Why I Carry a Handgun for Protection, Vol. 62

Because in the city in which we reside the supposed good guys can sometimes actually turn out to be the bad guys.

Detectives with the Arizona Department of Public Safety have concluded that not only did some law-enforcement officer members of the wannabe biker gang motorcycle club the Iron Brotherhood assault a 23-year-old man in a Prescott bar last December 22, breaking his nose among other injuries, the heroic first responders then told massive whoppers about exactly what happened:

"The DPS report notes that numerous members of the club made statements that were contradicted by videotape, other evidence and civilian witnesses."

The victim's transgression?  He asked the club's president some questions about the patches on his vest.  This apparently angered sergeant-at-arms and Phoenix "officer" Eric "Guido" Amato, who then decided to administer a little attitude adjustment.

Naturally, once other cops showed up to investigate the incident the blue wall of silence immediately went up, as found out by a parallel investigation:

"A separate administrative review conducted by a Coconino County sheriff’s commander and released Thursday by the Yavapai County Sheriff’s Office concluded that at least two Yavapai County sheriff’s deputies — [William] Suttle and Capt. Marc Schmidt — hindered investigators by lying and withholding information."

Open and shut, right?  Nope.  DPS, despite their findings, has declined to recommend criminal charges against any of the goons but instead merely identified some "potential criminal allegations" against several members of the club including assault, disorderly conduct, obstruction and false reporting. 

"Officer" Amato is under a separate internal affairs probe by the Phoenix PD but unbelievably is still out on the street in the South Mountain Precinct as a, get this, "Community Action Officer" (no doubt serving and protecting by educating the citizens about such serious threats as criminal motorcycle gang members). 

Two of the cops at least had the integrity to resign their positions, according to the story, but all of them remain uncharged and unsanctioned to date, almost five months later.

If any other biker gang had engaged in this conduct they would have been long ago jailed and criminally charged.  We already know the answer but we'll ask the question anyway - what's taking so long in this case?

"The Iron Brotherhood claims on its website to be a fraternity of motorcycle-riding law officers who do not associate with criminals."

Not exactly true, because at least some of them apparently are criminals.

We reserve our right to protect ourselves against an unprovoked criminal assault from anyone, whether they wear a badge for a living or not.

Hush, child. Your bottle is warming

A quick response to the Messiah's pathetic mewling in the Rose Garden earlier today:

"By now, it’s well known that 90 percent of the American people support universal background checks"

Says who?  Please cite where you discovered such magical fairy-dusted numbers, sir.  If anywhere close to 90 percent had truly supported that legislation it would have passed in a slam-dunk.  It didn't, of course, which leads us to conclude that you in fact are the one stretching the truth here.

"We’re talking about convicted felons, people convicted of domestic violence, people with a severe mental illness"

Persons who are already prohibited from buying a firearm from anyone anywhere at any time.  So you're proposing to make it doubly or triply illegal? 

"But instead of supporting this compromise, the gun lobby and its allies willfully lied about the bill. They claimed that it would create some sort of “big brother” gun registry, even though the bill did the opposite."

Universal background checks by definition would create a de facto gun registry that no doubt would be used to locate and attempt to confiscate firearms at some future date.  As to the ban on creating an official registry, it's true that one was in the legislation, but the one word "notwithstanding" in the bill basically negates the language and allows the Attorney General to do just that.

"There were no coherent arguments as to why we wouldn’t do this."

There were many, sir.  You just dismissed them as you do any viewpoints that differ from your collectivist worldview.

"But if action by Congress could have saved one person, one child"

So we take it you're in favor of any action that saves lives, up to and including waterboarding, then?

"I’ve heard folks say that having the families of victims lobby for this legislation was somehow misplaced. "A prop," somebody called them. “Emotional blackmail,” some outlet said. Are they serious?"

Yes indeed.  The same people you've been carting around on Air Force One, parading up in the Senate gallery and pimping out on sycophantic news programs?  This is a textbook definition of employing the transfer technique, and you should be ashamed of yourself for dancing in their children's blood to advance your political agenda.

"And I see this as just round one"

Bring it on.

At least he knows which end to hold

The President's propaganda office, under immense pressure to produce evidence that Barry has indeed held a firearm at one point in his life, has released a picture of the Messiah apparently engaged in a bit of skeet shooting at Camp David.  As if the Second Amendment was put into the Bill of Rights to protect an admittedly fun way to while away an afternoon.

"This official White House photograph is being made available only for publication by news organizations and/or for personal use printing by the subject(s) of the photograph. The photograph may not be manipulated in any way"

Parody is still protected speech under the First Amendment, as far as we can tell.  We're sure the Messiah's minions are hard at work undermining that right as well.  In the meantime, we eagerly await the Internet memes that undoubtedly will result from the pic.

