Does anyone know anything about it? All I know is 'big explosion, some injuries' -- no explanation or anything.
The media is reporting that it was one or more car bombs.
My dorm room was designated as a smoking room.
I like how urple answered his own question. Apo's comment is offensively off-topic, however.
3: Yes, but mine was designated so by the authorities.
If urple means who dunnit, nobody's claiming at the moment.
There was a simultaneous gun attack on a Norwegian Labour Party youth camp.
6: Those were comments from the PSA thread that I presume heebie copied over, but with names changed to protect the innocent. 1 was LB, 2 was me, 3 was heebie herself.
Wow, they're reporting 5 injured in the shooting at the youth camp, and that the PM was supposed to visit the camp. (Though not today.)
My Twitter feed has speculation and counter-speculation about Najmuddin Faraj Ahmad, aka Mullah Krekar.
Norwegian political parties have youth camps?
The police have also evacuated a rail station and the offices of a TV news agency. The BBC has it here. I'll stop transcribing it.
11. Until I'm proved wrong, I'm betting on the local far right.
Right. Tall blond guy wearing a police uniform, sounds like.
As terrible as it sounds, if there are "only" five casualties and no fatalities at the youth camp, they'll have had a lucky escape. The shooter was reportedly dressed as a cop, and so would have a strong element of surprise, and it's on an island so the response was quite slow. The reporting I've seen suggests at least half an hour from the first shots to the police arriving.
14: Because the targets were associated with a political party, rather than being symbols of Greater Norway in general?
16. Now saying there are fatalities. And the shooter still seems to be loose on the island.
17. Yes.
17: The same reasoning applied in the anthrax attacks.
http://www.jihadica.com/alleged-claim-for-oslo-attacks/
I stopped myself from typing 21 like 10 times.
I have no impulse control. At least when it comes to blog comments.
mine is not super great either, tbh.
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2010/07/why-does-al-qaeda-have-a-problem-with-norway/59649/
Oil-rich countries breed terrorism.
21: There was some line in the BBC reportage along the lines of "political violence is almost unknown in Norway" which, from what I've heard from first-hand accounts of people who've actually spent time there is total bullshit. As in many parts of Europe, there is an active fascist/Neo-Nazi scene that regularly engages in politically motivated violence against immigrants and leftists. But, like most other White Terror, that gets brushed under the rug unless, like this incident, it's too big to ignore. And even then, look at the (non) response to the Giffords shooting here. In 6 months, nobody outside of Norway will even remember that this happened.
This is saying 20-30 dead at the youth camp. Damn.
http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=no&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vg.no%2Fnyheter%2Finnenriks%2Fartikkel.php%3Fartid%3D10080593
If the current reports are true, this is the most successful lone nut in history, for some values of successful.
Lone, as in they think the same guy planted the bomb and then shot up the camp? Or do they think the bomb and the camp are a coincidence?
You couldn't get murdered twice by the sane guy.
It's funny -- bomb reads "ideological terrorist" to me, but shooter reads "mentally ill". It seems odd that the same guy would choose both methods.
34: Harris and Klebold planned such a combination. Shooting their way through the hallways was a secondary plan after their explosives failed.
And I suppose the Oklahoma City whatsisname -- McVey? wasn't a miracle of sanity.
Right, there are hints this is a Harris/Klebold who actuallly succeeded, presumably someone who dislikes the norwegian labor party, possibly ideological, but not a "regular" terrorist.
AP says Norwegian police say at least 80 dead in the camp shooting.
Jesus Christ.
Fucking horribly. And fuck the fucking idiots who ignore right-wing terrorism.
The quote: "One person with a belief is equal to the force of 100 000 who have only interests" which Breivik is reported to have posted on his Twitter account shortly before the attacks is being attributed to 19th century British philosopher John Stuart Mill, the father of utilitarianism.Doesn't sound very Millian to me. Any philosophers come up with a cite?
Jesus this is appalling.
The actual quote is:
One person with a belief, is a social power equal to ninety-nine who have only interests.
Essays on Politics and Society, part 2
http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/234/16572
So there's been some numerical inflation.
Politically speaking, a great part of all power consists in will. How is it possible, then, to compute the elements of political power, while we omit from the computation anything which acts on the will? To think that, because those who wield the power in society wield in the end that of government, therefore it is of no use to attempt to influence the constitution of the government by acting on opinion, is to forget that opinion is itself one of the greatest active social forces. One person with a belief, is a social power equal to ninety-nine who have only interests. They who can succeed in creating a general persuasion that a certain form of government, or social fact of any kind, deserves to be preferred, have made nearly the most important step which can possibly be taken towards ranging the powers of society on its side.With a bit more of the context.
Thank sounds a lot more Millian deflated and contextualised. Perhaps you should send it to Obama.
The site of the AUF (Norwegian Labour Youth) is particularly depressing, down to the plaque to the dead of the International Brigades unveiled at what I can only assume was the opening of the summer camp.
I know some people who are currently flying to an IUSY* meeting in Germany. I have to imagine it would be one of the grimmest meetings since the war.
* International Union of Socialist Youth. I assume that most of the Norwegian delegates would have been on Utoya.
