Recently in International Category

Photographing thugs 'is assault', police tell householder snapping proof of anti-social behaviour

It's the Daily Mail, but given the direction of things in Britain these days I'm buying it:

David Green, 64, and his neighbours had been plagued by the youths from a nearby comprehensive school for months, and was advised by their headmaster to identify them so action could be taken.

But when Mr Green left his £1million London flat to take photographs of the gang, who were aged around 17, he said one threatened to kill him while another called the police on his mobile.

And he claimed that a Police Community Support Officer sent to the scene promptly issued a warning that taking pictures of youths without permission was illegal, and could lead to a charge of assault.

When he started taking pictures, one of them called the cops. That's something right there, law-breakers asking the law for help. But the law sided with them.

Nothing to laugh about. This sort of thing is the natural next step after the right to defend oneself is outlawed. Note that I wrote that the right is outlawed, not removed. Big difference.

One thing worth laughing about is the Daily Mail's alt text for the image they included in the story:

Picture of yobs taken by David Green

Why is it that Green is apparently being treated like the yob?

Boris Johnson, the mayor of London, has some advice for those who might see a crime being committed or a victim in need of help: "If you see trouble walk away"

Via Jay Tea at Wizbang, who writes:

A city where no one will get involved in helping a neighbor being victimized is a city full of potential victims who can count on getting no help from anyone when they are the victim.

What a sad path Britain appears to be on.

Iraqi soldiers stand guard over rows of rifles seized by Iraqi security forces during recent operations in the Shiite enclave of Sadr City, June 18, 2008.

The Ministry of Minor Perfidy has a picture that appears to have been taken at the same event as the photo of the Iraqi police woman with an AK I posted earlier.

Go check it out.

I think the delivery of the Dirty Harry line would suffer from the layers of clothing masking the woman's expression during the delivery.

Incidentally, I've been revisiting the Dirty Harry movies recently. I plan to watch The Enforcer tonight. I haven't seen that in at least 20 years.

"Terrorist bread?" It's in Hezbollah's zone, so that probably helps move sandwiches.

Murdoc's guess is that they won't be importing any "terrorist meat" from Iraq or Afghanistan...

A female police officer aims her weapon at a practice range during a graduation ceremony in Karbala south of Baghdad, Iraq.

Found at MP.

Is there anything that the Kalashnikov doesn't do?

It's not an AK "lookalike" body. It's a real AK. It's unclear how much original rifle is left, though.

It's called the 'Lopashnikov' after S.S. Lopakka of the band KYPCK. KYPCK, "Kursk" in the western alphabet, is a Russian-singing Finnish doomsday metal band. Go figure.

SPECIFICATIONS:
Construction: neckthrough
Scale: 27"
Neck: maple
Body: maple
Stock and grip: maple
Fingerboard: ebony
Frets: 24 jumbo, Stainless Steel
Dots: white side dots
Nut: Earvana
Hardware: black. AK-47, Hipshot hardtail bridge, Planet Waves Auto Trim locking tuners, Schaller straplocks, Neutrik locking jack
Pickup: EMG81
Electronics: on/off switch
Color: Satin black/brown
Custom case

Another couple of pictures below.

Another horrifying non-gun incident from Japan:

A 77-year-old man was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of killing his entire family with a hammer, including a 4-year-old granddaughter, Japanese police said.

They also found the bodies of Kiuchi's 4-year-old granddaughter, 75-year-old wife, 49-year-old son and 44-year-old daughter-in-law

Combine this with the fact that Japanese suicides were near a record high last year despite a major government program to reduce them, and one might begin to suspect that removing nearly all guns from society doesn't solve all the problems that gun control activists suggest it would.

Yes, that Chicago.

Something I've been neglecting to post is a follow-up to the mass stabbing in Japan a couple of weeks ago where seven were killed. Ken Talton emailed me a link pointing to some pictures from the scene which show bystanders giving aid to the injured. Here's one:

This at least shows that not all the witnesses acted like anecdotal stories from other incidents suggested they might have. That's refreshing.

Another picture shows police arresting the killer. The guy with the backpack in the picture may be a civilian who helped apprehend him, or he might be some sort of security officer.

So while I continue to wonder at the mind-set that facilitated the success of this attack, we should not ignore those who did what they could when they could. For all we know, some of the wounded are alive today because of the aid complete strangers gave them.

Talton also has this:

Another, rather creepy bit of information via Danny Choo.

According to him, there have been 3 previous stabbing incidents this year similar to this one. In all four incidents, the perps, upon being apprehended, said..

"Anybody would have been fine."

This is worrisome, not just because of the utter sociopathic nihilism it indicates, but 4 murderers saying the exact same thing in such short order is just creepy. Is it a copycat spree, or something organized like one of those suicide chat rooms?

Meh this is just speculation but damn, that's odd.

No freaking kidding.

Also via Uncle: Banning hats because it's too hard to spy on you.

A commenter on Sunday's post about the most recent mass stabbing in Tokyo pointed out a comment over at Steven Den Beste's that includes:

As for cultural passivity, there was a recent incident on a train where an unarmed guy flashed a girl, and when she protested, he beat her up right in front of the other passengers and at the next stop stuffed her down between the train and the platform. No one did anything to stop him during the act or his escape, and no one even stayed as a witness. Yes, this does happen elsewhere in the world (however, non-involvement is the norm in Japan) but nontheless it always leads to a lot of extra soul-searching in Japan, as it should, since they pride themselves so much on their social responsibility and cohesiveness. When one of the witnesses to the train flasher assault later came forward via anonymous phone call to a TV station, he said the reason he didn't want to get involved at the time was he didn't want to get hurt (the pathetic pussy) but worse, he would have been late for work if he'd stayed to be a witness for the cops. He was dead serious with that excuse and had called in to make it clear he had a perfectly understandable reason for not getting involved.

Go read the whole thing.

This reminds me of the whole A kid punching a playground bully is a 'vigilante'? discussion in April:

In a comments thread over at Dean's World, responding to a commenter who wrote that women should simply yell "Masher!" and hit the offender across the face if pressed against or fondled by a stranger:

That's called vigilantism...So if you wish the people not to descend into tribalism and lawlessness, you would have to stop advocating 'take care of it yourself' for an official government law enforcement policy.

Response:

Oh for pity's sake. Is it 'vigilantism' when a kid punches a bully in the nose?

Answer:

Yes, of course.

In my school we seek to ensure that he does not have to do so.

So here we have a case where a woman stood up for herself after being flashed, and the flasher proceeded to beat her up while everyone else stood and did nothing. They probably didn't want to become 'vigilantes' by helping the woman (another 'vigilante.') Absolutely pathetic.

Then, to top it off, the non-'vigilante' witnesses don't even bother sticking around to help the authorities pick up the pieces after the fact. Indefensible.

So finally we have this, left in a comment on Sunday's post: