Archive for the ‘Crime’ Category
Columnist John Cass has written a column about a disturbing incident in Chicago. Here’s the video that’s going viral:
Kass’s column got my blood boiling. This is what got me started:
The video, posted by the Tribune’s Breaking News Center, shows in vivid and frightening detail how armed thugs robbed a gift and sports store Tuesday in the Logan Square neighborhood.
You can see the gunman demand the money. You see the store owner’s brother-in-law with a gun to his head. You see the shots being fired, and the bat wielded by a wounded and desperate Luis Quizhpe, the 62-year-old proprietor who fought for his life.
That’s what got me started but this is what’s got me seeing red:
On Wednesday we called Roderick Drew, spokesman for Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s Law Department, who told us that store owners are prohibited from carrying handguns.
“A business owner can register a long gun (rifle or shotgun) for their fixed place of business, but it has to stay on the premises,” Drew said. “The business owner cannot register or bring a handgun to his place of business. The only place a person can lawfully have a handgun is the home.”
Chicago’s and Illinois’ royalty are protected but shop owners are without protection. Rahm Emanuel is part of that royalty. He’s protected. Mr. Quizhpe isn’t part of that royalty. He was shot. Repeatedly. If Mr. Quizhpe had used a handgun to defend himself, there’s little doubt that Emanuel would’ve had him arrested and prosecuted.
During the Clinton administration, President Clinton talked about “people that work hard and played by the rules.” He suggested that he’d fight for them. In Emanuel’s Chicago, “people that work hard and play by the rules” get shot while the city turns a blind eye towards the victims:
Quizhpe said he’s considering selling the store his family has run for decades.
“I’ve been thinking about selling everything off and changing my business,” he said. “The reality is, with everything going on, it’s difficult to put myself and my family in danger.”
Democrats frequently talk about hunting when the conversation turns to the Second Amendment. That isn’t what the Second Amendment is about. It’s about the right of the citizenry to protect themselves from criminals and tyrant politicians like Emanuel. Chicago is doing everything possible to prevent people from protecting their families and businesses.
That’s clearly a violation of Mr. Quizhpe’s Second Amendment rights. Thankfully, Kass has written about this horrific event:
Anti-gun policy wonks talk in abstract terms. But it’s not abstract for victims. It’s not abstract for Quizhpe. And it wasn’t abstract for Michael Kozel, 57, who for 20 years owned a muffler shop in the Gage Park neighborhood. On Jan. 3 he was shot dead in the back by robbers, one of the 42 homicides that month. Chicago has already forgotten his name.
Politicians that won’t let citizens protect themselves from gun-toting thugs should be run out of office. There’s no chance that Emanuel will be run out of office. He’ll be praised by gun control activists across the nation. That’s the definition of being un-American. There’s nothing more un-American than acting like royalty while telling the citizenry that they can’t protect themselves.
When will Chicago take its city back? When will they admit that shopkeepers have the right to protect themselves against violent thugs?
Tags: Second Amendment, Chicago, Homicide, Rahm Emanuel, Criminals, Violence, Royalty, Democrats, Luis Quizhpe, Small Business Owner, Baseball Bat, Citizens, Public Safety
Juan Williams and Mary Katherine Ham normally get along with each other. This morning, Juan Williams accused Mary Katherine Ham of not caring about victims of violent crime:
Here’s the spiciest exchange:
MKH: It’s fairly clear that this wouldn’t help in these situations, that very little gun crime comes from the things you’re trying to regulate. Those things only impact people who are already law abiding and that’s what we’re talking about. You can’t just pass laws…well, people do all the time, unfortunately, but federal laws shouldn’t be passed, saying “Well, it might work.”
JUAN WILLIAMS: I live in the District of Columbia and I can tell you theey have extremely strong gun control laws and yet we have a very high murder rate. And why is that? Because guns flow in from Virginia, which has lax gun laws.
MKH: We have lots of guns in Virginia and yet, we don’t have a high murder rate so maybe there’s a deeper social problem going on than lone gunmen and gangs and crime in big cities.
JUAN WILLIAMS: Oh so protecting my life and protecting my family means nothing to people in Virginia and I should….?
