Scoopster News

Virigina Tech Shooting: Blame Diversity?

Did the Diversity Culture shield the VT Shooter?

If Seung-Hui Cho had been a white student, would stronger action have been taken?

The Washington Times has revealed that Cho had a series of run-ins with the authorities:

Officials confirmed today that the gunman behind Monday's killing spree at Virginia Tech had previous run-ins with campus police for "annoying" two female students.

Officials also said Seing-Hui Cho, a 23-year-old from Centreville, had been admitted to a mental health facility in 2005.

Apparently, the VT school leadership handled his stalking internally:

Campus police Chief Wendell Flinchum said in November and then December 2005, campus police met with Mr. Cho after receiving complaints from female students.

In November 2005, "Cho had made contact in phone calls and in person with a female student." The student informed police, but "declined to press chargers," describing Cho's contact as "annoying," Mr. Flinchum said.

The investigating officer referred the case to the school's office of judicial affairs, which handled the discliplinary process.

The Chicago Tribune also reports that he had at one point started a fire in a dorm room.  If I had started a fire in my dorm room, written demented poems that scared my professors, and then had stalked two females, I am sure that my discipline would have been permanent expulsion from the university. 

This begs the question, did the pressure of diversity and 'retaining students of color' shield Cho from the consequences of his actions?

Asian-American?!

Try: Un-hyphenated Asian.

TRIBE TRACKER: VT Gunman was Asian immigrant. Diversity strikes again.

Was it a Hate Crime?

In a rambling note, Cho Seung-Hui, a Green Card holder from South Korea, denounced his fellow students at Virginia Tech reflecting an animus towards Americans:

Alleged Virginia Tech shooter Cho Seung-hui reportedly left a note listing his grievances against "rich kids," "debauchery" and "deceitful charlatans."

The Chicago Tribune reports the note was found in Cho's Harper Hall dorm room on the Blacksburg, Va., campus. Cho, 23, a legal permanent resident who came to the United States in 1992, was described as a loner by university spokesman Larry Hincker.

As anyone who has attended an American university with foreign international students knows, non-Anglosphere students often have a chip on their shoulders about the country they have been strategizing on how to get to.

Moreover, all ethnicities---except Anglo-Americans---tend to view the world through the prism of race so there will always be an ethnic dimension to their decision making.  Cho's rambling note mocks Americans for being wealthy and immoral which is a common complaint amongst America's detractors.

The South Korean Government has rightly apologized as one of its citizens has unleashed the worst school shooting massacre in American history:

South Korea expressed its condolences, and said it hoped that the tragedy would not "stir up racial prejudice or confrontation."

"We are in shock beyond description," said Cho Byung-se, a Foreign Ministry official handling North American affairs.

If the situation had been reversed--an American student in Korea--everyone from Al Jazeera to the BBC would have been pontificating about American gun culture and racial bias. And CNN would be showing wall-to-wall footage of the rent-a-mob in Seoul.

I am deeply grieved by this crime despite having no connection with VT or even the State of Virginia. But some of our own have been senselessly slaughtered and it is a legitimiate line of enquiry to ask 'Why?'.

Anglosphere reports Shooter's Ethnicity

NZ & UK News Outlets report Gunman is Asian.

The New Zealand Herald compiled eyewitness accounts of the Virginia Tech shooting and buried the references to the gunman's ethnicity halfway down the page as does the BBC:

Virginia Tech student Erin Sheehan said she survived an attack on her German class and described the gunman.

She said: "He was, I would say, about a little bit under six feet tall, young looking, Asian, dressed sort of strangely, almost like a boy scout, very short-sleeved light, tan shirt and some sort of ammo vest with black over it."

But at least it gets reported. It's a legitmate line of enquiry.

VT Shooting: Why Hide the Gunman's Identity?

TRIBE-TRACKER: VT Shooter was Asian.

Diana Hartman over at BC Magazine has summarized the open source intelligence on the identity of today's gunman at the Virginia Tech massacre:

The gunman, wearing a maroon hat and black leather jacket, said nothing as he fired shots. He had a 9-mm pistol and a 22-caliber handgun. Including the gunman, 31 people are believed dead. It is reported that the gunman killed himself. Twenty-nine people are being treated by local hospitals. The gunman has been described as a young Asian-American male.

Why couldn't Police Chief Wendell Flinchum, Virginia Tech Police Department, say that?  In the live press conference I am watching as I blog, he is avoiding providing any information on the identity of the gunman.  Just as I, as a Society of Professional Journalists member, have received instructions ("Diversity Toolbox") on how to report on ethnicity in the news, I presume that US police leadership have similarly been instructed to downplay the ethnicity of criminals when they are not white.

WAR ON JIHAD: Iraq criticises UK rescue operation.

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - Iraq denounced British forces on Tuesday over a dramatic rescue of two undercover soldiers that could stoke hostility to the army in increasingly volatile southern Iraq. [Editor: Reuter's exaggerates, an Iraqi spokesman deemed it 'unfortunate'.]

British troops used an armoured fighting vehicle on Monday to burst into an Iraqi jail in search of soldiers held by police in Basra. The British commander said he learnt they had been handed to militia and ordered their rescue from a nearby house.

