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A gunman opened fire at U.S. Congressmen and others who were gathered at a practice this morning for the Congressional Baseball Game. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise and at least four others were reportedly injured. The gunman, who has been identified by unnamed sources as James T. Hodgkinson III, was taken to a local hospital where he died from his injuries:
A gunman unleashed a barrage of gunfire Wednesday at a park in Alexandria, Va., as Republican members of Congress held a morning baseball practice, wounding at least five people, including House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (La.).
The suspected gunman is James T. Hodgkinson III, 66, from Illinois, according to multiple law enforcement sources. President Trump announced that the gunman, who was wounded in a shootout with officers, has died at an area hospital.
The wounded also included two Capitol Police officers and a congressional aide, according to one law enforcement official and witness accounts.
Congressman Scalise was shot in the hip and is in stable condition.
Hodgkinson's motive may have already been identified by the media:
A Facebook page belonging to a person with the same name includes pictures of Democratic presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders, and rhetoric against President Trump, including a post that reads: "Trump is a Traitor. Trump Has Destroyed Our Democracy. It's Time to Destroy Trump & Co."
Charles Orear, 50, a restaurant manager from St. Louis, said in an interview Wednesday that he became friendly with Hodgkinson during their work together in Iowa on Sanders's campaign. Orear said Hodgkinson was a passionate progressive and showed no signs of violence or malice toward others.
Also at LA Times, Reuters, The Atlantic, The Hill, and CNN.
(Score: 2) by fyngyrz on Wednesday June 14 2017, @09:52PM (4 children)
Cough. Hopefully not. I would like to think that most of the population of the US is smart enough to know that a state of civil war is really no good for, you know, people and other living things. Much as I dislike many of the things that are going on, words and paper are a far better choice than a shooting conflict. Everything our citizens depend on (and hopefully are still able to recognize that they depend on) such as sanitation, food supplies, power, fuel... all these things depend heavily upon a civil society. Break that assumption, and you're going to starve, get too cold/hot, live in the dark, and be unable to travel, in no particular order but pretty much guaranteed to all come about.
My chief concern right now – and I emphasize right now – is that all these threats of taking medical care from people are going to create some thoroughly angered individuals. Basically, if you never give a baby candy, it'll just sit there and burble. But if you give it candy, and then take away the candy, it's going to scream until something is done about the offense or until is distracted by something more interesting. The problem with medical care is that the "candy" is the extended or even immediate life of family members, and inevitably, some people are going to be left without said family members, they will inevitably be very, very angry, and they are going to be able to rather precisely assign responsibility for their losses. And as for the "more interesting" bit, there may not be anything more interesting anyone can offer those people.
See, the thing about taking everyone's guns? That was right-wing agitprop, and it never had anything behind it. So no one really got past the armchair warrior stage. But the signs exist that taking people's medical care is quite possibly going to come about, legislation to that effect is in play right now in the senate, and the suffering that will cause is far beyond the insult to one's liberty that comes about by being told you can't have a gun. The potential for more-than-armchair reactions seems to me to be much higher than it was for those concerned about their 2nd amendment rights.
I don't claim to know what's going to happen. But I see some fairly serious potential for problems if the medical care thing isn't dealt with in a forward-looking, actual-better-care manner. Anyone who thinks they'll be angry with higher taxation really hasn't thought through how angry someone could be if they directly lose an SO or a child to existing policy reversals.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by edIII on Wednesday June 14 2017, @11:18PM (3 children)
Nobody, except for some military jarheads with blood lust, think war is good for anyone. Internally, or externally, it's a fucked deal that illuminates how avarice and power corrupts all that it touches. It's touched the whole world.
How quaint. I guess you believe voting solves things too?
ONLY violence, sea changes, and massive strikes/riots changes anything. It's not about better or worse, but about effectiveness. People started out with the quest for the 8-hour day by talking. The Elites responded with cops moonlighting (mercenaries) as their personal enforcers that shot women and children dead in front of their husbands.
We get nothing by talking, nothing by writing, nothing by voting. The only possible choice that involves very little conflict is massive national strikes. ALL of that conflict is related to scabs crossing the line because their desperation, and not being represented or cared for by those striking. The Elites play us against each other in this way.
