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MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell Blames NRA For Slowing Down Investigation In Boston Bombing Video: http://bit.ly/Yzsc9X

"..The NRA is also in the business of helping bombers get away with their crimes.."

Lawrence O’Donnell apparently has absolutely no shame. Speaking on his MSNBC program The Last Word w/ Lawrence O'Donnell on Wednesday night, O’Donnell asserted that the National Rifle Association's (NRA) successful lobbying efforts in Congress were hindering the federal criminal investigation in the Boston Marathon bombing.

In his opening monologue, O’Donnell absurdly thundered that the “NRA's effort to guarantee that American mass murderers are the best-equipped mass murders in the world is not limited to murderers who use assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.” O’Donnell’s vitriol did not stop there. Instead, he doubled down claiming that the NRA is, “in the business of helping bombers get away with their crimes.”

MP3 audio here http://newsbusters.org/sites/default...ONNELL-NRA.mp3

Gunpowder could be traced by investigators to a buyer at the point of sale if gunpowder contained a taggant. An element that would enable tracing of the purchase of gunpowder but thanks to the National Rifle Association, identification taggants are required by law only in plastic explosives. The NRA has successfully blocked any requirements for such taggants in gunpowder. So such supremely helpful evidence as taggants are not available to the FBI in this investigation.

O’Donnell is correct that the use of taggants could potentially help in identifying the origin of certain bombs but he ignores the rationale behind the NRA’s objections in 1995.

According to the Seattle Times, at the time of the debate, “Opponents said the government had not proved the devices were safe. Tampering with explosives could put miners and others who work with them at risk, the Institute of Makers of Explosives said. Opponents also argued that the taggant program would be too expensive.”

So professionals involved in the making of industrial explosives noted that taggants might make legitimately-purposed explosives harmful to the miners and other professionals who use them on the job site.

In addition, the NRA had similar safety concerns about taggants in gunpowder, likening it to federal registration of firearms. In 1996, U.S. News & World Report ran a story showing that the NRA was extremely concerned with whether taggants could affect the stability of explosives:

That's the chief concern of the NRA in regard to black and smokeless gunpowders, which are used by millions of sportsmen. Some 28 percent of bombings involve gunpowder--usually in pipe bombs--so experts believe they'd be crucial to a taggant program. But testing by the Office of Technology Assessment did reveal potential problems when taggants were mixed with smokeless powders.

As a result in 1996, Congress approved an NRA-backed proposal that an independent body, “examine all technologies that allow explosives to be detected before a terrorist or criminal explodes his bomb in addition to those that will identify the explosive after a blast.”

The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) which completed the study announced four major findings:

•Bombs using black and smokeless powders account for a small number of deaths and injuries each year. (Annually, 10 deaths and approximately 100 injuries.)

• Information gathered by the BATF and the FBI regarding bombings is incomplete.

• An effective taggant system with the associated record keeping would incur significant costs.

• No taggant system has been found that is technically feasible for use in black and smokeless powders.

The NAS then specifically recommended that, “Identification taggants in black and smokeless powder should not be implemented at the present time."

In other words, sound science cuts against the use of taggants. As a host for a network that insists conservatives are anti-science, isn't it well, anti-science of O'Donnell to not heed the findings of a professional scientific body?

I suppose not, not when it cuts against a liberal policy agenda or a cynical talking point to insist that the NRA has Boston blood on its hands.



