Oklahoma Dude Traipsing Around With AR-15, Pistol, Tactical Vest Just Fine, But Brass Knuckles A Crime
Just like the Founders wanted!
In Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, last week, a whole bunch of panicked citizens called 911 to report a guy walking around town wearing a tactical vest and carrying a loaded AR-15 and a holstered revolver. First, employees at the courthouse locked the doors and called 911 when he tried to enter wearing the vest, but otherwise unarmed. Then he showed up at a strip mall, this time fully armed, leading to a bunch of 911 calls. He went into an AT&T store, and terrified employees ran out the back of the store and, again, called 911. Finally, he started walking toward a Target store, prompting more 911 calls from people who thought they were about to witness or become victims in another mass shooting, which are all the rage these days.
But none of those incidents were actually crimes, thanks to Oklahoma's gun laws, which allow open carry of long guns and pistols, although at the moment Oklahomans are still prohibited from open carry of tactical nuclear weapons. It's also legal to have a concealed weapon in most places, because it is a "constitutional carry" state, which means the more guns, the better. No license or permit is needed for either open or concealed carry. Openly carried handguns do at least have to be in a holster, and concealed weapons have to be completely out of sight, so there's that.
As for the heavily armed gent in Broken Arrow, while cops did warn him that he was going to generate more 911 calls if he kept walking around looking like that, he wasn't breaking any laws. After he went into the AT&T store and more calls came in, cops did find out that the dude had a misdemeanor warrant (unrelated to the walking around armed bit), so they arrested him before he entered the Target.
When they searched him, they found a set of brass knuckles, which actually are illegal in Oklahoma, what with there being no well-funded brass knuckle lobby. They also found he had another firearm, a .50 caliber semiautomatic handgun, which was concealed, but Oklahoma only allows handguns up to .45 caliber, so he was charged for that one, too.
So just to be clear: Terrified people called 911 again and again on the scary looking dude carrying a small arsenal, but it was all legal until cops found the brass knuckles and the .50 caliber handgun.
We'll assume this disturbing incident will result in swift action by the Oklahoma legislature to overturn any remaining limits on handgun caliber.
Rogers County Sheriff Scott Walton told the Tulsa World that the fellow who looked like he was ready for a shootout was in fact not breaking the law, but added,
quite honestly, nobody needs to be walking down the street with a rifle. [...]
But I don’t make the laws; we just try to live by them and do a very difficult job in a world that’s got those people in it.
Walton explained that the guy hadn't been carrying any weapons when he went into the courthouse, and the AT&T store didn't have a sign saying weapons aren't allowed. And he never actually tried to enter the Target, so no crime there either.
Walton said that such situations makes law enforcement's job "a lot harder," what with people being allowed to carry assault weapons all over the place.
“If I spook the right person, they might send me to meet Jesus,” Walton said. “Here’s a guy with a rifle that can take me and a lot of other people out, but he’s not doing anything. Now I got to make a decision. That decision is a lot tougher now.”
Now, before you start thinking Walton is some kind of gun-hating radical, we should also point out that in February 2020, the sheriff also declared Rogers County a "Second Amendment Sanctuary," which doesn't actually mean anything legally, but signaled he loves guns and the good citizens who carry them for freedom, and will never ever take them away for tyrannical purposes. At the time, he said that "Good people do not get in trouble with guns, they just don't.”
Mind you, we suppose "good people" only includes those who wander around carrying an AR-15 and pistol of the proper caliber. Add in brass knuckles and you're dealing with a dangerous criminal.
Also too, at a forum on active shooting incidents last week, Tulsa Police Captain Mike Eckert explained that since law enforcement is best equipped to determine the nuances of whether particular armed citizens are behaving lawfully, citizens should call 911 if they feel somebody might be dangerous, and let cops deal with it.
“If somebody is causing you concern or putting you in fear for some reason, that’s what 911 is designed for,” Eckert said.
“With Oklahoma being an open-carry state, it’s not against the law to carry a firearm, but it is against the law to commit a crime with a firearm. Sometimes that can be very muddy waters to deal with or work your way through.”
