Archive for child abuse

VIDEO: NRA convention speaker advises parents to store guns in kids’ rooms

gun boy child smaller

At a “Home Defense Concepts” seminar offered at the NRA’s Annual Meeting, Rob Pincus, who owns the popular firearm instruction company I.C.E. Training, said this, and yes, he actually got laughs:

How about putting a gun in a safe in your kids’ room? Good idea or bad idea? We have an emotional push back to that.

Here’s my position on this: If you’re worried that your kid is going to try to break into the safe that is in their bedroom with a gun in it, you have bigger problems than home defense. [Laughter]

And if you think that the kid who’s going to try to break into the safe because it’s in their room isn’t sneaking into your room to try to break into stuff, you’re naive and you have bigger problems than this. [Laughter]

So let’s settle that issue and think about it. In the middle of the night, if I’m in the bathroom or getting a glass of water, I’m in the bedroom, watching TV in the living room, if that alarm goes off and the glass breaks, the dog starts barking, what’s the instinct that most people are going to have, in regards to, “Am I going to run across the house to get the gun, or am I going to run over here to help the screaming kid?”

And if I’m going to go to the kid anyway, and I have an extra gun and an extra safe, why not put it in their closet?

Gee, what could possibly go wrong?

Pincus, that paragon of sensitivity and family values, must have let slip what’s left of his tiny little mind that a five-year-old boy shot and killed his two-year-old sister with his favorite birthday present ever – a rifle. Then again, why would that matter to him? He likely supports websites like Crickett that put out ads for baby’s first rifle and fill their pages with testimonials from parents who say things like, “My 4 1/2 year old daughter thought the ‘pink one’ was far superior…” Oh and let’s not forget, he’s a participant in the same event that provides gun gifts for tots.

Perhaps he should give this report from ChildrensDefense.org a look-see. Here’s a sample of what he’d see:

chart graph guns children deaths via Childrens Defense . org

Still laughing, guys?

not funny hahaha no

Think Progress has more.

VIDEO: Kill, baby, kill. No kidding, this is an ad for baby’s first rifle.

crickett guns for kidsVia

A short time ago, I posted “Baby’s First Gun: “My 4 1/2 year old daughter thought the ‘pink one’ was far superior…” ” That post included testimonials from a site that markets and sells firearms and accessories… for the whole family. The statements came from proud parents whose 4- and 6-year-olds became proud owners of their very first rifles. Real ones. That shoot real bullets. Baby’s First Gun. Nothing could be totes adorbser.

The firearms in question are especially appealing because they come in fun colors like pink (!), so much fun in fact that, per one illiterate parent, “the color really helped get her excitet about it.”

What could be more wholesome, right-to-lifey, and family valuesy than a tiny tot learning to kill? And isn’t that what Jesus would want, innocent toddlers learning to blast one of god’s equally innocent creations to smithereens?

Interestingly, I just clicked on my link to the testimonials. They’re gone. I got a 404 “Not found” error message. In fact, if you go to  http://www.crickett.com/ site, you get this message, in part:

If you are a member of the general public:

The fact that you are seeing this page indicates that the website you just visited is either experiencing problems, or is undergoing routine maintenance.

It’s been like that for a couple of days now.

But turn that frown upside down, chums! My old pal and amazing source, Hugh Kaufman, found this video for us. Gather ’round kiddies! This one’s for YOU, courtesy of  CrickettRifles CrickettRifles:

“Start your own [killing] tradition.”

The only thing that can stop a bad baby with a gun is a good baby with a gun, right NRA?

crickett guns for kids logo

“A Week of Upchucks: Keep on recruiting for bad guys while you root to undermine education, science, equal rights”

gop fail 3Please welcome back guest blogger K.C. Boyd. You might remember her from her earlier posts:

A Week of Upchucks

By K. C. Boyd

 “Pro-Life” Upchucking

  • Add Ohio’s to the ever-growing list of states whose House voted to defund Planned Parenthood.
  • Senator Brownback signed House Bill 2253 this week. Scribbled at the top of his marked up copy of this “Pro-Life Protections Act,” were the words Jesus & Mary, with “Pro-Life” further down in the margins. Good to confirm in writing that legislators really do govern by Sharia the Bible. After North Dakota, the Kansas bill is second to define life as beginning at conception.

Beyond Upchuck: Second child of faith-healing couple dies after no medical care

  • With the death of an 8-month old baby resulting from Fundamentalist Christians putting faith over science, this is well beyond your average upchuck. When you become a parent, you are responsible for your children’s health and welfare, and that includes after the child is born. If a mother or father chooses God over medicine for themselves, that’s their choice, and their problem. But to sit by and pray while their 8-month baby struggles for days with severe diarrhea and breathing problems, such negligence is criminal (even more so, this being their second child to have died from prayerful neglect.)
  • Meanwhile, out in Oklahoma, self-proclaimed pro-lifers, more accurately described as pro-negligence once the baby is born, have decided that public education’ isn’t all that important or necessary. In line with the ‘drown-it-in-the-bathtub’ meme, Kansas’ governor and legislators have enacted public school cuts that are among nation’s highest and which, over time, may well destroy public education, as we know it. At the same time, the goodly legislators are looking for ways to cut taxes (for the rich.)

