It’s Wednesday, October 4th, 2017…but before we begin, our deepest sympathies go out to the families and victims of the unspeakable violence in Las Vegas.
Now, here’s The Gouge!
First up, we present as cogent an encapsulation of our view on the Las Vegas massacre as we’ve seen, courtesy of Townhall.com’s Guy Benson quoting Republican Congressman Mo Brooks (the target of the same Progressive gunman who shot Steve Scalise at a Congressional baseball practice mere months ago) in response to reporters questioning whether that attempt at mass murder had changed his view on the 2nd Amendment:
“The Second Amendment right to bear arms is to ensure that we always have a republic.And as with any other constitutional provision in the Bill of Rights, there are adverse aspects to each of those rights that we enjoy as people.And what we just saw here is one of the bad side effects of someone not exercising those rights properly…We’re not going to get rid of freedom of speech because some people say some really ugly things that hurt other people’s feelings.We’re not going to get rid of Fourth Amendment search and seizure rights because it allows some criminals to go free who should be behind bars.These rights are there to protect Americans, and while each of them has a negative aspect to them, they are fundamental to our being the greatest nation in world history.“
As Jim Geraghty observed at his Monday Morning Jolt:
“We’re going to hear a lot of questions in the coming days about “why did he do it? Does it matter? Aren’t all of these shooters more or less the same?” In their minds, they’ve been wronged by the world; the world owed them something, and it refused to give it to them. The Isla Vista shooter believed he deserved pretty women;the Alexandria shooter who tried to kill GOP congressmen believed he deserved a world where his party was in charge. The Columbine killers believed they deserved a world where they would never feel ostracized.
After mass shootings, I often find myself referring back to the observations of Willard Gaylin, one of the world’s preeminent psychology professors. Gaylin writes about the dangers of “grievance collecting” in his book Hatred: The Psychological Descent into Violence:
Grievance collecting is a step on the journey to a full-blown paranoid psychosis. A grievance collector will move from the passive assumption of deprivation and low expectancy common to most paranoid personalities to a more aggressive mode. He will not endure passively his deprived state; he will occupy himself with accumulating evidence of his misfortunes and locating the sources.Grievance collectors are distrustful and provocative, convinced that they are always taken advantage of and given less than their fair share.
…Underlying this philosophy is an undeviating comparative and competitive view of life. Everything is part of a zero-sum game. Deprivation can be felt in another person’s abundance of good fortune. (Curiously, at least thus far, the Vegas shooter doesn’t seem to fit this profile.)
In this light, a worldview of gratitude, counting one’s blessings, and always keeping in mind that no matter how bad our troubles, there’s someone else out there who’s dealing with worse ones, isn’t just nicer, more optimistic, or more Christian. It’s a tool for warding off self-absorption, bitterness, and madness. A relentless focus on how others have failed you and how the world at large doesn’t live up to your standards could just turn you into a monster…”
Meanwhile, Forensic Psychiatrist Michael Wellner offers his thoughts on the minds behind these monsters, as well as a surprising conclusion (beginning at the 5:50 mark) as to who shoulders a significant portion of the blame for their mayhem:
By the way, why interrupt a guest to highlight The Donald walking from Marine One to Air Force One?!?
Speaking of monsters, it’s no surprise Progressives once again…
…heeded the advice of the mayor of America’s murder capitol:
Despicable.
Since we’re on the subject of the despicable, from FOX News via Balls Cotton we learn, at least according to a…
“The head of an international engineering firm in Puerto Rico said in an editorial Saturday that when the time came to send 50 of his engineers to help in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria, he bypassed local officials and went straight to FEMA.
The reason, said Jorge Rodriguez, the CEO of PACIV, in an editorial in the New York Post, is that “for the last 30 years, the Puerto Rican government has been completely inept at handling regular societal needs, so I just don’t see it functioning in a crisis like this one. Even before the hurricane hit, water and power systems were already broken.And our $118 billion debt crisis is a result of government corruption and mismanagement.”