In order for talking and writing to work, the other side has to be evolved enough to be receptive. They're not, and are nothing but pigs on two feet wholly bereft of any compassion, empathy, or humanity. How does talking work with these people again? I don't mean to imply the rank and file Republicans, but those that lead the party and hold office, along with the Elites driving it behind the scenes (Dark Money Politics). The really fucked part is, that when it comes to the Elites, party lines don't mean anything. I hold Democrats to nearly the same degree of contempt that I do Republicans, but that is largely isolated to the politicians and Elites. The average Republican voter has the ability to be a decent person, and could probably be reasoned with.
Ahhh, the duress. "We can't strike! We don't have enough food!", "We can't fight back! We're too weak!", "We can't push for change because they'll hurt us!". Nobody is deluded to think we don't need those things except for a very small fringe group with their own economic ideas that can pretty much be summed up as anarchy.
Society is already broken, and the complete breakdown in its fabric is well under way. There is no other future when living wages no longer exist, and the Elites own politics as their own personal engine of avaricious change. Sanitation, water, power, etc. are already broken and in incredible disrepair. Flint was the tip of the iceberg, and local taxes are going down faster because the average American Worker isn't paid a living wage, compounded by the fact that the American Worker is besieged on all sides by rich Elites bleeding them dry. Wages don't go up, but the cost of commodities do. More problematic is that for entire counties the average rent isn't 30-40% of income, but 150-400% of income. War on the poor is a fucking understatement.
Anger has nothing to do with it. Medical is wholly unaffordable, and yet, other countries demonstrate that the ONLY reason why American medical is unaffordable are the parasites in the system. When less than 40c on the dollar goes to your health care, that means health care is broken. Where government is picking up the tab, the taxpayer is so poorly represented it borders on criminal negligence. That fucking cunt that runs Mylanta deserves a hot spike up her asshole in hell for all eternity. You wonder how we have no fucking money, and yet are the wealthiest country on Earth? When a hammer costs $400 because a government procurement contract is run by fucking idiots.
You bet there will be blood when they take away the health care. Nobody will believe it's because of ethics, morality, or that it's more American somehow to not have medicine available to all. EVERYONE will believe the simple truth: Elites were being greedy little bitches, couldn't pay living wages, and cannot even be bothered to treat their wage slaves as human beings.
Yeah, that can start civil war. Americans don't sit there and watch the pigs on two legs go about their business. We rise up, kill that fucking pig, burn his house down, and watch his family run out of town to complain the "King" pigs that the slaves finally had enough. That's American history, and the true American way.
No shit. You can go an entire life without owning a firearm, but you can't go your whole life without seeing a doctor. Not unless you are very, very, lucky and don't mind living to or past the average life expectancy. The average American Worker, or wage slave, now lives considerably less long than the average Elite. That is precisely because of the rampant income inequality that has creeped up the last 40 years with the death of unions and the outsourcing of work to cheap hell holes where it is easy and common to abuse the people.
If it happens to me, I already know who I will be killing. That's not a joke. They will not get to go forward in life, exploiting the fuck out of other people, so that somebody else may die because of them. That's my line in the sand, and after they cross that, I will engage in a killing spree to rival them all. Not indiscriminately, but precisely, and my targets will be all people that are involved in the law, but especially those that profited from my loved ones death. Killing may not be the best word either, as I intend for them to live. Just with horrifically broken bodies that require a lot of medical care on a daily basis, that exist only as pain amplifiers.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by GlennC on Wednesday June 14 2017, @11:35PM
And here I am without mod points!
Please accept a virtual +10 from me.
Sorry folks...the world is bigger and more varied than you want it to be. Deal with it.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday June 15 2017, @09:57AM (1 child)
And then you go on to fantasize about your war on others.
You do plenty here to earn that complete lack of respect you get. Maybe you should learn how to help fix the world instead of merely being another problem on it?
(Score: 2) by edIII on Thursday June 15 2017, @07:49PM
Fuck off you piece of fucking shit. I don't give a fuck what a sociopathic little whining bitch like you thinks. "Muh society!".
You want me to be on you like white on rice again? I can. I've been ignoring you, would you like that to change? Then shut the fuck up. There is absolutely nothing positive to be gained by our interaction, unless it is your eyes bulging out of your head when I crush your fucking neck.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.