS said after Oregon bears repeating: “Our thoughts and prayers are not enough.” #SanBernardino
Skippy-san
“It’s all so surreal and fucked up. Enough with these fucking gun nuts already. Enough.”
Amen to that. But so much of our citizenry is so fucked up-they gotta have their guns. The founding fathers never intended this to be the result of the 2nd Amendment.
D58826
The building next store to the shooting site works with blind adults. Hasn’t the NRA suggested that blind people be able to carry weapons? That we are even discussing this in any way is beyond sad..
One hospital is reporting 8 victims, still unconfirmed
MomSense
@Suzanne:
I know. It is hard to take feeling so helpless to such madness and cruelty. At some point I just want to withdraw.
Pogonip
@Tao of Nope: Mine too. Of course, I’ll never say where!
Scapegoat
@SiubhanDuinne:
DING! DING! DING!
beltane
@Roger Moore: The NRA has convinced RW Americans that they are frail, vulnerable, and utterly irresistible to the legions of scary people that surround them. We may view the gun nuts as fat, ugly, hairy men, but they see themselves as Betty Boop left defenseless on an island of sexual predators.
Bobby Thomson
@Germy: not 4. My first thought was 2 or 1, except they usually turn the gun on themselves.
Roger Moore
@goblue72:
Daesh went after targets in Paris, including the highly symbolic Stade de France. If they decided to go after something in the LA area rather than DC or NYC, they’d probably go after tourists on Hollywood Blvd or shoot up Getty Center, or some similarly recognizable target. They wouldn’t go after a center for the disabled in San Bernardino.
Betty Cracker
@Amir Khalid:
That’s exactly right. I can’t think of a mass shooting event in recent years that didn’t feature some wingnut moron making a similar speculation, including the shooting by that far-right terrorist nutbag in Norway who killed dozens of his fellow Norwegians to protest Muslim immigration.
Tom
@goblue72: Ironically enough, this actually happened. In the aftermath of Katrina, Bush/Cheney had Blackwater go door-to-door and confiscate firearms.
So the one time that Big Government actually DID come to ‘take our guns’ and we didn’t hear a peep from the ammosexuals.
beltane
@Denali: If someone didn’t yell “Allahu Akbar!” it didn’t happen.
Pogonip
@goblue72: I pick 1 as most likely (apparently the facility is “troubled”) and 4 as next most likely.
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
Because one of those things is not like the other.
Germy
I wonder what civilized countries think of us? European college students who contemplate visiting the U.S. and their parents saying “are you sure you want to go there?”
goblue72
@Scapegoat: The TRUMP didn’t say that. That’s not what the TRUMP said. You are misrepresenting what the TRUMP said. You’re lying about what the TRUMP said.
JPL
From the NYTimes..
On the local police scanner, authorities reported that they were in pursuit of a vehicle, possibly with at least one of the suspects, heading northbound out of San Bernardino. Another possible suspect vehicle with Arizona license plates had also been seen driving away from the scene.
The number, gender and ethnic identity of the suspects has not been
lgerard
Has anybody checked to see if the Muslims in New Jersey are cheering?
I am sure Eric Bolling is on the case
Iowa Old Lady
@D58826: In Iowa, blind people can get gun licenses.
Roger Moore
@Brachiator:
Because guns are much more useful in committing crimes than ballots.
pat
Seems they are still looking for three suspects in an SUV.. Three doesn’t sound like a disgruntled co-worker…
Roger Moore
@Denali:
Because we don’t yet know if the shooter(s) is/are Muslim.
Scout211
I lived in Stockton CA in 1989 when my two daughters came home from school to tell me a wild story about a gunmen shooting and killing children on the playground of Cleveland school (not their school).
Because this was waaaaay before smart phones and social media, I didn’t believe them. It was too awful and too shocking. It just couldn’t be true.
I turned on the television and it was shockingly true. It was one of the first mass shootings at a school in US history. The nation was shocked.
I am so sickened that each mass shooting, while just as tragic as the next one, is sadly not shocking anymore.
goblue72
@Germy: They think we are barbaric cowboys.
D58826
@Iowa Old Lady: Then we really have left the known universe. We need a new phrase – jumping the shark no longer cuts it
Litlebritdifrnt
@Germy: My family thinks I am insane for still living here. Not only because of this kind of bullshit but because of the atrocious health care situation. They cannot wait until I move home.
