Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Gastritis broke my calculator.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

We can agree to disagree, but i’m right.

How has Obama failed you today?

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Four legs? good! two legs? we’re not so sure…

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Let there be snark.

Consistently wrong since 2002

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The revolution will be supervised.

I’m only here for the duck photos.

Nevertheless, she persisted.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

The math demands it!

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Yes we did.

Saul Alinsky is my co-pilot.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

‘Forty-two’ said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.

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Post Debate Open Thread: Good News Everybody, We Never Have To See or Hear the President Debate Ever Again!!!!

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Thank someone’s, anyone’s Deity or Deities, or if you’re an atheist, no one’s Deity or Deities, that that is over!!!

And now for your post debate enjoyment, I give you the most specialist operator to ever operate operationally!!!!

Here’s the full pic:

Post Debate Open Thread: Good News Everybody, We Never Have To See or Hear the President Debate Ever Again!!!!

This must be the world’s most dangerous Subway! Honestly, I used to go to the Subway on FOB Hammer, which is where my Brigade Combat Team was based out of in Iraq, a couple of times a week and get a sub. Sure, we were on the forward operating base, so inside the wire, but it was still a Subway in a war zone during a war albeit one that was in the Phase IV conventional/Phase VII unconventional phase of war, so post major combat operations. I don’t remember ever having more than my M9 (Beretta 92) and two extra magazines with me. Most of the time my sidearm staid in the armory and I checked it out for when I was operating off the FOB, which was about 50 to 60 percent of my deployed time. And even then, depending on what type of Engagements I was doing, I left my sidearm in the armory rather than carry it because of what not carrying it conveyed to the Iraqis I was interacting with.

The specialist operator to ever operate operationally here, however, is just WOW!!!!

This guy is carrying 4 full size SIG P320s, though the desert tan ones in the drop holsters appear to be an attempt to make it look like he’s carrying the military version, which is known as the M17.

He’s got two fill size mags in the black P320s, so that’s 17 rounds in each. 18 in each if he’s got one in the chamber in each gun. It looks like he’s got the 21 round extended mags for the desert tan ones. Let’s stipulate he’s got one in the pipe in all four guns. So that’s 80 rounds in the guns and he’s got two more full size and two more extended mags in the mag carriers in the small of his back. That’s 72 more rounds. Provided he doesn’t have more rounds or even more guns around front set up for cross draw or appendix carry or in his pockets, he’s got 152 rounds to get a $5 footlong!

Each of this pistols, brand new, out the door, is between $440 to $650 depending on what he’s actually bought. They all look to be the X grip configuration, so those are bit more expensive. The spare mags are $49.99 apiece. At the going rate of ammunition, if you can even find it right now, provided he’s got quality self defense ammo in the guns and the back up magazines, he’s got between $152 (Speer Gold Dots) to $228 (Federal HST) worth of ammunition on his waist and hips. Throw in another $200 to $250 for the drop holsters, the belt holsters, the gun belt, and the magazine carriers. So he’s spent between $3,000 and $4,000 to feel safe getting a $5 sandwich!

Personally I’d just go to a sandwich shop in a better neighborhood. Like Iraq.

Open thread!

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Today In Stochastic Terrorism: The FBI and Michigan State Police Prevent the Kidnapping of Governor Whitmer

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I can’t imagine why anyone in Michigan would think it was okay to plan a terroristic kidnapping and execution of the state governor?

Well that tweet explains it…

From The Detroit News (emphasis mine)

The FBI says it thwarted what it described as a plot to violently overthrow the government and kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. The alleged plot involved reaching out to members of a Michigan militia, according to a federal affidavit filed Thursday.

The court filing also alleges the conspirators twice conducted surveillance at Whitmer’s personal vacation home and discussed kidnapping her to a “secure location” in Wisconsin to stand “trial” for treason prior to the Nov. 3 election.

“Several members talked about murdering ‘tyrants’ or ‘taking’ a sitting governor,” an FBI agent wrote in the affidavit. “The group decided they needed to increase their numbers and encouraged each other to talk to their neighbors and spread their message.”

More than 12 people were arrested late Wednesday on state and federal charges.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel, federal and state officers on Thursday detailed charges and what they described as “elaborate plans” to overthrow the government and kidnap Whitmer.