From the Beeb thread:
Markku Niska tweets: 9/11 GW Bush: "We're gonna hunt you down!", 7/22 J Stoltenberg: "We will retaliate with more democracy, transparency and openness"
There's chatter that the alleged terrorist, Anders Behring Beivik, blogs as Fjordman, and has longstanding ties to Pamela Geller's* blog.
A Google seach turns up stuff like this.
Apparently on some blogs, they take their orange post titles seriously.
*My apologies to Ms. Geller - and to "Fjordman" - if these reports are wrong. One wouldn't want to paint all conservatives as proto-terrorists, since, as Greenwald points out, only Muslims can be labeled that way.
Wow, Pam finally hired a web designer.
That Goldfinger dame draped over the skyscraper is a nice nod to the aesthetic of the old site, though.
Yeah, I hadn't seen that site in quite a long time.
I see now that Geller posted a denial, which would be more persuasive if she didn't suggest that her relationship with Fjordman - even if he were Breivik - was like that of a news organization to a viewer.
McVeigh watched CNN when he lost it over Waco, so I guess CNN is a terrorist org?
This AP report quotes an editor of a Norwegian right wing site saying that the guy they think is the suspect sees "his main enemy is not Muslims, but multiculturalists and what he calls cultural marxists."
The article also implicitly maintains the view that you have to be as extreme as a neo-Nazi to be considered extreme right.
"What we know is that he is right-wing and a Christian fundamentalist." Mr. Breivik has not been linked to any anti-jihadist groups, he said.
Is this a typo - did they mean "jihadist"?
The other places where Fjordman posts have also got denials up, and he seems to have been communicating with one of the sites during the attacks.
So I guess it's just a case of someone learning the ethnicity and politics of the attacker, and unfairly tying him to someone else with similar views and ethnicity. Good thing we have people like Geller around to fight this sort of stereotyping.
Good comment at Yggles by "Ed Marshal"
And I really object to the "mad man" stuff. What he did was incredibly evil, but it was quite sane. The kids in that camp represented the next generation of elite Labour party leadership. In one fell swoop he destroyed the leadership seed corn of his political enemies.His fellow travelers are assessing what he did and don't find the idea mad at all. It's the logical conclusion of their paranoid politics. There will be more of this.
1) Imagine disappearing in the 1960s Weyrich, Reed, Gingrich, Norquist, Jarvis etc
2) There will pf course be short-term and medium-term effects, the demoralization of the parents, the loss of "worker bees" staffers for the next decade
3) You will rarely see me slip and ever talk about something twenty years away or more, because I don't think we have twenty years before at best the world becomes unrecognizable and unmanageable with current institutions etc
53: As soon as I heard that Breivik might have been a frequent partisan blog commenter who flirts with violence and evil, I thought of you, bob.
I need to get on the record as telling you that killing off the next generation of Republican operatives would be a heinous, awful thing to do and I really hope that you are just talk when you say shit like this.
The Washington Post's right-wing blogger hasn't yet felt the need to revisit this post. Neither have the editors.
54:I need to get on the record as telling you that killing off the next generation of Republican operatives would be a heinous, awful thing to do and I really hope that you are just talk when you say shit like this.
I have never explicitly advocated this, did not in 53, and it is despicable for you to project your own paranoid fantasies onto me like that in a public forum.
There are countless examples of the right, authoritarians or oligarchs, destroying or eliminating the "seed corn" or possible future leadership of the left, a most recent one being draconian sentences handed out to protesters in Greece.
There are of course other means the right uses, like limiting educational or employment opportunities for potential dissenters. Egypt has a shortage of qualified progressives in a position to take official leadership roles. Yggles posted a study showing that 20 somethings are now moving to Republicans during the Obama Lesser Depression.
Liberal reaction to events like Norway, or OK City, or NOLA after Katrina is...interesting...which is why I take Carl Schmitt seriously.
bob, I would consider it a personal favor if you kept away from discussions of recent mass murders.
It just crossed my mind that 9/11 was another conservative mass murder. Arizona. The Shia (and right-wing Sunni) destruction of the Iraqi secular elite under Bush was one of the horrible consequences of the invasion.
They kill us, for a broad meaning of us, a lot. Literally kill us.
58:Oh, I am well aware y'all don't want to, simply can't deal.
http://archive.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=6251
I guess the URL for that link should've been warning enough.
Gates of Vienna, where Fjordman contributes, denies he is Breivik.
62: Yeah, it's weird. *He* apparently claimed to be Fjordman, but that could easily be self-aggrandizement (of an extremely debased sort) I suppose.
Maybe 75% of male Norwegians who participate in America-centric online communities use the pseud of Fjordman.
Bob @53: I'd say madman is accurate. His means are as ridiculous as they are savagely evil (killing a large number of children at a camp and setting off a bomb does not destroy the future of a political party).
And did you really mean to imply that killing Republican leaders you despise when they were children would be justified? Surely that comment is simply poorly constructed.
I don't see this as a left vs. right issue. The person or persons responsible should be destroyed, and Norwegian police departments should probably update their procedures for responding to possible incidents such as this - much as the US did in the wake of Columbine. There isn't any political wisdom to draw from the events in Norway. Only sadness and anger.
Maybe 75% of male Norwegians who participate in America-centric online communities use the pseud of Fjordman.
Yeah, they couldn't convince Arne.
I'd say madman is accurate. His means are as ridiculous as they are savagely evil
Once you accept all the evil presuppositions necessary, it seems like an effective terrorist attack to me.
