Month: October 2017

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UPDATE: Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas Is a GUN-FREE Zone

The Las Vegas shooter was identified as 64-year-old Stephen Paddock from Mesquite, Nevada.

50 dead in mass shooting at Country Western concert!

A gunman opened fire on the crowd of concertgoers at the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival next to the Mandalay Bay Casino in Las Vegas.  At least 20 people are reported dead with 100 injured.

The sold out event with many of the biggest names in country music was in progress when shots were fired.  Videos of the event show the concert in progress and then suddenly multiple gun shots from an automatic weapon being fired.

The shooter Stephen Paddock was killed in the shooting.

He was firing from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Hotel.

The Route 91 Harvest festival is a gun-free zone.

That explains why no one in the crowd of country music fans was shooting back at the mass killer.

Here are the rules from the festival.

The post UPDATE: Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas Is a GUN-FREE Zone appeared first on The Gateway Pundit.

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Statistics show a ‘causal relationship’ between reduced policing and violent crime

Recent FBI statistics show that there is at least a “causal relationship” between reduced policing in cities that suffered from anti-police violence and violent crime.

The most glaring example is Chicago, where police have come under withering attack for several high profile killings of unarmed civilians. The murder rate went up an astronomical 86% from 2014 to 2016. But other cities, including Dallas, Baltimore, Milwaukee, St, Louis, and Charlotte also experienced spiking numbers of murders.

The common factors in all those cities were protests and riots against perceived police brutality.

Daily Caller:

As McDonald sees it, agitation by groups such as Black Lives Matter, encouraged by slanted media coverage, has led to a retrenchment among big-city police forces. Street cops are so worried about being vilified by city leaders and the press that they are avoiding contact with the criminal element, she says.

“Cops are backing off of proactive policing in high-crime minority neighborhoods, and criminals are becoming emboldened,” MacDonald wrote in a Sept. 25 piece for City Journal. “Having been told incessantly by politicians, the media, and Black Lives Matter activists that they are bigoted for getting out of their cars and questioning someone loitering on a known drug corner at 2 AM, many officers are instead just driving by.”

Critics have said MacDonald’s theory is not supported by statistical evidence, noting that big spikes in violence occurred in just a handful of cities. If the Ferguson Effect were a real phenomenon, they argue, it would have manifested itself across the country.

“It’s really a local problem, not a broad trend,” Ames Grawert, an attorney with the Brennan Center for Justice, told The Intercept in 2016. “There is no evidence that crime has gone up overall.”

Another year’s worth of FBI data, however, adds weight to MacDonald’s argument. Killings have spiked in several cities that experienced rioting or significant protest against the police.

Dallas, for example, recorded 171 murders in 2016 — 47 percent more than in 2014. The story was the same in Charlotte and Milwaukee, whose 2016 homicide totals were 43 and 57 percent higher than in 2014, respectively.

Nowhere is the correlation between reduced police activity — what MacDonald calls “de-policing” — and a higher number of murders stronger than it is Chicago.

Earlier this year, the University of Chicago issued a report on the data behind the city’s horrifying rise in gun violence in 2016. After concluding the wave of murders couldn’t be attributed to warm weather or a decrease in educational or social welfare spending, the report suggested a precipitous drop in police stops might be a causal factor.

It isn’t just officers being worried about getting into trouble for stopping people. There is real fear on the streets. Targeted assassinations of police officers are rising as black activists use white hot rhetoric to describe police as “terrorists” or that they’re “targeting” black males.

Every time an officer gets out of their patrol car in a high crime area, they have to be wondering if there is a shooter out there. This is the reality that police officers face and is certainly a part of the “Ferguson Effect.”

Politicians in big cities have shown they do not have officers’ backs. This contrbutes to the feeling that cops are alone and is a huge disincentive for them to enforce the law.

The Ferguson Effect is real. How many more cops have to die to convince anti-police activists of that fact?

 

Recent FBI statistics show that there is at least a “causal relationship” between reduced policing in cities that suffered from anti-police violence and violent crime.

