Shoppers at the Mall of the Bluffs Tuesday ducked inside back rooms and U.S. Marshals scrambled to the roof with guns drawn after people called police to report a man with a gun inside the mall.I couldn't find a code of conduct for the mall online, possibly because, Iowa being a "may issue" state, the practice of carrying firearms is not prevalent enough for the mall to post prohibitions against...? Anyone from around there, please weigh in if you know something.
The man was carrying an umbrella. [More]
How do you think hysterical cud-chewers like this are going to vote when they hear someone tell them we need to ban "assault weapons"?
Add to this indictment of too many of our countrymen a crippling timidity of soul:
These are the heirs of liberty, beneficiaries of ultimate and terrible sacrifices from men who pledged their lives, fortunes and scared honor. They have squandered an inheritance won through blood, powder and steel, and their shameful ignorance empowers further erosion of all our liberties.Enemies foreign and domestic must laugh at such knee-jerk cowardice. There can be no respect for--and no fear of--that which is on its face contemptible.
It's why the Founders knew a militia from the whole people was necessary to the security of a free state. Which explains why enemies are intent on seeing that concept disparaged and destroyed.
Our preoccupied-with-consumption/fatted calf culture no doubt heartens them tremendously.
[Via Joe T]
What were "US Marshals" doing at the mall? I don't see any Federal crime being committed.
ReplyDeletethese aren't the heirs of liberty. america renounced its inheritance a long, long time ago.
ReplyDeletethere's going to be a fight. this would not be true if the inheritance had been secured. it is true because we are aware of liberty, and want to take it back, and will be punished for doing so -- and soon, saying so.
all that has been secured is a sort of intellectual inheritance, and it consists of unwavering doublethink, arrogantly purporting to claim a difference between left and right, meanwhile ensuring all surrender 30%, 40%, soon 50% and more of their livelihoods to tax slavery at home and imperial aspirations worldwide.
those who would fight nobly in defense, if left alone, are sent to die in offense, for lies.
those who would give charitably, if left to their riches, are squeezed for every penny by force, for lies.
liberty is not something you take for yourself without also giving to even your most hated enemy.
They have a no-weapons-allowed statement in the fine print on their "code of conduct" signs.
ReplyDeleteWELL-said, Jon!
ReplyDeleteIndeed, Tax Freedom Day, when most of us stop paying the government and get to start keeping what we earn, is coming up, 5/12ths of the way into the year. Later than ever, and that's NOT counting the difficulty collecting from people whose jobs have been eliminated, or the Obama "carbon tax" that he and Piggy Waxman are rushing through Congress. One estimate is $3,100 per family to save the planet from us. Will couples have to file an Environmental impact Statement with the EPA before they can have a baby? I'm not laughing.
Here is the real deal: Disobey. When these grass-eaters vote in support of candidates who would ban any weapons, and the laws finally get passed, disobey. Refuse to abide by unjust laws. When everything becomes illegal, it's 1872 again and nothing is illegal. Carry. Use. Refuse to register or turn in.
ReplyDeleteWho are they to remove your rights? It is past time to disobey.
Marshals on-scene? Interesting. Makes the whole thing sound more serious. A more effective conditioning exercise.
ReplyDeleteI remember the Omaha mall shooting. The police circled the entire mall with yellow police tape before they went in. If you give these nuts enough time, usually they kill all the people they're going to and then shoot themselves. Like Cho at Virginia Tech. It's police department "best policy."
"He left his umbrella with officers before leaving the mall."
ReplyDeleteUh, why?
born n raised in Iowa.
ReplyDeleteDad was a first responder/paramedic for a dozen years and the issue of him being on scene before the LEO response team was often discussed. As I understand it, (bear in mind that I've not seen any official Iowa documentation of any kind on this topic) the IA LEO forces are conditioned to treat any visible firearm as a threat, permit or no.
My own assessment of Iowa is that the officials are inclined to do whatever they want regardless of what's written down as official policy. You can stand in front of a judge and have him quote the law to you and then decide to do something different. Depending on his mood or the moon or how much fiber is in his diet or whatever. Knowing the law in Iowa is never good enough, you have to know the local mood and local interpretations of the law. Quoting the law will just get you in trouble. Been there, done that, been detained, searched, surrounded, harassed, followed, yelled at by 2 judges.