The Gates of Vienna post is far from conclusive, if they'd communicated with Fjordman since the attacks they should have said so, they don't even acknowledge that he specifically has been fingered.
67
Once you accept all the evil presuppositions necessary, it seems like an effective terrorist attack to me.
Effective in killing a lot of people sure. Effective in advancing his political goals whatever they may be seems more doubtful (although time will tell). The Oklahoma City bombing seems to have had almost no long term effect.
65: There isn't any political wisdom to draw from the events in Norway.
Now, this is just absurd. For the last several decades, all over the world, we've seen a movement, occasionally referred to as "leaderless resistance" which depends on the ability of propagandists of the far right to encourage young men to commit violence in service of their ideology.
This practice is widespread along the entire spectrum of rightist organizing, from the Sarah Palins and Michele Bachmanns on one end, to the Tom Metzgers and David Dukes on the other. It's a very effective tactic when you acknowledge that the goal is to dismantle peaceful political discourse, undermine civil liberties and quell challenges to the ever-growing influence of the right.
What we can take from this act of violence, and the nearly identical incident in Arizona, is that increasingly militarized police, appeasement of the respectable racist right, and curtailment of civil liberties do not prevent this kind of violence, but rather lead to more of it, as the perpetrators are emboldened by their continued success.
65:Remembering George Tiller today
The original intent of the list was try to imagine what Norway might look like in twenty years with the loss of so many important leaders, to imagine the political effectiveness of the act. The problem in Norway was this act was apparently unimaginable, or a possibility that needed to be unimagined for liberal politics to be the limits of the possible.
But I am not apologizing for my fucking feelings, for my anger at the homicidal right, and anger at ineffectual liberals who won't even protect their own children from them.
This was not Columbine. This was politics.
What we can take from this act of violence, and the nearly identical incident in Arizona, is that increasingly militarized police, appeasement of the respectable racist right, and curtailment of civil liberties do not prevent this kind of violence
Natilo, has any of this actually been happening in Norway? Have civil liberties been curtailed? Have the police become more militarised? Has the racist right been appeased?
Norway Terror Reveals Disturbing Assumptions About Muslims ...this is not what the discourse should be this week
Even FDL escapes into the reflexive comforts of anti-racism
As for how to keep people worldwide safe, the answer lies not in rigid security and warmaking, but in what the Mayor of Oslo said today: "I don't think security can solve problems. We need to teach greater respect."
They hate you, they want you dead, they are killing you, and they are not teachable. Your weakness is encouraging them.
72: It's been happening other places, we've all seen that. This could just as easily have happened in Italy or Croatia or Poland. The Norwegian government has gone up a considerable amount in my estimation by not following the lead of most of the other governments. Given that, hopefully this will be one of the least successful of these interventions. But look what Obama's response was:
"Our hearts go out to the people of Norway" and offered American assistance in the investigation of the attacks. He also added that "It's a reminder that the entire community has a stake in preventing this kind of terror from occurring," along with mentioning that events in Oslo are a reminder that the world has a role in stopping acts of terrorism.
Sounds like more justification for the exact tactics we've seen them use again and again.
Look, it would make sense for you to be skeptical if this were the first such occurrence, or the second, or the fiftieth. But this kind of thing is happening continuously all over the world. And what's more, people like me have been warning you about it over and over and over again. We warned you about Stalin, and Franco, and Hitler and Mussolini, and got labeled "premature anti-fascists" for our troubles. You should consider listening to us for a change.
70
... and the nearly identical incident in Arizona, ...
It is my understanding that the guy in Arizona is obviously nuts and didn't have a coherent political motive. Is that wrong?
They hate you, they want you dead, they are killing you, and they are not teachable. Your weakness is encouraging them.
bob, are you sure you wouldn't be more comfortable at Instapundit, Gates of Vienna or Atlas Shrugged?
We warned you about Stalin....
George Orwell was one man, not Legion.
George Orwell was one man, not Legion.
But before he was finished, they wouldn't know the difference. Dolph Lundgren is George Orwell in Michael Bay's Homage to Catalonia. Coming August 2011.
76:It is the very essence of liberalism to make passivity (and the sacrifice of the innocents to the Gods of Peace) and self-martyrdom a virtue, from "Peace in Our Time" to "I gave up Social Security and Medicare and that makes me the moral winner."
This "turn the other cheek" asceticism is one of the clearest indications that liberalism is, besides the tool of capitalism to keep labour quiescent, the moral replacement for Western Christianity after early modern science made the supernatural elements unwieldy. It serves the same purpose: to call violence, resistance, and confrontation immoral in order to preserve its exclusive use by conservatives and their thugs.
But it goes far beyond violence of course, into a generalized and highly valued refusal to defend the interest of liberalism's vulnerable dependents and interests.
I'd watch that. I'd watch the hell out of that. Sam Peckinpah really didn't do justice to Down and Out in Paris and London, though I liked Jason Robards.
Why do I even bother to try to make a joke on purpose?
A joke is an epitaph on the death of a feeling a procedural liberal's will to murder.
62:Duty is almost a lost concept.
Non-violence in an Empire is a most interesting position in that it allows one to condemn the violence of conservatives and the Right while ensuring the comfort and safety of not requiring you to actually do what it would take to stop it. Clucking tongue irresponsibility.