The most glaring example is Chicago, where police have come under withering attack for several high profile killings of unarmed civilians. The murder rate went up an astronomical 86% from 2014 to 2016. But other cities, including Dallas, Baltimore, Milwaukee, St, Louis, and Charlotte also experienced spiking numbers of murders.

The common factors in all those cities were protests and riots against perceived police brutality.

Daily Caller:

As McDonald sees it, agitation by groups such as Black Lives Matter, encouraged by slanted media coverage, has led to a retrenchment among big-city police forces. Street cops are so worried about being vilified by city leaders and the press that they are avoiding contact with the criminal element, she says.

“Cops are backing off of proactive policing in high-crime minority neighborhoods, and criminals are becoming emboldened,” MacDonald wrote in a Sept. 25 piece for City Journal. “Having been told incessantly by politicians, the media, and Black Lives Matter activists that they are bigoted for getting out of their cars and questioning someone loitering on a known drug corner at 2 AM, many officers are instead just driving by.”

Critics have said MacDonald’s theory is not supported by statistical evidence, noting that big spikes in violence occurred in just a handful of cities. If the Ferguson Effect were a real phenomenon, they argue, it would have manifested itself across the country.

“It’s really a local problem, not a broad trend,” Ames Grawert, an attorney with the Brennan Center for Justice, told The Intercept in 2016. “There is no evidence that crime has gone up overall.”

Another year’s worth of FBI data, however, adds weight to MacDonald’s argument. Killings have spiked in several cities that experienced rioting or significant protest against the police.

Dallas, for example, recorded 171 murders in 2016 — 47 percent more than in 2014. The story was the same in Charlotte and Milwaukee, whose 2016 homicide totals were 43 and 57 percent higher than in 2014, respectively.

Nowhere is the correlation between reduced police activity — what MacDonald calls “de-policing” — and a higher number of murders stronger than it is Chicago.

Earlier this year, the University of Chicago issued a report on the data behind the city’s horrifying rise in gun violence in 2016. After concluding the wave of murders couldn’t be attributed to warm weather or a decrease in educational or social welfare spending, the report suggested a precipitous drop in police stops might be a causal factor.

It isn’t just officers being worried about getting into trouble for stopping people. There is real fear on the streets. Targeted assassinations of police officers are rising as black activists use white hot rhetoric to describe police as “terrorists” or that they’re “targeting” black males.

Every time an officer gets out of their patrol car in a high crime area, they have to be wondering if there is a shooter out there. This is the reality that police officers face and is certainly a part of the “Ferguson Effect.”

Politicians in big cities have shown they do not have officers’ backs. This contrbutes to the feeling that cops are alone and is a huge disincentive for them to enforce the law.

The Ferguson Effect is real. How many more cops have to die to convince anti-police activists of that fact?

 

via American Thinker Blog

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Marseilles Knife Terrorist ‘Illegal Migrant,’ Islamic State Claims Attack

Marseilles Knife Terrorist ‘Illegal Migrant,’ Islamic State Claims Attack

PAUL-LOUIS LEGER/AFP/Getty

by Liam Deacon2 Oct 20170

2 Oct, 2017
2 Oct, 2017

An illegal ‘North African’ migrant was behind the knife attack in Marseilles, France, on Saturday according to reports, which has been claimed by the Islamic State jihadist group.

The alleged migrant killed two females – a student and a nurse – aged 17 and 20 with a knife, slitting one across the throat, whilst reportedly shouting “Allahu Akbar”.

France remains in a state of emergency due to repeated terror attacks and the man, who was described as “dressed in black,” was gunned down and killed by security forces.

Sources told the Mail Online that he is thought to be a North African of either Algerian or Tunisian origin, who was arrested in Lyon for shoplifting just days ago.

French police point a gun at a man on the ground (C) as a stabbed woman lies (L) while soldiers secure the area following an attack on October 1, 2017 at the Saint-Charles main train station in the French Mediterranean city of Marseille. (PAUL-LOUIS LEGER/AFP/Getty)

The migrant had no papers on him and was in “an irregular situation in Europe”, so giving the authorities a chance to place him under judicial control.

