Here’s the live stream of the NYPD Press Conference regarding the attack/incident on the lower west side earlier this afternoon.
The information regarding today’s attack will likely change over the next 24-36 hours, so keep that in mind.
Open thread.
waspuppet
OK, here we go. They say they’re investigating it as a terror attack. But Gov. Cuomo JUST said there’s no evidence of a wider plot.
So what makes it a terror attack?
(That’s a rhetorical question.)
cain
I remember ramming cars into a people was not a thing. Seems like we seeing more of this now.
TenguPhule
Sadly, I predict Trump and his fellow traitors are going to use this as an obvious distraction.
Once upon a time, that would have been unthinkable.
Major Major Major Major
@cain: ISIS promotes it in their literature, for one.
TenguPhule
@cain:
You remember incorrectly.
It has been a thing for awhile.
It had just fallen out of favor because guns were more readily available.
rikyrah
Were the kids the target?
rikyrah
@TenguPhule:
They are all about the distraction.
That’s who they are
trollhattan
@cain:
Somewhat complicating matters is the fairly common redneck hatred of people on bikes. For all we know the NY driver could be from Staten Island.
Served
The rented Home Depot truck is going to be a thing.
TenguPhule
@trollhattan:
That would confirm the terrorist angle then. //
Yarrow
@rikyrah: Witnesses said the driver seemed to target the school bus.
Adam L Silverman
@waspuppet: They took the guy into custody. The suspect, upon exiting the rental truck, began yelling “Allahu Akbar”. They’ve spoken with the suspect. The type of incident is consistent with attacks in Europe.
It appears to be discreet and one off. As far as we know now. Remember the greatest concentration of counterterrorism and intelligence assets in the US is located in NY City. One of the intel fusion centers is in the area where this occurred. One lone nut who decides to do something stupid for whatever cause they’re espousing is very, very hard to stop. As bad as this was – 8 dead, 15 injured – it could have been a lot worse. Had he had just one AR pattern rifle with a drum magazine he could have killed and/or wounded dozens. Had he rented a bigger, heavier truck he could have killed and wounded a lot more. Had he waited and tried to do this at the Halloween parade tonight it could have been far, far worse. Had he just decided to ram into the playground at the school in the neighborhood it would have been far, far worse.
Trentrunner
Why can’t Trump keep us safe?
cain
I sure hope it isn’t a muslim, but another white man. Of course, another chance for Turmeric Toga man to screw it up with the victims. But he might do it with more zeal if the driver was either a 1) muslim 2) immigrant 3) black man…
He might even visit their flag draped coffins… fucker.
MJS
@rikyrah: For the most part, we have become accustomed to these things & worse, so I don’t expect it to be a useful distraction for long.
Elizabelle
@Adam L Silverman: I’m not with CNN, so when I see something like this I think: Good on our law enforcement agencies. This does not happen much here, and targeting bike riders and pedestrians with a vehicle, pellet gun and paintball gun smacks of desperation.
He did not have an assault weapon or make a suicide vest. Sounds like a disorganized attacker.
But CNN will flog this for all they can.
mai naem mobile
@trollhattan: the guy supposedly said Allah akbar when he got out of the truck. Ofcourse it could be a redneck muslin who hates cyclists.
Also too, putting on my tinfoil hat ,this happens just when Dolt45 has had his worst day in office and Muellers probe is just bearing fruit. Things that make you go hmmm hmmm.
Patricia Kayden
@Adam L Silverman: So indeed a terror attack. Sigh.
TenguPhule
FTFY.
JaneSays
@waspuppet: It was a terrorist attack because it appears to have had the explicit purpose of terrorizing people.
I have no problem with calling what this piece of shit did a “terrorist attack”, even though I know the orange fuckstain in the White House will parlay it into an opportunity to further malign more than 20% of the entire human population. It was unambiguously a terrorist attack.
The problem isn’t that we’re OK with calling things like this terrorism, it’s that we’re (not anyone here, presumably) hesitant about calling things like this “terrorism” when perpetrated by white men without any overt religious connotations.
Whether or not something is “terrorism” is defined by the act itself, not the perpetrator. This was terrorism. As was Las Vegas. As was Charlottesville. Reality-based people without a deep-seeded hatred for an entire group of brown people who refer to their conception of God as “Allah” recognize this.
cain
@Adam L Silverman:
Great so the dude is muslim.. fucking fantastic. I can hear the collective, frustrated, sigh from just about every non-batshit insane citizen of this country. If this was ISIS, they picked a good time for it.
schrodingers_cat
@mai naem mobile:
My mind went there too.
TenguPhule
@Adam L Silverman:
The scary thing is, these fuckers can learn.
Major Major Major Major
@JaneSays:
Yup, exactly. Just because Republicans don’t call obvious white/christianist terrorism terrorism doesn’t mean we should refrain from calling obvious islamist terrorism terrorism.
TenguPhule
@cain:
Almost as if Trump gave them a phone call or something.
/But surely even he couldn’t possibly be that stupid……..
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Served: Got a lot on orange on it, so either keeping with the day or the orange thing in the White House.
cain
@TenguPhule: Don’t worry 27% of this country will say he shouldn’t be indicted for colluding to do it. /s
TenguPhule
@JaneSays:
So after disqualifying the major papers and cable media, what do we have left?
Gin & Tonic
@cain: He’s apparently from Florida, too. So we can require everyone living in Florida to condemn his actions.
You first, Adam.
cain
@Trentrunner:
Didn’t he say he is the only one who can do it? The only one who can make us safe?