MKH: Oh, right. That’s what I said, Juan.
Here’s a hint to Juan Williams. Perhaps it’s better to live in cities where you can protect yourself. If you don’t want to move, then get DC to change their laws.
Saying that MKH doesn’t care about Juan Williams protecting his family is downright irresponsible. That’s as irresponsible as MKH saying that Juan Williams doesn’t care about the Bill of Rights and the Second Amendment. It wouldn’t be difficult to make a case that Juan Williams doesn’t put a high enough priority on protecting people’s Second Amendment rights. That wouldn’t make it easy to make the case that Juan Williams doesn’t care about the Bill of Rights.
In the end, Juan hinted that he planned on apologizing to MKH after the interview. To her credit, Mary Katherine Ham didn’t lose her cool despite Juan’s ill-advised accusations.
Tags: Second Amendment, Bill of Rights, Constitution, Gun Crime, Newtown, Mary Katherine Ham, Juan Williams, District of Columbia, Chicago, Gun Control, Virginia
This has been an intense week of hearings on Rep. Paymar’s gun confiscation legislation. Tim Jazursky’s testimony was particularly riveting. Not all of the testimony was intense. This testimony wasn’t intense as much as it was educational:
After Rep. Hausman talked about how Second Amendment advocates don’t talk about the opening words of the Amendment, Hamline law Professor Joseph Olson explained why. Here’s what he told the House Public Safety Finance and Policy Committee:
I actually had one of my articles cited in Heller so I know Judge Scalia knows — is familiar with my work. I’ve read the opinion a number of times. I teach it in my seminar at Hamline Law School. The Supreme Court did 2 things in the Heller case that are relevant to the discussion as Rep. Hausman brought it up.
One, in Heller, the Supreme Court made clear that the introductory clause of the Amendment isn’t part of the normative statement. In other words, the introductory clause is not part of the rule of law. The rule of law is that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged.”
The Paymar-Hausman gun confiscation hearings show why this issue is fraught with perils for the DFL. The DFL has been on the wrong side of this issue for most of my adult life. They’re wedded ideologically to a failed set of policies.
Stricter gun control laws aren’t the solution. Whether they’ve been implemented in Chicago, Washington, DC or elsewhere, they haven’t solved the problem. The DFL’s policy perscriptions are ideologically driven. Not only that but they’re constitutionally questionable.
If any of these bills are signed into law, the DFL will be bigtime losers. Rural DFL legislators might get defeated simply by being tied to the metro DFL anti-gun extremists. That might also hurt Gov. Dayton’s re-election chances. The DFL would be better off steering clear of this issue. They’d be better off figuring out solutions to the problem of violence in society.
It’s easy to picture Minnesota Republicans praying that the DFL pushes this legislation. The DFL is all but guaranteeing a GOP majority in the House of Representatives in 2015.
The FBI has started an investigation into a voting scam in Florida:
TAMPA, Fla. – The FBI is joining an investigation into bogus letters sent to many Florida residents, including the Republican Party of Florida chairman, that raise questions about their eligibility to vote.
FBI officials said Wednesday the FBI will focus on letters received by voters in 18 counties in central and southwest Florida.
According to the Republican Party of Florida, Chairman Lenny Curry received one of the fake letters on Tuesday.
“This type of activity is not only disgusting, it is criminal, and must be prosecuted to the full extent of the law,” Curry said in a release. “I call on Florida Democrats to join me in condemning this false letter writing campaign that appears to target likely voters in Florida, and help RPOF get the word out about this false campaign.”
Local 6 first reported the bogus letter scam on Monday, which claim to be from county supervisors of elections but are postmarked from Seattle. They raise questions about the voter’s citizenship and appear intended to intimidate people.
The FBI says voters who get a letter should contact their supervisor of elections and then keep the letter for the FBI.
Patrick Moran, the son of Virginia Congressman Jim Moran, needs a lawyer:
At the time this video was taken, Patrick Moran served as the field director for his dad’s campaign. He’s since resigned. In the video, Patrick Moran explained to a Project Veritas investigator how to commit voter fraud in Virginia.
