Zeeshan Aleem is a liar

The article starts out with an elephant sized clue:

Kyle Rittenhouse’s self-defense case was solid. That’s the problem.

It’s a problem the Rittenhouse had a sold defense? Aleem would have us believe in some bizarre world view where it would be better that Rittenhouse had killed two people and seriously injured a third without being legally justified? That’s crazy talk—unless the objective is to denigrate the use of a firearms for self defense.

If you read the article you can see that is his clear intent. And he doesn’t let little things like facts get in the way of his fevered rant:

For many the verdict is an outrage and a brazen miscarriage of justice. Rittenhouse is a Blue Lives Matter enthusiast who went to protests against a police shooting with a military-style rifle that he obtained illegally,

No. It was legal for him to possess the rifle. This was made clear in the trail and Aleem even mentions this later in his article:

…the judge dismissed the illegal possession of a firearm charge since under Wisconsin law 17-year-olds are allowed to possess long-barreled guns.

Apparently Aleem doesn’t realize reality is immutable. He can’t claim it was illegal and simultaneously admit it legal for Rittenhouse to posses it.

It’s apparently all about the narrative so facts and clear thinking are not the important part. Here’s the important part, in Aleem’s words:

While a gun ostensibly gives an advantage to the gun-wielder, it also heightens their fear of escalation, since losing the gun or misfiring it could result in their own harm. In other words, openly carrying a firearm introduces a perverse logic whereby it makes other people feel less safe and simultaneously increases the chance of violence against those people.

Rittenhouse’s behavior that fateful night is a powerful symbol of the danger of these movements, and the way they intensify social unrest: right-wing militias increase the likelihood of serious violence while purporting to try to put an end to it.

Given the direction of politics in this country, it seems inevitable that these kinds of armed groups will continue to cause chaos, and the Rittenhouse verdict may embolden them even more.

Ultimately I do believe that Rittenhouse behaved irresponsibly and endangered people recklessly, and that the tragic outcome of his behavior merits some kind of punishment. I can’t say exactly what I think that punishment should look like

It seems obvious Aleem believes, “There ought to be a law! I don’t know what that law might be but we can’t let people with his politics defending themselves with a gun.” This reminds me of something pulled from Robert F Williams book “Negros With Guns”:

When the blacks armed themselves, and without firing a shot, defended themselves an old white man in the crowd that was previously chanting, “Kill the niggers!” started screaming and crying like a baby (page 10). He then said, “God damn, God damn, what is this God damn country coming to that the niggers have got guns, the niggers are armed and the police can’t even arrest them!”

Prejudice is an ugly thing.

How to Lie About Guns

By Frank Melloni:

How to Lie About Guns, New York Times Style

One of the easiest ways to lie and not get sued for libel is to simply do so through exclusion. The New York Times is famous for this and if you don’t know enough about guns they can make things sound pretty bad, just by leaving out a little bit of information. In the wake of the Kyle Rittenhouse Verdict we ought to brush up on the tactics of far-left media.

James D. Zirin of The Hill is a liar

It starts with the headline and continues nearly non-stop with the lies:

A miscarriage of justice in Kenosha

The unimaginable has occurred. Kyle Rittenhouse, the admitted killer of two men and maimer of a third, has been acquitted on all counts.

It certainly was imaginable to me and millions of others. After the videos came out it was crystal clear to anyone who had a glimmer of knowledge about the use of lethal force in self defense. The author is a former federal prosecutor and cannot possibly claim ignorance of the law.

On Aug. 25, 2020, Rittenhouse armed himself with a borrowed AR-15-style assault rifle loaded with full metal jacket armor-penetrating ammunition and marched into downtown Kenosha, Wis.

FMJ bullets are not “armor-penetrating”.

An AR-15 is the same kind of gun, in design and function, that our troops carry in the field. But Rittenhouse from the evidence had never undergone any training, military or otherwise, in the use and operation of the deadly weapon, which was illegally purchased and given to him by a friend.

