Quick Hitts

Four weeks ago Jose Guerena was gunned down in his home by a heavily armed gang. Jose, an ex-marine who survived two tours in Iraq, was sleeping after working a 12 hour shift in a mine. He heard a violent commotion outside and, knowing his wife and child were inside, grabbed his rifle and stepped into the hallway. The gang broke down his door and shot him 71 times. To make sure he was good and dead they held off medical professionals for more than an hour.

The national news media ignored the story.

The five thugs who murdered Jose have already been exonerated.

Three weeks ago the same gang gunned down Raymond Herisse on a busy Miami street. He was driving his car and fleeing an altercation with other members of the same gang. The gang forced him to a stop and before he had a chance to react they executed him on the spot. They also showed no concern for bystanders – four other people were wounded.

The national news media ignored the story.

This week the same gang murdered William A. Cooper, a 69 year old man with bad eyesight. According to neighbors he was a nice old guy who never bothered anyone. There had been quite a few break-ins in his neighborhood, so when he heard a commotion outside he picked up his gun and went to see what it was about. He fired off a shot when his door was broken down, and so the gang members murdered him. A few stray bullets reportedly flew into the baseball diamond behind his house were children were playing.

The national news media ignored this story too.

Incidents like this are becoming more and more common. Hardly a week goes by without someone being killed or maimed by this deadly gang, but you’ll never hear about it if you get all your news from the mainstream media. These stories are not hard to find, though. Why is the MSM ignoring them?

Maybe it’s because this gang wears badges. The badges give them a license to maim and murder citizens, knowing that their “punishment” will be a paid vacation while other gang members “investigate,” then exonerate them. They also know that if they get as much as a tiny bruise from a citizen trying to defend themselves, that citizen will spend a very long time in jail.

Two of the murders were captured on video. Standard warnings apply. The first is the murder of Jose.

Notice that the siren was on for a mere seven seconds and sounded like an errant car alarm. Also notice that after breaking the door down they immediately started shooting. They could have quickly steped to the side and given him a chance to surreneder. Instead, they slaughtered him.

This was, of course, part of the War on Some Drugs. The thugs claimed he was part of a drug ring. None of these rocket scientists stopped to ask why a drug dealer would work 12 hours shifts in a mine. None of them said “Hey, let’s just knock on the door, or maybe arrest him when he’s leaving for work, or coming back home.

They found no evidence of drug dealing, and evidently didn’t have enough time to plant any.

The murderers were exonerated. Of course they were exonerated. You didn’t expect justice, did you? Come on, this is the United States. In the rare cases where cops fail to find themselves innocent, prosecutors seldom bring the cases to the grand jury.  Grand Juries very rarely indite. When they do the prosecutor stacks the jury with drooling mouth breathers who almost always give the cops a free pass. And in the extremely-ultra-rare-easier-to-win-the-lottery-twice-in-a-row cases where there’s a conviction, judges give them the lightest sentences possible. For instance, in Washington State a transit cop shot a kid in the back, while the kid was handcuffed and face down on the ground. It was captured on several videos, so a pretense of justice was necessary. The cop was given a mere three years for manslaughter.

Here’s the video for the Miami Murder.

One of the thugs even pointed a loaded gun at the man taking the video. The thugs tried confiscating his camera, but he was smart enough to remove the chip and hide it in his mouth. The cops were dumb enough for that to fool them.

One of the most important gun safety rules is “look behind your target.” No matter how bad the bad guy is you need to make sure stray bullets, or bullets that penetrate the target, don’t hurt someone else. Thugs, though, don’t give a damn about the safety of citizens. They wounded four people who had nothing to do with the incident.

Cooper was also a victim of The War on Some Drugs. The police were acting on an anonymous tip that he was selling some of his prescription pills. He had a predictable schedule and could have easily been arrested without incident. Instead, he was slaughtered in his home. Oh, and there was no evidence of drug dealing either. So sorry.

Cops used to brag about doing their twenty years without ever un-holstering their gun.  They were justifiably proud of that.  It was a measure of skill, the ablity to handle potentially dangerous situations without allowing them to escalate.  It meant they were able to do their job with minimum risk to themselves and the public.

