Posted on 10/04/2017 6:12:28 AM PDT by EdnaMode
As I write this, there is only a small handful of facts, or alleged facts, that all of the talking heads in Big Media seem to agree upon regarding "the largest mass shooting in American history."
First, 64 year-old Stephen Paddock, a white man and resident of Nevada, appears to have acted alone when he opened fire upon over 22,000 country music concert attendees in Las Vegas.
Second, Paddock had a lot of weaponry, guns of various sorts, in the hotel room that he used as a sniper's nest.
Third, Paddock is a relatively wealthy man who enjoyed gambling and may have accrued quite a bit of debt as a consequence of his sinful pleasure.
Fourth, the shooter has a girlfriend, Marilou Danley, an Asian woman who, at the present moment, is in Tokyo. Initially, police cleared her of any wrongdoing. According to the latest update, however, they still plan on interrogating her when she returns to the states.
Fifth, nearly 60 people are now dead and over 500 people have been hospitalized.
Finally, according to his own brother, Paddock had no political or religious affiliation.
As things always go with these sorts of matters, what we think we know now will inevitably change and, in some respects, undoubtedly change dramatically as more information comes to light. So far, though, this is essentially the extent of the propositions on which the Big Media insiders agree.
Admittedly, I don't know anything more at the moment. However, I'm shocked (though not particularly surprised) that no one--namely, no "conservative" commentator--has so much as suggested even the possibility that this historically unprecedented massacre just may be the event in which the violent hatred to which suspected Deplorables have been routinely subjected for over a year-and-a-half has reached its bloody climax.
From even before President Trump received his party's nomination, leftist agitators, mostly fans of Bernie Sanders, began making it a habit to crash Trump's rallies and assault his supporters. Since this time, literally hundreds of Trump supporters, men, women, and young teenagers--the folks who Hillary Clinton infamously characterized as "deplorables"--have had their person and property abused by leftists of different sorts. Antifa ("Anti-fascists"), BLM (Black Lives Matter), and BAMN (By Any Means Necessary) are some of the more militant leftist organizations that came to be counted upon to attack indiscriminately, and with a range of weaponry, Trump supporters--i.e. veterans, flag-waving patriots, Republicans, Christians, and anyone and everyone else who is deemed "fascist."
Pepper spray and bear mace; sticks of dynamite and Molotov cocktails; bats, pipes, clubs, and flagpoles; stones, flamethrowers, and bottles; feces and urine--these are among the weapons that have been used against those who have declared their support for "free speech," Trump, and the American flag.
Some far left members of "The Resistance" have indeed shown up to some events armed with guns, although no one, to my knowledge, has yet used these guns on Trump supporters.
Of course, as recently as June, a Bernie Sanders admirer and avid MSNBC viewer, James Hodgkinson, in an effort to slaughter as many Republican members of Congress as possible, shot several, including and most notably, Steve Scalise (And shortly before this event, another zealous Sanders fan and Trump opponent, Jeremy Christian, who the media tried ((absurdly)) to depict as a "white supremacist terrorist," stabbed three men on a Portland, Oregon train, killing two of them).
In other words, the last nearly two years have established two things:
(a)Violence against anyone and everyone who is suspected of having contributed to the election of President Trump (and the GOP) has been normalized;
(b)This political violence has been normalized by those on the far left.
It also bears noting that Antifa and the like, in affirming their allegiance to "The Resistance," affirm their ideological and political affinity with all of those "mainstream" Democrats in Congress and the media who similarly raise the proverbial banner of The Resistance. For that matter, the embarrassment of a former presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, also proclaimed her own allegiance to The Resistance some months back, as did former Attorney General Loretta Lynch.
Democrats own the fringes of their party.
Now, given the patterns of the last two years (to say nothing of the left's long history of violence), is not the theory that the Vegas killer was but another committed Resister, determined to, "by any means necessary," "bash the fash" not eminently plausible?
After all, the predominantly white country music fans upon whom Paddock set his sights constitute the collective poster child of the Deplorable, a fact of which leftists, in their ever articulate manner, have spared no occasion to remind us from the moment that word broke of this outrage.
Shouldn't someone in Big Media, specifically, in the so-called "conservative" media, at least raise these points?
