#anti terrorism act

[ausetkmt]

A former FBI counterterrorism agent, Dave Gomez, told The Washington Post he thought that a fear of being seen as targeting President Donald Trump's base was muting the agency's response to violence by white nationalists."There's some reluctance among agents to bring forth an investigation that targets what the president perceives as his base," Gomez told the publication.The comments followed an attack on Saturday by a gunman at a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, that the FBI is treating as a domestic terrorism incident.Investigators have said the gunman left a racist manifesto on the messaging board 8chan ahead of the attack.

FBI agents are hesitant to investigate white nationalist extremists because they don't want to be seen as pursuing investigations against President Donald Trump's base, a former FBI counterterrorism agent told The Washington Post.

The former agent, Dave Gomez, said he believes that FBI Director Christopher Wray "is an honorable man, but I think in many ways the FBI is hamstrung in trying to investigate the white supremacist movement like the old FBI would."

"There's some reluctance among agents to bring forth an investigation that targets what the president perceives as his base," Gomez said. "It's a no-win situation for the FBI agent or supervisor."

He said that Trump's repeated criticism of the FBI and its investigation into Russian election interference and collusion were likely factors as well.

The FBI declined to comment to Business Insider on Gomez's claims. An FBI representative told The Post that the comments were not accurate and that the agency distributes resources according to its assessment of the threat posed by domestic terrorism.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the FBI says about 40% of the domestic terrorism cases it is investigating involve racism.

Gomez's comments followed Saturday's shooting in a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, that killed 20 people. Investigators have told media outlets that shortly before the shooting, the gunman posted a racist and anti-immigrant screed on the messaging board 8chan, known as a hub for white nationalists. Authorities have identified Patrick Crusius as the suspect in the shooting.

That shooting was followed hours later by another mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio, that investigators have not tied to racist ideology. Authorities have not publicly identified a motive in that shooting.

Saturday's shooting was the latest in a long series of deadly attacks by white nationalist extremists in the US and abroad. In March, a gunman killed 51 people in mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, and livestreamed the attack on social media.

At a Senate hearing in July, Wray said an increasing number of domestic terrorism incidents were motivated by white supremacist and white nationalist ideologies.

Law-enforcement responses to violence by white nationalists have long been the focus of fierce bipartisan disputes. Republicans in 2009 reacted furiously to a Department of Homeland Security report that described right-wing extremist violence as a rising threat. They accused the agency of a bid to smear conservatives.

Trump's political opponents have accused him of deliberately stoking racist divisions in the US and actively courting the support of white nationalists during his 2016 presidential campaign.

In a March op-ed article for Time, the director of the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University linked a rise in white nationalism to "a coarsening of mainstream politics, where debates on national security and immigration have become rabbit holes for the exploitation of fear and bigotry."

The president last week claimed he is "the least racist person anywhere in the world" and on Sunday linked the El Paso attack to a "mental-illness problem." In the wake of the New Zealand attack, he said he didn't see white nationalism as a growing global threat.

Under US law, while it is a crime to provide support for foreign terror groups like ISIS, there is no equivalent for domestic terrorism organizations, The Post said.

The FBI is investigating the El Paso attack as a domestic terrorism incident and possible hate crime. In a statement on Sunday, it warned that Saturday's attack could inspire copycats.

[dynamitekansai]

WWE RAW (DECEMBER 16, 2024)

[thefreethoughtprojectcom]

Richard Medhurst, a Syrian-British independent journalist who defends Palestinians' right to resist Israeli apartheid, occupation, and other crimes, said this week that he was recently arrested at London's Heathrow Airport.

🔥 Fuel Our Work: https://bit.ly/TFTPSubs ��� TFTP Podcast: https://bit.ly/TFTPPodcast

#TheFreeThoughtProject #TFTP

[moonlayl]

Source - The Jerusalem Post

You can’t make this shit up. This is actually insane and disgusting. People can lose their job for pointing this out while a fcking Israeli politician can just literally say this. What the fuck do you mean do to Gaza what was done by the Nazis?