Those days are long gone.  In recent months they’ve conducted armed raids on places like health food stores, because the raw milk they were bravely hunting down evidently gives hippies superpowers.  They’ve made armed raids on the Amish who also were selling raw milk.  They do have pitchforks that are very very pointy.  One man was dragged out of house at gunpoint because his wife had missed some payments on her student loans.

We can only guess why cops insist on using such dangerous methods to attack citizens. Perhaps they need the adrenaline rush. Perhaps it’s pure bloodlust. Perhaps it’s simply contempt for the citizens they pretend to serve. (If you haven’t seen that contempt first hand, visit any police forum and con your way into the private areas. You will be appalled at the attitudes they proudly display.)

Why does the national media ignore it? I have no idea, and would love to read your hypothesis.

The only thing more appalling than the media’s complacency and the cops contempt for the public is the citizens who insist on defending cops in these situations. Check out the comments on any news story like this. You’ll find a plethora of bootlickers defending the murderers. They don’t just accept the cops behavior; they celebrate it and cheer it on. I’m embarrassed to share the country with such people.

Occasionally I’ll see a video that’s so perfect any further comentary would only distract from it.

Congratulations. Out of a trillion web pages, I’m visiting one of yours. You’ve got an opportunity to show me something, sell me something, enlighten, amuse or entertain me.

It’s a shame I left within seconds because you did something stupid.

Most of these tricks have been around long enough that they’ve been discussed to death, and any reasonably competent web designer should know better than to use them. Yet I see them in action every day.

Automatic Audio – Automatically playing music or a sales pitch has been so despised for so long I’m amazed so many web designers still do it. Some sites think it’s OK if it’s accompanied by an animated talking head. It isn’t. Others make it even more annoying by waiting thirty seconds or so before assaulting your speakers. I usually cruse with my own music playing and typically open several tabs while reading an article, so your attack on my sound system forces me to go on a tab hunt for your awful page. When I find it I’ll slam it shut, but not until glancing at it just long enough to remember to never, ever buy your product or service.

Video Starting With Commercials – You may think I want to watch your video so badly I’ll sit through a fifteen second commercial first. You would be wrong.  A five second “Brought to you by…” banner is fine.  Anything longer than that and you’ve lost me. And you’ve made it even more annoying by disabling the skip or pause button. No problem – there’s a nice “X” on the browser tab that solves that problem instantly.

Slide Shows – Most of us are suckers for headlines like “Sixteen Ways to Save Money” or “Ten Gadgets You Didn’t Know You Needed,” or “Five Ways to Make Visitors Bolt From Your Site” But lately more and more lists use slide shows with one item per slide. I’ve even seen this done with “100 Best Movies” or “50 Essential Albums.” I’m not sure who clicks and clicks and clicks and clicks to slog though these messes, but I don’t. I don’t even bother for three or four.  If you’ve got a long list just break it up over two or three pages.

Flashing Ads – lightly animated ads can be eye catching. Flashing/strobing/quaking ads are annoying enough to make me leave immediately. I use Adblocker and flash blocking plug-ins, but some ads get past them (which is also annoying). I know you don’t have complete control over what ads appear on your site, but if a flashing ad hits, block it, or you’re going to lose a lot of your visitors.

Popups – This is another trick that should have been abandoned years ago. People hate ’em. They’re stupid an annoying and a powerful incentive to leave. The worst offenders are pop-ups that make you search for the “close” link. No problem; I’ve got one of those on my tab. See ya.

“But,” you say, “I’m offering a free newsletter!” Pfft. Who isn’t? And why would I want a newsletter from a site I haven’t looked at yet? It’s like walking into a coffee house and immediately being accosted by the owner saying, “Would you like to be my friend? Please please please? It doesn’t cost anything!”

I have no idea if I want your newsletter, or want to sign your petition, or vote for you for some contest. Odds are I’m not the least bit interested in what you think is so urgent.  Let me look around first. Make the offer somewhere on the page and leave it up to me, instead of shoving it in my face.