Tags: Voter Fraud, Florida, Virginia, FBI, Project Veritas, Patrick Moran, Jim Moran, Anti-Semite, Corruption, Investigations, Forgeries, Utility Bills, Democrats, Election 2012
When I first read TheDC’s article about Sen. Klobuchar, I was curious to find out what they’d found. After reading the Klobuchar campaign’s explanation in this article, though, it’s apparent that they’re trying to shovel this past the election. This non-explanation explanation is finely parsed messaging:
“Senator Klobuchar did not ask her county attorney staff or law enforcement to refrain from investigating or prosecuting Tom Petters,” Klobuchar campaign spokesman Linden Zakula said in a prepared statement. “She was not presented with evidence for prosecution of charges against him.”
I don’t doubt that this statement is accurate. I’m equally certain that it’s exceptionally evasive. It’s quite possible Sen. Klobuchar didn’t tell her staff to not investigate or prosecute. That isn’t what I’m questioning. What I’m questioning, though, is why Sen. Klobuchar didn’t direct her staff to investigate Petters.
Sen. Klobuchar saw the evidence against Mr. Hettler and Ms. Kahn. Sen. Klobuchar went above and beyond her authority:
The documents also show that Klobuchar exceeded the bounds of her jurisdiction as County Attorney to intervene in federal bankruptcy and other legal proceedings whose results helped Petters erase the earliest indications of his criminal activity.
Why did Sen. Klobuchar take these extraordinary steps? It’s unthinkable to have a county attorney assist in erasing Petters’ previous criminal activities. At minimum, this shows she knew about Petters’ past criminal tendencies. At minimum, shouldn’t that be enough to start an investigation?
It’s one thing to investigate and find nothing for find out that potential crimes committed didn’t fall into local jurisdiction. If Klobuchar’s office investigated but found evidence of a federal crime, she could’ve referred it to the U.S. Attorney’s office.
Sen. Klobuchar has often touted herself as a consumer watchdog. It appears as though she failed in that capacity at a critical time when she could’ve protected others from having their life savings stolen. One wonders whether she ignored the biggest case because of political considerations.
It’s beginning to look like that.
Tags: Amy Klobuchar, Prosecution, Ponzi Scheme, Tom Petters, Richard Hettler, Ruth Kahn, Cover-up, Scandal, DFL, Election 2012
When the news broke of the affair between Michael Brodkorb and Sen. Amy Koch, the DFL punditocracy hyped it up, saying that Minnesotans would be repulsed by the scandal. At the time, I thought it probably wasn’t smart for the DFL to play things up like they did.
I thought that the DFL would overplay their hand with that scandal. That’s becoming reality with the news about Kelly Gauthier’s late night rednezvous with a 17-year-old boy:
State Patrol will confirm that one witness approached a trooper around 11 at night on July 22nd to report an incident.
The State Patrol turned the investigation over to the Duluth Police Department.
Well placed sources today told the Northland’s NewsCenter, the incident involved a 17 year old boy with whom Gauthier was reportedly engaged in a sexual act.
Because the age of consent in Minnesota is 16 it is not illegal to have sex with someone who is 17. However it can be a misdemeanor to engage in sex acts in a public place.
Our sources say Representative Gauthier met the young man on Craig’s List and that police are investigating the potential that money changed hands which could make it a criminal matter.
I won’t pretend that the GOP is pure as the driven snow. I’ll just suggest that, if it’s confirmed, paying a person for sexual acts is a crime in Minnesota. That elevates the situation considerably.
I’ll be honest. I never bought the thinking that the Brodkorb-Koch scandal was enough to tip the legislature from GOP to DFL. That’s why I don’t think this scandal will impact which party will be the majority party. That said, it’s pretty apparent that a potential case of child prostitution isn’t the type of thing that Ken Martin and Paul Thissen want to dealing with heading into the sprint to the finish line.
The only question left unanswered is whether Rep. Gauthier is forced to resign immediately or if the DFL leadership is willing to sit on their thumbs and say nothing. Then again, this DFL leadership team might pretend that this didn’t happen and pray that their media allies at the Strib and WCCO will protect them with a shroud of darkness.