Mary G
Someone who works there, but had taken the day off, called into the local news just now. His daughter also works there and called him from the restroom while the shooting was going on. It was a Christmas party/award ceremony for SB county employees. She hunkered down and was not hurt, but she must have been terrified, as he was.
Betty Cracker
@JPL: Could be understandable confusion in the aftermath. Or maybe it’s real. The CNN “breaking news” chyron currently reads:
“Police officers with heavy weapons will be dispatched to key sites like universities, hospitals and Planned Parenthood sites that could be vulnerable in San Bernardino, California, a local law enforcement source says.”
Who the fuck knows?
Elie
@Archon:
Why shoot up a rehab facility?
“Soft” target? Perversely among the softest of all…..
God help us — pray not – please…
Germy
@goblue72: About 20 years ago I had a friend visit from the UK. She told me her parents warned her before she left to make sure to get medical and dental checkups before coming here (She lived here for about a year for work) because they told her the U.S. medical/insurance system was insane. They were terrified she’d have a medical emergency and bankrupt her family. They also worried about her being shot.
Germy
@Litlebritdifrnt: Why on earth would you want to stay here? I fantasize about taking up residence in Canada or some civilized European country.
Elie
@Germy:
I of course understand your feelings, but the last thing this world needs is for decent people to abandon this country to the orks…
rikyrah
HOW did the Domestic Terrorists get their guns to kill the disabled?
GregB
If the shooter(s) is not an Islamic militant we can rest assured that it is the work of a lone mentally ill gunman, a transgendered liberal Black lives matter protester or an Obama initiated false flag to frame Wayne LaPierre and his fan boys.
Germy
@Elie: but the orks have already taken over…
Trump leads in the polls. The GOP (that everyone assures me is “doomed”) has taken over most local governments and the congress. Every few days there’s another shooting.
Iowa Old Lady
@GregB: An article on Kos says three white men in military gear. Early info, of course, so who knows?
Elie
@rikyrah:
Well they went to a gun show and bought them right out.. Just like everyone else.
goblue72
@Germy: If I had an EU passport – or any easy ability to emigrate to the EU – I would do it in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, while I am in a skilled profession, its not a technical or engineering profession, and is highly tied to the specifics of the U.S. legal and real estate system.
Shoulda studied computer programming in college.
Brachiator
@trollhattan:
Really? I’m not for guns, but restoring a felon’s right to vote seems to easily lead to reconsideration of the restoration of all rights. Otherwise, you are being capricious and arbitrary.
@Roger Moore.
The Bush political crime family would disagree with you about that.
Kay
@rikyrah:
They’re saying the facility has a conference area that is rented out for events. The event was a banquet for county employees- there are three buildings- so it may not be disabled people.
dman
@bemused: @bemused:
I’ll take a stab with what will be said…
“If only they were all armed inside…”
Elie
@Germy:
Nope — sorry I donot believe that. Trump leads the orks, but there are plenty of the decent tribe. You seriously need to stop thinking that. THAT is defeat before ever taking up the battle and I will not do that…. no reason to do that. Don’t give the light of your strength to the darkness THAT easy.
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
I see your problem, do you?
Pogonip
@Litlebritdifrnt: Why DO you stay here? Is GB worse? Are we the lesser evil?
Germy
GregB
County employees.
It is either ISIS style attack or a Posse Comitatus type of reunion.
Elie
@goblue72:
I’m really sorry that you feel that. Really.
MobiusKlein
@Iowa Old Lady: Legally blind is not the same as totally blind. It’s not like you have to pass a vision test elsewhere to get a gun permit.
NickM
My right-wing FB friends are mysteriously silent, praying that the shooters turn out to be “Muslin”. If so, this will mean “WAR”!! If not, the silence will be deafening.
trollhattan
A handy dandy 2015 mass shooting calendar here.