See relevant transcript below

MSNBC

The Last Word w/ Lawrence O’Donnell

April 17, 2013

10:02 p.m. EDT

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: There are new developments tonight in the bombing investigation here in Boston. But that investigation could be moving faster were it not for the successful lobbying efforts of the National Rifle Association. The NRA's effort to guarantee that American mass murderers are the best-equipped mass murders in the world is not limited to murderers who use assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. The NRA is also in the business of helping bombers get away with their crimes. Gunpowder could be traced by investigators to a buyer at the point of sale if gunpowder contained a taggant. An element that would enable tracing of the purchase of gunpowder but thanks to the National Rifle Association, identification taggants are required by law only in plastic explosives. The NRA has successfully blocked any requirements for such taggants in gunpowder. So such supremely helpful evidence as taggants are not available to the FBI in this investigation. The FBI tells NBC News it is following some promising leads. One in particular, video and images collected by authorities showing someone carrying a heavy backpack or duffle bag and placing it at the spot where the second bomb went off. Key evidence is also being obtained from footage captured by a security camera above one of the bomb sites. That camera was on top of the Lord & Taylor department store on Boylston Street just over here one block away. Despite conflicting reports today in the media, none of which originated from this network, there has been no arrest of any individual or individuals at this time. The FBI and Boston police are calling for restraint from the news media. Adding to the confusion here in Boston today, the federal courthouse was evacuated earlier this afternoon. Employees were given what is known as a code red order to leave as a result of a bomb scare. We've also obtained more photos of evidence collected from the bomb sites. Here's a closer look at the fragments left from the pieces of a pressure cooker. NBC News' Pete Williams points out that one of the pressure cooker lids ended up on the roof of a nearby building because the force of the explosion was so great. This photo shows bb’s and a nail believed to be part of the shrapnel in one of the bombs along what could be the zipper from one of those black backpacks or nylon bags authorities have mentioned. Investigators now know the type of batteries use and Michael Isikoff reports they were in a battery pack made by a company in California used to power toy cars and often for sale in hobby shops. Officials have opened up more of the area around the crime scene, focusing their investigation primarily on those two explosion points and the stretch of Boylston Street in between them.

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/jeffrey...#ixzz2QvBdaDBp


There is no tragedy too big or too small that Lawrence O’Donnell wouldn't EXPLOIT to attack the NRA

Middlesex Co. DA release confirming Watertown suspect death

Once again asking for good thoughts. Something big is going on in Boston. Stay inside!! MIT officer killed, 2 people were on the run, another officer down. Police say they have explosives and automatic weapons. One confirmed to be in custody. They're searching for the other. Charlie is still at work. They're on air while this is all happening. This is too close to 'BZ. another explosion reported. Listening to it all on the Boston Police, Fire and EMS scanner. I talked to Charlie and Kayleigh and they're both inside. http://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/6254/web

Police: One Boston bombing suspect dead, another on the run
Friday, April 19, 2013 - 8:21am

CNN — Police sealed off densely populated portions of the Boston metro area early Friday after a violent night of chasing the Boston Marathon terror suspects left one of the men and a police officer dead.

The manhunt effectively shut down a large portion of the nation's fifth-largest metro area.

Developments moved quickly:

-- Police swarmed over a Watertown, Massachusetts, neighborhood looking for the surviving suspect, identified by Boston police as Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, age 19.

-- Several sources told CNN that the dead suspect was Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26. According to a source briefed on the investigation, the suspects are originally from the Russian Caucasus and had moved to Kazakhstan at a young age before coming to the United States several years ago.

-- Police ordered businesses in the suburb of Watertown and nearby communities to stay closed and told residents to stay inside and answer the door for no one but authorities. Boston authorities advised the same. The city's subway, bus and Amtrak train systems have been shut down. Taxi service across the city was suspended. Every Boston area school is closed.

--The search followed a violent night in which authorities say the men allegedly hurled explosives at pursuers after killing a university police officer, robbing a convenience store and hijacking a car.

"It's jarring," said CNN Belief blog writer Danielle Tumminio, who lives in Watertown.

Oluwaseun Odewale, who lives in Arlington, described his neighborhood as "deathly quiet."

"All my doors are double-locked. It's silent all around, there are no usual sounds of cars, nothing," he said.

Boston's public transit authority sent city buses to Watertown to evacuate residents while bomb experts combed the surroundings for possible explosives.

Police warned Watertown residents to lock their homes and stay away from their windows and doors.

Police officers in full body armor, carrying automatic weapons, flooded the area, traveling the streets in convoys and going door-to-door to track the suspect down.