Apparently, Rep. Gauthier is hiding from the press:
Republican Party of Minnesota Chairman Pat Shortridge issued the following statement calling for transparency regarding this issue from the DFL House Caucus and Rep. Gauthier.
“Wednesday’s revelation that DFL State Representative Kerry Gauthier is under investigation for alleged misconduct at a Duluth area rest stop is deeply disturbing.
“Today, Gauthier’s constituents have legitimate reason to believe that what he terms a ‘private matter’ is preventing him from doing his job representing them.
“Gauthier’s absence from today’s legislative hearing on providing his district relief from the floods that devastated Duluth in June, raises serious doubts about his ability to continue holding public office. He attended a previous meeting on August 7, when the July 22 incident was still not publicly known. His failure to come to the Capitol today indicates that as other legislators are discussing helping his district, he can’t even serve his constituents for fear of having to face reporters.
This isn’t private conduct since it’s affecting his ability to serve his consistituents during a crisis. That’s anything but private conduct.
Finally, Rep. Thissen hasn’t spoken about this in almost 4 weeks. His silence indicates that his actions are purely politically motivated. There isn’t another justification for his silence.
Tags: Scandal, Kerry Gauthier, Paul Thissen, Investigation, Police, Prostitution, Corruption, Craigs List, Cover Up, Media, DFL, Election 2012
I started writing this post last night because I was utterly disgusted with a) Bill Burton, b) Stephanie Cutter, c) Joe Soptic, d) David Axelrod and e) President Obama.
This morning, Michelle Malkin gave a devastatingly powerful interview to the hosts of Fox & Friends:
While Michelle was getting increasingly agitated, a thought popped into my mind. I’ve advocated Mitt putting on brass knuckles and beating President Obama, Bill Burton and Stephanie Cutter to a figurative pulp.
This isn’t a policy difference that surrogates are best used for. It’s a time when Mitt needs to take this personally. It’s a time he shows us that he’ll ‘get bloody’ when Team O resorts to personal attacks filled with outright lies and insinuations.
The reality is that fighting President Obama and his Nixonesque henchmen in the trenches will fire up conservatives while telling independents that the President and his team are the most despicable people in presidential history.
Showing people that President Obama’s trained henchmen tried tugging on America’s heartstrings will move voters. Most importantly, it’ll tell Team Obama that they’ll pay a price for playing dirty politics.
Michelle’s got a point, too, that this is illegal coordination between the Obama campaign and Priorities USA. The Obama campaign can’t host a conference call in May with Joe Soptic telling essentially the same story then as he told in the Priorities USA ad, then disavow any knowledge of Mr. Soptic’s story.
Mitt, this isn’t the time to ‘let surrogates handle it’. This isn’t the time to simply criticize the Obama campaign of lying.
It’s time to accuse the Obama campaign arsenal of being Nixonesque. It’s time to tell the nation that the ‘Chicago Way’ isn’t the American Way and that the nation rejects President Obama’s gutter politics and the politics of personal destruction.
It’s time to verbally punch President Obama’s windpipe. He’s a disgusting excuse for a human being. It’s time he got called for being that.
Tags: President Obama, Priorities USA, Bill Burton, Stephanie Cutter, Joe Soptic, David Axelrod, Chicago Way, Politics of Personal Destruction, Democrats, Mitt Romney, Lawsuits, Michelle Malkin, GOP, Election 2012
Yesterday, Mitt Romney’s campaign asked Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli to investigate the activities of the Voter Participation Center:
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s campaign is asking Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli to launch an investigation into voter-registration forms that are being sent to Virginia residents and addressed to deceased relatives, children, family pets and others ineligible to vote.
The errant mailings from the Washington-based nonprofit group Voter Participation Center have befuddled many Virginia residents, leading to hundreds of complaints.
The organization has been mass-mailing the forms, pre-populated with key information such as names and addresses, to primarily Democratic-leaning voting blocs such as young adults, unmarried women, African-Americans and Latinos.
VPC founder Page Gardner has responded to the Romney campaign’s request in this communication:
Attempts by the Romney for President Campaign to block voter registration efforts in Virginia “may rise to the level of interference with legitimate voter registration efforts contrary to applicable state and federal laws,” the Voter Participation Center (VPC) said today in a letter to Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli.