However incendiary my rhetoric, I take my own comfort in that I know that violence will always be initiated by the right, and always exceed any on my side. All I am saying is stop the fucking cheek-turning and tongue-clucking. It's embarrassing.
Well, okay. It remains pretty hot here, alas.
I'm not arguing, apo, but has there been a period of (either world or US) history that hasn't featured widespread political violence? I guess what I'm getting at is that I'd be interested in having you define your terms. How widespread is widespread?
Or, put another way, how will this era of widespread political violence be different and worse than the other eras of widespread political violence?
People can now use facebook to incite violence and skype to talk about it.
I assumed it was because we would recline while eating unleavened bread. But maybe there's something else.
And blood on doors if I can't catch those kids.
Heh. That was the quote I had in mind when I made my comment. Though I couldn't remember it verbatim, didn't want to bastardize it, and was far too lazy to look it up. Still, I pwned you. In my mind.
78: I am inappropriately fond of you.
97: My Google-fu is strong.
You know nothing of my work, Von Wafer.
I'm not arguing, apo, but has there been a period of (either world or US) history that hasn't featured widespread political violence?
The US has been mighty calm during your and my lifetimes.
I would say that with certain extremely important exceptions* - the Civil War and assassinations, obviously - a lot of political violence in US history has been what you could call social violence: voter intimidation is about both the voters and the elections, for instance. Political violence aimed at or carried out within political institutions - that is, the branches of government, political parties, and the like - does not seem as common, at least once you get past the Civil War/Reconstruction era at least. Or maybe I'm missing some completely obvious counterexamples (aside from the, uh, aforementioned assassinations).
*I'm aware that I'm setting myself up for an internet tradition here.
102:Not during all of mine
Ah, those halcyon days of youth, when blood ran in gutters hope inspired the nation and great progressive achievements were accomplished and lasting liberation movements born.
If conservatives aren't violent, you're not doing it right.
102: John Mueller has a theory that the world is steadily getting less shitty as far as violence goes. I wonder if that won't turn out to be as true as the "great moderation" idea about recessions getting milder. Still, there is a bunch less murdering happening than in the early modern past and a bunch less government-sponsored/war/etc. death than most of human history.
103:Tell that to Goldman, Debs, the Hollywood Ten, the Panthers.
The violence of the state of course looks like "law and order" to those who internalize its structures.
And the right will certainly be satisfied with an intimidated and passive left, as long as the mere threat of social disorder does the work.
They'll announce the deal tomorrow before the Asian markets open. Obama will claim victory.
Here's a link with a nice quote for bob:
Kari Helene Partapuoli, director of the non-governmental Norwegian Centre against Racism, noted that his online posts are common within Norway's gaining right-wing movement but still gave little clue that he would embark on such an attack. "However," she added, "there are many people who are active in that way, and it's a giant leap to this kind of extreme violent actions."
Because, you know, right-wing xenophobes are known for their pacifistic ways.
106.1: It can't be that hard to find Bobby Seale's email.
The Panthers are the closest to a counterexample on that list. Jail, deportation, blacklists -- these are all types of wrongs, but not the same as violence as I thought we were using it here.
They'll announce the deal tomorrow before the Asian markets open. Obama will claim victory.
And then he'll retreat to his safe haven in the UAE?
106.last is probably right and certainly reflects poorly on the political system.
I wouldn't be surprised if Boehner - where did Cantor go, did they chain him up in a basement somewhere? - broke down and cried. And then told the Asian markets that while he doesn't want them to "fuck off" - no, not him, he's reasonable - some people in his caucus apparently do. Then Obama will announce that they're going to talk again. Then Grover Norquist will slip in a bathtub and hurt his pinky. "Owie!" he'll say, wrapping up the injury in a band-aid made out of $100 bills (because just one wouldn't be enough).
The people who are close, like Klein, just can't find see 225 house votes yet. So the markets will have to crash first. Then the somebodies will whip house members til their eyes bleed.
I am still betting it will be more house democrats the republicans on the final votes.
Then the Republicans will campaign on House Democrats and Obama cutting the benefit and ending the job. And you now what, those Republicans will be absolutely right.
Social disorder ain't so bad, ain't the worse thing.
If I had Grover Norquist money, I'd have one of those great big showers instead of a tub. I'm tired of stepping over the side of the tub to take shower.
102: I think I might be a bit older than you, but still, I was thinking of militias (not just the Murrah Building but all the other lunacy under Clinton), gay bashing, and all manner of racial violence that goes under- or unreported. But maybe none of that is what you had in mind.
Regardless, yes, I think our lifetimes have been uncommonly quiet. We've lived through relatively prosperous times, I guess. At least until recently. (Even the first Bush recession, which drove me to my ancestral homeland in Canada, was relatively non-horrible compared to this one.)
A few hours later, Norquist will backtrack on the "owie" claim, but he'll decline to identify with whom he discussed the statement.
75: Here's the thing: Of course these lone gunman are nuts. Of course their politics are incoherent. That's why they're easy prey for the PVV and the EDL and the GOP. Sane, rational, balanced racist fucks just work within the system, a la Lee Atwater.
This is a transnational movement. There doesn't have to be a rational reason to take out Rep. Giffords in Arizona, or a bunch of socialist youth in Norway. Whiteness and imperialism are perceived as under threat, so political violence everywhere is justified, according to Wilders and Bachmann and their ilk.