Michigan State Police Col. Joe Gasper said the department will take swift action against those seeking to harm anyone in the state of Michigan.

“This case is one of the largest cases in recent history that the MSP has been involved in,” Gasper said during an afternoon news conference.

The affidavit filed in federal court details probable cause to charge the six men with conspiring to kidnap Whitmer. Those identified by name include:

  • Adam Fox
  • Barry Croft
  • Garbin
  • Kaleb Franks
  • Daniel Harris
  • Brandon Caserta

In late June, Fox posted on Facebook a video in which he complained about the state’s judicial system and COVID-19 restrictions on gyms operating in Michigan.

“Fox referred to Governor Whitmer as ‘this tyrant b—-,’ and stated, ‘I don’t know, boys, we gotta do something,” according to the court affidavit. “You guys link with me on our other location system, give me some ideas of what we can do.”

The affidavit describing the thwarted plot reports two occasions when the alleged conspirators conducted surveillance on Whitmer’s vacation home — during the day on Aug. 29 and at night over the weekend of Sept. 12-13.

Fox and two other individuals located Whitmer’s home and shot video and took photos of it as they drove by on Aug. 29. One of the individuals then calculated how long it would take local and state police to respond to an incident at the property.

“We ain’t going to let ’em burn our f—in’ state down. I don’t give a f— if there’s only 20 or 30 of us, dude, we’ll go out there and use deadly force,” said Fox during the surveillance operation, according to an audio recording quoted in the affidavit.

In an encrypted group chat, Garbin later suggested that demolishing a nearby bridge would hamper a response by police to the governor’s home, according to the court filing.

The September surveillance followed a field exercise in at Garbin’s property in Luther, Michigan, where the conspirators allegedly detonated an improvised explosive device made from a commercial firework wrapped in shrapnel “to test its anti-personnel effectiveness.”

After a briefing on the plan to kidnap Whitmer, a larger group of the men drive from Luther to the vacation home in three separate vehicles while armed.

They stopped to check the underside of a highway bridge to check for places to attach an explosive charge, and discussed detonating explosive devices to divert law enforcement officers from the area of the governor’s home.

“She f—ing goddamn loves the power she has right now,” Fox said during the surveillance operation, according to the affidavit. “I can see several states takin’ their f—in’ tyrants. Everybody takes their tyrants.”

The group later returned to Garbin’s property, where they discussed destroying Whitmer’s vacation home. “Kidnapping, arson, death, I don’t care,” Franks said, according to the affidavit.

The group later made plans to conduct a final training exercise in late October but then decided that was too close to the November election, so they moved forward with raising money to procure explosives and other supplies including an 800,000-volt taser. It’s unclear when the kidnapping was planned for.

Much more at the link.

In addition to the charges against the six men above, Michigan State Attorney General Dana Nessel has brought state charges against seven additional men and identified the militia involved as the Wolverine Watchmen.

The Wolverine Watchmen would be the Michigan Militia Corps, Wolverines. The front page of their website provides this information:

A well-armed citizenry is the best form of Homeland Security and can better deter crime, invasion, terrorism, and tyranny. The intention of this website is to inform, promote and facilitate the development and training of the militia. Everyone is welcome, regardless of race, creed, color, religion or political affiliation, provided you do not wish to bring harm to our country or people. If you are a United States citizen (or have declared your intent to become such), who is capable of bearing arms, or supports the right to do so, then YOU ARE the MILITIA!

The Bill of Rights Amendment II
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,
the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN OF 1963 ARTICLE I
§6 Bearing of arms.
Sec. 6. Every person has a right to keep and bear
arms for the defense of himself and the state.

And they have a link to their very long pdf handbook that goes into excruciatingly bad historic detail in asserting and delineating what a militia is, why it is legal under natural and constitutional law, and why it is necessary. For example:

The Militia for Beginners

The militia — sit down, brace yourself, this gets complicated — is: everyone! By definition, the militia consists of “all citizens capable of bearing arms”. I can list everyone and everything we are, but I think “everyone” pretty much covers it; so let’s move on to what we are not.