It is not the same kind of gun and does not function the same as any rifle used by any military in at least the last 60 years.

As a (formerly) certified firearms instructor I can say with 100% certainty this was not the first time Rittenhouse had used a firearm. Some people, and I agree with this, say:

Based on the videos I’ve seen Rittenhouse is one of the best weapons handlers under pressure I’ve ever seen.

This was not an untrained person.

The gun was not illegal purchased. There was nothing illegal in any of the transfers of that firearm.

One shot might have qualified as self-defense, but four shots, it would appear, doth a murder make.

False. This was drilled into my General Defensive Handgun classmates and I back in ‘97:

If it ever becomes times to shoot someone, do they need to be shot a little? Or a lot?  If that time comes you should shoot early and often — until the threat is over.  If you shoot a “set”, such as a double tap, you may stop shooting too soon.

Zirin is a former attorney. Having watched the trial we can conclude his education must have been suitably refreshed. That he still claims such falsehoods is evidence of deliberate lies.

Although his second victim, Anthony Huber, was “armed” only with a skateboard, Rittenhouse claimed he shot him dead because he believed Huber was threatening his life.

Rittenhouse was on the ground and Huber hit him in the head with the skateboard. This is clearly lethal force. You are legally allowed, and I would say morally obligated, to defend innocent life using lethal force when confronted with lethal force by your attackers. Zirin learned this in the trial as well because he quoted the judge saying essentially the same thing. The only question here is, “What is the objective of these lies by Zirin?”

The trial was highlighted by emotional and illuminating testimony from Rittenhouse himself, who wept as he protested that he had acted in self-defense when he fatally shot Rosenbaum not once but four times. Rosenbaum had thrown a plastic bag at him and chased him.

Lying by omission. Zirin left out the part about Rosenbaum threating to kill him, then chasing him, and finally attempting to take Rittenhouse’s rifle.

I find it interesting and someone comforting that the poll taken at the end of the article shows I’m not the only one taking issue with this liar:

image

Alexandra Hutzler of Newsweek is a liar

The headline sets the tone with Black Lives Matter Says System Is Upholding ‘White Supremacy’ After Rittenhouse Acquittal. Technically that is true. @Blklivesmatter did tweet that on November 19th. That claim is absurd on the face of it but the author doesn’t even hint there is anything wrong with such a claim. She quotes numerous other falsehoods told by various people and then tells one of her own:

Rittenhouse, then 17, was illegally armed with a semiautomatic rifle and said he traveled from Illinois to help protect businesses during the protests.

False. The judge threw out that charge because it was false. The law is confusing and it would be easy for the average person to believe that claim but numerous lawyers and many ordinary people were able to build the flow diagram to conclude, as did Rittenhouse before carrying the gun, that it was legal. Hutzler even mentions the judge threw out the charge. Why didn’t she get the clue? I suspect she did get the clue but the truth didn’t matter to her. She is a liar and may even be proud that she can (mostly) get away with it.

Stephanie Willis is a liar

Stephanie Willis rambles on about “privilege” and but never gives us any “meat” to back up her claims:

Kyle Rittenhouse being found not guilty on all counts after more than 24 hours of deliberations can be summed up with one simple phrase: White privilege. It’s an all too familiar theme we witness when White defendants are on trial for killing us.

I dare say Kyle Rittenhouse was cloaked with a privilege you cannot find in any legal precedent – The Rittenhouse Privilege. Throughout the trial there were instances in which it was quite apparent that the scales of justice tipped in favor of Kyle Rittenhouse.

Let’s start with the jury makeup. After the jury process, 18 individuals were selected to listen to the trial. Of these 18 individuals, 12 were selected at random by the defendant, Kyle Rittenhouse, to deliberate. These individuals consisted of seven women and five men – only one was a person of color.

The next thing to consider is the venue. The case was tried in Kenosha, which according to Census data is over 75% White. In the past, Kenosha country voted Democratic but went for Donald Trump in the 2016 election. It is also particularly important to consider the fact that Wisconsin is a gun friendly state. But we must also ask ourselves Gun Friendly toward whom?