And that prohibition on face shoving includes when I leave your site. I’m done, ready to move on, I might come back later and BAM – here’s a popup when I try to leave. Ok, I guess I won’t be coming back later.

Good site design is not just what you do; it’s also what you don’t do. If you find something, anything, that annoys you on the web, you should know most of your visitors will have the same reaction.

It’s not easy to get people to your site. Once you’ve their time and attention don’t squander it by annoying them, or they’re likely to leave and never come back.

Here’s yet more entires in the ongoing, and apparently endless, list of Things Atheists Didn’t Do. Next time someone makes the idiotic claim that atheists are more immoral than the religious, refer to to these handy lists. Everything in them, from the horrific to the hilarious, was inspired by superstition and ridiculous religious beliefs, which don’t encumber atheists.

We start with “Moderate Muslim” news.  A a 14 year old girl in Bangladesh (a moderate Muslim country) was raped.  She was sentenced to 101 lashes, but collapsed after the 70th, and died a week later.

The moderate United Arab Emirates was kinder to a woman who was gang raped by six men.  They only sentenced her to one year in prison for extramarital sex.  She avoided a sentence of flogging and life in prison by dropping the charges against her rapists, including the one who laughed at her in court.

Baptists don’t murder or imprison our rape victims in the US.  They just ask them if they enjoyed it, then make them stand in front of the congregation and confess their sins.   And when their pregnancy is the result of being raped by a deacon, well, that must have been God’s will.

And if you rape a cow in Bali, you’ll have to marry it even if it seduced you, to cure the village of bestiality, but then the cow is drowned.  I’m guessing that’s followed by a reception where everyone is served very fresh hamburgers.

In Tehran the vice police ordered breasts be removed from manikins, resulting in this bizare photo.

In Washington state a man claimed he led police on a 100 MPH high speed chase to honor his God.  Evidently his God was busy the day of the trial – he was convicted.

Ever wonder what it’s like to be finger-banged by Jesus?  Now you know. (NSFW video)

Kids, if you’re offered a choice between visiting an atheist neighbor, and a Christian neigoboor who makes their own tattoo guns with guitar strings, you might want to go see the godless guy.  He won’t tattoo a cross on you.

In Kenya Pastor Lucy claims to cure people of AIDS, (YouTube video) then gives them fake tests and declares them healed.  She says God gives her money.

A GOP backed Punk Rock Evangelical Band (no, that’s not a typo) praised Muslims for murdering homosexuals.  The band’s front man, Bradlee Dean, said, “Muslims are calling for the executions of homosexuals in America. This just shows you they themselves are upholding the laws that are even in the Bible of the Judeo-Christian God, but they seem to be more moral than even the American Christians do, because these people are livid about enforcing their laws. They know homosexuality is an abomination.”

Lawmakers in Louisiana dealt with the gulf oil disaster by declaring a day of prayer, which worked really well.

Atheists aren’t known for invading churches and passing out books by Dawkins or Hitchens, but Father John Parnell claims Jehovah’s Witnesses walked into his church and started handing out their tracts.  He also claims they told his daughter, ‘You are going to be burned into the eternal fires of Gehenna if you don’t listen to what I say.” Bzzzt! Wrong answer, Sparky.  JayDubs (one of the many derogatory names for JWs used by ex-JWs like myself) don’t believe in hell, or fires in Gehenna.  Imagine that, a priest making stuff up.

A 15 year old JayDub died after refusing a blood transfusion after a car accident.  It’s frightening to think that I would have done the same thing if that happened to me when I was 15.  Doctors should have an automatic right to override the patent’s wishes in such cases.  This kid deserved a chance to grow a brain later in life.

In Indonesia 37 kids stood on a wire-cable suspension bridge for a traditional good luck ceremony.  It collapsed.  25 of them were lucky enough to be rescued.  12 of them weren’t.

According to Bored Panda: “This is an actual logo designed in 1973 for the Catholic Church’s Archdiocesan Youth Commission. It even won an award from the Art Directors Club of Los Angeles.” But maybe this doesn’t belong on the list – this looks like something an atheist might design.

Perhaps it was inspired by this.