[vampirehizzies]

also correct me if I'm wrong but did elijah even make an effort at engaging with hope in like, an uncle-niece way to build that relationship and fond connection? because even KOL the guy who is the only one pointing out how weird the family's codependency is and obviously wanted out is also regularly keeping contact with hope and sends her gifts? at least pre-legacies, he was regularly involved with her as... a person. honestly maybe the writers just forgot to include any bonding scenes between them in season four (since obviously in s5 his memories were erased and then hayley's death...) but elijah didn't seem to make any effort to interact with hope - the kid he revered and idolised as the savior of the family - and that tracks with the fact that the only two things he seems to care about about is sex with hayley and keeping klaus alive/redeeming him.

[turnedpalefromlackofsun]

one time i drew a picture of my favorite ship beating the shit out of eachother and since violence is sex to me, i tagged it as ship

and then people got confused and then i got confused. to this day, im still confused.

[porschesbabydaddy]

he's soggy kinn :(

Prism count your fucking days

[nando161mando]

[immaculatasknight]

Correct scholarship

[wild-at-mind]

Sometimes just from someone's username you know they would reblog a post that's like omg Trump will do genocide and Harris will do genocide but with emojis and memes!!

And then you see that they did in fact reblog the post and you're like ohhh can we stop pretending this is any kind of leftism.

[ausetkmt]

The Jacksonville shooter (whose name I shall not write) ultimately killed three innocent Black Americans at a Dollar General Store only after he was first spotted at nearby Edward Waters University (EWU).

As the shooter donned his bulletproof vest, some EWU students eyed what they believed to be a suspicious person.

The students at the Florida historically black institution immediately alerted a nearby security guard who approached the suspect near his car. Upon seeing the officer, the suspect fled in his car toward what would be his next target.

Had the cowardly shooter not turned the weapon on himself after killing three innocent Americans at the discount store, his first encounter at Edward Waters University would have been more than strong trial evidence that his plan was to kill Black Americans.

In plain language, the Jacksonville shooter was engaged in a terrorist plot.

“Terrorist” is defined (rather circularly) by Webster’s dictionary as

“relating to, or characteristic of terrorists or terrorism: practicing or involving violent acts of terror.”

The key to the definition is that terrorism involves acts of violence.

One might imagine one of the definitional requirements of terrorism would be the use of violence to achieve political or cultural objectives, but Webster’s ignores this element.

But, we know from our recent history, terrorism can be simple violence calculated to induce fear and terror in its victims — and its victims are most often those who are identifiable and insular — those who are either vulnerable minorities or protected class members.

This is a pattern that is clear from the racist massacres dating from the era of post-Civil War Reconstruction until last week in Jacksonville.

But had these recent incidents been perpetrated by any identifiable non-American, this nation would have acted swiftly to prevent future atrocities through passage of anti-terrorism legislation and would have appropriated funds for both the FBI and DOJ to investigate and prosecute them “to the full extent of the law.”

Instead, in the wake of the repeated attacks, national and local politicians recite a litany of delay and denial mixed with indifferent thoughts and belated prayers about the deaths of their fellow countrymen and women.

Instead it is past time to act.

They must denominate these clockwork-like acts of violence as real terrorism; and, in doing so must both legislate and appropriate the resources necessary to prevent them.

But to do this they must first confront a hard truth — the truth that the most dangerous terrorists in our midst are other Americans: mainly radicalized young white Americans who seek to kill and terrorize their own neighbors — Americans who are Jewish, Black or Hispanic.

The same fervor to fight terror which once spread across all spheres of politics after 9/11 seems to have evaporated in the last half decade once the incidence of terror evolved to acts against Americans by other Americans.

But that doesn’t change the state of reality.

[noirandchocolate]

Prev tags you’re absolutely correct my friend—the legislative statement that goes with this statute (Section 490.00 in the link above) starts with: “The devastating consequences of the recent barbaric attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon underscore the compelling need for legislation that is specifically designed to combat the evils of terrorism.”