Citizen_X
@Amir Khalid:
So…white males then, eh? /cynical me
pat
Live update from the Guardian says there was some sort of “function” that was targeted by the shooters.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Pogonip: DH is two years away from retirement. It would be foolish to throw away 18 years of hard word and contributing to a retirement system that you never collect on. As soon as his retirement kicks in at age 60 that whooshing sound you hear will be me and him heading across the Atlantic.
jl
@trollhattan: That commenter seems to be in a trolling mode right now. Probably best to ignore until some argument is made for the bald assertions.
goblue72
@Elie: I am so done with this country. I am middle aged and I have absolutely no faith that this country is going to make much improvement over the next 20 years. Don’t want to waste rest of my life on the off chance maybe, someday, sorta we will get a real social welfare system is more than just scrap handouts for the poor, but is a broad based, economic redistributionist system.
There are countries on this planet where – to varying degrees – that has already been achieved – the Nordic Countries, the Benelux countries, France, etc. Generous vacation policies, shorter work weeks, REAL family friendly supports (subsidized child care, significant maternity leave, etc), better public school systems, real public transit, safer streets, etc.
Its hard to become rich there, but who cares. You can be comfortably middle class, happier and have more time with your family. What once upon a time we’d call “civilization”.
So done with the U.S. So done.
Brachiator
@trollhattan:
The problem is yours. Defend your position, if you can.
Linnaeus
Another day of life, and death, in America.
Scapegoat
@Iowa Old Lady:
But… but… with BEARDS, right? RIGHT?!?!?
Iowa Old Lady
@MobiusKlein: You don’t have to pass a vision test to get a gun permit? That…does not comfort me.
Punchy
Anyone wanna speculate how many innocents currently on the road in black SUVs are about to be stopped, beaten, cuffed, and perhaps shot?
Elie
Have people ever noticed that its always the liberal progressives who threaten to move to another country at the first sign of any trouble? The right-winged haters always want to throw OTHER people out, but we liberals always want to “self deport” as soon as the crazy oppo brandish their threats and shake their weenies around.
Dunno about you, but I don’t want anyone to push me off what is mine and what I struggle to uphold.
The Thin Black Duke
@Litlebritdifrnt: Good. I’m glad you’re getting the hell out of Dodge. This country has turned into a goddamned insane asylum and too many Americans living here like it that way.
Calouste
@Roger Moore: I agree with that, Islamic terrorists go for high profile targets. It would also be unusual if this was a work or relationship related shooting for the shooter to flee the scene, as well for it to be more than one shooter (although that’s still unconfirmed).
Brachiator
@Punchy:
Zero.
goblue72
@Litlebritdifrnt: Us too. We are already eyeing on saving for a small condo in eastern France, likely in one of the mid-size regional cities along connected to Paris by TGV – someplace like Dijon, Lyon, Avignon. Nothing fancy. Maybe buy while still working, hire a professional property management company and rent out via AirBnB in meantime. And seems frankly more affordable to buy a retirement condo there, than here in the Bay Area.
Spouse and I taking French at the local community college this Spring.
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
That’s not the best “I know you are, but what am I?” I’ve seen in this site, so try again if you can, Sparky.
Elie
@goblue72:
So tell me, what would you fight/struggle for? Anything?
If you are so over it, then so be it… best you go where you can have it just easy breezy, I guess.
trollhattan
@Punchy: @Brachiator:
Yeah, that never happens.
JMG
@goblue72: Alas, current French law limits the time a foreign (non-EU) family can live as residents to about six months of the year. Either Lyon or Avignon would be great, however. Good luck!
Germy
@goblue72: Wow, you actually have a plan. That’s admirable.
I mostly dream about it. I don’t think my wife wants to leave her family behind. I’m stuck here.
Amir Khalid
@Iowa Old Lady:
My understanding is that anywhere in America, one need not pass any test to get a gun — not in firearms safety, not in marksmanship — and short of a felony record it’s near impossible to lose one’s right to a gun.
Germy
@Elie: I’ve been fighting and struggling for forty years here. And always with the assumption that once the old racists/rightwingers died out, things would improve. And now we see people who were in grade school when I was voting and protesting, and they’re running for president, saying the same shit Ronald Reagan said.
Karen
GOP and Trump will “suggest” the following:
1. Disabled are really Muslims in disguise and by killing them, it kills ISIS.
2. Disabled are not really disabled.
3. Disabled are thugs and gunmen were in fear of their life.
4. Disabled are really Syrian Refugees so the gunmen HAD to shoot them.
Does anyone have any more of have I just about covered it?
Ridnik Chrome
@Elie: Agree with you one hundred percent.
