The Glade 4.0

Michigan man kills anti-abortion activist.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/09/11/mic ... index.html

At least he's not a hypocrite on his disdain for life.

Yikes.

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The Dude abides.

Stories like this are of the vein that make me weep for our species. What could this man possibly believe that he had to gain through this act?

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"Once we realize that imperfect understanding is the human condition, there is no shame in being wrong, only in failing to correct our mistakes."
- George Soros

The same thing the guy that shot Dr. Tiller believed. Both of them should be prosecuted as domestic terrorists.

The thing that gets me about this is that he murdered a second man, and was hunting for a third, and the second man was not involved in the anti-abortion stuff. Apparently the first victim was displaying those horrifying dead baby posters in front of the high school, and that set this ******* off.

I too weep for our species.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Yeah We aren't sure that this is an "Anti Abortion guy Murdered" or "A guy murdered who happens to be anti abortion." However I do think that both should be equally horrifying, and if not you have to examine yourself and ask why.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

Why should they be prosecuted as domestic terrorists?

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A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. ~ John Stuart Mill

Yeah, I don't get that either.

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The Dude abides.

Politically or religiously motivated violence like this is terrorism. It's no different than a suicide bomber or Tim McVeigh, other than scale.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

these are not frikking terrorists, murderers yes, terrorists no.

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Darksiege
Traveller, Calé, Whisperer
Lead me not into temptation; for I know a shortcut

Not at all. Terrorism is motivated by a desire to change government policy or public opinion through the deliberate creation of fear. Political or religious motivation does not, by itself, mean an act is terrorism.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Well, then at least one of them is a terrorist, by that definition. Putting a gun to someone's head in the middle of church and pulling the trigger would seem to qualify as an attempt to change government policy or public opinion through the deliberate creation of fear.

And it worked - the clinic closed after Dr. Tiller's death, leaving only one clinic in the country where a woman can have a late term abortion, regardless of medical necessity. The others have all been scared into not performing the procedures anymore.

The motives of this most recent shooting aren't entirely clear, but I'm pretty comfortable with the assumption that the act was intended to have an effect above and beyond the murder.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

You tried this tactic in the thread about Dr Tiller's death, and it didn't fly then either.

His clinic didn't close because of the "deliberate creation of fear." it closed because no one else wanted to do his late term abortions.

I don't consider any murder a terrorist act just because the person killed had opposing beliefs to the person comitting the murder. You'll have to prove your assertion that these were both done to create fear in an attempt to change government policy or public opinion.

I'm curious about your comment that this is some sort of tactic. I made an argument.



Forgive me, but I just don't think that's accurate. -



He is a Nebraska doctor. Furthermore, I think one can make the argument that fear of being gunned down might have a lot to do with why doctors are unwilling to perform those services. It seems to me that the terrorism worked very well in the case of Dr. Tiller. I hope the terrorism in the case of this poor gentlemen fails.



Forgive me, but I do not remember asserting that. I remember saying that I feel that religiously or politically motivated violence constitutes terrorism. I should probably add that there needs to be an intention to cause an effect in the community or government.

I don't think anyone can reasonably argue that Tiller's murder was not intended to cause fear and have a direct effect on the performance of abortions in Kansas, the performance of later term abortions, etc. I am fairly certain when the facts are out on this shooting, the same will be true.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Wait a minute...Late Term Abortions are still legal? I thought those were banned?

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Dr. Tiller did not perform elective late term abortions. He performed abortions only in cases where the fetus was non-viable or there was a risk to the health of the mother. He was exonerated in court, twice IIRC on charges that his standards were too low to constitute a risk to a woman's health.

In fact, I don't know any doctor in the country that performs elective late term abortions, and you may be correct that such a procedure is illegal in most states assuming no risk to the mother or fetal non-viability.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

I don't see any reasson we'd make that assumption. It's not at all unlikely the killer never even considered the ramifications beyond

It's the same way with the church killing. Just because the killing was conducted in a spectacular manner doesn't mean it was an act of terrorism. Terrorists have an agenda, make demands, and have definite goals for the changes they want to see.