"It is a very unfortunate development that the British forces should try to release their forces the way it happened," Haider al-Ebadi, an adviser to Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari, told a news conference in Baghdad.

British forces said the soldiers were in danger.

"From an early stage I had good reason to believe the lives of the two soldiers were at risk," Brigadier John Lorimer, the British commander in Basra, said in a statement.

WAR ON JIHAD: Basra Violence reveals Breakdown of Law.

British Soldier, engulfed in flames, escapes his tank while attacked by an Iraqi mob.

Disturbing footage coming out of Basra in the British-occupied zone of southern Iraq points to a breakdown in the rule of law in that city.

Recently, the relatively quite southern zone has seen an upsurge in violence.  An Al-Qaida group operating in the area has referred to the British soldiers as "crusaders". With an al-Qaida presence and bomb material coming in from neighboring Iran, Iraq is clearly the frontline in the War on Terror (War on Jihad). It is no longer tenable for partisan pundits to claim that Iraq is somehow disconnected from the War on Terror.

Senior British sources have commented in recent weeks that they have not excluded the possibility of a rise in violence in southern Iraq during the campaigning for the constitutional referendum.

They will now be trying to ascertain whether recent attacks are the start of that trouble. They are also concerned that the insurgents may be changing their tactics.

Better explosives and detonators are thought to have been coming over the border from neighboring Iran.They are not just enabling more numerous attacks, but also ensuring greater effectiveness.

British forces have been used to patrolling Basra without helmets, projecting an image of friendliness, believing that will win over the local population. Surely, this 'kindler gentler' waging of war favored by Tony Blair's New Labour government must end given the mob attacks on British patrols.

Earlier, two white Britons wearing Arab clothing shot at an Iraqi Police group in Basra.  It is suspected that the Britons are special forces officers on a covert operation.  London-based Iraq watchers have confirmed that the Iraqi security forces in Basra have been infiltrated by Ba'athist elements, supportive of Sadaam Hussein, and by agents of the Shia Mehdi Army, loyal to Shia cleric Moqtada Sadr.  It is possible that the British operatives may have pinpointed insurgents within the Iraqi police force.

Reports from the ground are conflicting, but the two Britons were arrested and detained by the Iraqi police in Basra.  While the British Ministry of Defence claims that negotiations secured the transfer of the British citizens to UK custody, eyewitness accounts state that several British tanks attacked the Iraqi police station and bulldozed a wall in order to rescue them. 

The viciousness of the Shi'ite mobs rioting upon news of the arrest of the two Britons coupled with the Basra Governor's hostility and lack of cooperation with the British Army points to a complete breakdown in the relationship between the Coalition and the local Iraqi authorities in southern Iraq. This disturbing development shows that the Coalition cannot rely on the Iraqi security forces in the foreseeable future. 

Perhaps the best Exit Strategy is for the United Kingdom and the United States to crush the insurgency and then get out.  It would behoove the supporters of the Coalition operation in Iraq to now drop the "nation-building" rhetoric.

In other developments:

• Iraq's Finance Minister, Ali Allawi, tells the UK's Independent newspaper that large-scale corruption in Iraq's ministries, particularly the defence ministry, has led to the theft of more than $1bn;
• The Iraqi government says a nephew of Saddam Hussein, Ayman Sabawi, has been sentenced to life in prison for funding Iraq's insurgency;
• Al-Qaida says it was behind the 7 July bombings in London, in which 52 people were killed.

9/11: LEST WE FORGET: ITV News to honour Rescorla

Many of our readers will know the story of Lt Col Rick Rescorla, the British-American dual citizen who dedicated his life to serving the US.  He is credited with saving nearly 3,000 lives on 9/11 as the Chief of Security for Morgan Stanley at WTC.

We recommend OurWayofLife Blog for a fitting post on Rescorla.

ITV, the UK's largest commercial news outlet, is tonight airing a documentary about Rescorla entitled as "The Man Who Predicted 9/11"  on Britain's Channel Four:

The story of Rick Rescorla, the British security chief of Morgan Stanley's offices in the World Trade Centre in New York. After realising a terrorist attack using planes was a possibility, he made sure his co-workers were prepared for the eventuality. His foresight would ultimately save 2,700 lives when his nightmare scenario became a reality on 9/11

The California Legion Post 149 pays tribute online to Rescorla, flying both Old Glory and the Union Jack in his honor, calling him "An American Hero."  Indeed, during the evacuation of WTC, the English-born Rescorla lead his colleagues in singing "God Bless America" (as well as traditional 'Cornish' folk songs from his English county of birth).

Of particular interest is Rescorla's prediction of 9/11 which is the central theme of the ITN documentary.  The film "Voice of the Prophet" by Bob Edwards contains an interview with Rick Rescorla made in his office at the WTC in 1998 in which he discussed the plans he had made for a nightmare scenario in which the Twin Towers would be hit by airplanes.