Look, what's the No. 1 domestic terrorism threat, according to the FBI? The ALF and the ELF. Neither of whom have ever killed a single person. Yet the racist far right is ignored, except in the very rare cases (like the Hutaree) where they are stupid enough to directly target LEOs themselves. Then, of course, all bets are off.
What's more, the racist far right has deep connections to the state security forces. Witness the Johnny Bonta attack last month -- they protect their own. This hardly limited to the US either -- go into any random Italian police station, and you'll find a picture of Mussolini. No wonder they are not interested in pursuing cases against the fascists -- they are them.
Look at what happened during WWII -- the German-American Bund was actively supporting the Third Reich, yet were any of those people interned? Of course not. Instead it was completely innocent, law-abiding Japanese-Americans who got shunted off to the concentration camps.
Obama's statement is exactly what we expect to see in these cases -- a refusal to even countenance the actual source of the problem, and instead a justification for the continued harassment and attacks on immigrants, Muslims, Arabs, leftists and environmentalists.
a la Lee Atwater
Who, like Bobby Seale, has sold BBQ.
I think I might be a bit older than you
We were born just seven days apart, but I was first.
120: I'm younger than either of you by a couple of years, unless you went to high school at 10 or something.
So, I can't speak to the horror that was 1970.
118: I think a lot of it is that right-wing violence is chiefly directed at people lower on the power scale than the perpetrator. (minorities, women, the poor) Whereas Left-wing violence is against those higher on the scale than the perpetrator (corporations mostly). And as the police mostly exist to protect the powerful from the weak...
In the last four hours or so, Yahoo's front page has run headlines indicating no less than four different shooting incidents around the country. Doesn't appear to be political, just horrible.
|| So which option (if either... ) would be more disconcerting? 1.) 12-year-old and her boyfriend spend afternoon unsupervised in suburban downtown. 2.) 12-year-old spends afternoon at boyfriend's house with parents home. |>
If you trust the 12 year olds, I can't see why either should be disconcerting.
Natilo @70: What we can take from this act of violence, and the nearly identical incident in Arizona, is that increasingly militarized police, appeasement of the respectable racist right, and curtailment of civil liberties do not prevent this kind of violence, but rather lead to more of it, as the perpetrators are emboldened by their continued success.
First, as James @75 pointed out, the shooter in Arizona is quite insane. Second, suggesting that the Norwegian police forces update their tactics to a mass shooting is not suggesting that they curtail liberties. Third, a well equipped force trained for this contingency could have ended this in 10 minutes or less. "More understanding" isn't needed.
Nor does, as you assert later @118, the FBI consider eco-terrorism "the number one domestic terrorism threat." Are you really forgetting about Oklahoma City and the militia movement, Eric Rudolph, the Unabomber, and other incidents? Somehow I doubt that the FBI has. Any extremist group that preaches and teaches violence is on the radar.
Bob @71: But I am not apologizing for my [...] anger at ineffectual liberals who won't even protect their own children from them. This was not Columbine. This was politics.
I don't know what to make of this. Is this a criticism of the police response to the incident, or of the lack of security at the location? If so it has nothing to do with "liberalism." It's simply an error in judgment.
But you seem to be implying that liberals fail to recognize the truly violent nature of conservatives. There certainly are violent conservatives, but it's a mistake to characterize all conservatives as violent, or to treat every ideology on the right as identical.
125: As long as she has the car back by twelve, what's the problem?
Yeah, I wouldn't worry about either option.
128: . Third, a well equipped force trained for this contingency could have ended this in 10 minutes or less.
Assumes facts conspicuous by their absence from evidence.
Downtown makes me a little uneasy, for vague, inarticulable stranger-danger reasons. reassurance that I am paranoid is encouraged...
BF's house makes her father worry bc there are bedrooms...
128.2: Nor does, as you assert later @118, the FBI consider eco-terrorism "the number one domestic terrorism threat."
Not sure if they still are saying that but a few years back that is exactly what they were saying (found quotes to that effect from 2005 and 2008).
">[2005]The FBI believes Rudolph and McVeigh are part of the past.
Instead, the agency sees a new threat: "The No. 1 domestic terrorism threat is the eco-terrorism, animal-rights movement," said John Lewis, an FBI deputy assistant director and top official in charge of domestic terrorism.
[2008]"It [ec0-terrorism-JPS] remains what we would probably consider the No. 1 domestic terrorism threat, because they have successfully continued to conduct different types of attacks in and around the country," said FBI Special Agent Richard Kolko.And it was getting a lot of focus back in early 2002.
134: Not really awake yet. 2008 link is to this story.
132: I wouldn't worry at all about it for stranger-danger reasons; the only thing I'd worry about would be a kid who was young for twelve getting lost or scared or confused. But two twelve-year-olds together who aren't wildly flaky will be fine.
There are reports that Breivik's manifesto cribs heavily from Ted Kaczynski's. I wonder what would show up if someone put it into one of those plagiarism-detectors recently discussed.
the only thing I'd worry about would be a kid who was young for twelve getting lost or scared or confused.
This is probably unlikely, since two of them would find the resources to handle it, but even if they did have some moments of being lost, scared and confused, that isn't a reason they shouldn't do it. They'll live through lost, scared and confused, and then other risks are vanishingly rare, no matter what you hear on the terribly skewed news.