Schaudenfreude Upchuck

  • Things aren’t looking too promising for a successful GOP’ wooing of the LGBT community. Despite the spoken desire by one wing of the party to at least appear more gay-friendly, the RNC couldn’t help caving to the Rebiblicans’ that make up its base. At the RNC April meeting in Los Angeles, The GOP confirmed that they cannot and will not change their platform when it comes to gay marriage. Why schaudenfreude, you ask? Quite frankly because this upchucker loves nothing more than to see than the GOP engage in all manner of self-sabotage.

Dino Upchuck

  • Ken Ham is smiling these days thanks to a deal his Answers in Genesis’ ad agency made to screen an animated Creation Museum commercial during previews at each of the 458 theaters showing the newly released Jurassic Park 3-D movie. Not only that but these theaters will also continuously loop said commercial in their lobbies, exposing evermore young people to the Big Lie.

And finally, heading over to the land of whack job Upchucks

  • Ann Coulter exercised her right to persecute Muslims on Fox (cough) News when she stated that the Boston bombing suspect’s wife should be in prison for wearing a hijab. Talk about denying a woman’s rights – - someone needs to sew her mouth permanently shut.
  • Pat Robertson, never one to disappoint averred that “Islam is to blame for not only the Boston Marathon bombing, but terrorism around the world.” Comparing ‘Evil’ Islam To Nazism, Robertson is sure to have ruffled the feathers of many a future would-be terrorist.
  • Lastly there’s the Beckster’s continued accusations of a dreamt–up government cover-up with regards to the Marathon bombing. Informed by what can only be a super-duper top-secret source, Beck accuses the Dems of hiding “damning evidence” that a Saudi National was involved in the Boston bombing. Of course we know he’s a nutcase but something that most folks aren’t aware of is that Homeland Security Chairman Michael T. McCaul, Jeff Duncan, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence, Peter King and Chairman of the Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security, Candice Miller wrote to Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano requesting an immediate classified debriefing on the Saudi whose identity is said to be hidden and who the government instantly spirited out of the country/ This can’t help but make one remember when Bush and Co. really did whisk the Bin Laden family out of the country just after 9/11, well before private or commercial planes were permitted back in the air.

I say, keep it up guys. Keep on recruiting for the bad guys while you root to undermine education, science and equal rights.

We’ll see you in 2014.

Novelist K.C. Boyd is the author of Being Christian: A Novel. According to Mikey Weinstein, President of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, “Boyd created a story so riveting that not only could I not put it down, but upon finishing it, I found myself, like an addict, craving more.

VIDEO: Man (allegedly):“Shut that n*gger baby up,” slaps him. Child was crying during flight from “pressure in his ears.”

Man calls baby N word news story Man calls baby N word news story 2

A drunk 60-year-old man schmuck got irked because a 19-month-old baby was crying during a Delta Airlines flight to Georgia. Or, hmm, it just might have been because an African American 19-month-old was crying.

The toddler was in tears because of air pressure causing pain in his ears. So what’s a full-grown, inconvenienced Idahoan to do? Why, call a little defenseless child “n*gger baby” and provide even more pain by slapping him, what else?

Every conscientious parent knows that nothing quiets down a distressed baby in agony more quickly than a swift smack to the face.

Little Jonah’s mom:

“His eye was swollen… and it was bleeding.”

Be proud, Mr. Violent Drunk Racist. You, a male adult, traumatized a tiny, unsuspecting, distraught, innocent small fry and his mother.

Via Raw Story:

The 60-year-old man told Bennett to “shut that (‘N word’) baby up,” and slapped the 2-year-old boy in his face as the plane prepared for landing, according to an affidavit.

“I said, ‘What did you just say?’” Bennett explained to ABC News. “And he was so drunk that he fell onto my face, and his mouth moved over to my ear and he said it, just directly into my ear.”

Sidebar: I wonder if Mr. Violent Drunk Racist has kids of his own, and if so, how often he slaps them (or worse). And I also wonder if Mr. Violent Drunk Racist is an avid gun owner.

H/t: @PennDragonArt

Justice For Christian, But How Many More?

christian1

What a sad, messed up story. Christian is 13, 12 when he was arrested and he has spent almost two years in a juvenile facility waiting for a trial.

Nothing about Cristian’s life has been easy. He was born to a mother who was just 12 when she had him. She became pregnant at the age of 11 after being sexually assaulted by Cristian’s biological father. The father was imprisoned on charges directly related to her pregnancy and would later be described as having little to do with his son.

At the age of two, Cristian and his mother were placed in the same foster home after the “authorities found the toddler walking around dirty and naked outside a South Florida motel while his grandmother, who would have been about 34 at the time, nursed a drug habit inside.”

At just three years old there were indicators that Cristian had experienced more than just neglect. Department of Child and Family Services reported that Cristian, still only three, pulled down the pants of a six year old and simulated a sex act. No information was provided about where the three year old learned this behavior, but further information indicated that days prior to that he had caused the death of a kitten after it scratched him in the face. Though these behaviors strongly suggested that Cristian had experienced other types of abuse, nothing appeared to have been done about it.

