Lives in a Shoe

Around the Same Time as Richardson's Interview, ISIS Claimed Responsibility.

 

Bill Richardson, former governor of New Mexico, piously called for reflection.

“I’d like to say something supportive of the President-elect,” Richardson stated. “But, you know, to frame this attack as a clash of civilizations, Christians against Muslims, it helps ISIS recruit. It helps inflame the situation.”

The former Democratic presidential candidate added, “I wish the President-elect wouldn’t do foreign policy by tweet or there should be, I think, more concerted effort to one, get more information. Number two, find ways that we can not make this an inflammatory charge against Muslim countries that are our allies.”

Roughly around the same time as this interview, ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack in Berlin.

A Better Rant

 

Fired From Job at Health Club for Being Too Intense

"Our gym is about fun and fitness and his overall personality wasn't bringing out the fun."

Religion of Peace in Wisconsin.  Weapons but not terrorism charges.

"We are Muslims, defending Muslim religion, we are on our own, my dear, we have organized our own group..."

Hamzeh, 23, has been charged with possessing a machine gun and a silencer. Despite indications of an attempted act of terrorism, Hamzeh is not charged with any terrorism counts. 

A terrorist-style plot intended to kill dozens of people with automatic weapons at a Masonic center in Milwaukee was foiled this week by FBI agents, federal prosecutors said Tuesday. Samy Mohamed Hamzeh discussed his plan to attack the center with two others, detailing how they would quickly and quietly kill the first people they saw and then methodically move through the building, "eliminating everyone" they encountered, according to a federal criminal complaint. Hamzeh, 23, has been charged with possessing a machine gun and a silencer. Despite indications of an attempted act of terrorism, Hamzeh is not charged with any terrorism counts.... "Thirty is excellent. If I got out, after killing thirty people, I will be happy 100% ... 100% happy, because these 30 will terrify the world."

Oorah

Three unarmed American badasses  -- the would-be murderer (with ties to Islamic terror) had an arsenal, but it wasn't really fair now, was it? 

One serves in the Air Force, another recently served in Afghanistan in the National Guard, another is studying physical therapy in California - and all three Americans are being hailed as heroes for disarming a gunman on a high-speed train who may have been known to intelligence services in three countries.

Love this:

 "without their sangfroid we could have been confronted with a terrible drama."

Americans Spencer Stone (U.S. Air Force) and Alek Skarlatos (Oregon National Guard) subdued the Moroccan jerk with the help of California student Anthony Sadler, and British national Chris Norman.

That's some serious sangfroid right there.

via ABC News, Spencer Stone, Alek Skarlatos, and Anthony Sadler

Does History Run Only One Way?

Nope.  I used to think it did, and recall my naïve amusement at Iran's 1979 revolution.  What could a faraway religion possibly have to do with me?  Quite a lot, as it happens.  Then I used to think what I would do if I'd been around  in 1939, wondering what events in Europe had to do with me.  What would I have done?

Not really All-Steyn-All-The-Time, but this -- "Living History" -- should be read if for no other reason than to start a conversation.  Part of that conversation from my side would be the statement that the Paris kosher market murder victims were not "folks" randomly gunned down but were targeted for being Jews.   

When you're living history as opposed to reading it, the trick is knowing when to head for the exit. One of the things I appreciate about, say, Mittel Europeans of a certain age is that, when you meet them in their grand Paris apartments or rambling house on the edge of Hampstead Heath, somewhere deep inside is the memory of the 3am knock on the door or a little boy crouched under the eaves in the attic. A couple of years back, at a very agreeable cocktail party, I found myself talking to a Hungarian Jew about the last days of the war in Budapest. The jig was up but the German puppet regime had figured they might as well kill as many Jews as they could. No time for niceties any more - for trains and camps and paperwork. There was a shortage of ammunition, so they tied the Jews together in a line, dragged them out into the Danube, and then shot the ones at each end. Everyone in between drowned. Aware of what was happening, a family took in my friend and hid him. He now enjoys a prosperous and comfortable life in the United States, but in his core, deep down within, he remembers his teenage self living day to day and never knowing whether the next morning would be his turn to be roped out in the river.