Think instead of them feeling excited and proud of their urban selves. And having a fine afternoon.
There was a hubbub a year or two ago about some agency -- the FBI? -- having cited the potential for right-wing domestic violence among its increasing priorities, was there not? Conservatives threw a fit, as I recall, declaring variously that this was sheer slander, that the commie-pinko-liberal-nanny state was propagandizing, that ALF and ELF and similar black-garbed anarchistic protesters have always been more of a threat, as everyone knows, and so on.
Perhaps now is a good time to mention the four-year-old I found on the streets of Sacramento. By his account, he hadn't wanted to take a nap at his preschool, so he left. He'd gone home, not found his parents (mid-morning on Tuesday), so he lit out for his grandma's house. When I joined him, he'd gone two miles in the right direction. (I saw a small kid on a busy street, so I parked and asked if I could walk with him. He said yes, but he wouldn't get in my car.)
His pre-school called all the parents to search; one of them spotted us. The pre-school and the grandma found us shortly.
1. We were going the right way. We'd have reached the grandma in another mile and a half.
2. The grandma didn't get out of her big town car to talk to him. She spoke to us through the rolled-down passenger side window, told him to go back to school.
3. His pre-school teacher, beside herself, did grab him up and hug him. Her question? "How did you cross the freeway?"
So what I'm saying is that two twelve-year-olds will be fine.
Has Rory been out alone with her girlfriends before? If yes, is there something different about her being with her boyfriend?
I don't know what "boyfriend" means for 12-year-olds these days, to be honest. Does it mean holding hands, maybe experimentally smooching a bit, or does it mean, you know, groping? Not to get technical or anything.
Depends on the twelve-year-olds in question.
Right. Di might can guess regarding Rory and her boyfriend, since she's probably met the boyfriend and obviously knows Rory.
My first impulse was that between the two choices in 125, option (1) downtown unsupervised, was more disconcerting, but I was really thinking of the opportunity for shenanigans. If it's just a question of safety alone downtown, what Megan said.
I wouldn't worry too much about the potential for shenanigans. At any reasonable level of supervision, if there's an intent to smooch, smooching's going to happen -- to cut that out as a possibility, I think you'd have to be keeping an over-the-top level of restriction.
Not that there's no value to supervision at all; I wouldn't be sponsoring sleepovers with the boyfriend. But worrying about what they're going to get up to because they're hanging out at a house with parents in it, eh. They might get up to something, but probably not anything they wouldn't get up to regardless. (And of course at that age it's probably more likely than not that they're not doing anything of the kind at all.)
I don't think she's been out alone with the girls downtown before (though the bigger the group, the less concerned I'd be). They survived the adventure fine, in any case. If I can't articulate a sound concern, then probably nothing to be concerned about...
I am assuming smooching occurs. Doubt much more than that going on. We've watched enough DeGrassi that I'm sure she understands all the hazards of out of control adolescent romance...
OT: I don't get today's Doonesbury. Is it about the Bushes doing their own grocery shopping? And the clerk not being impressed?
all the hazards of out of control adolescent romance...
She might fall for a sparkly vampire.
Megan's always falling for sparkly vampires.
The thing is, I really can't decide between sparkly vampires and shirtless werewolves. You can't imagine how torn I am.
I have the same problem. It's not good to ping-pong back and forth: let's try this thing. Well, that didn't work out, ultimately, in the end, so let's try this totally opposite thing. Hrm. Well. Verdict: both good. Verdict prime: Stop overthinking.
I will note that there are simultaneous sparkly vampires and shirtless werewolves.
I had to look up Degrassi, by the way.
What happens if a sparkly vampire bites a shirtless werewolf? Can you get simultaneous sparkliness and shirtlessness?
147: I haven't read Doonesbury in a while, but it looks like not Bush but the two regulars in the last panel, being treated robotically.
That's the idea, yes. I'm pretty sure I've encountered these.
Um, the vampire part of the sparkliness is deprecated, and the inarticulacy of the werewolf part likewise. Best of both worlds.
Pfff, buncha prancing pretty boys, both of 'em.
By his account, he hadn't wanted to take a nap at his preschool, so he left.
Shot in the dark here, but was he carrying a stuffed tiger?
I actually feel somewhat badly for talking about men this way.
157. No, the tiger was at home waiting to pounce, hence the trip to grandma's.
John Mueller has a theory that the world is steadily getting less shitty as far as violence goes.
I'm kind agnostic on this question in terms of interpersonal violence, but I'm firmly on the side of "Yes" in terms of indirect violence.
A friend gave me a copy of A Bintel Brief recently and when I flipped it open the very first thing I read was an absolutely heartbreaking letter from a man with tuberculosis, begging for advice on how to stop himself from wanting to hug and kiss his three-year-old daughter.
His description of his own agnoizing awareness of the disease and the danger of passing it on, plus his wife's anger and grief when she saw him break down and hold or cuddle the child, was shocking to a modern reader.
It makes you realize: in those days, a death sentence from TB was not an unusual thing among people living crowded in poor city neighborhoods.
So yeah: are we getting better at not killing each other? Verdict mixed. Are we getting better at protecting each other from the spectre of diseases that used to claim thousands if not millions? Damn straight.