Further indicators of sexual abuse were present when Cristian was five years old. It was alleged that he was found naked under a bed with his younger brother. The same year, it was also reported that Cristian was masterbating at school, drawing phallic symbols, and trying to pull down the pants of other children. Mental health evaluations were ordered by the court, but none of the records maintained by the Department of Children and Family Services stated they had taken place or that Cristian was provided with therapeutic treatment for the behaviors. Minimally, a more complete investigation into potential sexual abuse of Cristian should have been conducted.

You can read at the link what happened to him (that they know of) between 5 and 11. Sigh. It’s what next that really gets my goat.

A few months later on March 14, 2011, deputies were called to the apartment: Fernandez’ baby brother, 2-year-old David, had died at a local hospital. The medical examiner determined that the toddler had a fractured skull, bruising to his left eye and a bleeding brain.

Susana, then 25, admitted to investigators that she had left Fernandez, David and her other children home alone. When she returned, she said she found David unconscious. She waited eight-and-a-half hours before taking him to the hospital and searched “unconsciousness” online and texted friends during that time.

Susana also revealed that two weeks before David’s death, Fernandez had broken the toddler’s leg while wrestling.

Susana was charged with aggravated manslaughter; the medical examiner said David might have survived if she had taken him to the hospital sooner for the head injury. She pleaded guilty in March and could get 30 years.

Fernandez, who had first been questioned as a witness, was soon charged with first-degree murder. The other felony charge was filed after his 5-year-old half-brother told a psychiatrist that Fernandez had sexually assaulted him.

Christian is actually on the better side of our messed up juvenile justice system. He got a “reprieve”.

christian2

Jacksonville, FL – Friday, February 8, 2013 — This morning the state of Florida agreed to greatly reduced charges in the case of Cristian Fernandez. Two years ago, the state had charged then-12-year-old Cristian as an adult for the death of his younger brother. The child was facing a mandatory minimum of life in prison without parole in the death of his 2-year-old half brother, David Galarraga.

As a friend of mine said, “Even though this kid was able to get a plea deal and only serve in a juvenile facility until he is 19, we as a country put kids this young for life without parole…just us and Somalia. Great company to be in!”

You can read more about Christian and other similar cases here.

Cardinal Mahony used cemetery money to pay sex abuse settlement. “They took it from people who had no voice: the dead. They can’t react.”

family values my ass

Another day, more hypocrisy to report. Specifically, more hypocrisy from Cardinal Roger Mahony. Even more specifically, more hypocrisy from Cardinal Roger Mahony and his involvement with covering up years of child abuse.

We now find out that Religious Roger took money intended to maintain cemeteries and redirected it to settling the horrific cases of child molestation. After all, thought he, $660-million is a lot of CYA money. Of course, he failed to disclose that after cashing in various investments, “the main asset liquidated was cemetery money.”

Details, schmetails.

Not exactly holier than thou. Not exactly doing unto others. Not exactly kosher.

Via a rather lengthy article in the L.A. Times:

Under his leadership in 2007, the Archdiocese of Los Angeles quietly appropriated $115 million from a cemetery maintenance fund and used it to help pay a landmark settlement with molestation victims.

The church did not inform relatives of the deceased that it had taken the money, which amounted to 88% of the fund. Families of those buried in church-owned cemeteries and interred in its mausoleums have contributed to a dedicated account for the perpetual care of graves, crypts and grounds since the 1890s.

Now for the highly frustrating answer to the question we’re all asking:

The church’s use of fund money appears to be legal. State law prohibits private cemeteries from touching the principal of their perpetual care funds and bars them from using the interest on those funds for anything other than maintenance. Those laws, however, do not apply to cemeteries run by religious organizations.

Maybe someone needs to rethink that exception.

Mary Dispenza, who received a 2006 settlement from the archdiocese over claims of molestation by her parish priest in the 1940s, said her great-uncle and great-aunt are buried in Calvary Cemetery in East L.A.

I think it’s very deceptive,” she said of the way the appropriation was handled. “And I think in a way they took it from people who had no voice: the dead. They can’t react, they can’t respond.

Family values my ass.

“If the abused children had only stayed in the embryo stage, then maybe ardently pro-life Catholics would be storming the church doors”

roger mahony cartoon

Another L.A. Times letter to the editor, because our voices matter:

Re “Trying to make sense of it all,” Feb. 4

As disturbing as I find the information being released from the Los Angeles Archdiocese’s priest personnel files, what I find even more disturbing is the apparent lack of outrage in the form of massive demonstrations at the downtown cathedral and at parishes across L.A.

If the abused children had only stayed in the embryo stage, then maybe ardently pro-life Catholics would be storming the church doors demanding more than empty “sorry, we got caught” apologies from Cardinal Roger M. Mahony and even his successor, Archbishop Jose Gomez, who worked to block the release of these files the moment he arrived in Los Angeles.

Bill Cranham

La Quinta