A Broken Arrow police spox also told the World that it might be a good idea for folks to be familiar with state laws, to help them decide whether to call 911, but go ahead and do so if you see something you think is suspicious. So if you see something, say something, just don't assume cops can stop anyone. Or something.
Sheriff Walton also appears to have thought carefully about the subtleties of who exactly is a good guy with a gun, as illustrated by the incident in Broken Arrow.
“I don’t expect everyone to become educated on the fine line of the law. If you’re waiting too long to make that decision (to call 911), that in itself is life-threatening.”
The best thing to do under current Oklahoma law is to call the police to make the determination, he said.
“I think of: What would I want my daughters-in-law to do if they had my grandkids and saw someone like that?” Walton said. “My answer would be: Call the police. 911. Let us go to work.”
Then, assuming the scruffy guy looking like a potential mass shooter doesn't have any brass knuckles on him, he can go about his day and we can all rejoice that the Second Amendment protects all our freedoms.
[Tulsa World / KTUL-TV]
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Fine, Mitt Romney, Pass A Child Allowance Plan And We Will Not Hit You *Today*
You know. For kids!
For six months last year, the USA actually did something pretty astonishing: It slashed the rate of child poverty with the Expanded Child Tax Credit (CTC) that was included in the American Rescue Plan. With the very first round of monthly payments, in July 2021, the child poverty rate fell from 15.8 percent to 11.9 percent, a 26 percent reduction in child poverty in just a month. For the six months the credit lasted, US child poverty dropped by about 30 percent. An extension of the expanded credit was included in the Build Back Better Bill, but we all know what happened there. At the moment, there doesn't appear to be much chance of reviving the expanded CTC, either as a stand-alone bill or as part of a pared-back reconciliation package — and any renewed expansion of the CTC would likely crash into the same Joe Manchin-shaped wall all over again.
Read More:
Joe Biden's Expanded Child Tax Credits Coming To Your Bank Account Near You!
Washington Post Takes Us Inside Manchin Tantrum That Killed Build Back Better
Mitt Romney's Child Allowance Plan Pretty Damn Good, Would Cut Child Poverty. Yes, That Mitt Romney!
So here's a surprise: Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) has brought back a revised version of his own 2021 plan to provide a monthly allowance to most American families with kids, with some tweaks intended to make it more palatable to his Republican colleagues; he's even picked up a couple of co-sponsors, Richard Burr (R-North Carolina) and Steve Daines (R-Montana). Romney's calling it the "Family Security Act 2.0" and billing it as "pro-family, pro-life, and pro-marriage" in hopes of at least getting some other Republicans to glance at it before rejecting it because it doesn't ban all abortions or even execute any doctors. The "pro life" bit is a new feature that would start payments to pregnant women in the four months leading up to their due date.
Yeah, that's actually a really good idea, and as we asked last year, has Mitt Romney been infected with Scandinavia?
Remember, this is the guy who, when he ran for president in 2012, railed against "free stuff" and condemned the lazy 47 percent of Americans who supposedly "believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it," just because they're children, retired, or make so little income that they get the Earned income Tax Credit (EITC) and pay no tax. Same guy!
As with the earlier iteration, Romney's plan would give families $350 a month for each child under the age of five, and $250 a month for kids aged six to 17, for up to six kids, or as they say in Utah, a tiny family that doesn't hardly even count. It would also provide up to four of those $700 a month prenatal payments to help pay for the costs of new babby. Parents could choose to have the credit paid out monthly or to take a lump sum annually.
New in the bill this time around would be a sort of work requirement, though it would be far less onerous than the arbitrary cruelty red states have come up with to keep people from receiving food stamps or other benefits. Instead, to qualify for the full benefit, families would have to have earned at least $10,000 in the previous year, which is really not a hell of a lot of income. People with income below that level would get a partial credit based on whatever income they did have. It strikes us as arbitrary and cruel — people with the very least income get punished with lower benefits? — but that's what was needed to get GOP cosponsors, the Deseret News explains:
Romney’s policy advisers said that the earning requirement and other changes from the senator’s initial proposal are what colleagues told Romney they’d need to support the measure. Staff members also expressed hope the bill would attract support from Democrats, but noted that many senators across the aisle still hope to see the expanded child tax credit and monthly payments from the American Rescue Plan resuscitated.