Germy
from NYMag:
mtiffany
Can’t wait for Mika and Joe to tell us how violent video games are to blame and we shouldn’t even so much as arch an eyebrow in the direction of those nice patriots over at the NRA…
Kryptik
@Elie:
It’s the consistent sense of futility and feeling that every lesson that is learned, no matter how hard we work, is always the exact opposite of the lesson that should be learned, and that the country’s arc, outside of a few thankful outliers, is consistently bent toward the right, forever and anon.
It’s hard to feel like we can be Americans when the country, no matter how hard you try, consistently screams “NO” and kneecaps you to the ground.
sm*t cl*de
@Germy:
The rest of the world is increasingly reluctant to accept US refugees.
Heliopause
I request forgiveness for joining in the speculation-fest, but does anybody know if the San Bernardino County Dept. of Health provides abortion services?
Germy
@Heliopause: Their website has crashed.
Linnaeus
@Elie:
People get understandably frustrated, and I don’t begrudge anyone’s individual choice to live where they want, but I think people also forget what it took even for other nations to get where they are now.
I think social democracy as it’s been achieved in much of Europe is admirable and the US would do well to emulate what they’ve done (or even emulate some of what Canada does). But it took years and years of political movement work, dealing with undemocratic and/or repressive governments, political violence, and flat out war.
? Martin
My stepsister used to work there. She no longer lives in CA, but I’m guessing she still has a few friends she’s kept in touch with.
I’m just waiting for my campus to get hit.
But boy, look at all those good guys with guns unable to do jack shit about it. I don’t question that they are extremely well trained and competent, but guns give you a first mover advantage that cannot be easily countered no matter what.
Kryptik
@Germy:
If anything, it feels like the age of social media has allowed the ‘millennials’ to buck the supposed trend and come out even more racist, bigoted, and right-wing in general outside of a few outlier issues. And all without the annoying real world consequence of having to meet diverse people to get them to rethink their issues
Outside of a few major public figures, the most terrifyingly eliminationist and bigoted shit I’ve seen have come from the under-30s, my generation, who would love nothing more than to have me tarred as a plague, an invader, an abberation, and are more than willing to act on it clearly now. And I’m not even gay, muslim, or black, the Unholy Trifecta of Super-Motherfucking Not-American. The Othering is strong in the Millennials, and the demographic advantage we’re supposed to see is feeling more and more like an utter lie with every passing month.
SiubhanDuinne
@beltane:
Someone on FB (so, for what it’s worth) said they had heard the conference room was the site of a Christmas party.
Fox News: “Another salvo in the Democrat War on Christmas!”
Brachiator
@trollhattan:
Sorry, the ball is in your court. If you have something better than weak snark, bring it. The restoration of felon’s rights is an issue that might come up in the next election. What wisdom do you have to share?
Elie
@Germy:
I guess you only see the failure and the back slidding. Not the successes and progress. I dunno, I do not see utopia anywhere just de facto. Only things that must be worked for.
I am very committed to the work of continuing to improve and build the United States of America. I will grant you that these days are very challenging and depressing. Very. I admit to being also scared/doubting that my efforts and the efforts of many of like mind, may not be enough.
This past election in my county, we defeated ALL the right winged candidates for the County council. Something that I worked for but truly did not expect. It means something, but is not everything. Lot of work to do but definitely encouraging, as the red team had all the money…
I just don’t give up like that. My people have been lynched and put in back of buses. Lots of folks fought for full citizenship here against great odds. I wish our fight was over and resolved, but to give up now? To walk away from the bloody sacrifices of so many, just like that? No way. Not evah — not for me.
You and others may see it differently.
Germy
@Elie: I have to say I admire you. I truly do. I admit I give in to despair too often. You are one of my favorite commenters here.
goblue72
@JMG: My understanding is that it is possible to get a long-term resident visa in France. You have to be retired (not going to work in France) and demonstrate the financial means to support yourself – a “visa de long sojourn”.
There’s a financial assets/income test, but its not as onerous as say Switzerland, where they only want rich retirees. And passive income earned from U.S. investments (including Social Security) is exempt from taxation in France, as long as it not over a certain amount.
So if you are retired, buy a property, and have sufficient income from Social Security and your investment accounts, its possible.
? Martin
@Kryptik:
That is exactly the opposite of my experience. My kids and their friends are unerringly tolerant.