We are not racists fighting the “great race war…to annihilate the mud people”, we welcome everyone, regardless of the hue of their skin; we are not terrorists advocating violence or destroying buildings in Oklahoma full of men, women, and children, only lunatics do that; we are not right-wing religious extremists fighting “demonically controlled people activated by Satan”, we welcome everyone of every religion, no religion, or anything in between as the case may be.

We are portrayed as above, as it serves the purpose of tainting the legitimacy of our concerns. (Apply the duh theory here.)

The reality is that it is illegal to form a militia in all 50 states. You can find all the state by state details here at Georgetown Law Schools Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection, which has produced this handy and easy to use online fact sheet. Here’s the details for Michigan:

Is it legal to act as a private militia in Michigan?

No. All 50 states prohibit private, unauthorized militias and military units from engaging in activities reserved for the state militia, including law enforcement activities. Some, including Michigan, also prohibit paramilitary activity during or in furtherance of a civil disorder. Michigan’s laws are described below:

Michigan Constitution: The Michigan Constitution forbids private military units from operating outside state authority, providing that “[t]he military shall in all cases and at all times be in strict subordination to the civil power.” Mich. Const. art. I, § 7.

Michigan Statutes:

Prohibition on paramilitary activity: It is a felony in Michigan to either:

(1) “teach or demonstrate to another person the use, application, or construction of any firearm, or any explosive orincendiary device, if that person knows, has reason to know, or intends that what is taught or demonstrated will be used in, or in furtherance of, a civil disorder,” or

(2) “assemble with 1 or more persons for the purpose of training with, practicing with, or being instructed in the use of any firearm, or any explosive or incendiary device, if that person intends to use that firearm or device in, or in furtherance of, a civil disorder.” Mich. Comp. Laws § 750.528a.

Prohibition on falsely assuming functions of a peace officer: It is also a crime in Michigan for any person who is not a “peace officer” to “[p]erform the duties of a peace officer.” A “peace officer” includes a sheriff, deputy sheriff, police officer, federal or state law enforcement officer, and security employee, among others. Mich. Comp. laws § 750.215.

This is thwarted domestic stochastic terrorism. You have a group of people who are illegally conspiring under several Michigan state statutes and the Michigan constitution to undertake what would clearly be illegal violent actions against persons and property. They had tested improvised explosive devices (IEDs). They had planned several types of actions that would have resulted in mass casualties.

DHS finally released their October 2020 domestic threat assessment, that they tried to bury until a whistleblower made that impossible. The assessment makes it very, very, very clear that the predominant terrorism threat to Americans in the US are white supremacists and other right wing domestic extremists and that one of Russia’s major influence operations to disrupt the 2020 elections is to incite terroristic violence by these groups against visible racial, ethnic, and religious minorities.

Updated at 3:05 PM EDT

Here’s the live feed of Governor Whitmer’s press conference:

Open thread!

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Excellent (Heartbreaking) Read: “A mentally ill man, a heavily armed teenager and the night Kenosha burned”

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Anti-police-brutality demonstrators were converging on Kenosha from all over Wisconsin for a second night of marches. An armed right-wing group had put out a call for “patriots willing to take up arms and defend [our] City tonight from the evil thugs.”

Joseph Rosenbaum — depressed, homeless and alone — didn’t belong to either side. He had spent most of his adult life in prison for sexual conduct with children when he was 18 and struggled with bipolar disorder. That day, Aug. 25, Rosenbaum was discharged from a Milwaukee hospital following his second suicide attempt in as many months and dumped on the streets of Kenosha.

His confrontation hours later with Kyle Rittenhouse, a heavily armed teenager who had answered the call for “patriots,” kicked off a chain of violence — the deadliest of the summer — that left Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, dead. A third victim, Gaige Grosskreutz, 26, lost a chunk of his right biceps but survived.

Within hours, the three men and the teenager who shot them were assigned roles in the country’s churning partisan drama. On the right, Rosenbaum, Huber and Grosskreutz were cast as antifa foot soldiers, bankrolled by shadowy forces and determined to set fires and spread anarchy. On the left, the three shooting victims, all of them White, were celebrated as anti-racist martyrs battling armed vigilantes who had coalesced to support police departments accused of racism and brutality…

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Late Night Open Thread: Mock, But Don’t Point

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Never point your weapon at something you might want to use later, they told me…

Speaking of gunhumpers mishandling things:


He has a book to sell, while it’s still news:

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Toxic (Open Thread)

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I’ve only seen bits and pieces in clips, but from that, I’ve concluded that Biden gave a helluva speech today:

A couple of notable quotes from the clip:

“Donald Trump has been a toxic presence in our nation for four years. Poisoning how we talk to one another. Poisoning how we treat one another. Poisoning the values this nation has always held dear. Poisoning our very democracy. Now, in just a little over 60 days, we have a decision to make. Will we rid ourselves of this toxin, or will we make it a permanent part of our character?”