Does history sometimes run backward?  Heck yeah.  Think of the Dark Ages.  And then take a peek at graduating classes of Cairo University 1959, 1979, 1978, 2004.

Class of 1959

Class of 1978

Class of 1995

Class of 2004

 

 

Admit It: ISIS is an Islamic Death Cult

From the Daily Beast:

Wood argues the Islamic State views itself as “a key agent of the coming Apocalypse.” He is absolutely right, and we have been seeing the symbols for months. After spending about 200 hours combined over the last few weeks, analyzing every word and symbol in the burning video of the Jordanian Air Force pilot and the execution video of the Coptic Christians, we can tell you that both videos reveal Islamic State strategists, propagandists and recruiters are very much grounded in a logical interpretation of the Quran, the hadith, or sayings and traditions of the prophet Muhammad, and fatwa, or religious rulings.

They are also hell-bent on one mission: Chasing the apocalypse, according to Islamic eschatology—the study of the end of the world.

 Read the whole thing.

U.S. Muslims Take On ISIS's Recruiting Machine

More of this, please.

With the Islamic State in particular deploying savvy online appeals to adolescents alongside videos of horrific executions, the sense of urgency has grown. Though some Muslim leaders still resist cooperating with the government, fearing that they would be contributing to religious profiling and anti-Muslim bigotry, many have been spurred to respond as they have come into contact with religiously ardent youths who feel alienated by life in the West and admit that they have been vulnerable to the Islamic State’s invitation to help build a puritanical utopia.

Muslims willing to speak our deserve our respect and our support. The article breaks sunshine through the gloom of my pessimism.  From the NY Times.

 

 

When the Lights Go Out Forever

Pay attention.

It would come with almost no warning. Without any immediate signs as to why, the lights go out, cars stop dead, telephones cease to function, everything with a microchip in it fails, and most of it all never works again.

In the wake of an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) attack on the United States, part or all of the country is thrust back into the 1860s but with 10 times the population. The threat is real, it is pressing, and the United States is doing little to address it.

It strikes many Americans as a fanciful prospect, almost cheesy apocalypse porn, to suggest that something as simple as the destruction of the nation’s power grid could thrust the United States into the dark ages. But those who have investigated this prospect are not rolling their eyes to the threat as are so many of the country’s sophisticates.

 

This Wasn't An Incident Where Billy-Bob and Joe Decided, After a Few BrewskisTo Come In and Shoot Up a Substation

Snipers took out power station in California.

SAN JOSE, Calif.—The attack began just before 1 a.m. on April 16 last year, when someone slipped into an underground vault not far from a busy freeway and cut telephone cables.

Within half an hour, snipers opened fire on a nearby electrical substation. Shooting for 19 minutes, they surgically knocked out 17 giant transformers that funnel power to Silicon Valley. A minute before a police car arrived, the shooters disappeared into the night.

Peggy Noonan again warns of the ease with which our power sources could be knocked out.

More than 100 shell casings were later found at the site. They were of the kind ejected by AK-47s. They were free of fingerprints.

Mr. Wellinghoff later toured the area with professionals from the U.S. Navy's Dahlgren Surface Warfare Center in Virginia, which trains the SEALs. He said the military experts told him it looked like a professional job. They noted small piles of rocks that they said could have been left by an advance scout to alert the attackers as to where to get the best shots.

Some in the industry see it the way Mr. Wellinghoff does, including a former official of PG&E, who told an industry security conference he feared the incident could be a dress rehearsal: "This was an event that was well thought out, well planned and they targeted certain components."

Rich Lordan, an executive at the Electric Power Research Institute, said: "The depth and breadth of the attack was unprecedented" in the United States. The motivation, he said, "appears to be preparation for an act of war."

/tr