Puerto Ricans elected a new governor last November but, Rodriguez charged, he was inexperienced and had never been responsible for a budget. Gov. Ricardo Rossello cannot exactly count on those around him either, Rodriguez asserted. “His entire administration is totally inexperienced and they have no clue how to handle a crisis of this magnitude,” said Rodriguez, who has a graduate business degree from Harvard Business School and was named a “Most Distinguished Graduate” by the University of Puerto Rico.
For his part, Rodriguez argued that government mismanagement that has created so many problems for Puerto Rico is showing itself again as it attempts to deal with the devastation from the hurricane.
Black hat: $12; t-shirt: $35; standing in front of pallets of federal disaster relief while criticizing the President’s response to hide your own ineptitude? Priceless!!!
“For instance, shortly after the hurricane hit, the government imposed a curfew from 6 pm to 6 am and then changed it,” Rodriguez said. “Now, it’s 7 pm to 5 am, and makes no sense.The curfew has prevented fuel trucks from transporting their loads.“These trucks should have been allowed to run for 24 hours to address our needs, but they have been stalled, and so we have massive lines at gas stations and severe shortages of diesel at our hospitals and supermarkets.”
Rodriguez said it is the federal government that has put forth an organized response, and that it is wrong of Puerto Rico’s own political leaders to blame it. “I’m really tired of Puerto Rican government officials blaming the federal government for their woes and for not acting fast enough to help people on the island,” he said. “Last week I had three federal agents in my office and I was so embarrassed; I went out of my way to apologize to them for the attitude of my government and what they have been saying about the U.S. response.”
The business leader said FEMA experts were present in no uncertain terms when Hurricane Maria hit the island. “The first responders and FEMA have all been outstanding in this crisis, and should be supported.” “I was really proud of their quick response,” he added…”
For those still ignorant of the massive mobilization and amount of federal aid directed at Puerto Rico, here’s a list of FEMA/federal actions to assist the beleaguered island as of Sunday, courtesy of Stilton’s Place:
PUERTO RICO RESCUE UPDATE:
The news media is presenting the impression that Trump isn’t doing much about the crisis in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. So here’s a summary (compiled mostly from FEMA’s daily updates) of what the Trump Administration has done so far since Maria hit Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands on September 20.
By September 23:
** Six commercial barges were delivering meals, water, generators, cots, and other commodities to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. ** Three flights per day were arriving, each carrying approximately 33,000 meals. ** The logistics support ship SS Wright arrived carrying more than 1.1 million meals, and nearly one million liters of freshwater. ** Two shipping barges with 1.2 million liters of water, 31 generators, and more than 6,000 cots have arrived in St. Thomas. ** Two additional shipping barges loaded with food, water, and emergency relief supplies are en route to the Caribbean Sea from Florida. ** Millions of additional meals were and are being flown to Puerto Rico from staging areas in Kentucky and Florida. ** DLA transported 124,000 gallons of diesel fuel to Puerto Rico.
By September 27, the Trump Administration, working with officials in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands:
** Opened points of distribution (POD) in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands for survivors to get meals, water, and other commodities. ** FEMA, working in coordination with federal partners, provided millions of meals and millions of liters of water to Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands. Additional meals and water continue to arrive at the islands daily. ** FEMA’s National Business Emergency Operations Center (NBEOC) is facilitating private sector requests for humanitarian relief. ** The NBEOC continues coordination between government and private sector organizations as the community responds to Hurricanes Maria. ** Mobile Emergency Response Support (MERS) communications assets and personnel continue to support the FEMA Incident Management Assistance Teams (IMAT), Urban Search and Rescue (US&R), National Disaster Medical System (NDMS), and other federal teams in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
As of September 27, 2017:
** A U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) mobile communications team is in Puerto Rico to help improve communications across the storm-impacted area. ** FEMA search and rescue teams have visited all 78 municipalities of Puerto Rico, conducting search and rescue operations and helping to assess hospitals. ** FEMA US&R task forces saved or assisted 843 individuals and five pets, while searching over 2,600 structures as of September 27. ** The U.S. Virgin Islands Water and Power Authority drinking water system is back online, and other drinking water systems on the islands are top priority for receiving generators. ** The Concordia potable water pump station is online in St. Croix. ** The U.S. Virgin Islands Water and Power Authority Waste Management, and USACE are addressing potential public health risks of garbage build up; coordinating route clearance of wires and poles to enable garbage haulers to access the St. Thomas landfill. ** The National Guard Bureau (NGB) has thousands of Guard members on the ground in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands taking part in security and support operations. The Air National Guard is focused on transporting food, water, and communications capabilities as well as rapidly increasing airlift into affected areas. ** More than 180 Federal Law Enforcement Officers (FLEO) are in San Juan and the U.S. Virgin Islands supporting search and rescue, medical teams, and other federal responders, additional FLEOs are en route expected to arrive this week. Additional law enforcement support from New York State Police is on the ground in St. John. ** The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has supported the restoration of services to all 8 commercial airports in Puerto Rico. ** The FAA has restored full Air Traffic Control (ATC) services to Luis Munoz Marin International Airport in San Juan and limited ATC services to Rafael Hernandez Airport in Aguadilla. Recovery efforts are now supporting more than a dozen commercial passenger flights per day at Luis Munoz Marin International Airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico. ** 26 chainsaw teams and one Incident Management Team (IMT) (23 individuals) from the Department of Agriculture United States Forest Service arrived in Puerto Rico Wednesday to conduct emergency road clearance and manage logistics. ** The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) debris experts are assisting FEMA with debris management strategies in Puerto Rico and U.S. Virgin Islands. One of the first priorities is emergency route clearance in multiple locations to enable access to remote locations. ** USACE also completed a Blue Roof install on Cyril E. King Airport on St. Thomas, and completed its first residential Blue Roof install on September 23. Assessments for St. Croix are ongoing. A customer service center for Blue Roof installations opened over the weekend for Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. ** To bolster the delivery of fuel throughout Puerto Rico, 100 delivery trucks were dispatched by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) carrying an estimated 275,000 gallons of diesel fuel. ** Power is restored to Centro Médico Hospital in San Juan and San Pablo Hospital in Bayamón, Puerto Rico. **The Governor Juan F. Luis Hospital in St. Croix and the Schneider Regional Medical Center in St. Thomas are established as mobile hospitals. ** More than half of dialysis centers in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands are open and accessible for patients. More critical care facilities will re-open in the coming days as power and access are restored. ** The U.S. Coast Guard reports the following port statuses with additional ports opening as assessments continue: Puerto Rico: Open: Port of San Juan, Guayanilla, Salinas, and Talboa Open with restrictions: Arecibo, Fajardo, Culebra, Guayama, Mayaguez, and Vieques U.S. Virgin Islands: Open: St. Thomas: Charlotte Amalie, East Gregerie Channel, Crown Bay, West Gregerie Channel St. Croix: Krause Lagoon, Frederiksted, Limetree Bay Open with Restrictions: St. Thomas: Redhook Bay St. John: Cruz Bay ** USACE coordinated transportation of more than 300 FEMA or Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) generators from across the U.S. to meet anticipated requirements in the islands. More generators continue to arrive.
The above info is compiled mostly from the FEMA website, which provides a daily update on what’s happening. And this from my military expert friend J Michael Waller who is tracking this closely. I’ll just copy and paste here what he reports:
US Navy/Marine Corps Assets currently on station, or enroute to the Caribbean AOR: 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit with Battalion Landing Team 2/6 Carrier USS Abraham Lincoln Battle Group Amphibious Assault Ship USS Wasp Amphibious Assault Ship USS Iwo Jima Amphibious Assault Ship USS Kearsarge Amphibious Transport Dock USS New York Amphibious Landing Ship USS Oak Hill Hospital Ship USNS Comfort (UPDATE: Comfort has arrived.) Aviation Logistics Support Ship USNS Wright Dry Cargo Ship USNS William McLean
The above are enough assets to land an entire USMC Marine Expeditionary Brigade, with combat logistics elements. For those who don’t know what that is, that’s several thousand Marines, with all their gear.
All of the above, with the exception of the hospital ship, are capable of independent air operations.
Note: MEDEVACs are ALREADY being done, and began IMMEDIATELY by the US Coast Guard, and US Navy aviation. Carrier USS Abraham Lincoln is producing purified potable water, at the rate of 400,000 gallons a day. Full capacity.