The mom jeans add an outstanding sartorial touch, by the way.

And I want France to have free ice cream on Tuesdays

"Obama Has Massive Lead in Global Poll"

So what?

Only votes cast by U.S. citizens count in the upcoming election, as much as the Messiah and his supporters wish for that not to be the case, as judging by the latest polls that's the only way they're going to be able to pull off a win.  Tam, who resides in the battleground state of Indiana, notes that pretty much every single Republican ad she's seen (and she's apparently seen plenty) mentions repealing the abomination that is Obamacare, while all of the Democrat candidates' ads won't even mention the currently millstone-like Obama, much less his signature legislative accomplishment.

Things are definitely getting interesting.

The Jack-Booted Thug(s) of the Week...

... are Louisville, Kentucky police officers Trey McKinley, Donald Pugh, Jeremy Linton, Daniel English and Joseph Vidourek, as well as Sgt. Kirby Shobe.

These fine public servants, especially "Officer" English, rousted National Guard Lt. Col. Donald Blake Settle, a highly decorated 29-year soldier with a traumatic brain injury, last January simply because he was wearing dirty clothes from a remodeling job and was observed by English to be having difficulty speaking while Settle was conversing with an acquaintance he ran into at a local mall while shopping for a gift card.

Despite his (accurate) protestations that he was neither impaired nor a homeless vagrant, Settle was menaced twice with a TASER, brutally tossed to the ground and handcuffed, and then threatened with arrest (for what?  The story doesn't say, and there definitely was no actual crime being committed) before the cops made some calls and finally managed to figure out that he was telling the truth.  Did that information make one bit of difference?

Naw, they still rudely told him to hit the road:

"Settle said he was told to leave the mall and get his gift card somewhere else on the way out of Louisville."

Didn't they already make a movie about exactly this kind of official abuse of innocent veterans by such smug self-proclaimed guardians of proper dress and diction?

Naturally, none of the cops were disciplined for their wrongdoing, not even "Sergeant" Shobe, who despite apparently being the supervisor at the scene didn't bother to fill out a report on the incident, most likely because enough clock ticks had passed for even that half-wit to figure out that he and his fellow thugs might actually face some consequences for their unlawful actions. 

"'You always err on the side of caution because what, to me, this looks like, is that we were trying to cover something up,' [Louisville PD Col. Vince] Robison said, later clarifying, however, that it didn’t appear there was any “conspiracy” to cover anything up, just a “poor job” in not documenting what happened."

Oh no, no conspiracy at all, it was just a (very convenient) crappy job by his officers.  But no punishment for said crap performance.  What a professionally-run department.

Settle has been told he will have to sue the department to receive a copy of the sham "investigation" into incident.  According to the story, he plans to do exactly that. We hope he gets some significant monetary damages as well to assist him in his recovery.
 

Thanks for visiting

An illegal immigrant who made his way into the U.S. through Mexico, got caught, made a nebulous asylum claim of "religious persecution" from a government that no longer existed at the time he left his home country (but the rest of his family seemingly has no issues and stayed there), had his claim denied, is ordered deported in 1996 and not only ignored the order but subsequently missed not one but two court hearings to appeal his status, is finally located and picked up by ICE and is in jail awaiting return to his homeland, so naturally he's crying about how unfair the system is.

The man unwisely married and had five children while under that active deportation order, so of course it's America's fault that his family is apparently going to be split up.  Nope, he has no sense of personal responsibility whatsoever for his current predicament despite the choices being entirely his at every step of the process.

And no, he doesn't qualify for President Obama's illegal end-run around the law relaxation of immigration policy for certain individuals, which seems to be the main point of the story - let's let everyone unlawfully here stay!

By the way, the illegal alien is from Romania, about as white as a country gets, so the tired old racial bias argument simply won't play here.

You're too stupid to figure it out yourself

First Nanny Michelle Obama apparently isn't finished lecturing Americans about what to eat and even how to shop for their vittles: 

"Tips from the mother-of-two and healthy living fanatic include to 'steer clear of the cookie, snack and soda aisle'... 'And if you stay at the outer aisles you try to avoid going in and getting the processed, packaged foods.'" 

You don't say?   

The most disturbing part is that this "fanatic" would unilaterally ban burgers and fries if she all of a sudden had the power, simply because she personally disapproves of such fare.

Maybe you should work on the President before you presume to harangue the rest of us, ma'am.  He, true to his hypocritical nature, is definitely not paying attention to one word of your incessant nutritional nagging.