Via AS, I have seen the death threat to the Iranian blogger Editor:Myself. In the world of the Theo Van Gogh murder, these matters are to be taken seriously. To be candid, when I was president of the West Coast branch of PEN (circa 1992) at the height of the Salman Rushdie fatwa, I thought threats like this were something of a game (We would all try to hold parties for Salman, etc., no one thinking there was really a danger. Who could do such a thing?). No more.
Meanwhile, and not unrelatedly, it seems the Iranian nuclear situation is headed for a difficult crunch between the US and Europe. And our friend Vladimir Putin is not beng helpful, at least outwardly. He is continuing his for profit game, helping the mullahs get their reactor, as if Beslan had not happened. Money talks indeed. Aren’t you relieved Bush is in the White House with this going on? I am. But he has his hands full.
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19 Comments
1. David Thomson:ìAren’t you relieved Bush is in the White House with this going on? I am.î
Most definitely. The Iranian mullahs should not push their luck. John Kerry will not be our commander-in-chief. I expect the stuff to hit the fan before the inauguration. President Bush will likely give the green light to Israel to bomb Iran.
Nov 6, 2004 - 3:45 pm 2. penwil:On Bush’s interview with John O’Reilly last month he said unequivocably that Iran would not be allowed to devlop nuclear weapons. I believe he meant it, which is one of the reasons why I voted for him.
Nov 6, 2004 - 4:00 pm 3. Buddy Larsen:I think you’re right, penwil. I would not trust Kerry with Tel Aviv. Even though I’m certain Tel Aviv doesn’t need the USA on this issue, it sure can’t hurt to have her. Kerry is convinced he can word-off any political mistake, and I’m not sure that real people aren’t sort of abstract, to him.
This may be covered elsewhere, but it just came up The Corner.
Nov 6, 2004 - 4:38 pm 4. BigFire:Unfortunately, like me, you live in the Los Angeles County. This means your ability to legally purchase firearm (you have a little daughter in your house, so you might not want to keep firearm) is limited. You can drive up to Ventura or down to Orange county, where the gun laws are less insane. But please do take extra care of security around you and your love ones.
Nov 6, 2004 - 5:32 pm 5. richard mcenroe:Bigfire ó To an expat New Yorker like me, LA is Dodge City when it comes to being able to buy a gun… and I’m all for it.
I just read Edited by: Myself. He’s going to report this threat to the Canadian authorities? Given how far the Canadian government bends over backwards to avoid giving offense to Muslims in Canada, that wouldn’t reassure me much…
Nov 6, 2004 - 5:42 pm 6. Buddy Larsen:Here’d be my advice, from low-crime-for-a-reason rural Texas:
You should have a dog that will bark. A house dog. Doesn’t have to be a guard dog, heck, a Chihuahua will do, but you want a nervous dog that barks at everything untoward. Best house hardware, a short-barrel 12 gauge pump, plug removed,loaded with #9 field-load birdshot to be first in the chamber when you pump it. Loaded, but on safety with nothing in the chamber–that’s the speed vs safety compromise.
That low-power birdshot is your non-fatal leg blast, or scare shot into a phonebook. It gives you options. But every shell after that, 4 or 5 depending on the model, or two if you’d rather stay game-legal and leave the plug in, should be kill loads, double-ought buckshot, magnum load.
For carry, back and forth to the car, and in the car, it gets dicier whether you want big iron with max stopping power, but that you probably won’t pocket and may need when you don’t have handy, or something lighter that you’re more likely to have handy, at the loss of some stopping power. A model 1911 .45 Auto, or a simpler/more reliable but with fewer shots .357 Magnum revolver, is great for the former, and a .38 Special or small-frame 9mm Auto for the latter. Smith & Wesson has a pocket-friendly hammerless revolver that’s no bigger than your hand, hits what you point at, and will drop a man only a little less reliably than a big bulky .45 or .357. Especially if you run a few hundred rounds thru it and make it part of your arm, so you can place fast shots where you want ‘em.
Keep both weapons loaded but unchambered (arguably ‘unchambered’ is no safer in a revolver, and a little tricky to keep legally ‘unloaded’–which in Texas is, next trigger pull fires no bullet). ‘Loaded vs unloaded’ argument ought to end with this: If you need it, you may be out of time to load it.
The 12 will disappear from sight pushed back to the wall on top of larger hardcover books on a high bookshelf. Kids are a huge potential danger, if you’re gonna be gone, and are leaving kids in the house, lock it in a steel (no glass) gun safe.
Doing all that will make you feel immeasurably better. Ladies who want to train, go with the 20 gauge (matter of body weight vs recoil) instead of the 12. If you break a statute, let ‘em fine you, after they cart off the guy who tried to break in.