“That hasn’t been our preferred route or the position of our conference,” a policy adviser said on background, expressing optimism that “more serious discussions” with Democrats around The Family Security Act 2.0 will take place once that effort plays out.
As with the existing child tax credit — and the short-lived expanded version — the full credits would be available to individuals making up to $200,00 a year or $400,000 for joint filers. Above those income levels, the credit phases out sharply, dropping $50 per month for each $1,000 above the limit.
Romney's bill would also rework the Earned income Tax Credit to eliminate marriage penalties (Pro-marriage!) and to avoid "benefit cliffs" by gradually reducing the amount of the EITC when people make a little more income, rather than eliminating it altogether (Pro-work!).
To pay for the new benefit — which would cost about $93 billion annually— the Romney plan would modify or eliminate some current federal benefits. The first time out, Romney sought to eliminate Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), which was an absolute no-go for most Democrats. Family Security Act 2.0 would, like the first, eliminate the state and local tax deduction (SALT), which is very popular with blue-state moderates, but which goes mostly to fairly well-off folks, to offset the higher taxes in blue states. That would provide $25 billion annually. Hell, it's wealth redistribution, and we're good with it.
Deseret News explains the other federal cuts that would make the plan budget-neutral:
Earned income tax credit reform would save $46.5 billion. Dropping the head of household filing status would save another $16.5 billion. And the final $4.7 billion would come from eliminating the child portion of the child and dependent care credit, the senators said.
Romney’s policy advisers told reporters that the head of household filing status is a “really regressive way to support families.”
Given that head of household status is pretty popular with single parents who have dependent kids, trying to axe it could be a hard sell, even if some of the lost tax advantages would be offset by the tax credits. Same for the child care tax credit.
So does Romney's proposal have any better chances this time out? We're guessing probably not this close to the midterms, although maybe there'd be 60 votes in the Senate to pass help to families that could be bragged about in campaign ads. Family policy boffins are again making positive noises, so that's good, and there's support from a bunch of groups on the Right for its "pro life" provisions.
But as the Atlantic noted, Romney's first Family Security Act, for all the praise it got from both sides of the aisle, never got any real GOP support, and Democrats were focusing all their energy on Build Back Better, leaving Romney's bill without a home. It would be nice to think a really bipartisan coalition in Congress might be open to the new version, and we could even see it going somewhere if Democrats hold on to Congress in the midterms. If Republicans take either house this fall, they'll be far too busy investigating Nancy Pelosi and passing abortion bans for Joe Biden to veto.
[Sen. Mitt Romney / Deseret News / NPR]
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Fox News On January 6 Hearing Would Like You To LOOK OVER THERE! Wait No Not There Either.
This is some blatant propaganda shit.
The first night of the January 6 Committee hearings was all over TV last night, not only on cable news, but also preempting programming on the legacy broadcast networks ABC, CBS, and NBC. But nobody watching Fox News saw the hearing at all, because the network didn't carry it, shunting the live coverage over to Fox Business instead. (See? Fox DID SO carry the hearings, just on the channel fewer people watch.)
Read More: LIVEBLOG: Watch The January 6 Committee Hearings With Your Wonkette!
But Main Fox didn't ignore the hearings and rant about China or migrant caravans or sex-crazed pandas as you might expect. Instead, the network's two top opinion shows, "Tucker Carlson's Radio Rwanda For Terrified White Folks" and "Sean Hannity Is Very Worried About America So You Should Worry About America Too," spent the two hours telling Fox viewers why the House January 6 Select Committee and its hearings are terrible and bad.
There also weren't any commercial breaks that might have risked viewers changing the channel and catching part of the hearing.
We can understand why Fox News didn't want any of its regular viewers seeing dangerous things like the committee's video compilation showing scenes of violence. Much of the video was previously unreleased. Wouldn't want to remind the Faithful how awful January 6, 2021, actually was.