How is the described jury makeup tipping the scales in favor of Rittenhouse? What, in her mind, would create a balanced trial? What should the composition of the jury be? Where would she think a venue be found? What does the predominate Democrat bias of the county with the outlier of 2016 going to Trump have to do with anything? She says these things as if these were obvious, unquestionable, evidence of bias. Absent a lot more explanation I can only conclude these are the ravings of a paranoid.

Nevertheless, she asserts her conclusion:

The Rittenhouse Privilege has set a precedent. There is now legal precedent which permits individuals to claim self-defense in the most outrageous of cases. Be forewarned – this precedent will only extend to individuals who can claim the Rittenhouse privilege.

With video and still pictures from multiple angles for nearly all the shootings and witnesses testimony consistent with the digital evidence the facts of the case could not be more clear. Rittenhouse met the requirements of the law and was justified in using deadly force against his attackers. That Willis claims to be an attorney, yet asserts this was an “outrageous” because Rittenhouse was found not guilty, only eliminates the defense she is ignorant, and not malicious, in her assertions.

Willis is a liar.

Headline writer is a liar

The headline reads Kyle Rittenhouse verdict violates these 5 standards for claiming self-defense. But if you read the actual article you will not find any such claim.

You can find errors in the article, such as in the Zimmerman/Martin case it is claimed the Florida Stand Your Ground law was an issue. But the writer doesn’t make the false claim the headline writer does.

I have to believe someone was making a deliberate effort to deceive the public and liable Rittenhouse.

Quote of the day—Ryan Chittum

On balance, the press has been a destructive force on this story, from its beginnings in the coverage of the Jacob Blake shooting that set the whole thing off and which we know was justified, to the downplaying of the $50 million in destruction done by rioters in Kenosha, to the libelous portrayal of Rittenhouse and the particulars of what happened. There have been innumerable journalistic disasters in the Trump era, but this is the most blatantly reckless one of them all.

Ryan Chittum
Media critic with the Columbia Journalism Review,
November 21, 2021
Misinformation About Kyle Rittenhouse Case Floods Social Media, TV Networks
[I think Chittum is giving the media too much credit with the claim of “reckless”. With the videos so easily available, with the jury verdict known to everyone, with the claims they make so absurd, I don’t believe they are “reckless”. They are malicious liars.—Joe]

Erwin Chemerinsky of the LA Times is a liar

Lies:

The verdict in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial sends a chilling message

Rittenhouse, then age 17, went to Kenosha, Wis., where protests were expected after police officers shot and seriously injured Jacob Blake. Rittenhouse had an AR-15-style rifle, which he was too young to legally possess. A teenager carrying an assault-style weapon in a tense situation is a recipe for disaster, and that is exactly what happened. Rittenhouse shot and killed two people and seriously wounded a third.

Rittenhouse testified at the trial that he went to the city on Aug. 25, 2020, to provide protection for local businesses and patrol as civil unrest developed. There is so much that is disturbing about that: a teenager deciding that he needed to provide law enforcement, when he lacked training or experience, and illegally arming himself with a semiautomatic rifle.

Not surprisingly, Rittenhouse’s presence with a big weapon provoked a reaction. Joseph Rosenbaum, a person with a history of mental illness who had been released from the hospital that day, allegedly grabbed at Rittenhouse’s gun and then was shot four times and killed. Anthony Huber apparently struck Rittenhouse with a skateboard. Huber then was shot and killed when Rittenhouse thought Huber was reaching for his weapon. Gaige Grosskreutz felt his life was in danger when he saw Huber killed. Grosskreutz reached for a weapon and then was shot and wounded by Rittenhouse.

Rittenhouse was not too young to legally posses the rifle.

Rittenhouse did not decide to be there on his own. He was asked to help defend private property after the police watched it burn the previous night.

Not surprisingly, Rittenhouse’s presence with a big weapon provoked a reaction.