Back to the point though... if a 'pillar of the community' says that umbrella is a gun ... its a gun... and no amount of proof or logic will change their decision.
As Hecate said, no weapons.
ReplyDeleteThe Mall of the Bluffs is owned by the same management company as Westroads in Omaha, which is where the Von Maur shootings of December 2007 occurred.
After that, they ripped (literally) the signs off the walls for a month or so afterwards. When things had calmed, they replaced them.
The man left the umbrella with officers so as not to panic anyone else on the way out. Pathetic.
ReplyDeleteWhen he carried it pointing down, the story says, everything was OK. When he raised it -- like John Steed in "The Avengers," maybe -- panic.
Maybe government will MANDATE that all umbrellas must have orange tips.
I remember reading about an experiment on ducklings. Scientists suspended a cardboard silhouette from an arm. When it passed over with the long "neck" forward, the ducklings interpreted it as a harmless goose. When the long part trailed behind and a short neck was in front, it was a hawk and the ducklings panicked and scattered. Same piece of cardboard.
If 20 people ran TOWARD a shooter, someone would get through. Ever since I learned about "slotting," I've practiced it on my workout dummy. I would have no probblem doing it. And, I remind you, I'm the LEAST aggressive person there is.
But my handgun provides a nice margin of safety. Laws be damned.
Our forefathers must surely need to vomit in heaven at such a display of utter spinelessness!
ReplyDeleteDave, I read this blog regular so I'll cut you come slack. I'm sure you are unaware of the geography, location of Council Bluffs - Mall of the Bluffs. In all essence Council Bluffs is Omaha NE, the are side by side.
ReplyDeleteNow I'm sure you haven't forgotten in December 2007 a 19-year-old gunman killed eight people Westroads Mall in Omaha.
So one would expect a swift response to "man with a gun in the mall"
Now who ever called in this false report should be going to jail.
Also the big lot of us "hysterical cud-chewers" we are pro gun and know how to use them. We are NOT pro self loading rifle ban. (aka assault weapons)
http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/12/05/mall.shooting/index.html
Google map council bluffs
http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ei=bjALSp_AHpDcMcvxkeAL&resnum=1&q=council+bluffs&um=1&ie=UTF-8&split=0&gl=us&ei=bzALSpKUOpPaMa67ieAL&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=image&resnum=1
I have lived across the river in Omaha, and I have lived in Cass County adjacent to Pottawotamie County, Ia. I have been Mall of the Bluffs many times.
ReplyDeleteThe thing I notice is twofold. One, I doubt very seriously everybody ran to secure postitions. Have you ever seen a corn-fed Iowa woman? She may have waddled to a secure position but she damn sure didn't run. Sorry, anonymous. But I lived there too. The second thing I noticed about this is that the urban dwellers in Iowa are an entirely different breed from the rural and small town residents of the state. Just like damn near everywhere else. However, just like damn near everywhere else the urban dwellers control most of the votes, ergo, the decent self-reliant folks of Iowa get screwed with the "new Daddy" the urban centers vote into office. These office holders know they do not need to obey the law, or enforce the law as it is written unless they agree with it, and they only agree with the laws that provide them authority, legitimate or not, over the citizen.
I thoroughly enjoyed my association with most of the Iowans I have known, but then again, I didn't spend much time in the urban centers where the weaklings congregate.
David,
ReplyDeleteThe only legal restrictions on carry locations in Iowa Code that I found are: state parks (except during hunting season and in designated areas only), schools, and 1000 feet from a school or public park. I don't know how they reconcile this law with a gun owner who lives across the street from the grade school, though.
You can't openly carry any weapon anywhere except on your own property - that may be where this guy "violated" the law by openly carrying a loaded umbrella. (Sorry, but I have visions of an innocent Mr. French taking a stroll to the Orange Julius after buying a shirt at JCPenney's.)
Why would US marshalls be involved with state code, anyway?