Nov 6, 2004 - 6:49 pm 7. richard mcenroe:Buddy, that last bit of advice, tho well intentioned, will get you sued out of your house in LA.
I recommend reading Mas Ayoob. He’s a police captain who’s written some of the best work on the use of lethal force by private citizens AND surviving the legal aftermath, both civil and criminal.
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:09 pm 8. Catherine:Sorry—-way OT—-I just found this in a Howard Kurtz column:
This is hilarious!
Reaching out to all Americans means:
Talking to MSM reporters!
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:16 pm 9. Buddy Larsen:Yep, I know. Texas is far more lenient to self-defense. But, still, a legal-nightmare aftermath IS an aftermath. That’s really what i meant. But certainly, if one isn’t positive that one will make the right determination, then, well, one should stay away from lethal weapons. And thanks for fleshing that out. You’re right, I did edge into the irresponsible a bit.
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:21 pm 10. Buddy Larsen:Catherine, what is an “MSM reporter”?
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:23 pm 11. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):In Arizona, it is legal to kill a burglar, no questions asked, it you are in the house. You are less likely to get shot in return, or sued, if you kill the buglar – at least in this state. Most gun people would say never fire a warning shot.
In the car, I’ve got a Sig 9mm and I do keep a round chambered (it is double action). I have a pocket gun which is a Sig .380 and looks a lot like the James Bond Walther-PPK. Unfortunately, I haven’t had time to take the concealed carry course so my pocket gun stays locked away. Since in AZ you can carry openly in almost all circumstances, if I really entered a situation where I thought I might need a gun, I’d just carry the Sig 9mm openly.
On the other hand, it’s smart to avoid such a situation. I have only carried that way in the wilderness, where you never know whom you may come across.
I was also unarmed when I was shot at in the Superstition Mountains near here. There are a lot of old prospectors [nutcases] looking for the Jacob Waltz’s gold mine or the legenday Peralta treasure, and some of them are a few bricks short of a load.
Lest one considers this to be paranoia, I have fired a weapon in my car in self defense.
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:27 pm 12. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):The MSM are angry at the White House, and have been for quite awhile, for a couple of reasons. The Bush White House almost never leaks, and they hate that. Also, Bush has told MSM reporters that they don’t speak for the people, which ticked them off. Essentially, Bush treats them as nothing special – they exist, he can feed them information when he feels like it, but he owes them nothing. This also really upset them.
The MSM has come up with this model (apparently partly from a white house aide) where the MSM is “reality based” and the White House is not. What the white house aide meant was that because of their power, they were changing reality, and had to look at things in that light. Also, if Bush doesn’t read the newspapers, it’s because he has people to do it for him.
In any case, the Washington Press corps hates the White House, consider Bush to be information deprived (he told them he doesn’t read their papers), and is somewhat confused by the whole thing.
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:35 pm 13. Buddy Larsen:In those immortal words from “Lonesome Dove”, better to have one and not need it than to need one and not have it. I bet you were deaf for a week, firing off inside your vehicle.
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:36 pm 14. John Moore ( Useful Fools ):Buddy
MSM = Main Stream Media
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:36 pm 15. Buddy Larsen:Something has totally changed when all the relativists suddenly stop asserting “there is no one truth” and start lecturing us on “facing reality”. Do they mean, there IS a ‘reality’, after all? If so, then what was all that other bit about?
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:43 pm 16. Buddy Larsen:John, thanks…I was being sarcastic. Like someone said, sarcasm needs its own punctuation marks. What bugs me is read (I ‘reed’ this) and read (I ‘red’ that) and the like.
Nov 6, 2004 - 7:48 pm 17. someone:Meanwhile, The Atlantic does its best to try to convince us that there are no good military options v. Iran.
Take with salt.
Nov 6, 2004 - 8:47 pm 18. Kyda Sylvester:I am relieved that Bush is in the White House for any number of reasons, but this is first among them.
Nov 7, 2004 - 1:08 pm 19. j. marzan:I posted this on Jarvis’ blog…
I’ve been thinking about it for a long time, Jeff — the idea of radical Islamists threatening to kill or harm pro-war bloggers and thinkers like Instapundit, Belmont Club, USS Clueless, and even Andrew Sullivan.
Can you imagine the damage the Islamist can do vs. the fight against the Islamofascists if they do a hitjob on prof. Glenn or silence the Belmont club — whose contributions and analyses on the war in Iraq are invaluable, IMO…
And who really knows why Steven Den beste USS Clueless is quiet recently? Is it because he is “tired” of blogging, or because he got threatened by a pro-jihadist supporter who did not like den beste’s strong views on Islam and terrorism?
Sometimes, it is better to remain an anonymous blogger than use your real name… for your own safety. I won’t be surprised if bloggers who use their real names will revert back to being anonymous bloggers in the future.
Nov 8, 2004 - 4:56 am