“Instead they let him go, and the next they heard about him was in connection with a double murder,” said the investigating source in Marseille.

“Forensic evidence has linked him with the incidents in Marseille and in Lyon, but his actual name and other details remain in dispute.”

“He was known to police for his links to drug-related crimes, but had used up to eight identities over the past few months.”

The source also claimed the attacker was not on a terrorist watch list and had no links with radicalization. However, the Islamic State terror group has claimed responsibility.

In a statement from the Islamic State-affiliated Aamaq news agency, the terror group said the attacker was one of its “soldiers” who was targeting countries involved in the coalition fighting in Syria and Iraq.

In a tweet, President Emmanuel Macron said: “Deeply outraged by this barbaric act, in pain with the families and relatives of the victims of Marseille.

“I hail the Operation Sentinelle soldiers and the police forces who reacted with extreme calmness and efficiency.”

A police source explained: “[The stabbings were] frenzied and took place in front of lots of witnesses. The man first shouted threats, and then launched into the two women.

“The two were killed by a knife, and then soldiers on anti-terrorism duties intervened. They shot the man dead.”

via Breitbart News

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How many $ billions will the NFL lose over its kneeling fiasco?

Signs are evident that the NFL has done permanent damage to its business by appearing to side with the Colin Kaepernick-initiated kneeling during the National Anthem. My guess is that the owners of NFL teams collectively have lost billions, and I suspect that Roger Goodell will lose his job.  

Francis Turner calls our attention to a poll from Yahoo Finance  

A new Yahoo Finance poll suggests the NFL has an enduring problem on its hands. Nearly 62% of 9,056 respondents told us they plan to watch less pro football in response to the anthem controversy. Thirty-six percent said they plan to buy less NFL merchandise, and 32% have chosen not to attend a game they would otherwise have gone to. Those findings all have financial implications for the NFL and its 32 team owners.

We wanted to limit our survey, conducted online via SurveyMonkey from Sept. 28-29, to people who patronize the NFL, and exclude people who have an opinion but don’t watch football. So we only counted answers from people who describe themselves as pro football fans. Eighty-eight percent of respondents said they watch at least one game per week, with 46% of those saying they watch more than two games.

He adds:

While it is true that this is an online poll, the sample size is large (YUUGE even), and SurveyMonkey are known to be good are detecting and removing ballot stuffing attempts.

You can look at all of the results in graphic form here.

Here are the two that Turner calls “most brutal”:

Almost half of the public would be pleased to see them suffer financially! They are angry, and no longer identify with those teams.

My guess is that the owners initially dismissed the thought of long term damage because of their experience with the players’ strike. Lots of fans were upset, but they came back. If that’s why they thought – and still think – that the fans will come back, they misunderstand the bonds that tie fans to their teams. Becoming a fan involves identifying personally with a team and with all the other fans of the team. Fans become a tribe of sorts, sharing a common identity and common hopes. Part of the reason people like to go to games is the glorious feeling of togetherness, sharing thrills and disappointments. They “affiliate” with the team.  

The flag, the National Anthem, and the nation itself are an even larger identity, vastly larger and more important.  The nation is a glorious tribe, one that is multi-racial and multi-everything, because it includes every American.  It is a tribe for which Americans have willingly died, in fact, whom we honor by standing for the National Anthem and saluting the flag.

When identities clash, people are forced to choose between them.

or

This doesn’t describe every fan, but it describes a big share of them. If the NFL loses only 20% of its revenue over the next few years, that is billions.

For decades, NFL owners were able to extract an ever-increasing bonanza by raising ticket prices, from networks bidding against each other for broadcast rights, and corporate suites lulled them into believing that the public’s appetite for their particular form of entertainment was insatiable.

The next time a team tries to extract taxpayer money for a new stadium, the opponents will outnumber the supporters, I bet. Angry people write letters and attend protests.

In fact, it might be time for Congress to revisit that NFL’s status as a nonprofit, which deprives the Treasury of a lot of money, I bet.   