So yeah: are we getting better at not killing each other? Verdict mixed. Are we getting better at protecting each other from the spectre of diseases
We are unfortunately immiserating a lot of people.
Any "are we getting better" question has to specify the baseline against which it's measuring itself, obviously.
Since this is the current live thread, I'll mention that Alternet is worth looking at lately. I'd always had it in my blog list.
OT: "In Jesus' name, boogity, boogity, amen."
That's preachin'.
147: Mike Doonesbury just realized that he has become invisible to young women.
JP @135: Looks like an off the cuff remark by an FBI agent, not a real statement of what the FBI considers top domestic terrorist threats. Some of those extremist groups spend their spare time stockpiling weapons, whipping up hatred towards the government, and conducting little training exercises.
Even for a large government organization, it would be remarkably stupid for the FBI to actually consider eco-terrorism to be more of a threat than those extremist groups. Personally, I can't buy the thesis without something more solid than that single remark by an agent in the story you linked.
164: I was just thinking that it sounded like something out of Talladega Nights when he thanks Jesus for his "smokin' hot wife".
167: I can look up more references later when I go dig up my copy of Green Is the New Red, but this was the explicit and stated focus of the Ashcroft DoJ, and was extensively discussed at the time. Yep, it was stupid. But they were (are) stupid.
137
There are reports that Breivik's manifesto cribs heavily from Ted Kaczynski's. I wonder what would show up if someone put it into one of those plagiarism-detectors recently discussed.
See here for some examples. I would expect this sort of thing could be automatically detected given both documents.
Oh, man. So he's a plagiarist. This is going to seriously undercut his credibility.
I read elsewhere that it's not just Kaczynski that he cribbed from. Apparently much of his manifesto is cut and paste from various sources.
Jane Hamsher on debt ceiling negotiations
6) Ryan Grim lets us know that no matter what happens, we're probably looking at a "Super Congress" - Catfood Commission II, whose recommendations on things like Social Security and Medicare would be fast-tracked to the floor of each chamber for an up-or-down vote, with no possibility of amendment.
John Ryskamp via Yves Smith and Jane Hamsher on enabling acts. Blocking off, 1st para Smith, 2nd para Ryskamp, emphasis mine
The TARP, along with a new extralegal legislative process that is likely to be part of the bailout bill, are enabling acts. In a 2010 post, John Ryskamp discussed enabling acts, using the German Greek bailout legislation, Paulson's 2008 draft legislation, and Hitler's 1933 enabling act as case studies. His overview:The enabling act changes the nature of the political system which puts it into effect, which is why such political systems are said to have "committed suicide" by passing enabling acts. It is important to keep this in mind, because, on their face, enabling acts seem often only amend the previous political system; the political system remains, and indeed enabling acts make much of the supposed preservation of the existing political system. They also make much of dealing only with specific problems over a specified period. But various traps, sprung along the way to enforcement, lead to unitary power and the discarding of government. People wonder how a simple remedy led to such profound dislocation.
I am not being hysterical, this is exactly what it looks like when social democrats are confronted by a plurality of fascists...they and the process get all squirrley, collapses, and we get authoritarianism.
Oh...
128: I am an eliminationist. Conservatism kills. Millions upon millions.
171, 172: He wrote for right-wing blogs. What do you expect?
DeLong ...somehow thinks this paragraph deserves front-page status
Fatally, however, [conservative German Chancellor] Brüning refused to [expand the currency supply], because he was nervous that printing money that was not tied to the value of gold would cause inflation. Of all the long-term effects of the German inflation, this was probably the most disastrous. But it was not the only reason why Brüning persisted with his deflationary policies long after feasible alternatives had become available. For, crucially, he also hoped to use the continuing high unemployment rate to complete his dismantling of the Weimar welfare state, reduce the influence of labour and thus weaken the opposition.... The bank crisis put into Brüning's hands another card that he was unwilling to use... [but] he did nothing, even though the means of escape were now there and voices were already being raised in public in favour of stimulating demand through government-funded job-creation schemes.Richard J. Evans, The Coming of the Third Reich, pp. 253-254
Jeffrey Sachs wants a third party, Thomas Friedman wants a third party, teapartiers and firebaggers want two new partiers.
Mark Thoma is kinda sweet
In that respect, I am annoyed at the (demonstrably incompetent) ratings agencies, S&P in particular. They are now saying that simply raising the debt ceiling is no longer enough, there must be trillions in deficit reduction -- enough to derail the recovery and potentially send the economy back into recession -- to avoid a ratings downgrade. So S&P is making it more likely that a recovery killing deal will be made, and less likely that there is a last minute deal that "cleanly" raises the debt limit, avoids the recession risk associated with immediate debt reduction, and also avoids the risk of the severe economic problems associated with default. [Update: see here too, and here.]
Social Democrats and liberals can't ever see when the system is going down, but S&P earns their money over evaluating that kind of risk. We have been in collapse since Florida 2000, if not the Clinton Impeachment.
The only chance this country had for a kinder gentler authoritarianism was Obama going Louis Napoleon. Now I suspect Rick Perry will be the last President for a generation.
167: See also the comments here by an "FBI deputy assistant director and top official in charge of domestic terrorism." Protecting property is extremely important.
Bob @173: It's really mind-boggling to me that you seem to be advocating violence against conservatives. You don't see how incompatible that suggestion is with a free and open society - to say nothing of the evil of unjustified violence? Or are you being needlessly provocative?
