Congratulations, Colorado Springs, Colorado! Two mass shootings in less than one month! That earns you some kind of 2nd Amendment Hero award for sure. With memories of the Halloween shooting spree still fresh in everyone’s mind, we have yet another armed white guy terrorizing the staff and women at a Planned Parenthood clinic near the UCCS campus — people who were no doubt there for PAP smears and STD tests, not abortions. Three people shot, nine injured, after a five-hour standoff. Slow clap, Colorado Springs.
Yes, wingnuts. DO tell me how I need to be afraid of Syrian refugees and Muslims. Looks to me like the biggest perpetrators of terrorism on American soil are disaffected white guys exercising their constitutional right to be armed to the teeth and terrorize everyone they disagree with.
Oh, I’m sorry. Is it too soon already? Forgive my impolite response. There’s just so damn many shootings, it’s like it’s always too soon!
After our last tragedy in this city, the mayor of Colorado Springs had this to say about the state’s liberal gun laws:
COLORADO SPRINGS — Days after a rifle-toting assailant stormed a Colorado Springs neighborhood, Mayor John Suthers said he sees no reason to restrict residents’ ability to openly carry firearms.
“What your open carry laws are don’t dictate what your violent crime rate is,” Suthers said.
His comments came as debate swirled about a state law allowing people to openly carry guns in public, and numerous publications scrutinized the Colorado Springs Police Department’s initial handling of a 911 call about the gunman on Halloween.
Hmm, really? I’m not so sure about that. Well, by all means, don’t look under that rock, Mayor! And one month later we have another armed nutball waltzing into a Planned Parenthood clinic. Planned Parenthood officials, at least, are no dummies:
Security concerns at the clinic were high enough that the clinic had a “security room” with a supply of bulletproof vests, ….
So, this is your modern Libertarian right-wing conservative Christian world. Where a women’s health clinic is forced to have a “security room” with bullet-proof vests. The Taliban would be proud!
So, do you think open carry activists will now be volunteering to protect Planned Parenthood clinics around the country? Ha ha, I kid, I kid. C’mon, that’s just for military recruiters in strip malls! Women’s health clinics? Fuhgeddabout it. YOYO, y’all.
There was a moment this afternoon when a man walked up to the scene with a handgun strapped to his waist and ammunition vest around his chest. He appeared to be asking police if he could help. Officers told him to leave immediately because appearing at the scene while wearing firearms and that equipment was a bad idea.
Gee, ya think?!
Already we have the “tin-foil hate” brigade calling this a “false flag,” or blaming it on liberals to smear the anti-choice fetus-fetish zealots, etc. (It’s Breitbart, go over there and look, I’m not leaving any links.)
It’s Colorado Springs, you know? Home of Focus On The Family, a whole bunch of mega-churches, military bases, a real Libertarian paradise. Who is surprised that a women’s health clinic would be attacked here? Not me.
Southern Beale 
I could’t have said it better myself! Thank you for your posts!
What Jan said. Thanks so much for all of your posts. This one packed a most powerful punch.
But ISIS… aren’t we supposed to live in fear because of ISIS/ISIL/DAESH/Al QUAEDA and feel safe here in the Homeland because our paid-for government is totally you know on the job. Personally, whenever I see a tall, shabbily dressed, powerfully built white man brandishing a gun and talking in tongues with a thousand-yard stare I feel so much more secure. Especially at Waffle House.
“Bettis said she called 911 to report a man walking with a rifle and looking suspicious, but that dispatchers informed her it is legal to openly carry a weapon in Colorado.”
Unbelievable!
Also legal in Washington State. Baked into the state constitution. But, generally considered to be rude, stupid, uncouth, boorish and juvenile to walk around strapped. Didn’t keep a sadist from emptying out an Easter Egg Hunt gathering though by wandering through the crowd of parents and children in his Wyatt Earp costume.
And yet…try walking into a mall with a katana, machete or claymore strapped to your belt.
Legal in TN as of 2 years ago. Apparently they have a lobbyist, too. 😦
…And get shot by one of the open-carrying gun-nutters as a Terrorist, because only Terrorists carry around big-ass fucking chop-yore-haed-off knives…
(where the hell did I step through that friggin’ looking-glass?!?!)
~>X[
If the definition of terrorism is the attempt to instill fear in order to control the behavior of others, then “open carry” is terrorism. You walk around with a visible weapon only for the reason that you want someone to be afraid of you, because in your mind they might be a threat to you.
Eggggggzackly….
The gunnutz say that the 2nd amendment is there to protect all the other rights. When has a 2nd amender ever taken out his gun to protect anyone else rights?
“the 2nd amendment is there to protect all the other rights…”
That’s the definition of a gun bully.