That said, I agree that the intensity of hate speech has gotten much worse, but I think the number of people responsible for it has declined considerably. Same with the gun issue – fewer gun fetishists, but they have WAY the fuck more guns than they used to.
Germy
FlyingToaster
@Amir Khalid: Not true.
Massachusetts has very strict laws — you have to convince your police chief (or in the larger cities’ case, the Police Department) that you should have a gun.
In Watertown, that means you belong to a shooting or hunting club, pass a safety and marksmanship test (can and usually is administed by your club), that you pass the national registry (not a felon in or out of MA), that you have no outstanding warrants, that you have no restraining orders against you, and have safe storage for your weapons. Then you can get a permit to buy them.
In Missouri, on the other hand, you can buy a long gun (rifle or shotgun) at any sporting good store (or department of a department store). You only need id. A handgun or a semi-auto required a permit in 1977, but I believe the laws may have changed since then.
goblue72
@Elie: Seriously? That’s some majorly presumptive self-satisfied high ground claiming on your part.
By your reasoning, any person emigrating from their home country to go to another country for a perceived “better life” is abandoning their home country because they won’t “fight” for it.
That’s just blind nationalism and is nothing to crow about. People should be free to immigrate to where they like, for whatever personal reasons they have, and be free from judgment. Otherwise, every immigrant in this country who came here because they preferred it to their home country should pack their bags and go home to go improve THEIR country.
PaulW
Betty, if that was Tampa you’re talking about, that shooting was at one of those office buildings off the Causeway near the airport, right? I remember that one.
Amir Khalid
@Heliopause:
They provide rehab services for the physically and developmentally disabled. I doubt abortions are on offer.
Scapegoat
@Kryptik:
Seriously? My experience has been the opposite (in urban areas and college towns). Do you live in an urban, suburban, or rural area? What region?
trollhattan
@Brachiator:
Begin with your citations, as you seem to be the sole person to have brought it into the comments. Which states are preparing to give ex-felons guns and the vote?
Amir Khalid
@FlyingToaster:
Thanks. I stand corrected.
Calouste
@goblue72: Lyon is the second or third largest city in France (the other one about the same size is Marseille), with 1.5 million inhabitants or so. Hardly a mid-sized regional city.
Why the east of France btw? Winters are fairly cold there due to the elevation. The west, places like Tours or Poitiers, is a lot milder. Also more touristy so better for your airbnb plan.
goblue72
@Scapegoat: Me too – most of the millennial I encounter seem more liberal/tolerant not less. But I haven’t lived outside a big city in 25 years.
schrodinger's cat
@Elie: Hear, hear. I agree. I don’t know why doom and gloom porn is so addictive, seems to me it cuts across the ideological divide.
Scapegoat
@Elie:
Bravo! Proof that there can be progress. Keep at it!
Brachiator
@Elie:
Well said. Very nice, especially given today’s horrible events in San Bernardino.
Heliopause
@Amir Khalid:
I’m referencing a report that the room targeted was being rented out to a county Dept. of Health event.
Fair Economist
@Elie:
Yay Elie!
goblue72
@Calouste: I was shorthanding. Yes, Lyon obviously a bit bigger. More meant one of the cities along that side but outside Paris due to cost.
As for Tours and that area, we enjoyed the Loire, but couldn’t see living there and frankly felt too “touristy”. As for Poitiers, don’t really vibe on living in Southwestern France. My wife would probably pick Dijon if it was up to her, and I’d probably choose Avignon. Pretty sure we can agree on something.
Liberal With Attitude
I’m just saying the same damn thing I say every time.
There is no moral right to own a deadly weapon in a civilized society.
None. Period.
I’m not interested in pacifying the gun nuts, or placating the fearful, or reassuring the hunters.
Guns need to become a regulated privilege.
Political feasibility isn’t the point. Changing the conversation moving the window, getting to a different frame of reference is the point.
Origuy
In the eighties, I was working in north Sunnyvale, CA. Down the street from my office was a subsidiary of TRW called ESL. On February 16, 1988, a man obsessed with a former co-worker went there with an arsenal and 1000 rounds of ammunition. He went into the building and shot eleven people, killing four. One of the wounded was the object of his obsession, who had obtained a restraining order against him.
rikyrah
About the shooting today:
You don’t HAPPEN upon a place like this.
