By Other Means: February 2019

Thursday, February 28, 2019

Thursday Wifus mostly with Rifus

More not safe for fan-service below the break.

High Speed Cattle Cars Aren't Better

Seeing Red

More not safe to receive that kind of eyebrow arch from below the break.

Tuesday: Tap, Rack, and Bang

More not safe to field-strip below the break.

Friday, February 22, 2019

BeCos(play) It's Friday

More not safe to work against or sometimes for below the break. As always bonus nerd points if you recognize the characters portrayed.

Thursday Wifus with Rifus

More not safe for fan-service below the break.

Poe's Law Illustrated

You know I was joking when I said that the President could come out against setting yourself on fire and there would be a sudden rash of self immolation.

On Tuesday, Out, a magazine devoted to LGBT issues, ran an op-ed slamming President Trump’s effort to decriminalize homosexual behavior across the globe, snapping that it is cover for a “colonialist” attitude toward Iran.

Then again it does fit nicely on the "what-benefits-socialism-more" inter-sectional totem-pole. Those who have been paying attention at this point have enough of a sense of the rankings to know this would be the likely result if they couldn't have their cake and eat it too.

Seeing Red

More not safe to tossle below the break.

The Next Time Someone Tries to Argue For Minimum Wage Increases

Tuesday: Tap, Rack, and Bang

More not safe to field-strip below the break.

Monday Made Me Laugh

Sunday, February 17, 2019

De Facto Death Squad

Foreword: This commentary is about to be very blunt. Current/former LEOs and people who are blindly back the badge might think this bluntness means I'm against law enforcement in all circumstances or that I'm personally attacking them. People who are anti-LEOs in all circumstances might think that I backing their twisted and idealized version of anarchy. I can't control what reactions people have I can merely advocate that people apply logos to a topic that pathos all too often reigns in.

Some of you might remember the Houston Chief of Police a week or two ago using the shootout which killed or injured police officers conducting a raid and though nobody felt it worthy of mention at the time resulted in the deaths of the home's lawful occupants to attack the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. It now appears that either due to his own confirmation bias or trying to preemptively cover up for his department murdering two people he should have waited for what the late Paul Harvey would have called "The Rest of the Story":

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) --
A confidential informant didn't buy drugs at the southeast Houston home where a botched police raid turned into a deadly shootout last month, according to a new search warrant.

The shocking new information was revealed today after ABC13 obtained two of several search warrants executed as part of the ongoing investigation following the deadly raid. The search warrant clearly shows the initial information used to obtain the no-knock search warrant involved a number of lies.

The details don't improve things here. Also notably lacking is any form of apology from the Chief of Houston Police for the character defamation he tossed out both upon the deceased citizens and others who keep and bear arms. Not only were the firearms used to resist this illegally obtained warrant not the evil back semi-automatic rifles, but as it would appear that the firearms used to kill innocents in this case belonged to his department.

People are going to point out that "18 grams of marijuana and about 1.5 grams of cocaine" were found after the raid, which if valid is illegal. However at this point neither of the house's occupants are alive to dispute such evidence. This is NOT the type of drugs sworn to in the search warrant request. Some other media sources are citing this narcotics unit having drugs in their own cars so after such a spectacular botch in which we already have one "bad apple" we are forced to ask how much pressure there was to not come up empty handed on the follow-up search. Again it has come out that the entire basis of this invasion was fraudulent which leave me disinclined to believe good faith findings in the rest, particularly findings from the same department:

Instead, Bryant said, he retrieved two bags of heroin from Goines’ own police car after another officer told him to do so. Bryant eventually admitted that he had no idea where the two bags of heroin came from and that he had never seen the bags before retrieving them from Goines’ car.

Smarter people than I are going to need to be involved in the nuts and bolts of how we begin to bring better accountability to our LEOs. My own inclination would be a radical refocusing of resources to crimes that directly affect people and property since the worst of this type of behavior seems tied to times and places that attempt to police morality.

Update:

To nobody's suprise:

Even before the deadly drug raid that left two civilians dead, Houston Police Officer Gerald Goines had a troubling history of allegations against him.