Massachusetts State Police spokesman Col. Timothy Alben asked residents for patience.

"We need more time," he said. "We're making significant progress up there. But it may take hours to do this."

"This situation is grave." Alben said earlier. "This is a very serious situation that we are dealing with."

Violent night

The violence began late Thursday with the robbery of a 7/11 convenience store, according to Alben.

Soon after, in Cambridge, across the Charles River from Boston, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology police officer was fatally shot while he sat in his car, the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office said in statement. Police believe the bombing suspects were responsible for the shooting.

The two suspects, according to authorities, then hijacked a car at gunpoint in Cambridge. They released the driver a half-hour later at a gas station.

As police picked up the chase, the car's occupants threw explosives out the windows and shot at officers, according to the district attorney's office.

Officers fired back, wounding one of the men, possibly the person identified by the FBI as suspect No. 1, who is seen in the images released Thursday in a dark cap, sunglasses and wearing a black backpack.

The man died at Beth Israel Hospital. He had bullet wounds and injuries from an explosion, according to officials. The second man apparently escaped on foot.

Richard H. Donohue Jr., 33, a three-year veteran of the transit system police force, was shot and wounded in the incident and taken to a hospital, a transit police spokesman said Friday. The officer's condition was not immediately known.

CNN photographer Gabe Ramirez arrived in Watertown as the chase ended.

"Police were in a standoff with the vehicle just down the hill," Ramirez said. They ordered one suspect out and commanded him to strip down completely naked before putting him in a patrol car, which did not leave the scene.

The man was later released and is not a suspect in the case.

But while the man was being held, FBI agents approached the squad car, and police ordered the man back out of the car. FBI agents questioned him -- still fully undressed -- on the sidewalk.

In an early phase of the lockdown, a man could be seen lying face down on the street with his hands outstretched in front of him and his legs crossed. It is unclear whether this was the man who was arrested and ordered to undress.

Details about the suspects

The men moved to the United States at least a few years ago, according to sources.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older brother, had studied at Bunker Hill Community College and wanted to become an engineer, the source said. He then took a year off to train as a boxer.

The source told CNN's Deborah Feyerick that a posting on a social media site in his name included the comments: "I don't have a single American friend. I don't understand them."

The source added that it should not be assumed that either brother was radicalized because of their Chechen origins.

CNN's Terence Burke, Dave Alsup, Carma Hassan, Jake Tapper, Drew Griffin, Steve Almasy and Chandler Friedman contributed to this report.

http://www.nbc33tv.com/news/crimetra...boston-bombing

This is the photo now being displayed on the local news.

WTH ??? That is the suspect in grade school ??

THIS is who we are looking for today :




MASSIVE MANHUNT UNDERWAY: Boston Marathon Bombing Suspect 2 At Large Following Watertown, MA Shootout, Suspect 1 Dead. One police officer dead; another critically wounded.

Police have said they believe him to be a terrorist who is here to kill people. Please SHARE and get this guy's picture out!

...

JUST IN: Dzhorkhar Tsarnaev, 19, the Boston Marathon attack suspect now at large, came to the United States as a tourist in the early 2000s and asked for asylum while he was here, a federal source said. He was naturalized last year.

...


For those following this feed, the suspect's gray Honda CRV has been found abandoned in MA. Suspect is considered ARMED and EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. DO NOT APPROACH. Contact police.

"I respect this country. I love this country. This country that gives [a] chance to everybody else to be treated as a human being." -- Ruslan Tsarni, uncle of the two suspects, visibly shaken and giving his condolences to the families of the victims, when asked what he thinks of this country.

And when asked what he would say to his younger nephew: "Turn yourself in."

Let us not jump to conclusions about motives, or place blame at the feet of whole communities, people or religions.

MIT officer killed in the line of duty identified as Sean Collier, 26
Campus patrol officer, a resident of Somerville, Mass., had worked at MIT since 2012.
April 19, 2013



MIT has identified the police officer killed in the line of duty on Thursday evening as Patrol Officer Sean A. Collier, 26, of Somerville, Mass.