Yyyep. It’s 9/11. And NY’s statute is particularly broad, too.

Just in case, you know, anyone is interested…

Here’s New York’s statute on terrorism.

The pertinent parts someone may be…y’know possibly wanting to know about…

Are Section 490.05(1), which defines “act of terrorism,” and Section 490.25(1), which sets forth the elements of the “crime of terrorism.” Just to make things clearer, because statutes often are not, murder is a “specified offense” as defined in Section 490.05(3).

You will notice when looking at these sections, that “terrorism,” as defined by New York law, does not require a mass attack, an attack on a government or other public building, etc. Because murder is a specified offense, killing a single person is a sufficient underlying crime. Additionally, the statute does not require intent to coerce a government. That is one possible sufficient intent. Another is an intent to “intimidate or coerce a civilian population.” In other words, a group of people.

However, please remember, while you are thinking about this topic, that charging a person with a crime is not the same as convicting them. The State has the burden to prove every element of every crime alleged against a defendant, who is presumed innocent unless a jury decides the State has met that burden beyond a reasonable doubt. So if, say, someone murders a single person, and is charged with terrorism, the State will need to prove that this person possessed the requisite intent/state of mind associated with terrorism, not just the intent to kill associated with murder.

Just so you are aware.

And now, for people who do not like to click links, here are the provisions I’ve mentioned, below the cut:

Section 490.05(1)—

1. "Act of terrorism":

(a) for purposes of this article means an act or acts constituting a specified offense as defined in subdivision three of this section for which a person may be convicted in the criminal courts of this state pursuant to article twenty of the criminal procedure law, or an act or acts constituting an offense in any other jurisdiction within or outside the territorial boundaries of the United States which contains all of the essential elements of a specified offense, that is intended to:

(i) intimidate or coerce a civilian population;

(ii) influence the policy of a unit of government by intimidation or coercion; or

(iii) affect the conduct of a unit of government by murder, assassination or kidnapping; or

(b) for purposes of subparagraph (xiii) of paragraph (a) of subdivision one of section 125.27 of this chapter means activities that involve a violent act or acts dangerous to human life that are in violation of the criminal laws of this state and are intended to:

(i) intimidate or coerce a civilian population;

(ii) influence the policy of a unit of government by intimidation or coercion; or

(iii) affect the conduct of a unit of government by murder, assassination or kidnapping.

Section 490.25–

1. A person is guilty of a crime of terrorism when, with intent to intimidate or coerce a civilian population, influence the policy of a unit of government by intimidation or coercion, or affect the conduct of a unit of government by murder, assassination or kidnapping, he or she commits a specified offense.

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[im-totally-not-an-alien-2]

Danny, at 17, did not have the best love life. This is partially because two of his must haves in a partner are " Will protect me with their life" and "Will commit unspeakable acts of violence for me" or at least beat someone up for his honor.

Naturally, this doesn't always result in the most stable of partners.

His first girlfriend, Valerie, became an anti-hero and broke up with him for his safety.

He finally got with Sam in sophomore year only for the feds to come into class one day to arrest her. To his surprise, her crimes had nothing to do with ghosts but rather an incident where she went too far and committed a few acts of economic terrorism. Danny and Tucker never really learned the specifics of the crimes, and her parents hushed up as many news outlets as they could, so there wasn't much info to go around. All they knew was that she saved thousands of lives by doing it.

In the end, she was sentenced to eight years, and she broke up with him so that he wouldn't wait around for her to get out.

His third partner was a guy named David who was really sweet. Unfortunately, Danny got kidnapped one day by David's arch nemesis, who was some villain with a corny edge lord name. Yeah. David had become a a super hero after they started dating.

And if you guessed that he freaked out and dumped Danny for his own protection, you'd deserve a cookie.