In Pakistan, five women were buried alive for wanting to pick who they married.  In Turkey, which is also considered a “moderate” Islamic country, a 16 year old girl was buried alive for the crime of “talking to boys.”   There are about 200 honor killings in Turkey each year.

Remember the nice view at the public swimming pool?  Sorry, folks, it’s been blocked off because someone might look at the Muslim women.

Richard Merryman is charged with raping a five year old boy at a church meeting. Quick Hitts has been unable to confirm the rumor he is also being charged with impersonating a Catholic Priest.

While Christan fundies go batshit fighting abortions Scientologists are sometimes forced to have them, because babies tend to be so damn distracting.

Dr Atiya, the head of al-Azhar’s Department of Hadith, issued a fatwa that said if a woman fed a male colleague “directly from her breast” at least five times they would establish a family bond and thus be allowed to be alone together at work. He later retracted it, doubtless to the chagrin of boobie-loving Muslims everywhere.

In Yemen, a 12 year old child bride died of internal bleeding caused by being raped by an older man, her husband.  (I don’t care if they were married, in accordance with Islamic law.  If she’s 12, and he’s twice her age, it’s rape.)  In other words she was literally raped to death. Praise be to Allah.

A Pakistani lawyer is calling for the death of Mark Zuckerberg because he allowed a page on Facebook for “Everybody Draw Mohammed” day. Meanwhile, the woman who suggested it, an American, has moved and changed her name, in America, because of threats against her life.   My picture for EDMD is to the left.

While all these are bad things that Atheists didn’t do, there is at least one thing Catholics and all atheists with good taste can agree on – The Blues Brothers was a great movie.

We’re always lectured that it’s wrong to celebrate anyone’s death, even the death of evil people.  I disagree.  The world is far better off without him, and that’s worth celebrating.

I predict Muslims all over the world will riot over this.  I also predict Seattle will get a lot of rain this summer and Paris Hilton will get even more skanky.

While this is an emotional release of almost orgasmic proportions for Americans, it won’t make much difference in the long term.  We’ve already done a pretty good job of messing up his network, as evidenced by the lack of terrorism on US soil.  After their initial outrage Muslims will consider him a martyr, and treat him the way Catholics treat their saints.

But we can extend our own jubilation just a bit longer by carefully disposing of his body in the most insulting way possible. You’ve probably received some variation of this e-mail a few times:

HOW TO STOP ISLAMIC TERRORISTS . . . it worked once in our History

Once in US history an episode of Islamic terrorism was very quickly stopped. It happened in the Philippines about 1911, when Gen. John J. Pershing was in command of the garrison. There had been numerous Islamic terrorist attacks, so “Black Jack” told his boys to catch the perps and teach them a lesson.

Forced to dig their own graves, the terrorists were all tied to posts, execution style. The US soldiers then brought in pigs and slaughtered them, rubbing their bullets in the blood and fat. Thus, the terrorists were terrorized; they saw that they would be contaminated with hogs’ blood. This would mean that they could not enter Heaven, even if they died as terrorist martyrs.

All but one was shot, their bodies dumped into the grave, and the hog guts dumped atop the bodies. The lone survivor was allowed to escape back to the terrorist camp and tell his brethren what happened to the others. This brought a stop to terrorism in the Philippines for the next 50 years.

Pointing a gun into the face of Islamic terrorists won’t make them flinch. They welcome the chance to die for Allah. Like Gen. Pershing, we must show them that they won’t get to Muslim heaven (which they believe has an endless supply of virgins) but instead will die with the hated pigs of the devil.

It’s a great story, but it probably never happened.  There’s no record of it, but more importantly Pershing’s record indicates he’s not the kind of guy who would do that sort of thing.

But we can, and we should.  We should sew up the body in a pigskin suit, dump it in a vat of pig entrails, and then give all the people who lost loved ones in 9/11 an opportunity to relieve themselves on it.  Then we should bring it to an unmarked location, somewhere in the Mohave, perhaps, dump it in a deep hole and pile more pig guts on top of it.