As we look at the lies that were all over Fox last night, remember: This is what Fox News viewers did not see. It's what Fox News absolutely did not want them to see.
'We Will Tell You The Truth,' Says Habitual Liar
Instead, Fox viewers got Tucker Carlson telling them that he was actually very proud that Fox wasn't showing the hearing, because only Fox News can be trusted, no do not look elsewhere ever:
In fact, it's deranged and we're not playing along. This is the only hour on an American news channel that will not be carrying their propaganda live. They are lying, and we are not going to help them do it. What we will do instead is to try to tell you the truth. We've attempted to do that since the day this happened.
Hilariously, Carlson did tell viewers that "if something noteworthy happens ... obviously we will bring it to you immediately." But Carlson, and later Hannity, never cut away to the hearing even once, proving how unimportant it must have been.
Then he got to the serious business of lying, insisting we will never know what really happened that day because it was simultaneously nothing important at all ("barely rates as a footnote"), a false flag operation perpetrated by FBI provocateurs, a complete cover-up by the government, and a legitimate expression of anger by patriots who were upset the election had been stolen from Donald Trump. It may also have been a dessert topping and a floor wax.
Tucker once again rolled out his insistence that a guy named Ray Epps just had to be a federal provocateur, because clearly no real patriot would ever encourage violence, mercy no. (Reality: Ray Epps is a freaking Oath Keeper who looked forward to hanging Mike Pence or Nancy Pelosi, just like the rest of 'em.)
Read More: Ray Epps! Ray Epps! He's Here! He's There! He's Every F*cking Where!
We especially like the way Carlson insisted the committee covered up the truth, all while Tucker himself lied and lied, like claiming that "none of the so-called insurrectionists had guns." Reality: At least 10 have been charged with firearms offenses so far, and many other rioters carried knives, folding batons, and stun guns, to say nothing of their use of improvised weapons like police shields and flagpoles. Also, let's not forget the guy who pleaded guilty not only to carrying guns, but had a cache of Molotov cocktails in his truck. AHA! says Tucker, But Molotov cocktails are not firearms, I win!
Look At These Losers. Just LOOK At Them!
For some real laughs, check out the gallery of goons Fox had on as guests (lovingly collected by Nikki McCann Ramirez) instead of carrying the hearing, and get a load of the Stalinist-sounding chyrons. There was Tulsi Gabbard ("The January 6th 'Show Trial' is underway").
CPAC magnate Matt Schlapp ("The left's changing views on riots")
Federalist CEO Sean Davis ("Liz Cheney is helping Democrats crack down on Americans who oppose their agenda")
And our personal favorite, Michael Tracey, who probably complained that Maxine Waters was trying to murder him again. (Chyron: "Democrats want to destroy anyone that challenges their message and power")
Why Did Capitol Police Keep Hitting Themselves?
Tucker also dragged out the canard that no cops died due to the mob, because they merely committed suicide later, and in the case of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, he just happened to die of natural causes like one of those clumsy Russian oligarchs who clumsily fall out a window now and then.
Carlson went on an extended rant about the multiple incorrect reports that Sicknick had been beaten with a fire extinguisher, calling the reports deliberate lies, but he left out the fact that Sicknick had been attacked with a chemical spray. Instead, he said, Sicknick "died of a stroke in his office later. No one has been charged in Officer Sicknick's death because Officer Sicknick wasn't murdered."
Carlson left out that Sicknick's attackers were charged with assault, but not with murder, because an autopsy did indeed find that Sicknick died of a stroke — but the DC medical examiner added that "all that transpired" on January 6 "played a role in his condition.” Just not enough to get a murder conviction.
Read More:
Guess We’ll Never Know What Killed Brian Sicknick, It Will Just Be A Mystery!
What Tucker Carlson Doesn't Say Is More Insidious Than What He Does
Officer Caroline Edwards Is A Goddamn Hero
It's a familiar lying by omission strategy for Carlson, who also likes to suggest that George Floyd happened to die of a drug overdose that was completely unrelated to a rogue cop kneeling on Floyd's neck.