Random inidividuals can do that too, like the Unabomber, but in the absence of any sort of statement or indication from the perpetrator that he had a goal beyond satisfying his own rage, there's no reason to think he did. Simply slapping the label "terrorist" on people robs it of its usefulness as a descriptor.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Roeder was associated with the Freemen, a militia group that does not recognize the government of the US to be legitimate, and considered himself a "sovereign citizen". He was pulled over for driving without a license plate, and officers found bomb making materials in his trunk. None of that leads me to conclude that it was just a lone crazy guy lashing out. It leads me to believe he had a radical agenda that involved violence. Now, he might also be a crazy guy, but that doesn't mean this wasn't terrorism.

So, when I look at a terrorist, I find some common themes.

1) association with an extremist, militant organization

2) religious or political zealotry

3) a violent act directed at their "enemy", be that the US, gay people, or in the case of Dr. Tiller, an abortion clinic.

4) The results of an act - fear, and change as a result of that fear.

Generally speaking such attacks are well planned. Roeder's attack, at least, qualifies. He knew when his victim would be vulnerable and in a public area, and he assasinated him there, in front of a crowd, in a horrific fashion.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

I don't really see how the views of that group relate in any way to abortion. If he had killed the man for some reason related to the Freemen's goals, you'd be on much stronger ground.

There is also no evidence that there was any "change as a result of fear." They could find no replacement for the doctor, but since the killer was a lone actor, there is no good reason to think that was the reason. It's quite likely that no doctor able to perform such services wished to move to rural Nebraska.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

He was also associated with the Army of God, a group that stems from the Feemen and other radical groups. The Army of God produced pamphlets on methods for attacking abortion clinics, and was responsible for a lot of the attacks and assassinations in the 80s.

Groups like the Freemen work as feeder groups for other right wing militants like the Army of God.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

To be fair, in America, terrorism has traditionally (over the last 8 years) been defined as whatever the government decides is most convenient to be labelled terrorism.

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Well Ali Baba had them forty thieves, Scheherezade had a thousand tales
But master you in luck 'cause up your sleeves you got a brand of magic never fails...
...Mister Aladdin, sir, What will your pleasure be?
Let me take your order, Jot it down -You ain't never had a friend like me
█ ♣ █

So, twenty or more years ago. Being associated with a group and doing the same sorts of things it did twenty years ago isn't much of a case for terrorism or political agenda. It really indicates a lone nutcase angry that his group is no longer doing these things.



Do they? Have you got any intelligence information on these groups and how they "feed" each other?
Just because two groups are "right wing" does not mean they feed each other. Just because a person has political views on the right does not mean they are religiously on the right, or that even if they are that it is to the same degree any more than being politically liberal makes one religiously liberal.

This is the case in Iraq as well. For example, not all Shiite insurgents are primarily religious. Some support extreme Shia religious dominance of society; others are political organizations that happen to be Shi'ite religiously.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Just because the government is doing something stupid doesn't mean we all should.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Tell that to those who went off about William Ayers. His group never killed anyone but themselves, and his long past association with radicalism meant that Barak Obama was a terrorist sympathizer.



You can go check out the Southern Poverty Law Center if you like, or read any number of books or articles on radical militia groups in the United States.



Can you explain where you got that from my post? Because I didn't argue that, and would not do so. It does not logically follow.



Again, I am not understanding where in my post you managed to come up with that idea. I certainly didn't express it.



Sure, which is why I list politics and religion as common factors in terrorism.

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It feels like all the people who want limited government really just want government limited to Republicans.
---The Daily Show

Hahahahaha! Quoted.

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"Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." Jesus of Nazareth

Failing to kill people does not excuse one from the label of terrorist, since Ayer's group DID have explicit political change goals. Moreover, the only reason they killed no one was incompetance. Ayers isn't engaging in terrorism now, but he certainly was a terrorist.



No, you can show the specific feeder relationship between Freemen and Army of God, or at least between groups that are similar in nature and goals to the Freemen, and groups that are similar to AoG. By "similar" I mean something more specific to their goals, agenda, tactics, techniques, procedures, and beliefs than "right-wing militants."



Dude...


What is that saying if not that righ wing groups feed each other? What is it about the Freemen that makes them a feeder for the Army of God?


If one group is a feeder for another group, there must be something in common between them that makes them attractive to each other, and "right wing" isn't it. You posted that comment about some right wing groups feeding others, but just being right-wing doesn't establish that relationship. It's entirely possible that their goals may conflict; for example AoG may want massive government regulation of social behavior based on religious views while Freemen opposes it because they oppose government regulation of any stripe.



That's true, but it's tautological. Obviously they're factors in terrorism since a terrorist needs to have some goals along these lines or he's just a pedestrian criminal.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."