I admit, I was a bit dubious about Obama’s reelection campaign SOTU speech. “The state of our union is getting stronger”. Everything is great (it must be; he used the word often enough- it showed up four times in just one paragraph).
But by watching Faux Snooze with my father, I’ve learned that the… -ahem- …greatest remaining challenge facing the world is whether the Cowboys or the Patriots, or terrorists or somebody, have soft limp balls.
…complains that his comment was taken out of context.
Last I heard, Twitter was limited to 140 characters. What frickin’ context, fat boy? If you want to establish context, maybe you oughta produce another loser “documentary.” Your last one was… what; going on six years ago, and opened in a grand total of two theaters? (Hmm. “[F]inal domestic total was $14,363,397.” Sniper has already made 105 megabucks in four days. I think I see Moore’s real problem with the flick.)
And apparently Seth Rogen thinks covert assassination is just plain, clean fun, but a sniper with minimal support hitting targets in combat, and taking return fire, is just nasty propaganda. (Kudos for the quick Godwin’s Law invocation, Killer. Damned good thing your cinematic bomb suddenly got all that convenient publicity, or it never would have made even that piddling $5.4 million. Huh. Even less than a Moore crapfest. Your envy is showing.)
‘This teaches an important lesson: “Why worry about reality, when we can FANTASIZE solutions to our problems, which would almost certainly work if we lived in a Roadrunner cartoon?”’
– Vin Suprynowicz, author of Send In the Waco Killers, The Ballad of Carl Drega, The Black Arrow, and The Testament of James
As my regular reader :) might be aware, I’ve been concerned about the report of W. F. Burns Middle School asking parents for canned good to place in classrooms as improvised weapons. In fact, the idea struck me as so suicidally silly that I was darned near sure it was a hoax. I was wrong; it was real, apparently an element of the “ALICE” (Alert, Lockdown, Inform, Counter, Evacuate) system of response to an active shooter in a school.
But reporters are notoriously bad at getting facts straight. It was possible that some lazy scribbler confused ‘We advise being aware of possible improvised tools in the surrounding environment’ with “Stock improvised weaponry in advance.” So I went to the source, the ALICE Training Institute’s Keith Siegel, Chief Operating Officer (ksiegel@alicetraining.com).
As I’m sure you’ve been pleased to note, ALICE has been in the news recently. You may be somewhat less pleased with the response to certain apparent aspects of ALICE (“School Requests Students be Armed with Canned Food Items to Thwart a Possible School Shooting,” http://buzzpo.com/school-requests-students-armed-canned-food-items-thwart-possible-school-shooting/), to wit: prepositioning canned food as last ditch weaponry for the children. I must admit that as a military veteran, former peace officer, and former licensed private security officer, I found the _reports_ that your system advocates this AS A PLAN a little troubling. (While I do think that one — even a child — should be prepared to fight back if necessary, _planning_ the use of improvised, minimally effective weaponry — to the extent of prepositioning canned goods just for the purpose — seems less than wise. “Improvisation” is what you do when _plans_ fall through, when the _right tools_ were not prepositioned.)
News reports rarely get all the facts right; reporters often “invent” facts to to scoop the competition or increase their audience. Knowing that, I’ve looked over your web site and see that prepositioned improvised weaponry for children seems to conflict with element “C” of your ALICE system.
So, finally my question: Does your system actually teach and advocate prepositioning canned food for use in fighting off an attacker(s) equipped with firearms, or is this a misinterpretation by the media? If it is not an accurate description of the ALICE system, will you contact W. F. Burns’ Principal Holley to correct her dangerous plan? (Note that prepositioning items specifically as weapons for children also violates that school’s code of conduct and may even constitute a class C felony in Alabama.)
It was a fairly simple “Yes, we suggest it” or “No, we don’t; we simply advise being aware of possible improvised tools in the surrounding environment” question. Yes or No. The response from Nick Feyerchak, National Sales Manager (nfeyerchak@alicetraining.com):
Thanks for your inquiry. Would it be possible for us to schedule a brief call? I’d be happy to walk you through the ALICE concepts and give you some background as to where the “throwing canned goods” originated.
Please suggest a few times.
Uh oh. No straight answer. They want to talk to me by phone rather than give a simple Y/N in a conveniently copy&pastable email. I gave Feyerchak my phone number and awaited the call. I kept a list of questions ready so I could be careful and precise.
-ring!- Mr. Feyerchak on the line.
After the usual pleasantries, Feyerchak began grilling me on my qualifications (milvet/peace officer/security officer). He wanted to know how I heard about this. He wanted to know when I first heard of ALICE.
I cut him off. “Am I answering your questions, or are you answering mine? Does your ALICE system recommend prepositioning improvised weapons in schools?“(Read straight off my ‘script’.)
He asked if I was familiar with OODA Loops.
I replied affirmatively and asked if he was familiar with my question: Does your ALICE system recommend prepositioning improvised weapons in schools? Yes, I was getting impatient with him; his entire routine was designed to evade a straight answer.
Which he still wouldn’t give. He finally stated that they recommend keeping a tool box, and at the bottom of that box would be things that could be used as weapons.
“So your answer is ‘Yes’?”
“Yes.” He began babbling some more, but I cut him off.
“Thank you. That’s what I wanted to know.”