The carrier, all 3 assault ships, the LSD, and LPD, all have operating rooms to stabilize critical medical/trauma cases, prior to evacuation to either the hospital ship, or land based medical treatment facilities. The hospital ship is capable of handling a patient load of up to 1,000 patients, with full OR, ICU, and Recovery wards.
In addition, fleet refueling ships are also enroute to provide fuel specifically for public safety equipment on the ground.
Obviously, the human catastrophe in Puerto Rico continues to be dire. Pray for Puerto Rico. And much work still needs to be done. But it’s just inaccurate (intentionally inaccurate) to suggest that Trump has not taken every conceivable action to help the 3.4 million people of Puerto Rico.
In addition to this there are in excess of 10,000 giant shipping containers filled with emergency supplies and the mayor refuses to work with the trucking Union to get distributed throughout the Island
What else should he be doing?
And though America’s Armed Forces are performing brilliantly in an area outside their primary areas of expertise, in a commentary which deserves reproduction in full, Townhall.com‘s Kurt Schlichter details how and why they can’t perform those for which they’re intended:
Our Broken Obama Military Can’t Even Manage to Toss Out Traitors
“After nearly a decade under President Faily McWorsethancarter, can our military win a fight with North Korea? Because if it is unable to perform the basic task of ensuring that the people commissioned to lead our troops in the defense of the United States are actually loyal to the United States, how the hell can we reasonably expect it to be able to conduct high-intensity combat operations against a Nork Army that prioritizes fighting over political correctness?
We can’t.
I don’t enjoy saying that – it gives me no pleasure to have to wonder whether the Army I served in both in active and reserve status for close to 28 years is broken. And it’s not just the Army. The Marines and the Special Ops community, well, they seem to be holding on to the standards the rest have forgotten, but the Navy and the Air Force – they’re broken too. Our military – in terms of strategy, equipment, and leadership, is in crisis. American troops will die if we don’t fix it.
Hell, they already have.
We have a Navy that can’t even sail its few remaining ships without running into giant cargo vessels. I come from a Navy family. You should call my dad, the retired lieutenant commander, and ask him what he thinks about the Navy’s current level of seamanship. It will not be a happy chat.
It is, in fact, a disgrace. Our sailors, the precious young men and women we commissioned officers are charged with leading and protecting, are dying because our officer corps tolerates incompetence. One collision is an accident.Two is a lifestyle.
And yeah, they’ve fired some admirals, and that’s a good start, but the problem is a cultural rot, not just one ‘ed-up command. The Navy focused on things besides its mission – “to maintain, train and equip combat-ready Naval forces capable of winning wars, deterring aggression and maintaining freedom of the seas” – and in the last few months that misplaced focus has killed 17 sailors and taken two major vessels out of action in the Western Pacific at the very moment we are on the edge of war.
Did you know several senior Navy officers are being or have been charged for corruption? Corruption. Graft. Bribes. Hookers. Senior leaders, and they’re scumbugs – criminal scumbags. But hey, the Army has its problems too. General Petraeus…sheesh, what a punch in the gut it was to see him use the Army values as a latrine. Then there was the 82nd Airborne general court martialed for using his billet to build himself a sex harem.And how about the colonel who played games with contracts and ditched his wife to marry an Iraqi chick – the Army was so upset he got a reprimand and to keep his pension. No jail time.
Let me say that again. No jail time.Yeah, that would totally have happened to a sergeant who did the same thing, according to several high-ranking unicorns in the Judge Advocate Office.
Want to know what generals and admirals don’t get in trouble for?Failing to win wars.
The military senior leadership has turned into a fraternity, where they cover up for each other and make sure everyone graduates with a gentleman’s “C”. And it’s not even a fun fraternity – the senior leadership is painfully politically correct, parroting all the right buzzwords and receive wisdom of our failed ruling caste.Many of these people are courageous on the battlefield – they’ll happily charge a Taliban warrior wielding an AK-47. But they quake in their boots back home in the face of an enemy they don’t understand and that can destroy their careers – the Social Justice Warrior.That’s why you don’t see them saying what every damn one of them knows is true – that women, despite their heart and commitment, are a net liability in ground combat units, that trans troops are an expensive distraction and damaging to morale, and that the insane focus on “diversity” programs sucks up priceless training time and fuels, rather than quells, discord in the ranks.