You PLAN to come to a place like this.
You PLAN to come with a DEATH WEAPON to kill people at a place like this.
Please explain to me….WHAT THESE PEOPLE COULD HAVE DONE TO YOU TO OFFEND YOU SO MUCH THAT YOU COME HERE TO MURDER.
trollhattan
@Amir Khalid:
Only medical services listed are dental.
Elie
@Germy:
Believe me… I have to fight it too. We have to keep each other strong, Germy. Thank you for your kind words…
schrodinger's cat
@rikyrah: This does seem like a well planned operation.
Elie
@goblue72:
As I said, goblue, others may have other thoughts or may make other decisions. I just shared my values and priorities. That is why we can all choose our own path, right?
PS – by the way, I am NOT a nationalist if you mean by that, a person who believes “America love it or leave it”. I KNOW the US is flawed — very flawed. I have a dream that it might be better and the people here can make it better — more just, more humanistic, more “free” in the best sense. I do not support blind fealty to its symbols or to its power.
dlm
@rikyrah: And they Planned how to get away.
Kryptik
@Scapegoat:
Urban, but again, social media and online interaction, from people I know personally offline and/or online, letting their freak flag fly, in ways that clearly belie their honest thoughts rather than what might say in ‘polite company’. People who might see me and be ok with me, but then turn around and say shit that clearly betrays the idea that I’m only one of the ‘good ones’ and would otherwise be subjected to the same vitriol toward someone similar but without the anchor of personal familairity. That doesn’t even get into the ugly morass of Facebook and Twitter strangers, stories about the shit going on at schools, and the sheer depth and depravity seemingly perpetuating in the public institutions brushed off with a ‘meh’ by the media unless it has a sexy inroad to demonizing all blacks/muslims/etc.
There’s reason I so rarely advocate anything politically in person anymore outside of honest friends and family.
schrodinger's cat
@Elie: This country is flawed but so is any other country in the world.
Sunday’s NYT had a report about how it is impossibility to assimilate in Belgium if you are not white. It doesn’t matter if you were born there, you are always an outsider, to be referred to as a foreigner, if you are not white.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
For those outside the area, San Bernardino is out in the desert about 60 miles east of Los Angeles. It’s about as likely to be Daesh terrorists as Oklahoma City was. This was committed by American murderers, not foreigners.
Calouste
@schrodinger’s cat: Belgians are Flemish or Walloon first, Belgians second. Half the country thinks the other half are foreigners, and vice versa. That doesn’t exactly make integrating actual foreigners easier.
skerry
@Origuy: I was working there at that time. Friends of mine were killed.
D58826
only slightly OT –
But but but it must have been a transgender liberal. (sigh)
Chris
@Betty Cracker:
That’s exactly right. I can’t think of a mass shooting event in recent years that didn’t feature some wingnut moron making a similar speculation, including the shooting by that far-right terrorist nutbag in Norway who killed dozens of his fellow Norwegians to protest Muslim immigration.
A far right terrorist nutbag who cited Pamela Geller and Daniel Pipes among his inspirations. Funny how the American right wing felt no obligation at all to “denounce the extremist.”
schrodinger's cat
@Calouste: Did you read the piece? The near impossibility of assimilation in Belgium. According to the author, assimilation is easier if you are white but impossible if you are not, even if you speak with a perfect Flemish accent and are not an immigrant at all but a citizen from birth.
Origuy
@skerry: Ouch. Sorry to open a wound. I didn’t know anyone there, but I knew people who did. We went on lockdown for a while.
Chris
@Tom:
Ironically enough, this actually happened. In the aftermath of Katrina, Bush/Cheney had Blackwater go door-to-door and confiscate firearms.
…
So the one time that Big Government actually DID come to ‘take our guns’ and we didn’t hear a peep from the ammosexuals.
The Bush era and its impact on the militia movement brand of paranoia is fascinating, in the sense that there was no impact at all. The loonies spent the entire decade of the 1990s spinning conspiracy theories that saw a Clintonian black helicopter behind every cattle mutilation. Then the Bush administration rolls around and actually does a ton of what they were saying Clinton wanted to do… and the movement is basically dormant. Doesn’t start waking up against until the end of the Bush era.