Collier had served as a member of the MIT Police since Jan. 9, 2012, following service as a civilian employee with the Somerville Police Department. He was single and a native of Wilmington, Mass.

“Sean was one of these guys who really looked at police work as a calling,” said MIT Police Chief John DiFava. “He was born to be a police officer.”

Collier was shot Thursday evening following an altercation at the corner of Vassar Street and Main Street in Cambridge, roughly between Building 32 (Stata Center) and Building 76 (David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research) on the MIT campus. He was transported to Massachusetts General Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

The MIT Police, Cambridge Police Department and Massachusetts State Police are continuing their investigation of the circumstances surrounding Collier’s death.

DiFava said Collier was highly involved with MIT’s student population.

“In a very short period of time, it was remarkable how engaged he was with students, particularly graduate students,” DiFava said. He added that Collier had become active with the MIT Outing Club, joining students in skiing and hiking.

“The loss of Officer Collier is deeply painful to the entire MIT community,” said MIT President L. Rafael Reif. “Our thoughts today are with his family, his friends, his colleagues on our police force and, by all accounts, the many other members of our community who knew him. This is a senseless and tragic loss.”

“The MIT Police serve all of us at the Institute with great dignity, honor and dedication,” said Israel Ruiz, MIT’s executive vice president and treasure. “Everyone here — those who knew Officer Collier, and those who did not — are devastated by the events that transpired on our campus last night. We will never forget the seriousness with which he took his role protecting MIT and those of us who consider it home.”

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/v...lier-0419.html

Boston Manhunt Shows Importance of 2nd Amendment Rights
by Mike Flynn19 Apr 2013, 8:43 AM PDT

Friday morning, the entire city of Boston was put in lockdown. Residents were warned to "shelter in place," meaning staying locked in their home, answering only to uniformed law enforcement personnel. Hundreds of police swarmed through the city, tracking a violent terror suspect who is possibly armed with explosives with a clear intent to kill. The situation is a reminder of why millions of Americans cherish their right to own guns to protect themselves and their families.

Gun control advocates mistakenly assume Americans cherish their 2nd Amendment rights because of either a cultural anachronism or an affinity for hunting. The left looks at gun control as a debate over which guns Americans "need." They often argue, for example, that Americans don't "need" a 30-round magazine to hunt deer. That's true, but the debate isn't about "needs", it is about rights.

The 2nd Amendment is built on a foundation of hunting, but, rather, the ability to protect one's life and property. The manhunt in Boston today shows the very real threats that occasionally enter our lives. In a situation like Boston, seconds count, while the police are minutes away.

Hopefully the second Marathon bombing suspect will be apprehended today without additional loss of life. Moreover, let's hope that no one has to try and defend themselves against the suspected terrorists. Gun control advocates, though, would be wise to reflect on the unfolding events to understand why many of us "cling" to our guns.

The world can be a very dangerous place.

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...endment-rights

Father of Lone Terrorist Threatens To Unleash Hell On USA If Son Is Touched
John Hawkins

"If they killed him, then all hell would break loose.”

That’s what Anzor Tsarnaev, the father of Boston bomber Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, told ABC news.

In another conversation with the Associated Press, Anzor Tsarnaev added that his son was a, “true angel.”

Yeah Anzor, not so much.

While you can’t help but sympathize with any parent who finds out that his child has gone this far wrong, the reality is that his son murdered people and crippled others for life. There are other people who lost children, too. There are sons whose fathers will be crippled for life. There are mothers whose daughters are missing legs. There are parents who will never see their sons again because Anzor Tsarnaev’s son killed them.

Yet, he’s claiming that “all hell would break loose” if something happened to his son.

Well sorry buddy, you’re a little too late on that front. Maybe if your son hadn’t grown up around someone who had that kind of mentality, none of us would be in this position today.