Danny was noticing a pattern here. One that continued with everyone he dated. They always became some kind of hero before dumping him for his own protection, and it was infuriating. Sure, danny could defend himself, but he was never deep enough into the relationship to reveal his phantom half, and frankly, his hero career was something he left behind when he left Amity and destroyed the portals.

He met Tim at a skatepark after Tim fell off his board cause of some jerk speeding out in front of him on his own board, forcing Tim to stop or else hit the guy. The guy was unrepentant and Tim calmed him down (this did not stop him from melting the guys wheels with an ectoblast when no one was looking).

Tim then asked him to coffee. Danny, noticing how cute Tim was, agreed.

Danny was up front with his parents being mad scientists in Illinois. He always was with all the people he dated. It was better not to hide these kinds of things or worse, wait until you're already attached and afraid of losing them. So he always told potential partners as early as possible. Tim seemed a bit put off by this but was calmer about it than most, and they continued chatting.

Tim didn't seem like the type to turn to heroism or anti heroism so he felt safe on their later dates. It was only after he had known Tim for a while that he put the pieces together.

Tim was always covered in bruises that he hid with his clothes and make up, he had complained about batman over the phone when he thought danny couldn't hear, he was rich, he knew how to fight as revealed by his stances and footwork dispite trying to pretend he didn't, and lastly he held a lot of political power and influence being Bruce Wayne's son. Power he had no reservations using when it suited him or he was just feeling petty (that pettiness was part of why danny was falling for him harder than he thought he could)

No wonder Tim was so okay with his parents being rouges.

Tim was a villain!

At least Tim wouldn't leave him like all his exes. Danny doesn't think he could handle it if he did. Another good thing about this is now he can talk more freely about the more villainous and morally gray ideas and inventions when he was alone with Tim.

Tim didn't see anything wrong with Danny's idea to use something similar to cloning pods to make synthetic meats like rump roasts and steaks as a way to end world hunger and was eager to add to the conversation.

[tanadrin]

@grimogretricks

For people saying that airport security is wholly theatre and that it doesn't do any good- certainly it seems they've gone overboard on certain things, but what is your explanation as to why hijackings and terrorist attacks involving planes are MUCH less common than they used to be?

Sorry that this is mostly off the dome, and has less references than I would like. We argued this stuff to death in the aughts, though ultimately the political incentives in favor of security theater were just too great. Everyone is terrified of the potential backlash of not being seen to do enough in advance of the next big terrorist attack, I guess. And to be clear, we are talking mostly about post-9/11 airport security measures as being security theater. Some degree of airport security has been necessary since people started getting on airplanes with guns and informing the pilot that, hey, guess what, we're going to Cuba instead of Miami today.

But the big reduction in airplane hijackings came with the institution of metal detectors to keep guns off airplanes after a couple high-profile hijackings in the 1970s. But remember that these incidents were of a very different character than what we now think of as the risk to airplanes: they were certainly a problem, but the modus operandi of hijackers in this era was to force the plane to fly to a non-extradition country and land safely. 9/11-style hijackings, that used the plane as a bomb and killed everyone aboard, were on nobody's radar--when the goal was blowing up the plane and killing passengers, bombers generally used bombs planted in checked baggage, which requires different security measures from passenger screening.

Two security changes occurred after 9/11 that made future such hijackings basically impossible: one, probably most importantly, was that passengers understood they no longer could count on hijackers having an interest in surviving the hijacking. This change in passenger behavior was immediate: later that same year when a guy tried to bomb an airplane (using a really ineffective device hidden in his shoe) passengers immediately acted to restrain him. The second important change was reinforcing cockpit doors and keeping them locked: this makes hijacking airplanes with knives (the only major modality left to most would-be hijackers) functionally impossible.

All the other intense passenger screening and security measures implemented after 9/11 has been repeatedly shown by security researchers to be pretty ineffective, not even very reliable at stuff like keeping knives off airplanes. For years after 9/11 there were endless news stories about law enforcement running drills at airports and weapons making their way through security. A lot of later security measures, like liquid limits in carry-on baggage, came from terrorist plots that didn't even make it off the drawing board (and are unlikely to have ever worked anyway), and seem mostly to be overzealous ass-covering by transportation security officials.