I never did get around to asking why they thought prepositioning canned food was more effective than pre-planning and positioning tools actually designed for defense, or if they would advise schools like Burns of the code of conduct/legal conflicts of their suggestion. It took a few minutes for him to say yes or no. Bog only knows how long he’d have skated around those. I’m on a prepaid phone with just so many minutes available.
So PrOincipal Holley was actually following specific advice to violate her school district’s code of conduct (and possibly commit a class C felony) to stockpile beanie weenies to hurl at armed, murderous psychopaths. Advice which even conflicts with element C of the ALICE system (“ALICE does not endorse civilians fighting an active shooter…”).
I have no problem with teachers and students being encouraged to do whatever they must to defend themselves, including grabbing anything available. Improvised weapons as a last ditch measure when better options have run out is good. Skipping proper tools and planning to use minimally effective improvisations first is simply asking to be killed.
I’d rather see schools buy bulletproof whiteboards, than see them spend money on ALICE.*
(Which is a shame, really. Much of ALICE is good sense, as far as I can tell from the web site. But they spoil the whole thing with the canned food projectiles. I’m afraid of what other deadly advice slips into the program.
* I have problems with some of the proposed deployments of those, too. But at least they’re designed for the job, and would stop bullets better than beanie weenies.
Apparently today is Dress Up Your Pet Suicide by Cat Day.
Jigsaw‘s having none of that crap.
Confirmed: The letter is real.
Update: See below.
Remember the Alabama school that appeared to have sent out a letter requesting children bring canned food to heave at attacking shooters? My take at the time was ‘hoax.’ I mean… who could be that stupid? Lots of folks posted questions regarding the letter’s authenticity over at their Facebook page. I didn’t think much about the lack of response over the weekend.
But the weekend is past. The school hasn’t posted any amusing denial of the absurd letter, neither on Facebook, nor their web site. I sent the principal an email.
No response.
But their web site has now been updated,so they’ve had time to deny.
But they haven’t. They are dead silent on the idiotic idea. Which, to my suspicious mind, means the letter probably is real after all and they’re over-working their defective minds to explain why they thought it was a good idea, now that they’ve seen the national ridicule and criticism.
Update, 1/12/15: I’m now convinced that these idiots really did send that letter, that it’s not a hoax.
Still dead silence from the school. No replies to inquiries. Even better…
…they’re deleting comments (simple inquiries and ridicule alike) from the Facebook page. They’re in damage control mode; pretending that no one thinks they’re the clueless halfwits that they are… by “eliminating” the criticism.
The Internet doesn’t work that. PrOincipal Holley of W.F. Burns Middle School, meet the Streisand Effect.
Update 2, 1/13/15: Lacking any response, I sent PrOincipal Holley another email this morning. Still nothing. Critical Facebook comments still seem to be disappearing. In an earlier post, I alluded to this possibly being a violation of the school’s weapons policy. It is; in fact, any child following the instructions of that letter faces suspension at a minimum. Potentially, it could lead to felony criminal charges.
From the CCSD Student Code of Conduct:
Major Offenses–Class IIIThe offenses will result in the following sanctions:
Elementary and Secondary Students
The disciplinary action for such offenses will be suspension and/or a
recommendation for expulsion by the principal. If so recommended, the expulsion procedures in this book will be followed. Pending final determination of the matter by the school board, the student may be offered the opportunity to attend an alternative program.Violations
[…]
12. Possession of Weapons—A knife, metallic knuckles, tear gas gun,
chemical weapon or device; or any other weapon, instrument or object with the intent to be armed. (emphasis added-cb)
a. In accordance with the Federal Gun-Free School Zone Act of 1994, students found to be in possession of a firearm on school premises will be expelled for not less than one (1) year. Further, The Code of
Alabama, 16-1-24.1 (a) (b) (c) (d), 16-1-24.3 (a), and Legislative Act
94-87 states that the possession of a deadly weapon on school
premises with intent to do bodily harm is a Class C felony. (See policy
6.30.1)
I guess Holley just hates kids.
Criticism mounts over thin US presence at Paris rally, Kerry schedules France visit(not linked because I’m not giving them the traffic; find it yourself.)
Criticism mounted Monday over President Obama’s muted response to Sunday’s massive rally in Paris against Islamic terror, a historic show of unity that drew more than a million people, including more than 40 world leaders — but none higher representing the U.S. than its ambassador to France — as the White House continued to avoid calling last week’s attacks an act of Islamic terror.
-yawn-
Meanwhile, in an alternate universe where Obama skipped town to attend the Paris rally:
Fox: Obama a “narcissist” for upstaging “photo op”
Fox commentators, high on hairspray fumes, objected to President Obama’s presence at the Paris anti-terrorism rally. “He’s a strutting narcissist who ducked out of important anti-terrorism planning sessions – which would have ended terror in our time – just so he could photobomb a highly publicized rally, and get his picture taken with dozens of world leaders at a meaningless event that looked nice, but accomplished nothing. Since he established a policy that terror should be handled as crime, he should have sent Attorney General Eric Holder to confer with his French counterparts instead.”
For eff’s sake, Barrycade does (and doesn’t do) enough real objectionable stuff. Americans should be glad the clown didn’t go, if only because he couldn’t tote a teleprompter along on that march… and have you heard what comes out of his mouth when he tries to speak extemporaneously?
The maniacal morons of Faux must be praying for a Hillary Clinton administration to follow Obama, just so they don’t have to go out of the Dimwit-bashing business.