Baseball, once upon a time, was the most popular sport, earning the title, “The American Pastime.”

The NFL faces so many problems, from brain trauma liability to TV ratings, and has such a high overhead that the last thing it needs is to alienate a fraction of its fan base.

Signs are evident that the NFL has done permanent damage to its business by appearing to side with the Colin Kaepernick-initiated kneeling during the National Anthem. My guess is that the owners of NFL teams collectively have lost billions, and I suspect that Roger Goodell will lose his job.  

Francis Turner calls our attention to a poll from Yahoo Finance  

A new Yahoo Finance poll suggests the NFL has an enduring problem on its hands. Nearly 62% of 9,056 respondents told us they plan to watch less pro football in response to the anthem controversy. Thirty-six percent said they plan to buy less NFL merchandise, and 32% have chosen not to attend a game they would otherwise have gone to. Those findings all have financial implications for the NFL and its 32 team owners.

We wanted to limit our survey, conducted online via SurveyMonkey from Sept. 28-29, to people who patronize the NFL, and exclude people who have an opinion but don’t watch football. So we only counted answers from people who describe themselves as pro football fans. Eighty-eight percent of respondents said they watch at least one game per week, with 46% of those saying they watch more than two games.

He adds:

While it is true that this is an online poll, the sample size is large (YUUGE even), and SurveyMonkey are known to be good are detecting and removing ballot stuffing attempts.

You can look at all of the results in graphic form here.

Here are the two that Turner calls “most brutal”:

Almost half of the public would be pleased to see them suffer financially! They are angry, and no longer identify with those teams.

My guess is that the owners initially dismissed the thought of long term damage because of their experience with the players’ strike. Lots of fans were upset, but they came back. If that’s why they thought – and still think – that the fans will come back, they misunderstand the bonds that tie fans to their teams. Becoming a fan involves identifying personally with a team and with all the other fans of the team. Fans become a tribe of sorts, sharing a common identity and common hopes. Part of the reason people like to go to games is the glorious feeling of togetherness, sharing thrills and disappointments. They “affiliate” with the team.  

The flag, the National Anthem, and the nation itself are an even larger identity, vastly larger and more important.  The nation is a glorious tribe, one that is multi-racial and multi-everything, because it includes every American.  It is a tribe for which Americans have willingly died, in fact, whom we honor by standing for the National Anthem and saluting the flag.

When identities clash, people are forced to choose between them.

or

This doesn’t describe every fan, but it describes a big share of them. If the NFL loses only 20% of its revenue over the next few years, that is billions.

For decades, NFL owners were able to extract an ever-increasing bonanza by raising ticket prices, from networks bidding against each other for broadcast rights, and corporate suites lulled them into believing that the public’s appetite for their particular form of entertainment was insatiable.

The next time a team tries to extract taxpayer money for a new stadium, the opponents will outnumber the supporters, I bet. Angry people write letters and attend protests.

In fact, it might be time for Congress to revisit that NFL’s status as a nonprofit, which deprives the Treasury of a lot of money, I bet.   

Baseball, once upon a time, was the most popular sport, earning the title, “The American Pastime.”

The NFL faces so many problems, from brain trauma liability to TV ratings, and has such a high overhead that the last thing it needs is to alienate a fraction of its fan base.

via American Thinker Blog

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Budapest and Warsaw Under Attack Because ‘Hungary and Poland are Standing in the Way of George Soros’

Budapest and Warsaw Under Attack Because ‘Hungary and Poland are Standing in the Way of George Soros’

ROBERT ATANASOVSKI/AFP/Getty Images

by Jack Montgomery1 Oct 20170

1 Oct, 2017
1 Oct, 2017

The Hungarian government says that conservative Central European countries — particularly their own and nearby Poland — are being attacked by the European Union because they are “standing in the way of George Soros”, the billionaire financier and open borders activist.

The Hungarians believe that EU officials — who have met with Soros at the highest level — have adopted the so-called ‘Soros Plan’ for mass immigration into Europe more or less wholesale, including recommendations to accept an influx of some one million migrants per year, and to redistribute them throughout the bloc through a mandatory quota scheme imposed by Qualified Majority Vote.