And, finally, we should note that the real security threats to airplanes in the post-9/11 era seem to have come come from two sources that are basically impossible to protect against using traditional security methods, and for which passenger-based security screening is useless: anti-aircraft missiles and suicidal pilots (plus an honorable mention to aircraft companies trying to skirt certain regulatory requirements).

Despite what decades of American media would have you believe, elaborate plots targeting transportation infrastructure and involving like a dozen people are actually not at the top of the list of terrorist methodologies--why time and money training members of your organization to fly planes into buildings, when you can just use social media to convince a guy to drive a car into a crowd of bystanders, or stab somebody on the street? It's much cheaper, and much, much harder to guard against. Random lone-wolf terrorism is, unlike the kind of elaborate plots portrayed on TV, and one-off real-life examples like 9/11, basically impossible for security services to guard against in advance. But in order to justify the war on terror, and large budgets for security services on anti-terrorism grounds, it was necessary to play up the threat of such plots, even if by its very nature 9/11 was impossible to repeat. For similar reasons, the post-9/11 era also played up the threat of Islamic extremism and large overseas terrorist networks, even though far-right extremists acting in small groups also have managed to kill huge numbers of people in spectacular ways.

So for all these reasons, and those noted at the top, the political incentives around transportation security means that passenger screening measures in airports are almost guaranteed to be a one-way ratchet, even if they don't work. It's a bit like the fabled anti-tiger amulet--it's easy to say the lack of tigers is proof it's working! Even if the real reason there are no tigers about is that you live in Ohio. The media environment post-War on Terror helped create a public appetite for and approval of such anti-tiger amulets, too, of course. This was not by any means a purely top-down phenomenon.

[demonic0angel]

Due to the Anti-Ecto Acts, Jason, a highly ecto contaminated individual, is legally no longer considered a sapient being. Which means he can no longer be legally held accountable for his actions. A fact he abuses with enormous glee.

“We need to talk," Bruce said, sounding exhausted.

Jason smiled cheerfully. While the look usually would've been uncharacteristic enough to make them all test him for his DNA, it was so common nowadays that everyone just put their head in their hands to hide away from his smile.

"Why? What do you mean?" Jason asked.

Damian stood up, slamming his hands down on the table. "That! That is what we are concerned about! Your crimes must be answered to!"

"Crimes?" Jason was almost batting his eyelashes with the way he was blinking innocently at Damian. "What crimes? I have done no such thing."

Dick spoke up wryly, "Little wing, you terrorized the mayor by stalking him for several days, pranked the GCPD seven times, let the animals go in the zoo twice, stole multiple priceless treasures to give to Jazz and Danny and their friends and family for bribing government officials, robbed three banks to fund the cause to assassinate the president, shot five billionaires, beat up four other CEOs, and then lit the roof of Wayne Enterprises on fire to declare your love for Jazz. I'm pretty sure those are crimes."

Jason beamed. "No, they're not. Because according to recent law, proposed by the GIW and ratified by the government, I am not a sapient being. Therefore, I can no longer be held accountable for my actions. Until I am caught and tried by the GIW, I am not bound by any laws and nobody is allowed to take me in except the Ghost Investigation Ward."

Tim grumbled something underneath his breath, which sounded a lot like, "I should've just reported his ass to the government."

Stephanie nudged him hard. Tim growled and then rubbed at his shoulder. Finally, he stood up and said, "Jason! It still isn't an excuse for you to jeopardize our work just so you can flirt with Jazz and overthrow the government!"

Jason's grin grew even wider.

"What're you gonna do? Arrest me?"

Damian and Tim lunged at him and then an entire brawl broke out. Bruce clutched his coffee mug to himself desperately, praying for any god out there to give him patience and help.

... he was pretty sure they were laughing at him.