But because they didn't see the hearings, Fox viewers also didn't see Capitol Police officer Caroline Edwards testify that the attack on the Capitol looked like a "war scene":
There were officers on the ground. They were bleeding. They were throwing up. I saw friends with blood all over their faces. I was slipping in people's blood. I was catching people as they fell. It was carnage. It was chaos. [...]
I am trained to detain a couple of subjects and handle a crowd, but I'm not combat trained. And that day, it was just hours of hand-to-hand combat.
Fox viewers also didn't see Edwards describe seeing Sicknick, who like other Capitol Police had been hit with chemical spray by rioters:
All of a sudden, I see movement to the left of me. I turned, and it was Officer Sicknick with his head in his hands and he was ghostly pale, which I figured at that point, he had been sprayed and I was concerned. My cop alarm bells went off. Because if you get sprayed with pepper spray, you're going to turn red. He turned just about as pale as this sheet of paper.
Gee, if he wasn't feeling well he should have called in sick that day, huh?
They Distort, We Deride
The spin went on for the rest of Fox primetime, with Carlson, Hannity, and the other network talking heads behaving, as the Washington Post'sPhilip Bump put it, "as though it was former president Donald Trump’s defense team — without, of course, showing its audience the prosecution’s case."
Fox did provide glimpses of the hearings, but only as a video window in the background, often restricted to long shots of the hearing room, and never with sound. As NBC News producer Manny Fidel pointed out last night on Twitter, even that partial coverage cut away when the hearing showed the violent attack on the Capitol.
\u201cI lined up the Jan. 6 committee hearing footage with Tucker Carlon's show and found that Fox News cut away from clips that showed rioters breaking into the Capitol\u201d— manny (@manny) 1654829284
For his part, during his commercial-free hour, Sean Hannity dismissed the hearing as the "dullest, the most boring — there's absolutely nothing new — multi-hour Democratic fundraiser masquerading as a Jan. 6 hearing." He wasn't watching, and neither were his audience, so Hannity missed his own mention in the hearing, when Liz Cheney read his January 6 text to Kayleigh McEnany, telling her "no more crazy people" and "no more stolen election talk ... Many people will quit."
Instead, the crazy people all found on-air spots on Fox News, the end.
[WaPo / Nikki McCann Ramirez on Twitter / Media Matters / CNN / Salon]
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Washington Post Takes Us Inside Manchin Tantrum That Killed Build Back Better
Shades of Newt Gingrich in the back of Air Force One
Sunday's Washington Post brought us what promised to be the thrilling behind-the-scenes true story of "How the White House lost Joe Manchin, and its plan to transform America" (free linky), with insider accounts of how the nominally Democratic senator from West Virginia and the Biden White House just couldn't reach an agreement to pass Joe Biden's signature legislative package, the Build Back Better bill, which had already passed in the House and just needed buy-in from Manchin to pass in the Senate. It's an interesting read, but don't go looking for any great insight into any epic clash of principles and personalities. Instead, we're told, the Build Back Better negotiations fell apart because Joe Manchin was offended by a White House statement that he felt was Very Unfair to him, so he had a big tantrum and sank the bill. Or at least, that's what the insiders say.
The Post explains that on December 14, Manchin and the White House seemed close to a deal:
Manchin had offered to support a $1.8 trillion package, a step toward the White House position, while Biden agreed to jettison a budget gimmick that Manchin believed disguised the true cost of the plan. The tenor of their conversations was “peachy,” according to one person briefed on the talks, and the two sides agreed to put out a statement saying they would continue talking.
And then, incredibly, it all fell apart.
The big problem was that the White House issued a statement that "named Manchin as the focus of negotiations," and Manchin was furious about that, although that had been obvious to anyone paying even a little bit of attention. The story says that the White House sent Manchin's office a draft of the statement, and that Manchin's people asked that Manchin either not be named or that the statement say negotiations included Sen Kyrsten Sinema (D-Arizona) too. The story notes that, once the prospect of income tax increases was eliminated, Sinema was on board, but that's what they asked for.