Before covering and concealing the grave forever we’ll throw in pictures of 72 really ugly virgins.  And then, as a final insult, a life-size pork rind sculpture of Rosie O’Donnell, completing the pig theme.

Update: Right after I posted this I saw the news that he was buriend at sea. Time quotes an official as saying, “”We are ensuring that it is handled in accordance with Islamic practice and tradition.  This is something that we take very seriously. And so therefore this is being handled in an appropriate manner.”

So they not only blew an perfect opertunity for more closure, they aquesed to the Islamic superstisions.

Idiots.

One of the most common debating tricks on-line is putting words in someone’s mouth, then condemning them for something they never said or even implied.  It’s dishonest, vile, and used almost exclusively by the left.

If you say you think the Feds taking control of health care is a bad idea they’ll ask why you want poor children to die in the gutter. Question the usefulness of the Department of Education and they’ll demand an explanation of why you want people to be stupid. Say you think the EPA is out of control and they’ll insist you think pollution is a good thing.

I can’t figure out why this douchebaggery is so common on the left and almost non-existent on the right.  Right wingers do it occasionally in articles or in other media, but hardly ever in on-line conversation.  There are just as many dishonest people on both sides and there’s no reason they couldn’t use this particular trick.  But they do it so rarely that when you see it in action you can assume, with 98.67% accuracy, it’s coming from a socialist nanny-stater who starts off every day by kissing their own Obama tattoos.

This isn’t a new phenomenon.  I noticed it back in the days of using 1200 baud modems to dial up BBSs.  But it’s become more and more common as the years have flown by, and I’m at a loss to figure out why it’s only oozed leftward.  Does Paul Krugman sneak into lefty’s rooms at night and whisper how-to-do-it lessons in their ears? Is it explained in some secret Keynesian tract that’s only given to Daily Kos readers after they’ve sworn an oath of fealty to George Soros?  Is it only taught, discreetly, as a secret part of college courses like “Michael Moore Film Appreciation,” “Why You’re Smarter Than Everyone Else” and “How Noam Prefers his Analingus?”

I could be suffering from confirmation bias, but I doubt it.  This isn’t difficult to spot – it’s about as subtle as Rosie O’Donnell doing a cannonball into a kiddie pool.

I can’t figure it out.  If you can, or just have a good hypothesis, please leave a comment and Smartenize® me.

Imagine an iPhone app that would give you real time updates about the location of violent gangs that want to rob you at gunpoint and mess your life up as much as possible.  Gangs whose members are known for committing murder and getting away with it.  Gangs that use tazers on old people and children and anyone else they feel like zapping.  How could anyone object to such a useful app?

Several such apps exist and congress weasels Charles Schumer, Frank Lautenberg, Tom Udall and Harry Reid are so upset about them they’re demanding Apple remove them from their app store, because the gangs this protects us from are the police.

The Weasels claim making this information available is a threat to public safety. That requires believing the fiction that the police have something to do with public safety.  Road blocks are nothing more than revenue generators.  The same goes for the enforcement of most traffic laws – they are there to make money, not to keep the roads safe.

A while back I was stopped for not wearing a seat belt.  I was driving from one parking lot to another, down about 50 yards of road, at a slow speed with no one anywhere near me.  I usually wear my seat belt religiously, but neglected it this time.  I was given a ticket, of course.  The ticket was for $25, a slap-on-the-wrist punishment that fit the “crime.”  But there was an $85 surcharge attached to it, making it a $110 fine.  Can anyone, even a congress weasel, claim a 340% surcharge is about public safety?

The next day I was in the same shopping center, wearing my seat belt, and went to cut behind the shops.  I stopped when I saw the area was thickly infested with state troopers, stopping everyone and handing out more tickets.  Since that area wasn’t public property none of those tickets, if they were for moving violations, were valid, and the cops had to know that.  But most drivers wouldn’t, and the cops were using that ignorance to increase the state’s revenue.

The days of the cops being your friends are long gone (if they ever existed). They are a dangerous occupying army, and anyone who values their safety, property, or lives avoid them as much as possible.  Apps like this are not a problem – they are a solution.

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Here’s another article on the subject, along with contact information for both the weasels and Apple.