The reaction of normal people is to be polite and not commit crimes such as igniting a dumpster on fire and pushing it into a gas station. That Rosenbaum chased and grabbed (not allegedly, the coroner confirmed muzzle blast marks on his hand) at Rittenhouse’s rifle. Perhaps that his usually victims were young boys caused him to generalize that no serious resistance is to be expected. Regardless, this shows a catastrophic failure of his victim section process and does not reflect poorly on Rittenhouse.

“Huber apparently struck Rittenhouse with a skateboard”? The video and stills are very clear that it happened.

“Grosskreutz reached for a weapon and then was shot..” Lying by omission. Sure, he had to “reach for his gun” before he could use it. But the video shows, and he testified under oath, that he was not shot until he actually pointed his gun at Rittenhouse.

Quote of the day—Colin Wright @SwipeWright

The Left-wing media narrative on the Rittenhouse case is extreme, malicious, and untethered to reality. It is well beyond insane. It would be laughable if it weren’t so utterly frightening.

Colin Wright @SwipeWright
Tweeted on November 20, 2021
[It was my independent conclusion of this (although not articulated nearly as well) that led me to create a new blog category dedicated to exposing their lies.—Joe]

KYLE TRIAL ENDS IN JUSTICE

JPFO press release:

Even clean self defense puts you in dire jeopardy—

KYLE TRIAL ENDS IN JUSTICE

The only reasons for tension were outright lies by woke left

Acquitted on all counts—so he gets vilified by leftists and “news” media

   Too much happened for just another news release. How about a list:

  • The court system worked, video-obvious self-defense was exonerated properly
  • Leftist-led jury intimidation should be prosecuted, including “officials”
  • NOTE: Even with clear evidence of self-defense, you are very much on the line
  • If not for multiple dispositive videos Kyle likely would have been railroaded
  • Leftist reactions for months, and afterwards, exhibit derangement syndrome
  • Mass media has again proven itself a biased, prejudicial propaganda source
  • Reporting shows media hates guns, gun owners and even righteous defense of life
  • No one expects corrections for countless egregious mass-media errors
  • Everyone who cried guilt before the unanimous trial verdict should be ashamed
  • We the People got to see just how bad prosecutors can be, reprehensible
  • City riots were already on, leftists ran them, not Kyle, this is now clear
  • Claims of vigilantism, mass shooting, proven false—borne of media-fueled hysteria
  • A convicted felony child molester, out of jail, shot just before committing murder, is now hailed as hero and victim by media and leftists, this is crazythink.
  • If Kyle had not acted he’d be dead, no show trial, that must count for something
  • Judge advised court not to call the perps and rioters victims, a very good call
  • Gunfire in self defense is vindicated once again (14 cases OK’d by U.S. Supreme Court)
  • A dead criminal, shot in self defense by an innocent person, is not a victim, despite numerous almost uniform reporting otherwise by media in most cases
  • The left are still calling racism, with no ethnic element involved, that’s deranged
  • So-called “news” stations keep spinning out of control, immune to reality, justice
  • Biden labeled this young man a white supremacist, clear slander, can he be sued?
  • Lawsuits should fall like rain against the slanderers, libelers, character assassins
  • Lawsuits needed to help tame the movement to destroy reputations shamelessly

#####

Support JPFO, speaking truth to power https://store.jpfo.org/11-donations

The USA Today editorial board are liars

The USA Today editorial board is incoherent and/or has a reading comprehension problem and/or is lying. And they tell the lie that they believe an inanimate object can be guilty:

Kyle Rittenhouse may be innocent, but not the assault-style rifles are (once again) guilty in deadly shooting

He said the weapon was a key reason he shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum during the mayhem. “If I would have let Mr. Rosenbaum take my firearm from me, he would have used it and killed me with it,” Rittenhouse testified during the trial.

Demonstrators saw the shooting and chased after Rittenhouse in an apparent effort to disarm him. One of them was Anthony Huber armed only with a skateboard. Huber grabbed the barrel of the AR-15, and Rittenhouse shot him to death.