The VPC today asked the Attorney General to refuse the Romney for President Campaign’s request to investigate completely lawful efforts by the VPC to register Virginians. The VPC also asked the Attorney General to deny the Campaign’s request that State Board of Elections officials direct registrars to refuse to accept official, state approved voter registration applications submitted by eligible voters in the Commonwealth.
“The Romney campaign’s request for a probe into over 15 thousand returned legal and state-approved registration application forms is part of a blatant and ongoing partisan effort to keep people from voting, “ explained VPC founder and president Page Gardner. “We see it everywhere –voter purges in Florida, Texas and Colorado; onerous voter ID laws, which Pennsylvania State GOP House Leader Mike Turzai recently admitted serve no purpose other than to elect Republicans. We will fight these efforts to disenfranchise voters in Virginia and in every other state.”
Seventy-three (73) million Americans are unregistered in American today. This is a national disgrace.
The Voter Participation Center is a non-partisan, non-profit that focuses on registering and turning out the Rising American Electorate, unmarried women, people of color and young voters, who account for 53 percent of voting eligible citizens but who represent 63 percent of all unregistered Americans.
The VPC has helped register more than 1.5 million voters since it began in 2004. Since September 2011, the VPC has mailed out almost 7 million voter registration applications in 30 states. Those applications were reviewed prior to mailing by elections officials, including in Virginia where they were reviewed by officials in the State Board of Elections office. More than 400,000 Americans returned those applications to elections officials. The VPC plans to add to these totals with another 5.3 million piece mailing in early September.
“The new majority in America frightens some political groups because these are the voters they want to keep from the polls on November 6. It’s no surprise that our organization, which is conducting the largest mail registration program in the country, is under attack. But we have no intention of backing down. At a time when states have limited programs or resources to educate and register voters, efforts like ours, the League of Women Voters and other civic engagement groups have never been more important.”
The Romney campaign doesn’t have a complaint with voter registration drives that register “unmarried women, people of color and young voters.” The Romney campaign has a problem with VPC attempting to register out-of-state family members and deceased children:
Justin Riemer, the State Board of Elections’ deputy secretary, said forms have been sent by the group to deceased infants, out-of-state family members, and non-U.S. citizens, among others.
The Virginia State Board of Elections appears to be leaning towards investigating the VPC:
In a letter this month, the State Board of Elections asked the group to cease pre-populating their forms and raised questions about how the group was obtaining lists of registered voters, citing the errant forms.
Riemer noted that pre-populating the forms violates rules set forth in the state code and the Virginia Constitution requiring that voters fill out their own forms.
VPC knows that this investigation doesn’t have a thing to do with registering legal voters. They’ve included that in their official statement to deflect attention from the fact that they’re a) breaking the law by partially filling in the voter registration forms and b) sending registration forms to infants that died.
Based on Justin Riemer’s statements that VPC was warned a) not to fill in parts of the voter registration form and b) that filling in parts of the voter registration form was illegal in Virginia, it sounds like VPC is in deep legal trouble.
VPC’s letter to the Romney campaign opens with a bunch of bluster:
I write on behalf of the Voter Participation Center (VPC) in response to your July 24, 2012 letter to the Virginia Office of the Attorney General and State Board of Elections. The Voter Participation Center is astounded that the Romney campaign would make such blatantly false allegations. It is also astounded that you would call for an investigation into completely lawful voter registration efforts and that you would ask the State Board of Elections to direct registrars to refuse to accept official, state approved voter registration applications submitted by eligible voters in the Commonwealth.
Again, VPC is pretending that they haven’t been warned not to break the law but that’s reality.
Tags: Voter Participation Center, Voter Registration Fraud, Page Gardner, Voter Fraud, Investigation, Justin Riemer, State Board of Elections, Kenneth Cuccinelli, Attorney General, Mitt Romney, GOP, Election 2012
I wish this information surprised me but it doesn’t:
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s campaign is asking Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli to launch an investigation into voter-registration forms that are being sent to Virginia residents and addressed to deceased relatives, children, family pets and others ineligible to vote.