But they don’t dare object. That’d be risky. And these are the senior leaders who we will allow to lead our sons and daughters in battle if Korea goes hot. How’s your confidence level?
And we have now reached the pinnacle of the military’s moral bankruptcy with the revelation that one Second Lieutenant Spenser Rapone is a communist.Not like a wannabe communist, not like a routine college-years liberal dummy, but a full-on, dictatorship-of-the-proletariat communist.
Whileat West Point.
Yeah, and the Academy knew.The chain of command knew what this guy was, because he told them (Army alumni have done the job the MSM, which probably sympathizes with this idiot, has failed to do,digging up plenty about himand putting it out on social media).But the Academy let this creep slide through anyway.They let a guy who unequivocally stated his hatred for this country get a security clearance.(Sound familiar? The Air Force’s Worst Airperson of the CenturyReality Winner, anyone?)Then they gave Rapone a commission as a United States Army officer.And they did it knowing who he was, because in the leftist-loving environment Obama created, they were terrified to throw the bum out on his Marx.Hell, he felt comfortable enough to post this all on social media, and the Army chain of command didn’t act until we outside the military made a stink and it had to do something.
You’ve seen the photo of this disgrace wearing a Che t-shirt under his uniform and showing it off. Question: Who took the photo? He was with other cadets so some other cadet saw it and did nothing – doesn’t West Point have an honor code, or is honor now a microaggression? Imagine how interested CNN and the Democrats would suddenly be if his undergarment icon was Hitler, or even Robert E. Lee, instead of the racist, gay-murdering dorm room darling of the campus commies.
“But, he has a right to express his…” No, he doesn’t.
A United States officer cannot be a communist, or a Nazi, or a jihadist. These vile allegiances are incompatible with military service, and we are under no moral obligation to enter into a suicide pact by letting these vermin into our officer corps. Haven’t enough people died, like at Fort Hood, because the chain of command was too cowardly to risk getting called jihadiphobic to get rid of an insider threat?
Apparently not. Well, we’re not obligated to keep this America-hating cretin in either.
There’s an investigation going on to gather evidence to see if charges are warranted. If charges are filed, 2LT Rapone will get the due process rights punks like him would deny to others – including due process rights Democrats would deny college students accused of sex abuse.
Here’s what Colonel Schlichter would have done – actually, I would have dropped him into the bowl long before now and flushed, but let’s assume I got one of those 3 a.m. phone calls that begins “Sir, there’s been an incident…”
Turning now to the Sports Section, writing at NRO, Andrew McCarthy suggest we…
“I do not believe Trump made matters worse.Regarding the exhibition of contempt by NFL players during the playing of the national anthem, this puts me, quite unusually, at odds with a number of my friends and colleagues at National Review (Jonah Goldberg and David French, for example).
To my mind, to say that the president made things worse is to understate how bad things were — i.e., how appalling the fraud behind the kneeling protest has been. More damaging than anything Trump has said, moreover, is the indulgent reaction to the protest: The received wisdom that even if we find the tactic of the protesters objectionable, we owe them respectful attention because their cause — which they claim is racial equality — is an urgent and honorable one.
To the contrary, the protest promotes a false narrative.And we are not required to take at face value the protesters’ representation that they seek racial equality in the name of justice.Patently, what they are seeking is a perversion of justice based on racial inequality.
Furthermore, there is no First Amendment right to political speech in the workplace. Since the NFL is under no obligation to make its private platform a soapbox for promoting a false narrative — and particularly given that the NFL does not hesitate to suppress expression to which it objects — its decision to allow the exhibition of contempt for symbols of nationhood is a free choice, an implicit endorsement.
If the commissioner and the owners are now made uncomfortable because President Trump pointed out that they need not tolerate the exploitation of their forum by athletes who insult the nation and slander its police,good…”
To which we can only add a hale and hearty “AMEN“!!! Think of us as Quint, and the NFL…
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