Chris
@Elie:
Liberals don’t have the tribal revulsion for everything foreign or the blind certainty that America is the bestst best country that ever best’d, so they can entertain the idea of that kind of change better than a lot of right wingers.
But even there, I don’t think you’re exactly right that it’s just us. “Going Galt” is a meme for a reason; when I was reading right wing blogs in the aftermath of Obama’s election, it wasn’t unusual to see right wingers begging the wealthy to leave this ungrateful jealous socialist country to sink in its own shit, or even speculating about doing it themselves. (Of course, as with most liberals, it’s mostly just piss and wind).
skerry
@Origuy: No problem. You didn’t open any wounds. Days like today open them. So very sad.
Chris
@Linnaeus:
I think social democracy as it’s been achieved in much of Europe is admirable and the US would do well to emulate what they’ve done (or even emulate some of what Canada does). But it took years and years of political movement work, dealing with undemocratic and/or repressive governments, political violence, and flat out war.
I’m a dual citizen who’s pondered this occasionally over the years, and who is now looking at going back there at least for a while (master’s degree finished here, no job or immediately convenient relatives to stay with – so I’ll be staying with those on the other side of the Atlantic).
The thing that always gives me pause is that Europe comes with its own bucket of problems, which IMHO are going to be getting worse, not better. Yes, the 20th century social-democratic revolutions went further in Western Europe than in the United States, and its legacy is a much more humane system. But between the austerian sadism that’s taken hold among elites and the far right populist wave, it’s not the best time to be a left wing reformer right now (witness the savagery with which Syriza was confronted this year) and I’m as worried for the future there as I am here. The center right party back in France has been trying to reach out to (“win back”) far right voters ever since Sarkozy in a dynamic that looks uncomfortably reminiscent of the Southern Strategy to me – I could totally see myself moving to France, and in a few years having a front row seat to the election of a Reagan style demagogue. And France is by no means doing worst out of the European nations.
Linnaeus
@Chris:
I’ve been wondering about all that myself. The right in Europe is by no means moribund.
Scapegoat
@Kryptik: That sucks pretty mightily. Very sorry to hear it. I’d say you might want to find a new circle of friends, but am guessing that’s not as easily done as one might wish. On the plus side, the better example you set, the greater your chance of being a subtle, but positive influence.
I, too, have found this to be a fairly decent survival strategy. Sad to say.
Another Holocene Human
@Brachiator: Because there may be a compelling state interest in restricting certain people from obtaining guns who otherwise should have their civil rights restored?
What about a guy who only spent a year in prison but said he was gonna “blow away” his ex girlfriend and her mom … served his time, paid his debt to society, ought to be able to vote and have a job … but should he really have a handgun right now?
What about someone who had severe mental problems before, during, and after being sent to prison and is mentally competent to sign contracts and stuff like that … but too unstable to be around guns or frankly any sharp objects either?
Another Holocene Human
@Skippy-san:
This kind of mayhem is positively medieval, a time far, far in the rear view mirror for men of the Enlightenment. They reasonably expected domestic tranquility meant domestic tranquility and up until the 1950s state and local governments had lots of rules and regulations about what kinds of nasty human-bane devices you could own or carry in public.
Another Holocene Human
@Betty Cracker: OKC bombing, media was talking about moooslems. That’s why they kind of held their tongues for a moment on 9/11. They knew they had gotten it so very wrong in OKC.
Kryptik
@Scapegoat:
And considering the way things are, literally so. My bracing fear is being assaulted or worse by someone deep in the fever swamp because I made an offhand political comment and they decided I was ‘the enemy’.
Scapegoat
@Kryptik: I’m not that fearful (yet), but I did lose a close friend after sending him a ‘Congratulations!’ email after Obama was elected.
I knew he was deeply opposed to Obama, but had no idea how far his fear really went. He was retired at the age of 35 and living off investments from a tidy sum of money given to him by his parents. (Tough circumstances, right?). He was certain that he and his family (non-working wife, two kids) were going to lose a large chunk of their assets as a result of the election.
Strangely, he hasn’t called to express appreciation that Obama saved his bacon by pulling us all out of the fiscal meltdown fostered by W.
Oh well.
Ruckus
@Scapegoat:
I can make new friends. I don’t need bad friends.
prob50
@Punchy: In San Berdu? Probably “None”. However, I believe the “Over/Under” for the continental US is 21 1/2.