Read More:
Kyrsten Sinema Really Trying Our Patience, Tell You What
Democrats Gonna Cancel Child Poverty Right Along With Dr. Seuss!
And here, children, is why we won't be ending child poverty, having free childcare or universal pre-K, lower drug prices, or take serious action on climate:
The White House issued the statement anyway. The president had personally signed off on it. ButManchin exploded, texting a senior Biden aide that the decision was “unconscionable and extremely dangerous” at a time when liberal activists were targeting Manchin’s family with protests.
The Post doesn't really go into much detail on what "targeting Manchin’s family with protests" consisted of, but as far as we can tell from stories last year, that mostly involved the kayakers floating around his houseboat and calling for him to address climate change. Also some people chanted at him while he was getting in his Maserati SUV in a parking garage. No, they were not threatening anyone's life, that's more of a MAGAworld thing.
As for the White House press release itself, it was hardly a besmirch statement of libelslander, either. Issued in Joe Biden's name, the December 16 statement expressed optimism that the negotiations were moving right along, and didn't even remotely criticize or threaten Manchin. Here's the relevant bit:
I had a productive call with Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Schumer earlier today. I briefed them on the most recent discussions that my staff and I have held with Senator Manchin about Build Back Better. In these discussions, Senator Manchin has reiterated his support for Build Back Better funding at the level of the framework plan I announced in September. I believe that we will bridge our differences and advance the Build Back Better plan, even in the face of fierce Republican opposition.
My team and I are having ongoing discussions with Senator Manchin; that work will continue next week.
The statement goes on to say that actually getting stuff into legislative language takes time, but expresses confidence that yadda yadda yadda. Notice that the closest the statement gets to "pressuring" Manchin is the bit about his support for funding it, which certainly suggested no more damn cuts please.
Manchin's reaction was just plain weird:
Once the White House statement was released, Manchin “was just explosive. The anger — you could not believe the intensity,” said one person who spoke with him around that time.
Shortly afterward, Manchin texted Steve Ricchetti, one of the president’s top aides: “Steve, the statement you all put out tonight targeting me and my family was unconscionable and extremely dangerous. There will be no further negotiations,” two people familiar with the contents of the message said. Manchin allies say his reaction was in part driven by the number of credible threats at the time to his and his family’s safety.
Again, we're talking about kayaks, folks, unless there were a lot of terrible MAGA-style threats of death and dismemberment that we're not being told about; those would be terrible, but the White House statement doesn't "target" Manchin's family in the least.
In any case, aides say the White House statement crossed a red line for Manchin, and he was so very very mean mad that he turned off his phone and wouldn't take Joe Biden's calls, and that's why Build Back Better is dead and buried, although there are still hopes that he might be persuaded to support a very modest package of climate and tax measures, especially if someone can convince him it'll cut the deficit (nor cut consumption of fossil fuels).
We won't go into all the gory details here, but while we're perfectly willing to believe that Manchin had a shit fit over the statement, we'd also point out that he spent pretty much all of 2021 finding things he simply couldn't tolerate in Build Back Better, from the details of the electric vehicle tax credits to the fact that the child tax credit reduced child poverty without shaming poor people like it should, to his bizarre claim that low income parents would just blow the tax credits on drugs. And of course there was also his complaint that the funding cuts he'd demanded now were too sneaky and gimmicky. So if the White House had left his name out of the statement on negotiations, Manchin would absolutely have found something else to "explode" over.
Read More:
Joe Manchin Whines Build Back Better's EV Tax Credit Is Too Nice To Unions
Oh Good, Now We Know What Joe Manchin Wants, Maybe. And It's AWFUL.
Joe Manchin Killing Child Tax Credit Because Parents Would 'Just Spend It On Drugs'
Joe Manchin Complains Build Back Better Cuts He Demanded Are Very Bad And Tricksy
In conclusion, sure Joe Manchin had a tantrum over the White House statement. But let's not kid ourselves into thinking that he was ever really on board with Build Back Better, the end
[WaPo (free link) / Photo: Francisco Carbajal, Creative Commons License 2.0]
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