You may also like to read:

◦Chechen President: American Upbringing At Fault For The Boston Bombers
◦Confirmed: The Boston Marathon Bombers Were Both Muslims
◦Boston Terrorist On The Loose: Have You Seen This Man?
◦Ricin Terrorist Suspect Kenneth Curtis Is a Confirmed Liberal

http://www.mrconservative.com/2013/0...on-is-touched/


**NOTE - he wasn't a "Lone Terrorist" - he was with his brother... and we have no idea at this point if there were others involved. Reports were that there where three more found - undetonated - and the making of two or more

Boston police are now looking for a green '99 Honda Sedan with the Massachusetts plate 116-GC7.

Police say don't approach, alert authorities.

Here's special coverage of the developments in Boston on Channel 2: http://bit.ly/nNPFa9

One of the Chechen terrorists who carried out the Boston Marathon bombings should have been deported years ago after a criminal conviction, as called for by U.S. immigration law.

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the 26-year-old killed in a wild shootout with police, was a legal U.S. resident who nevertheless should have been removed from the country after a 2009 domestic violence conviction.

It is especially disturbing given the long history of Chechen Muslim terrorism that Chechens granted refugee status are not subject to enhanced observation and action when they commit violent crimes.

Big Sis: keeping her eye on Tea Party 'extremists', veterans and gun owners. Criminal aliens? Not so much.

Report: DHS Failed to Deport Boston Terrorist After 2009 Assault Conviction
By John Hill on April 19, 2013

Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the 26-year-old killed in a wild shootout with police, was a legal U.S. resident who nevertheless should have been removed from the country after a 2009 domestic violence conviction, according to a Judicial Watch source. http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/20...09-conviction/

That means the Obama administration’s DHS division missed an opportunity to deport Tsarnaev, but did not abide by Federal immigration law and let him stay. Tsarnaev was given this special treatment, despite not having any spouse, children or dependent elder parents that he would normally have needed as “mitigating factors” in his favor.

It is an especially remarkable oversight, as his crime was committed in his first several years in the country – a more egregious violation by an immigrant. Tsarnaev came to the U.S. on a tourist visa in 2006. U.S. immigration law is clear on this subject:

Conviction of a crime involving “moral turpitude” during the first five (5) years after being admitted to the U.S. carries a penalty of deportation. “Moral turpitude” crimes include theft crimes such as burglary and possession of stolen property, or violent crimes such as assault and battery. Even if a legal resident was not sentenced to jail time, they are deportable if the crime committed could have resulted in a sentence of one year or more in jail.

Failure to enforcement immigration law against violent criminals has become a disturbing pattern during the Obama Administration. In Obama’s first 3 years alone, thousands of criminal illegal aliens were released from detention – with thousands of crimes being committed by the aliens as a result – including 19 murders and 142 rapes.

This is why SWA has always said we do not have a “broken immigration system”, but rather a broken deportation system – and never worse than under this Administration. As with the other victims of Obama’s detainee releases, had DHS followed the law and deported Tsarnaev, four people would still be alive today.

The failure to deport Tsarnaev is especially stunning given the long history of Chechen Muslim terrorism, which one would expect would subject any Chechens granted refugee status to enhanced observation by immigration authorities.

In 1995, al Qaeda setup a camp in Chechnya—ordered by Osama bin Laden—to train “international terrorists” to carry out plots against Americans and westerners.

In 2004 Chechen Islamic militants attacked a school in Beslan, North Ossetia, Russia and they murdered 380 children, parents, teachers and visitors after holding more than 1,000 captive for three days.

In 2004, U.S. security officials released a report that a group of 25 Chechen terrorists illegally entered the United States from Mexico. There’s no telling how many of these Chechen terrorists have infiltrated the United States or how many opportunities the government has missed to protect the country by deporting them.

http://standwitharizona.com/blog/201...lt-conviction/

Weirdest thing ... I was post on FB on the "news leaks" regarding this ... and my entire FB went BLACK. The entire screen. Flat Black. Closed out... rebooted.... still black.... For the record - I am not suicidal nor am I planning any long trips.