Comments Posted By Richard Bottoms
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MORE THAN POLITICAL CORRECTNESS OR VICTIMHOOD AT WORK IN FORT HOOD ATTACK
I asked precisely what those (missing) rules were.
Rule #1: If your fellow soldier is saying things that indicate he is having a psychotic break or having anger issues sufficient that it becomes common knowledge he needs help, order him to get some help. Order his chain of command to make sure he gets some help. Follow up to see if he got some help.
Rule #2: If a soldier with access to weapons starts contacting individuals on the terror watch list or who are known to have terrorist links tell the people in his chain of command.
Rule #3: If a Black, Brown, Arabic, Irish, Ukrainian, Serbian, Greek, German, Italian soldier from this or any other ethnic group starts engaging in behavior that shows a patter of instability inform the chain of command. Oh, and take away his weapons.
Rule #4: If a soldier is conflicted about the very nature of whether he belongs in the military, send him for counseling.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 17:27
Everyone could see it but nobody
couldstop it.Everyone could see it but nobody would stop it.
Fixed.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 16:45
Aren’t you advocating some kind of thought police power - if a person thinks and speaks certain thoughts, they come under official surveillance?
Hello.
The military has the power to have you shot for not going to your assigned place of duty, or declaring a mutiny on the high seas.
I think they have all the power they need to look into soldiers that are problematic.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 16:44
By extension, what does this say about other 2 to 6 million Muslims in the US?
What does Larry Flynt publishing Hustler say about you?
The answer to both questions is nothing.
Hasan is an individual, the killer of Dr. Tiller is an individual, as were Richard Speck, Dylan Klebold, and Timothy McVeigh.
Short of rounding all of the Muslims up and shipping them to Peru, we're going to have to learn to live with them.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 16:41
Richard bottoms: Exactly what “rules of common sense” do you think should be added to our laws (in a way that’s constitutional, of course)?
Were you ever a soldier? I was.
Soldiers do not have the same protections as a civilian does. His commander could order his barracks or residence searched, detain him, investigate him on nothing more than his opinion that the soldier is not acting in accordance with good order and discipline.
Hasan could receive non-judicial punishment for simply saying the wrong thing in the wrong tone of voice to the wrong person.
I was called in to see my First Sergeant one time because an officer thought I was crossing the street in front of his car in an insolent manner.
The man's CO f***ed up. His buddies did the same by not ensuring that they looked out for not only themselves, but their fellow soldier. If he was in distress I guarantee it would have shown up during PT (Physical Training), formation, company training sessions or any number of opportunities under which you attitude and demeanor are scrutinized. Morale is so important an officer is designated for each unity to ensure it's good.
Hasan wasn't just some guy walking down the street that the government decided was a problem. He was a soldier in a military unit and his CO's job is to ensure every soldier under his command is fit for duty and ready to serve. It is highly unlikely no one knew he was unraveling.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 16:29
If the UCMJ had been followed, Hasan might have been discharged and this tragedy might have been averted.
In short no news laws needed, no mass expulsion of Muslims from the Armed Forces. Just people following the rules of common sense and good investigative practices.
The failure was in the chain of command for not identifying someone clearly unfit for duty. The idea that the military will spare no expense to run gays out of the Army, Navy, Airforce and Marines but take no action against Muslims no mater what the evidence is ludicrous.
Somebody stepped on their d**k. A few somebodies, and I can pretty much guarantee Maj. Hasan's immediate superior officer may as well start looking for another line of work.
He or she won't be seeing any more promotions in this millennium.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 15:27
Profile what people do, not who they are. It's Hasan's contacts, writings, and opinions that should have raised red flags.
Second, the tendency to fight the last war is also the problem. The last war as airliners smacked into two buildings. That worked. Once.
Now it's finding ways to assemble intelligence, react to behavior, and follow leads.
Good police work.
There's nothing in any policy Democrats have put forward regards to domestic spying that would have blocked surveillance of Maj. Hasan. Request a tap through the intelligence court and done.
Failure of imagination indeed.
When the FBI was chasing every person with a Muslim sounding name they were inundated with useless leads. They can't chase down every one who wears a turban.
So it's be smart or risk failure. Again.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 11:12
OBAMA'S "CHALLENGER MOMENT" AT FORT HOOD
MADDOW: If a religious extremist in a foreign country was under surveillance by U.S. intelligence, what would you call someone who tipped off that extremist, who told that person that U.S. intelligence was watching them, and specifically, that their E-mail was compromised, that intelligence agents were reading every word of their E-mails?
What would you call the person who completely blew that intelligence effort? Blew that surveillance target? Blew that lead that U.S. intelligence was following to fight terrorism?
As we talked about on this show last night, Congressman Hoekstra took it upon himself yesterday to disclose to "The Washington Post" that the alleged shooter in the Ft. Hood massacre, Maj. Nidal Hasan, not only had sent E-mails to a radical cleric living in Yemen. He had received two E-mails from that cleric as well. That's news, right?
No law enforcement agency or intelligence agency has released that information. No one from the U.S. government or anywhere else had gone on record or even leaked anonymously to the press that there were E-mails from that radical cleric to Maj. Hasan.
It's just Pete Hoekstra who said that to "The Washington Post," thereby broadcasting to the world the previously undisclosed fact that U.S. intelligence was reading that cleric's E-mail.
Republicans, always looking out for national security. Or as we like to call them, gigantic a**hats.
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 13.11.2009 @ 15:35
Even the most casual observor of Obama will admit his performances with and without the telepromtor are striking. So, while it may be “idiotic” to you, it is an comment-worthy phenomenon for most of the rest of us.
The level of silly from the Right is has been on of the most enjoyable part of Obama's first year. Barrack Obama manages a vote on health care reform, something that no president in a century has been able to manage and the Teabagger's Department of Silly Walks is fixated on whether the man reads his speeches or memorizes them.
However they are delivered he displays a facility with thought that the mental stuttering of George Bush cannot begin to compare to. Obama will shred Palin like Cheddar in a cheese grater when it comes to debates in three years or so.
Moose & Squirrel/2012
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 12.11.2009 @ 01:55
Gosh…what drives YOU?
ed.
Rush Limbaugh induced, Sean Hannity stoked, Glenn beck reinforced psychosis that says only Republicans love their country and Democrats are evil traitors who can never legitimately be elected to office.
In short, the modern Sarah Palin-ized GOP.
Moose & Squirrel/2012
Comment Posted By Richard bottoms On 11.11.2009 @ 13:08