Oudemia @169: Eco-terrorism may have been one of the focuses, but what I found implausible is the claim that the FBI judged eco-terrorism to be a greater threat than any other form of domestic terrorism. If you have references to support that, I'd be interested in reading them.
177.2: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7908466/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/
Actually, I find Andrew F.'s questions quite refreshing. Bob has been going on in this vein for so long now, people rarely if ever ask him what the fuck he's talking about, you know, seriously.
I mean, I know, I know.
Together, eco-terrorists and animal rights extremists are one of the most serious domestic terrorism threats in the U.S. today...for several good reasons:
http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2008/june/ecoterror_063008
128: Are you really forgetting about Oklahoma City and the militia movement, Eric Rudolph, the Unabomber, and other incidents? Somehow I doubt that the FBI has.
Somehow, I don't think you know what the hell you're talking about.
An Iraqi adolescent girl, gangraped, tortured, decapitated and then thrown in the gutters of Baghdad would like to thank Flippanter and parsimon for their tolerance of opposing positions, respect for law, and loyalty to the free and open society. She is at the head of a line of admirers millions deep.
Damn. I forgot the head of the dog.
I do wish people would quote and link when they claim I advocate violence. I said "eliminationist" this time, which meant distracting Republicans with shiny baubles and Nascar races.
people rarely if ever ask him what the
fuck he's talking about, you know, seriously.
probably has something to do with
Bob has been going on in this vein for
so long now.
Bob @183: So your solution is simply to eliminate those who advocate policies which will produce unjust results. All we need do is overcome the simple obstacle of identifying those policies and those who advocate for them. Such a solution has, historically, exhibited certain defects. Moreover if followed faithfully, which it never is, it suffers from an unfortunate suicidal recursion.
Natilo, "one of the most serious" is plausible. It was the "number 1" that I found kind of crazy.
One is the loneliest number that you ever saw. Lonely in a "writing a manifesto in an unheated cabin in Montana" way.
188: Yes, I found it crazy too, that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
Between this and the theory of politics thread, I really recommend Charles Pierce's article in Esquire on domestic terrorism from last week. Long, but worth reading.
Quote from the article linked in 191:
when the gun goes off or the bomb explodes, the powerful will deplore the actions of the powerless, and they will reassure the rest of us that We are not like Them, who are violent and crazy and whose acts have no reason beyond unfathomable madness. But above all, they will say, Ignore the fact that there is still a horrible utility in political violence, the way there was during Reconstruction, or during the labor wars of the early twentieth century. If there were not, it wouldn't be so hard to get an abortion in Kansas, and assault weapons would not have been accessories of choice at recent rallies purportedly held to discuss changes in the way the country organizes its health-care system.
It's like he's been reading McManus' crazy talk!
191: that's a great piece. Thanks for the link.
191: Yeah, great piece. But you can see the liberal bias here:
a journalist named David Neiwert put together a list of nearly thirty acts of right-wing political violence that had taken place, or had been foiled, in the United States since the summer of 2008
What about all the left-wing acts of violence? Huh?
Also, this part works better if you read it in Paul Harvey's voice:
But there is something about fragments that nobody talks about. It is a property first harnessed in 1784 by an officer of the artillery in the British army. He surmised that if you filled an artillery shell with fragments, you could wreak havoc far in excess of what would occur if the shell simply exploded. The destruction would breed upon itself. Propelled with sufficient force, the fragments would make new fragments of whatever they hit -- a cart, a tree, a human femur -- and, in turn, these new fragments would fly off to do their own damage. The officer's name was Henry Shrapnel.
And now you know ... the rest of the story.
What about all the left-wing acts of violence? Huh?
I'm pretty sure somebody who worked for a union once shoved somebody at a Tea Party demonstration. Also, black people mug white people a lot.
Among the useful observations in the Esquire piece:
But above all, they will say, Ignore the fact that there is still a horrible utility in political violence, the way there was during Reconstruction, or during the labor wars of the early twentieth century.
Ya know, it may be helpful to understand that I, and the rest of you, live in a world of constant and immanent and imminent violence...withheld.
I know that if I take a bite of the peach in the produce section they can throw me to the floor, cuff my hands behind my back, drag me to the copcar, and lock me away.
Violence is what makes our world work. We breathe it in every second. At the top end of this weltanschauung are the nukes.
People like Bourne and Hedges are crazy for thinking the health of the state is demonstrated with bombs in far off places. That is a trivial handwave. It is most exercised in playgrounds and voting booths. It is all violence and the threat of violence.
Why stop there Bob? Let's claim that politics is really all just kinetic energy. Some of it is potential energy, but really that's just kinetic energy withheld.
It's in distinguishing certain deployments of kinetic energy from other deployments that we get to helpful descriptions and prescriptions.
So, sure, I think our law needs to be enforced, with violence if necessary. At the same time I think it important that the law include a mechanism for change without violence - and that attempts to violate that mechanism unlawfully should be met with, if necessary, violence. That doesn't get us very far down the road in a political discussion, though, because most of the important questions are left unresolved.
But you refuse, it seems, to even go that far. You seem to think that second-order principles and protection of process are intellectualized luxuries of a weak liberal class in denial. In fact they're the things that make social progress possible.