To Chris Mallory: Good question about the U.S. Marshalls. I wonder about the turnout in Binghamton as well as at State Farm in IIRC Columbus (that was the phony "tornado warning")
ReplyDeleteOn lockdowns:
Greg Perry computer author:
My bride, a former public school teacher Lockdown is nothing more than an attempt to keep collateral
damage to a fixed number. Its their (failed) hope that the
maximum number of students who will die will be the number
locked inside the room or hall with the shooter.
and from http://freemendo.typepad.comm. Freemendo November 2007
Lockdown, lockdown, lockdown. No, no, no. When the terrorists began
their assault at Beslan, around 40% of the students and staff ran like
cuh-razy to get away from the school. A few hid in the boiler room.
Every single one of those children and adults lived.
Got it? Unerschroken, think about what to do if any "lockdown" is announced in a place where you are.
My own addition: think about what *might* happen should you successful exit the premises where there no *unofficial* armed person about. I'm wondering what the official response might be.
The freemendo blogger has an update
discussing "lockdowns" in the context of schools and in a Binghamton type situation where the shooter is confirmed to be confined else where. Read it too.
Anonymous 4:59 all the Omaha Westroads Mall incident shows is that *enough* ppl in IA refuse to learn from experience -- not just Iowan experience, but the relevant experience wrt to prevention. See
ReplyDeletee.g. the JPFO.org IOW, they are just about too dumb to live. Too bad they can take too many others with them.
Hmm, this is a good a place as any to remark that the truth that the U.S. Republic is not a "democracy" should be emphasized wrt the RKBA.
Which raises the question: exactly what kind of polity do we live in in actuality? I'd call it a somewhat restrained ochlocracy
To Mulligan: wrt the Iowan LEO/whatever doing what they think is best, the law be ****d: I recently read in a Mary Roberts Rinehart mystery written well before 1940 (the events are set in the 1920s) where the local sheriff
ReplyDelete(not Iowa, but MT or ID or someplace in the real West), decided to confiscate all the firearms of one resident after circumstances came to light that threw into question his account of certain events of a year or so ago.
(His hunting companion had died from a gunshot)
This was mentioned entirely in passing. The possession of many different guns was taken for granted. So was the suspect's inclusion in a posse shortly before the confiscation, where he performed admirably, since he knew the country)
He was in no way generally aggressive or violent. The confiscation was just a bit of sheriff mindplay with him.
(I should double check that the person confiscating them was the sheriff, i.e. that that was his title, but I do not have the book here)
Also notable: she has one character mention, also entirely in passing, that the recently imposed Income Tax had made his law firm a lot of money, after some bad years (to the best of my recollection)
AFAICS, she (Rinehart) had no axe to grind, no especial agenda, and began writing in the early decades of the 20th century, and was well established by 1930.
Older books, other than many Big Serious Fiction Masterpieces often provide such insights, but by "older" I mean often before 1930
The Steinbeck novel The Moon Is Down was a complete surprise to me(this was mentioned at Sipsay Street)
I guess I *really* needed to get out tonight. Another fictional portrayal of LEO mind games can be found in David Carkeet's 1980 or 1981 singleton mystery Double Negative. Even now I find myself less than horrified at the Lt.s actions, and I[m not hinting what they are. It's also a devastating portrayal of a certain kind of academic mentality (those who dig can find Mr. Carkeet's name in the annals of the CLS back when, this was about 1970, in the fabled agonistic linguistics presentation sessions)
ReplyDeleteFYI: This novel portrays, albeit incidentally, the mores of graduate students in the USA and contains some cusswords. That said, it's a good gift book.
It appears that no common umbrella was observed here by the person calling the police/U.S. Marshalls. That obviously was an assault umbrella - long, black, and purposely designed to induce maximum terror in all that see the umbrella. That alone justifies the confiscation of the terror inducing device. A collapsible umbrella would be just lead to the charge of carrying a concealable terror weapon - horrors!!!
ReplyDeleteRemember, how in the primaries last year how Iowans were so proud that they gave the Iowa caucus to.....Kimba?
ReplyDeleteUh huh, Sean. More Iowans live in the urban centers where the dim-witted congregate. However, in a left-handed defense of them in this particular case, the others weren't worth a damn either.
ReplyDeleteSame as in the general election.