The Resistance Library Podcast: The Story of How Philadelphia Became "The City That Bombed Itself"

Ammo.com ^ | 5/14/2021 | Sam Jacobs

[ammodotcom]

On this episode of The Resistance Library Podcast, Sam and Dave discuss the bombing of MOVE. If we told you that the Philadelphia Police Department literally dropped a bomb on a house in the city in the 1980s, you’d probably think that we had lost our minds. But, in fact, this happened on May 13, 1985, at the MOVE townhouse at 6221 Osage Avenue. The whole event was captured on camera and can easily be watched on YouTube for anyone who doubts that this happened.

The case of MOVE is an unusual one, because they cannot simply be shoe-horned into the usual “they were just minding their own business and then the cops came in with overwhelming force” narrative that more or less applies at Ruby Ridge or at Waco. This is not to imply that the actions taken by the Philadelphia Police Department were appropriate – there were children inside the MOVE townhouse. However, it is important to note that MOVE had a history of violence.

If nothing else, the bombing of the MOVE house in Philadelphia is an excellent example of a complicated situation with no easy answer. This is precisely what makes it worth close examination by those interested in government overreach and Second Amendment rights.

[Donnafrflorida]

The mayor ordered it. Mayir goode. Not a white supremist.

[Ken522]

I remember the jokes back then about how this was a government attempt at “urban renewal” or something ...

[xrmusn]

True....

Rizzo got ‘lucky’ on that one...Imagine had that happened in his tour.....

[monkeyshine]

Thanks for posting. Though it was basically before my time (I was alive but not really old enough to understand, and lived on the other coast), I did learn about it - from my liberal family, before they became leftists. Most are gone but the few remaining would probably approve today what they objected to a few decades ago.

I consider myself a real liberal. Maybe a capital L Liberal. Hard to put labels on things these days. But today’s “liberals” seem nothing of the sort. They are leftists, totalitarians. So was this idiot of a mayor.

[T.B. Yoits]

The Left insists on hiding that these lunatics killed a police officer and the building burned because they made it like a bunker inside and were storing gasoline in jerry cans on the roof.

[DoodleBob]

Friends of mine and I drove to the perimeter of the Osage Ave fire that night. We stood with other people in stunned amazement.

The City dropped two "entry devices" made out of Tovex, a substitute for dynamite, on the home. On a ROW HOME...what could possibly go wrong?

The whole affair is perplexing...a black radical organization is effectively killed by a government headed by a black mayor. The then-DA, "Fast Eddie" Rendell goes on to political fame and fortune; he's unapologetic and nobody ever presses the sombich on MOVE. Mayor Goode, to his credit, never cashed in and has repeatedly asked for forgiveness.

MOVE was hardly beyond reproach. But I suspect there were plenty of other options aside from dropping Torvex on row homes. And it's not too hard to draw a line from Osage Ave to Waco.

And yet many alleged "conservatives" think MOVE got what they deserve while liberals think the Davidians got what they deserve.

I think BOTH of these "prudential uses of state power" are reprehensible.

[lightman]

Pennsylvania Ping!

Please ping me with articles of interest.

FReepmail me to be added to the list.

[Donnafrflorida]

I just moved to Florida when my brother said mayor Goode just blew up a whole city block. I thought MOVE had incendiaries in the buildings that actually exploded.
My father was battalion chief earlier. Fireman were shot at if they went anywhere near that building. Needed police escorts

[Kid Shelleen]

>> Rizzo got ‘lucky’ on that one.. <<

Maybe, maybe not. Rizzo would probably not let the MOVE savages to get that entrenched. The Goode administration was terrified of a confrontation so they basically ignored them until all the black neighbors demanded action. By that time they had a bunker built. Rizzo already took out a MOVE house in Poweltown Village so he new how to deal with them. He most certainly would not have been hiding behind a TV like Goode.

[Kid Shelleen]

*** Philly Metro Ping ***

[ammodotcom]

And yet the position that the government shouldn’t bomb ANY of its own citizens is often pigeon-holed into the radical POV. Could be because the government wishes to reserve this right.

[DoodleBob]

I don’t see an expressly enumerated Constitutional power of the federal state to lay siege upon the citizenry, regardless of race, creed, or views on the designated hitter.