“The Hungarian Government absolutely and resolutely rejects every point of the ‘Soros Plan’, and continues to be against allowing one million migrants into Europe every year, the demolishing of the border security fence, the 9 million forints in aid to be provided to every migrant and the mandatory resettlement quota, in addition to which it also rejects the punishment of Central European countries [by the European Union],” declared Bence Tuzsonm, Hungary’s Minister of State for Government Communication.

Soros spokesman Michael Vachon recently alleged that “the claim that Soros is promoting a scheme to import a million illegal immigrants into Europe is Viktor Orbán’s fantasy,” — but as Prime Minister Orbán’s spokesman Dr. Zoltán Kovács has pointed out, Soros himself did insist that “the EU has to accept at least a million asylum seekers annually for the foreseeable future” in his September 2015 manifesto on the migrant crisis.

“Hungary and Poland are standing in the way of George Soros because of the opinions they have put forward with relation to migration, and as a result he wants to achieve his result by applying pressure to both countries”, noted Tuzsonm.

Tuzsonm said that “political attacks must be launched against countries that are against immigration” in service of the Soros Plan, both through mainstream media and the organs of the European Union — which has pledged to begin ‘infringement proceedings’ against those countries which are not co-operating with its quota regime.

Tuzsomn also believes the EU will attempt to hit recalcitrant member-states with “tough fines”, and that Soros is pushing the bloc to reduce agricultural and cohesion funding to Central Europe — impacting its rural conservative heartland.

“In view of the fact that we cannot count on the opposition parties in this battle here in Hungary, the Government is again turning to the people of Hungary and asking everyone who cares about the country’s independence and sovereignty, and for whom Hungary’s security and national culture is important, to take part in the National Consultation on the Soros Plan”, he asked.

Follow Jack Montgomery on Twitter: @JackBMontgomery
Follow Breitbart London on Facebook: Breitbart London

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Predictable: Liberals Seek To Frame Puerto Rico As Trump’s Katrina

All that is missing is Brian Williams reporting about floating dead bodies.

Via Daily Wire:

From the moment Hurricane Maria smashed through Puerto Rico, ripping off roofs and crushing the island’s electrical grid, President Trump activated all avenues of response by the U.S. government. The military and throngs of first responders rushed in and tons of water and food were sent to the U.S. territory.

But also since that first moment, Democrats and whiny liberals have been trying to denigrate Trump’s efforts, with one goal in mind — paint Puerto Rico as Trump’s Katrina.

President George W. Bush lost much support from Americans after the devastating Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans. Critics complained that he was slow to respond (he wasn’t — state and city officials said they had the situation well in hand, and by the time it was clear they didn’t, the federal response to catch up looked insufficient).

On Saturday, the Trump Haters finally got on the same page: Forget Russian collusion, forget James Comey killing Hillary Clinton’s campaign, it’s time to hype the devastation in Puerto Rico as worse than Katrina.[…]

The mess started after the grandstanding mayor of San Juan, Carmen Yulin Cruz, held a Saturday morning press conference claiming the federal government was doing nothing to help Puerto Ricans. Forget that she was standing in front of pallets loaded with supplies sent from the U.S., she’s a Democrat and she was clearly directed by party leaders to make the situation political.

And forget, too, that SHE was elected to help her people. Instead, in an impassioned speech that hit all the liberal touch points, Cruz said people were “dying” and she was “begging” for help.

Keep reading…

via Weasel Zippers

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Man Stabs 2 Woman To Death At Train Station In France, Shouts ‘Allahu Akbar’

Via BBC:

Two people have been killed in a knife attack at Marseille’s Saint Charles train station.

The assailant has been shot dead by security forces in the southern French city. The incident is being treated as an act of terrorism, officials say.

“Two victims have been stabbed to death,” regional police chief Olivier de Mazieres told AFP.

France’s Interior Minister, Gérard Collomb, said he was immediately travelling to the scene.