TenguPhule
@MJS:
You underestimate the depths FOX will sink to.
d58826
Der Fuhrer is at it again
Major Major Major Major
@cain: He alone, yes.
@TenguPhule: Fox is only watched by like five million people.
MJS
@cain: Exactly. “Look, I suck at preventing terrorist attacks” is not a great distraction from “I won the presidency because of the Russians.”
TenguPhule
@cain:
He claims we misheard him, he meant to say, he wants to keep our safes.
SatanicPanic
I guess his plan to defeat ISIS didn’t work.
TenguPhule
@Major Major Major Major: Which is five million too many.
But more seriously, the other news networks love them some gorn too. And if FOX shouts loud enough, they all start to play follow the leader.
MJS
@TenguPhule: No, I don’t. You overestimate their reach and influence. If they were as influential as everyone thinks they are, Trumps approval numbers wouldn’t be in the shitter.
japa21
@Gin & Tonic: Hmmm, Tampa area. Awfully suspicious.
TenguPhule
@SatanicPanic:
Trump insists he prefers Americans who aren’t killed by terrorist attacks.
Major Major Major Major
@TenguPhule: Eh, sort of. The rest of the media has to want to play along, like with Hillary’s emails or Benghazi. If it’s just Fox alone it doesn’t have nearly as much pull.
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: I condemn his actions. Unequivocally.
Happy now?
TenguPhule
@Major Major Major Major:
So you don’t think this is going to turn into another “He just turned presidential!” moment when Trump reacts to this?
tobie
@mai naem mobile: I’ve often wondered if Putin’s media operations don’t extend to participating in chat rooms and to encouraging unstable people to do horrific things when it’s politically expedient for Vlad. All this is to say…you’re not the only one with a tinfoil hat.
Adam L Silverman
@tobie: We know they do. We have evidence of it. There were news reports about it just last week.
Major Major Major Major
@TenguPhule: To be fair that only lasted like ten seconds until he stepped on his own dick again.
Schlemazel
@cain:
But the EEEeeee-vile liberal courts stopped him!! If only he had been allowed to ban immigration from Chad and Venezuela this never would have happened. Damn liberals
TenguPhule
@Adam L Silverman:
Well that’s fucking horrifying.
TenguPhule
@Major Major Major Major: True, but how many times did we have to suffer those same ten seconds?
TS
It took about 2 weeks for the media to forget about Las Vegas shooting – will this be different?
debbie
Thank Whoever those kids weren’t out and about. I hope they saw none of it.
MJS
@TenguPhule: There have been a number of recent events where the media in general has had the opportunity to proclaim Trump once again “presidential”. They have not, because he has failed every single time. Why do you think he will be able to say anything remotely presidential now?
TenguPhule
@Schlemazel:
Oh damn, he’s going to do exactly that, isn’t he. Blame his blocked travel ban again.
trollhattan
@JaneSays:
Yes, terrorism. Charlottsville: terrorism. Las Vegas: terrorism. London: terrorism. And so forth, the thing binding them is perpetrators who do not value the lives of others and want attention.
Starfish
@waspuppet: Someone yelled “Allahu Akbar.”
rikyrah
@Gin & Tonic:
He went to NY kill people?
Timurid
FLORIDA MAN
Shalimar
@mai naem mobile: There is that, but I have had MSNBC on for maybe half of the last 34 hours. There isn’t anything left they can say about Manafort/Gates/Papadopoulos and there isn’t going to be any new info any time soon, so that story is played out. This isn’t really distracting from it.
MJS
@TS: And less time to forget London, Paris, etc. Fox News will do everything they can to play this to Trump’s benefit, but they’re the only ones.
trollhattan
@TS:
To their credit our local paper has run Vegas survivor stories, chronicling many now facing a life coping with permanent injuries up to quadriplegia, and lack of adequate medical and long-term care coverage for it. So very many victims. Our region is further distracted by all the awful nearby fires, also with ghastly death tolls.
Somehow Trump continues to frontpage himself.
trollhattan
@Timurid:
“Saipov?” Sounds suspiciously Russian. The famous Florida-Russia-NYC triangle.
Sloane Ranger
The convenience of the timing for Trump was my 2nd thought too. Then I felt ashamed for thinking that.
Someone on CNN said it was fortunate the guns were fake or the death toll would have been considerably higher. Could News York’s stronger than average gun laws have saved lives?
d58826
@TenguPhule: YES YES Der Fuhrer knows how to protect America.
Oh wait the driver is a legal alien who arrived from Uzbekistan in 2010. Well then must be e-mails
Timurid
@trollhattan:
Apparently Uzbek. A lot of Central Asian names were Russianized under Russian/Soviet rule.
schrodingers_cat
@Timurid: Like the brothers in Boston. They were Chechen, IIRC.
d58826
@Timurid: @schrodingers_cat: Donald Trump is an absolute genus. He has imposed travel bans on countries whose citizens have never attacked us. Therefore his travel ban is a BIGLY Hugely success.
JaneSays
Terrorist is an Uzbek national named Sayfullo Saipov who came to the United States in 2010.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@d58826: You mean Uzbekibekistan.
Regnad Kcin
DO SOMETHING!,…
Hkedi
In times like these, for at least 24 hours, I try to follow the saying of Abraham Lincoln.
“Tis better to be silent and be thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt.”
Kathleen
@MJS: I have faith in @maggieNYT.
waspuppet
@JaneSays: OK. It’s the part about how this wouldn’t be terrorism if it were a white guy that rankles.
Death Panel Truck
@?BillinGlendaleCA: It was “Uzbekibekistanstan.” You’re short one stan.
Amir Khalid
@cain:
Muslim =/= person of colour