Monday, June 19, 2017
Incident Identification
I followed an old friend's Facebook comment to another high school classmate I have not seen in 40+ years. She had a link to a site called Angry Liberal which chided Donald Trump for being silent when white supremacist terrorists killed three Americans, two of which were veterans, but he congratulated a man who had choked and body slammed a journalist. I know what the second incident is, but even a little googling did not explain to me the first incident is about. What gives?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
10 comments:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/28/us/portland-stabbing-victims.html
Could be this.
Another story, same incident, including Trump angle.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/29/portland-attack-donald-trump-called-on-to-make-statement-about-double
Now I'm pretty sure this is what the description of the first incident refers to.
There was a murder about a month ago of a student on a university campus, not sure whether he was a veteran or active duty (and of course now I can't find the article) that might match the first incident (and be the second veteran). I believe Grim posted about it when it happened.
If it's the incident Grim talked about, it was a Bernie Sanders supporter who switched to Jill Stein who killed the Americans, two veterans. He could also be a white supremacist, but that first part was left out. A mere oversight, I'm sure.
It's the Portland story, yes. He was both a white supremacist and a Bernie supporter, which suggests to me that he didn't really care about Bernie's politics so much as Bernie's status as the candidate of rebellion.
I have noticed that it's more comfortable to talk about his white supremacism than his Bernie support (or his Jill Stein support). We're having a moment about that right now. Will you condemn an act of terrorism... even if it targets a mosque??? Well, yes, obviously. Will you condemn a terrorist... even if he's a liberal? Well.... we'll condemn him insofar as he's a white supremacist, or a domestic abuser, or something like that.
Different incident. The stabber in Portland is, as you both say, a Bernie supporter and a Stein voter. His victims—one was a veteran, the other (a much younger man and not a vet) attended my alma mater. There was also a third victim, who was stabbed but survived—not a veteran as far as I know.
The other incident I was thinking of, not in Portland, was a man—either a vet or active military— who was murdered on a campus. He was black and I think there was racial animus strongly suspected. I wish I could find the story, because I'm pretty sure I saw it at Grim's. I recall a photo of the victim wearing his uniform—does this ring any bells?
What I suspected was that the article your classmate linked was referring to both of these incidents, because it specified that three Americans were killed, two veterans. In the Portland murders, only two people were killed, one a veteran. Adding the second attack would give the correct numbers.
The second incident you're thinking of was a stabbing at University of Maryland. The CNN story is:
http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/22/us/university-of-maryland-stabbing/index.html
The attacked students were black, waiting for an Uber ride in the wee hours of the morning. The one who died, Richard Collins was a recent graduate of Bowie State (historically black college) and had just been commissioned a 2LT in the Army. The killer was a (white) UMD student who didn't know any of the people he attacked, and just walked up and demanded that they step aside. When they didn't, he attacked them. He also had a facebook page titled the "Alt Reich" and containing anti-minority and anti-woman statements, which will be used against him as evidence that it was a hate crime.
Considering the accuracy of the description of the Montana incident on that website, we could google until the cows come home and never match actual facts to the fake news headlines that inspired the reference to the other but I'll stand by my estimate it's the Portland attack. As jaed noted, I remember a third person was stabbed in Portland and survived. I haven't found anything definitive but I believe that man was described as a veteran as well but he may not have been. Unlike the Maryland incident, there were multiple fatalities. In the Portland attack the assailant was reported to be harassing one or more teenage girls wearing Muslim dress (he stabbed the men after they approached him), and also reported to visit or post on 'white supremacist' sites. I think the clincher for me was that "chided Donald Trump for being silent when white supremacist terrorists killed three Americans, two of which were veterans" matches very well to the headlines that show in a google search for the Portland attack. The minor details being wrong shouldn't get in the way of the greater narrative about the wave of hate that Trump is unleashing on America. /sarc
Speaking for myself, I wouldn't expect a random blog post to necessarily have to footnote everything-- at this point, I'm happy enough if they will be mostly right (e.g. saying "veteran" when really the victim is actually just entered the Army but hasn't gone to his first duty station yet; or saying three killed, but not specifically mentioning it was two unrelated attacks). Compared to, say, loudly asserting that the Gabby Giffords attack was instigated by Sarah Palin, which is outright libelous and been disproved multiple times.
Now, a larger beef is that a site that names itself "Angry Liberal" doesn't really have any standing to complain about Republicans acting angry, or the overall political climate being angry, or social media disseminating angry memes, or whatever. Have at least enough introspection to read your own title, and consider whether it reflects the mindset and societal values you wish to live with.
I also think that tweets are so far down the list of "things that are necessary to do when a murder occurs", that we should all just stop worrying about it all. Turn off twitter, it makes you stupid and hormonal, is what I'm saying.
Jaed:
You did see it at Grim's Hall. The story is here.
Post a Comment