France’s national police tweeted that the situation at the station had been resolved, and the perpetrator “neutralised and shot down”.

Keep reading…

via Weasel Zippers

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California Democrat Proposes Bill to Outlaw Gas-Powered Cars After 2040

California Democrat Proposes Bill to Outlaw Gas-Powered Cars After 2040

by Assemblyman Tim Donnelly30 Sep 2017Sacramento, CA 0

30 Sep, 2017
29 Sep, 2017

Another California Democrat is proposing a bill to eliminate gas-powered cars in California by 2040, following China’s lead (whose target date is a decade earlier). France, the United Kingdom, and India have already made similar proposals.

California already has the most stringent air quality regulations in the nation, with the goal of cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 80 percent from 1990 levels by 2050.

According to the Sacramento Bee, California is playing catch-up:

When the Legislature returns in January, Assemblyman Phil Ting plans to introduce a bill that would ban the sale of new cars fueled by internal-combustion engines after 2040. The San Francisco Democrat said it’s essential to get California drivers into an electric fleet if the state is going to meet its greenhouse gas reduction targets, since the transportation sector accounts for more than a third of all emissions.

“The market is moving this way. The entire world is moving this way,” Ting said. “At some point you need to set a goal and put a line in the sand.”

…

“California is used to being first. But we’re trying to catch up to this,” Ting said.

Breitbart News

noted

 earlier this month that Governor Jerry Brown laid down the gauntlet to California Air Resource Board Chair Mary Nichols publicly, calling for California to follow China’s lead and banish the internal combustion engine from California for good.

Ting has not released full details of his proposal, but the

Bee reports

that he is among a group of legislators pushing to increase the incentives that California currently pays people to abandon their gas guzzlers for hybrids or electric cars.  Incentives for luxury automaker Tesla have been highly controversial among California taxpayers, so any move in that direction is likely to have a political cost attached.

Some proposals under discussion by Nichols and other policymakers include using the regulatory rather than legislative route to implement the ban.

No one has yet explained how the state plans to deal with phasing out existing cars, including valuable classic and exotic cars.

There is likely to be stiff resistance to any proposal to ban gas-powered cars.

Ting plans to introduce the bill in the new legislative session that starts in January 2018.

via Breitbart News

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Pirro: Roy Moore’s Election ‘Was an Anti-McConnell Referendum’

Pirro: Roy Moore’s Election ‘Was an Anti-McConnell Referendum’

by Trent Baker30 Sep 20170

30 Sep, 2017
30 Sep, 2017

Saturday during her opening statement on Fox News Channel’s “Justice,” Jeanine Pirro reacted to former Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore’s victory over Sen. Luther Strange (R-AL) in Alabama’s Republican U.S. Senate primary runoff, saying the victory was an anti-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) referendum.

Pirro said Moore won the GOP vote over Strange because “Moore is more like Trump” and cannot be bought.

“Roy Moore, with virtually no money, wins even though the president, at Mitch McConnell’s request supports the sitting senator,” Pirro stated. “Now, that would make sense given he needs ‘Big Luther’ who is sitting until December for his healthcare and tax reform vote.”

She added, “Moore is a horseback riding cowboy who knows how to handle a weapon, a constitutional Christian conservative who twice chose to lose his job rather than compromise his principles, the kind of man who simply cannot be bought.”

“For decades, the establishment has been giving it to the American people. Last week, Alabama Republicans gave a big one back to the establishment, and it portends yet another upcoming insurrection not only in the next race between Judge Moore and his Democratic challenger this December but in the 2018 mid-term elections. Strap in, folks, it’s going to be a bumpy ride,” Pirro continued.

Pirro warned McConnell that he and his “lazy, blood-sucking” establishment Republicans are in for the “ride” of their lives in the 2018 mid-term elections.

“[Y]ou and your establishment, lazy, blood-sucking money hungry croners [sic] who do nothing for the hard working forgotten men and women of America are in for the ride of your lives. Be careful you don’t get thrown,” she concluded.

Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent

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