The errant mailings from the Washington-based nonprofit group Voter Participation Center have befuddled many Virginia residents, leading to hundreds of complaints.
The organization has been mass-mailing the forms, pre-populated with key information such as names and addresses, to primarily Democratic-leaning voting blocs such as young adults, unmarried women, African-Americans and Latinos.
That’ll get Voter Participation Center in trouble. Here’s why:
In a letter this month, the State Board of Elections asked the group to cease pre-populating their forms and raised questions about how the group was obtaining lists of registered voters, citing the errant forms.
Riemer noted that pre-populating the forms violates rules set forth in the state code and the Virginia Constitution requiring that voters fill out their own forms.
There’s no question that people that willingly commit voter registration fraud will willingly commit voter fraud. There’s no question that that’s what Voter Participation Center is involved in.
It’s one thing to send forms out with real people’s names on them. It’s still illegal but at least the Voter Participation Center could make a plausible argument. Mailing out registration forms with the names of family pets and deceased children is indefensible.
The intent is clear. Committing voter registration fraud is the first step. The next step is requesting absentee ballots in those fraudulent people’s names.
Check back Thursday to find out what connections VPC has.
Tags: Voter Participation Center, Janis Gardner, Voter Registration Fraud, Voter Fraud, Democrats, Crime, Investigation, Kenneth Cuccinelli, Virginia, Mitt Romney, GOP, Election 2012
Mark Ritchie must go. He was considered the thought leader for the bloody WTO protests in Seattle in 1999. In recent court filings, he’s said that he doesn’t have the affirmative responsibility of preventing felony voter fraud. Prior to that, it’s been proven that he hasn’t faithfully updated Minnesota’s SVRS, which he’s required to do according to HAVA.
We know this because felons have been convicted of voting illegally. Had the voter rolls been updated in a timely fashion, they couldn’t have gotten a ballot.
Now, the Pioneer Press Editorial Board is accusing Mark Ritchie of attempting to suppress the vote:
Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie has changed the Legislature’s voter ID amendment title, “Photo identification required for voting, ” into the following: “Changes to in-person & absentee voting & voter registration; provisional ballots.” Ritchie, who is well read and well spoken, clearly had to go deep into the Orwellian playbook to come up with that one.
But what explains this bizarre formulation that obviously seeks to obscure the initiative and confuse the voter? One of the best explanations we’ve heard is that Ritchie hopes to so confuse the voters that they simply throw up their hands and skip this ballot item altogether. Remember, by law in Minnesota, a nonvote on a constitutional amendment question has the same effect as a “no” vote.
Mark Ritchie’s cumulative actions have sent the unmistakable message that he won’t enforce parts of Minnesota’s election laws that he disagrees with. I wrote here about the lengths Mr. Ritchie will go in refusing to enforce the parts of Minnesota’s election laws he doesn’t agree with. Here’s what Mr. Ritchie said about enforcing Minnesota’s election laws:
There is nothing in the words “any election,” in art. VII, § 1, or elsewhere in Minnesota law that places upon Defendants [Mark Ritchie, Lori Swanson and Joe Mansky] an affirmative obligation to prevent such persons from committing felony voter fraud.
The thought that Mr. Ritchie won’t accept responsibility for preventing voter fraud speaks volumes about his governing philosophy. It says that Ritchie thinks it isn’t his job to prevent honest people from having their votes negated by dishonest people who are gaming the system. It’s as if Ritchie’s say it’s just his job to make sure as many people vote even if there’s substantial voter fraud happening.
Most importantly, it’s his statement that Article VII is meaningless. If he won’t enforce Minnesota’s Constitution, what’s his responsibility? Does Mr. Ritchie think that it’s his job to make sure as many people as possible? Does he think that enforcing the Constitution is unimportant?
At a time when voter fraud is happening, when tens of thousands of PVCs are returned because the address doesn’t exist, Minnesota needs someone who’s interested in protecting legal voters.
Minnesotans love high voter turnout. They also demand that ther election laws be consistently applied. Mr. Ritchie fails that final part badly.
That’s why he’s got to go.
Tags: Felony, Corruption, Mark Ritchie, Photo ID, Voter Fraud, Constitution, DFL, Elections