“The irony of the case is that Mr. Rittenhouse has become a cause célèbre among gun-rights advocates, even though, according to his own defense, it was his carrying of the rifle that put him in danger in the first place,” the Economist noted.

Rittenhouse said no such thing. And they quoted the testimony which refutes their claim! The key reason for all legal use of lethal force is the reasonable fear of imminent severe injury or death. Rittenhouse articulated this well, repeatedly, and the video supports his claims. Without the rifle Rosenbaum would still have been outraged at his dumpster fire, being pushed into a gas station, being put out with the fire extinguisher. And that outrage led to Rittenhouse being chased by Rosenbaum and others. And when they cornered him without the rifle they almost certainly would have caused him severe injury or death. Hence, the rifle cannot be the “key reason” justifying the use of deadly force.

They are also liars:

Such weapons were expressly designed for the battlefield, and that may be a good part of their appeal.

Wrong. Such weapons are expressly designed to be easy to shoot, maintain, carry, economical, and accurate. They are the most common rifle sold in the United States and no AR-15 style rifle has ever been issued to a military for battlefield use (the AR-15 is semi-auto, militaries all use select fire rifles).

The primacy of assault-style rifles in American society is not a Second Amendment issue. When the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia authored a Supreme Court ruling in 2008 underscoring the Second Amendment’s right to possess firearms, he said the freedom is “not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever.”

This must be a deliberate lie. Here is the complete quote from the 2008 Heller decision (emphasis added):

Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose. See, e.g., Sheldon, in 5 Blume 346; Rawle 123; Pomeroy 152–153; Abbott333. For example, the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues. See, e.g., State v. Chandler, 5 La. Ann., at 489–490; Nunn v. State, 1 Ga., at 251; see generally 2 Kent *340, n. 2; The American Students’ Blackstone 84, n. 11 (G. Chase ed. 1884). Although we do not undertake an exhaustive historical analysis today of the full scope of the Second Amendment , nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.26

We also recognize another important limitation on the right to keep and carry arms. Miller said, as we have explained, that the sorts of weapons protected were those “in common use at the time.”

I cannot imagine having read to middle of page 54 to pluck the “not unlimited” quote they did not read to the top of page 55 and see the sorts of weapons protected were those “in common use at the time.”

Being the most popular rifle style sold in the United States the AR-15 qualifies as “in common use”. Hence, the AR-15 is protected by the Second Amendment.

David S. Cohen of Rolling Stone is a liar

The mention of Rolling Stone and anything to do with guns and then bring up lies is probably being entirely redundant, but it doesn’t hurt to make it explicitly clear.

Lies:

While patrolling the streets, there was gunfire that resulted in some of the Black Lives Matter protesters thinking Rittenhouse was attacking them. They charged Rittenhouse, and he opened fire, killing Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber and injuring Gaige Grosskreutz.

That’s not how it happened. You can watch the video of every shot fired and see for yourself. The gunfire was as the “protestors” had boxed Rittenhouse in between some cars and were closing in on him. One of those attackers fired the gun into the air a few dozen feet from Rittenhouse. The shooting of Huber and Grosskreutz were a minute or so later as Rittenhouse was attempting to reach the safety of the police and the attackers caught up to him after he fell. They struck him with a skateboard, kicked him in the head, and pointed a gun at him. Each person shot was an imminent threat of permanent injury or death to Rittenhouse.

Pilar Melendez of The Daily Beast is a liar

Deception and lying by omission:

During the already-chaotic protest over the Blake’s shooting last August, a video played in court showed Rittenhouse, then 17, shooting Rosenbaum after the unarmed man tossed a plastic bag his way. As Rittenhouse ran away from the scene, still holding his AR-15, the teen is seen in another video running down the street with several protesters in tow.