Can there be any doubt that had this been a rap concert--an event comprised of tens of thousands of black men, women, and children--that, despite being short on verifiable facts, the very media figures who now refuse to indulge speculation as to the shooter's motive would have wasted no time in speculating about "racism?"
Can we doubt that had the targeted event been a gathering of tens of thousands of Hispanics or Muslims or gays that we would have been treated to endless speculation concerning the likely "racism," "Islamophobia," and "homophobia," respectively, of the shooter?
There is nothing objectionable about speculating, as long as the speculation is reasonable, rendered plausible (if not true) by the known facts. Intellectually curious people speculate. Speculation is actually preferable to the incessant repetition of talking points with which Americans are relentlessly bombarded by the media whenever events like this occur.
That those in the media now refuse to speculate or, to put it more accurately, that they refuse to advance the most plausible of speculative theories--the shooter, like the 66 year-old James Hodgkinson, who was in his age cohort, was an anti-Republican, anti-Trump zealot--is explained by the likely fact that he shared their animosity toward the same objects.
I'll show my hand now: While I may be proven wrong, I'd bet dollars to donuts that Stephen Paddock was driven by the same homicidal hatred of all things to his right that animated Hodgkinson.
Paddock, I find it more credible than not, saw himself as a member of The Resistance.
If the report from yesterday holds up that a couple of weeks ago he was trying to target the Life is Beautiful festival, which is for liberal millenials, that throws the ideological argument out the window.
“Shouldn’t someone in Big Media, specifically, in the so-called “conservative” media, at least raise these points?”
It’s been raised often enough in this forum, which I imagine is frequently trolled by the “so called conservative media”.
Kerwick is willing to openly discuss what those of us who are on the right are already thinking. Leftists have already been tweeting that those people who were at that country music festival deserved to die because they are most likely Republicans that voted for Trump. This visceral hatred displayed by the left of Trump and his supporters and anyone on the right is bound to drive people to foment violence and the "Resistance" justifies it!
It’s plausible.
My hunch, Paddock was an illegal gun dealer selling off-the-record cash only merchandise to unsavory types, conducting sales meetings in a swanky Las Vegas hotel suite, when things went sideways for him. Explains his wealth, lifestyle, and “motive”. Paddock wasn’t the shooter, an unsavory customer(s) was.
For what it’s worth.
Whether the authorities will allow the public to learn what his motivation was remains uncertain.
THAT is my one and only thought on this matter.
It is an Anti-Trump attack. The culmination of all the leftwing hate and violence....................
His wealth came from real estate...................
He could be BOTH........................
I hear what the author is saying. And it is logical. However, when I read Paddock’s profile, he does not strike me as a rabid leftist. He does not even strike me as the type of guy who cared about people or politics. In fact, reports are they he never even voted. What did he care about? Gambling, booze, food, $$, and women — in other words, he cared about his vices and the $$ which enabled them.
I think another possibility is that he was totally bored with his life and may have wanted to go out with an inexplicable bang. If so, he certainly achieved that objective.
OP is full of mistakes and inaccuracies.
I don't care if she is a striped ass ape.
The US and Japanese governments can't locate her and extradite her?
It was reported last night that she had arrived at LAX.
Personally, I think speculation until one has the evidence is counterproductive and just makes people look like nutjob conspiracy theorists. It’s embarrassing when supposed conservatives start pushing narratives that fit their preconceived paradigm (’he was a leftist’ ‘he targeted country music fans because they were Trump supporters’ ‘there was a second shooter’).
Sometimes things just have causes that don’t fit into our worldview or even make much sense at all.
I’m now 90% leaning antifa/OFA, you? And isn’t this humidity wretched?
I've read that. But real estate is a good way to launder cash.
Plausible? Yes.
However, plausibility still has some basis in logic and reason, and there may not have been either of these factors in the somewhat skewed judgment of Stephen Paddock. The scheme, well planned out and for the most part being executed according to that plan, really had no end point or objective beyond chaos. Making a statement? Revenge? Statement about what, or revenge on who?
She should be given the Point Break treatment. Open the cabin door in midair and tell her she will be launching an unpowered descent unless she talks.
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