On this the fourth anniversary of 9/11, we believe it is fitting to honor Rick Rescorla as a symbol of Anglo-American solidarity in the face of the Jihadist War on the West.  Unfortunately, Britain's New Labour government did not initially think that Rescorla was eligible for a British Gallantry medal. They yielded under public pressure.

SCAPEGOAT: Democrats attack, Republicans surrender on Michael Brown.

Despite local press coverage which confirms that FEMA's response  to Katrina was actually quite good considering the combination of incompetent local authorities and black "civil unrest", Michael Brown has been sacrificed by the Bush administration.

This, despite blog reports which claim the Democrat-controlled Senate unanimously confirmed Michael Brown as deputy director of FEMA:

"Amid all the bashing of FEMA director Michael Brown as an incompetent, unqualified, resume-padding political hack, one small factor has been overlooked: His job required Senate confirmation, didn't it? Indeed it did. And not only was Brown confirmed, but he was apparently confirmed by a unanimous voice vote -- when the Senate was controlled by Democrats. An enterprising blogger has found the transcript of Brown's June 19, 2002 confirmation hearing before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee, then chaired by Sen. Joseph Lieberman. The whole affair, including tributes from Brown's home-state senators, apparently lasted less then an hour, and ended with Lieberman saying, "Mr. Brown, I thank you very much. I will certainly support your nomination. I will do my best to move it through the committee as soon as possible so we can have you fully and legally at work in your new position."

Finally, with the "evil party's" chief banshees, such as Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi demanding the head of Michael Brown on a silver platter, GovExec.com reported in 2004 that President Bush should thank Michael Brown for his speedy handling of the FEMA response to Hurricane Charley as it may have delivered Florida to the Bush camp in the general election:

Now that President Bush has won Florida in his 2004 re-election bid, he may want to draft a letter of appreciation to Michael Brown, chief of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Seldom has any federal agency had the opportunity to so directly and uniquely alter the course of a presidential election, and seldom has any agency delivered for a president as FEMA did in Florida this fall.

The editorial line of Scoopster News is "Progressive-Conservative" and is not slavishly pro-Bush; we are independent and objective.  However, we regret the Republican adminstration's surrender over Michael Brown.  Something the "stupid party" does not understand is that the Left is motivated by the "optics" of a situation. Perception is reality. Partisan Democrats will view this as an enboldening victory and a concession of culpability by the Bush Whitehouse. 

Hate Crimes in the USA: Update

The Vail Daily of Colorado reports: 'Hate Crimes' Rarely Prosecuted.

‘Ethnic intimidation’ is a crime in Colorado, but activists and police say it’s is not widely reported. 

By JK Perry, 1 September 2005

Letecia Harrison, a Hispanic activist, says teenagers fire racial slurs at each other more often than do adults in Eagle County. Hispanics born in the United States can be aggressive toward Mexican immigrants because of social and economic class differences, Harrison said, while whites and Hispanics often ignore one another.

A crime called “ethnic intimidation,” which was passed in 1988 and is dubbed a hate crime by many, was expanded recently by the state legislature to include sexual orientation.

[Editor: I don't see the connection between Letecia Harrison's claim that US-born Hispanics harrass Mexican "immigrants" and the journalist's reference to ethnic intimidation.  If Hispanics are intimidating other Hispanics, how is that a hate crime? ]

The Ethnic Intimidation Act makes it a crime to harass or attack a person based on their race, color, ancestry, religion or sexual orientation. An attack, considered a felony, is punishable by up to three years in prison and a $100,000 fine.

Within the past four years, Vail police have filed ethnic intimidation charges just once. In January 2005, a man called the Polish boyfriend of his ex-girlfriend a “polack.” The charge was later dropped because the slur was not considered egregious.

Avon Det. Mike Leake said the charge is not difficult to prove.

“If people are engaged in a harassment case verbally, and they make a statement referring to the person’s ethnic origin, then it’s ethnic intimidation,” Leake said. [Editor: Oh really? Someone should tell that to the NYPD about the Marine Park incident.]

Oftentimes, ethnic intimidation charges are filed to enhance other violations, said Krista Jaramillo, spokeswoman for Avon police. [Editor: Enhance or trump up charges? ] “It works essentially just like the domestic violence … it has to be in conjunction with something else,” Jaramillo said.

An FBI report found 82 hate crimes were committed in Colorado during 2003, although not every law enforcement agency in the county or state reports the statistic to the bureau.

Open Border Lobby: Katrina created Sanctuary for Illegals.

Katrina Sanctuary [ILW.com Editorial]

The DHS announced that it will not bring sanction actions against employers for hiring [Editor: illegal alien] individuals evacuated or displaced as a result of Hurricane Katrina. For the time being, Hurricane Katrina has created a sanctuary for the undocumented. We commend the government for adopting a compassionate approach to this disaster. The anti-immigrationists doubtless would want to use Katrina as an opportunity to deport the undocumented thus doubly victimizing those are already suffering.

DHS Issues I-9 Announcement For Katrina Victims
DHS announced that it will not sanction employers for hiring victims of Hurricane Katrina who, at this time, are unable to provide documentation normally required under Section 274A of the INA. [Editor: Unable to provide proof of legal status in the US. ]