“Trump has sought to remake this nation in his image: selfish, angry, dark and divisive.”

Bravo!

Some of the usual Beltway suspects were opining that Trump has cleverly forced Biden to play on Trump’s LAW & ORDER turf. They say Biden would rather focus on Trump’s catastrophic mismanagement of the pandemic than address the civil unrest happening in some cities. I call bullshit on that narrative. TRUMP is the one who’s heaping praise on gun-toting psychos who are riding into cities flying Trump flags on their $45K pickups to stir up violent confrontations.

The anarchists and opportunistic turds who are looting businesses and burning buildings aren’t wearing Biden merch, and Biden of course has denounced those activities all along and did so forcefully today. They aren’t Biden’s base. They aren’t Democrats. The militia shitheads ARE Trump’s base, and they are Republicans, so if anyone has his balls in a vise, it’s Trump, not Biden, because Trump doesn’t dare denounce the militia goons.

Oh, and Biden got in plenty of shots about Trump’s COVID-19 clusterbumblefuck, plus he mocked the idea that he (Biden) is a socialist Trojan horse:

Anyhoo, well done, Mr. Biden. Open thread.

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American Carnage After Dark: The (Extrajudicial) Kenosha Shooter

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The kid who murdered at least two people in Kenosha seems to have been a softer, dumber version of the guy who murdered Heather Heyer in Charlottesville — a dropout whose uneasy classmates ‘joked’ about becoming a school shooter, someone whose only strong affiliation or interest was a Protect & Serve! fantasy of blue knights standing guard over a grateful community against the forces of disorder. In the Reuters video with the best short summary, he runs away from people attempting to disarm him, literally trips over his own feet, and starts spraying bullets in all directions when they catch up to him. Then he walks toward an armored police vehicle with his hands up — only to be waved past by LEOs in search of the real threat, mouthy Black protestors and stoners armed with skateboards.

And then the Worst People in the World leapt to his defense, because after all this ‘misunderstood young man’ was just doing what they’d been urging all their listeners to do.

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Late Night NSFW Open Thread: Heroes Among Their Fellow Bubble-Dwellers

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Which for some reason reminded me of commentor Another Scott‘s link this morning, from Wonkette:

Gun Nut Blows Own Nuts Off, Is Hailed As Hero By Group Of Men Who Point Guns At Their Nuts

… On August 11, the man, a member of the “Loaded Guns Pointed at [B]enis” group, started posting a live video of himself pointing a gun at his dick and balls, for reasons, when the gun “accidentally” went off, in what’s more accurately called a “negligent discharge” — and how. The video was swiftly deleted, and the man subsequently posted the picture above, showing blood spattered everywhere and the caption “[B]ois, I think I fucked up.” You will note the copy of the Constitution in the upper left corner, reminding us all that it is a man’s Second Amendment right to shoot his balls off if he so chooses.

It was not a mere graze. The man later went to the hospital and discovered that it had actually gone through, which seems … uncomfortable. But apparently he is doing okay for a guy who just shot himself in the balls. He has since been made an administrator of the group, and members have been photoshopping memes of him as a king, accepting the Presidential Medal of Freedom, etc. etc…

Further explication at the link.

Now, sure, this “king” could be a Biden voter, but be honest: If there is not a ‘Fudds for Trump’ flag at the next boat flotilla, it will be a disappointment.

Also, the Oval Office Occupant should absolutely do an interview with his fellow KING during one of his upcoming TeleRallies(tm), possibly with DJT Jr or Eric as moderator, because that would pwn Normie Joe Biden, who has never even considered the entertainment value of shooting himself in the balls.

ETA:

If only boats, or even better flags, had the vote!

Y’know, the Man Without A Country was being punished for treason…

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