Savagery comes in all manner of people and in a variety of places these days. Sometimes it arrives in waves that simply threaten to overwhelm.
Jimmy Holmes we know about. NBC News is reporting that recently released court documents show that a full month before Holmes shot up a crowded movie theater, killing 12 and wounding 70, his psychiatrist reported to University of Colorado Police he had threatened her via emails and text messages. She described the threats as, "homicidal statements." The same day she made the report university officials deactivated Holmes' student ID, officially removing him as a member of the student body. Apparently that was enough for the campus cops. There is no evidence they ever questioned Holmes, or that they reported him to any other law enforcement agency. Meanwhile our man continued to case the theater where the shooting took place and amass a vast array of weapons, ammunition, and explosive material. The rest, tragically, is history.
Reuters' Teresa Carson posted a story online today that Portland, OR. police arrested a man named Keven Michael Purfield. Apparently Purfield has been contacting relatives of Holmes' victims and harassing them over the phone and through emails and social networks. According to Aurora, CO police the number of people Purfield got a hold of is in the dozens. They claim he initially began telling them, "conspiracy theory stuff." Then it escalated to name calling and "hoping bad things would happen to them." On a Facebook page Purfield maintained that some of the coffins of the Aurora dead were empty. There were also references to Sandy Hook Elementary and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Purfield was charged with five misdemeanor counts of telephone harassment and one count of stalking. Bond was set at $10,000.
Our old pal Al Gerhart didn't get off so lucky in Oklahoma City. Gerhart, co-founder of the Sooner Tea Party (Not to be mixed up with the Oklahoma City Tea Party, which disavowed his foul ass as soon as this story broke) had emailed republican state Senator Cliff Branan threatening to "...dig into your past, your family, your associates and once we start there will be no end to it." He also promised to make Branan the "laughing stock of the Senate." All this because a bill he wanted passed was languishing in Branan's senate committee. Tuesday he was charged with blackmail and violating the Oklahoma Computer Crimes Act. Both counts are felonies.
According to a story in The Oklahoman by Nolan Clay, Gerhart has maintained his email was free speech and that he was being harassed because Sooner Tea Party tactics were effective. At a news conference last week, Brother Gerhart delivered on his promise by claiming that the scuttlebutt was that Branan had an affair with an aide, told his wife he wanted a divorce, but was later spurned by the aide. Branan says that the scuttlebutt is simply vile bullshit. When pressed for proof of the alleged affair, Gerhart admitted he had none.
Clay reported that the judge set bail at $15,000 and because Gerhart is such a ruthless and perhaps violent cretin he issued an order that prohibits him from coming within a 1000 feet of the Senator and any member of his family. In yesterday's story, Clay wrote that as of Tuesday night Gerhart had yet to surrender to authorities.
Then in Washington, Oklahoma Senator James Inhofe proved once again why many people consider his brain the most reptilian of any man alive. The Huffington Post quoted Inhofe as saying of the Newtown, CT parents who lost their children in December's deadly shooting spree, "See I think it is so unfair of the administration to hurt these families, to make them think this (the gun control debate) has anything to do with them, when in fact it doesn't." When reporters informed the senator that the families thought it had a lot to do with them, Inhofe responded, "Well that is because they've been told that by the president."
Jim, trust me on this. If my six year old was shot multiple times by some demented geek who was armed with a semi automatic assault style weapon and high capacity ammo clips I'd think gun control legislation has everything to do with me. I wouldn't need anyone, up to and including the President of the United States of America, to tell me it does. And I certainly wouldn't need some crass bastard such as yourself to dismiss that notion with such off handed cruelty.
No one has ever accused Inhofe of decency, or even of possessing higher thought processes, but it takes a rare beast to make the likes of Mitch McConnell appear civilized. The only question at this point is where the Oklahoma republican hides his tail.
How we got to this level of dementia is unclear. Unfortunately we are here and we're going to have to deal with monsters such as these on a daily basis.
As Thomas Paine once wrote, "These are the times that try men's souls."
Little did he know.
4-11-13
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