Technically true. But Rittenhouse did not shoot Rosenbaum because of the plastic bag. A few seconds later, and unmentioned by Melendez, Rosenbaum had Rittenhouse boxed in between several cars and another guy who had just fired a handgun in the air and Rosenbaum was reaching for the rifle. Any competent firearms instructor will tell you that when your attacker is attempting to disarm you it’s almost certainly time to start shooting.

New blog post category

When Brother Doug and I get together we frequently have long talks about our country’s political state. The illegal gun laws, the U.S. debt, the out of control printing of money, etc..

One of the things Doug frequently points out is that the average person doesn’t get outraged because the legacy media gives the political left cover through, at best, selective reporting of the facts and implications of things that are not true. And frequently outright lies.

So how do we combat these lies? Doug and I get frustrated at this point. Politely pointing out their errors doesn’t work. After all, as Lyle frequently points out a good case can be made they actually pride themselves on there ability to lie and get away with it.

I finally came up with decent response. I have created a new blog post category, Legacy Media Liars. This category will be used to call out individuals (when available) as liars. I don’t know that my blog has enough Google Page Rank to bring searches for the liars names into the top ten on Google but it’s better than doing nothing.

I have gone back to a few previous posts and categorized them as well to kind of jump start the category. This is as if I actually will be short on material. The Rittenhouse verdict probably gave me 100 articles to blog about in the first 12 hours after the verdict was announced.

This is going to be a busy category.

Quote of the day—Peter Dreier

Incidents like the Virginia and San Francisco shootings inevitably lead to a debate over gun control. Here again the media, politicians, and advocacy groups play their scripted roles. The media quote Republicans and conservatives repeating their claims that tougher gun-control laws wouldn’t have prevented the Virginia shooting, because the shooter could have obtained the gun illegally. And, they add, gun control undermines our liberties. 

To provide “balance,” the media quote Democrats and gun-control advocates, repeating their claims that this specific shooting, and the epidemic of mass shootings, would be dramatically reduced if we restricted the sale of guns and ammunition, including sales across state lines, because shooters often obtain guns in states with lax laws and bring them to states with tough laws.

Peter Dreier
June 16, 2017
The Virginia Shooting Isn’t About Bernie. It’s About the Right’s Embrace of Guns.
[I’m more and more convinced that, as Michael Savage says, Liberalism Is a Mental Disorder. I haven’t read his book but I took a college class on, and have experienced enough, abnormal psychology to recognize it. In this case it is conclusive because he cannot see that his political beliefs contributed to the bad results. One thing common to all personality disorders is that, in their minds, they didn’t contribute, in any way, to a bad outcome. It is always someone else’s fault.

With that mindset he goes on to describe a delusional world that is nearly unrecognizable to normal people.

This nut job, Dreier, not only gets things wrong, but he gets his “facts”, essentially, backwards. In this case the guns were purchased legally in a state, Illinois, with some of the most strict gun control laws and brought the gun to a state with much more relaxed laws. Although I didn’t quote that portion of the article, he repeatedly claims the gun was an AR-15 (it was actually an SKS). Furthermore, gun sales across state lines are already restricted.

This idiot thinks he knows what his writing about but his story is very nearly wrong in a fractal way. There is no attention given to fundamental principles, he does not address the infringement of specific enumerated rights, his conclusions are wrong, the theme is wrong, the paragraphs are wrong, nearly every sentence is wrong, and some of the words are wrong.

He has crap for brains.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Tam

Wow, Mark, that was nearly wrong in every particular! It bordered on fractally wrong, in that every little piece, taken by itself, was as wrong as the whole.

Tam
December 7, 2014
Sigh
[I read Mark Morford’s troll piece and briefly considered blogging about it. But I prefer to blog about things that either no one has noticed yet or that I have a quasi-unique viewpoint on. And this piece has been well covered by many others. This is just a small sample:

I had completely dismissed it as blog material. Morford is just too easy of a target and I have dealt with him at length before. Then I read the last sentence I quoted above of Tam’s. Wow!

I have seen this sort of thing many times before but didn’t have a name for it. Fractally wrong. I like it. I like it a lot.—Joe]