“WE ARE IN A FUCKING CRISIS IN TEXAS.” [email protected]
FORT WORTH — Police are trying to identify the man who entered the West 7th office of State Sen. Wendy Davis Tuesday afternoon and threw two firebombs just outside the door.
Two staffers were in the third floor office when the attack occurred around 4 o’clock. One of them had to leap over the flames to escape, then went to the break room, grabbed an extinguisher and put out the fire.
Investigators said Sen. Davis was not in the office at the time of the incident, but was at her law office closer to downtown Fort Worth.A staffer told News 8 the Democratic lawmaker was alerted about what happened and that security at Davis’ other local office was tightened as a result.
No one was hurt, but the lawmaker’s office was damaged by the fire.
It’s unclear yet whether or not the firebombing of Senator Davis’s office is connected to her advocacy for women’s health and pro-Planned Parenthood stance, but it sure feels that way to me and to the pro-choice women in Texas:
TX state senator @WendyDavisTexas‘ office was FIREBOMBED tonight. She is [email protected]PPact. THIS IS NOT A COINCIDENCE. @AngryBlackLady #teamuterati
— scATX (@scATX) March 21, 2012
i just want to scream: WON’T ANYONE HELP US PLEASE? RT: @scATX: WE ARE IN A FUCKING CRISIS IN TEXAS. — meadowgirl (@meadowgirl) March 21, 2012
@scATX i just can’t with all of this stuff. it SCARES me. like, can i be out as pro-choice and stuff & not end up DEAD or on FIRE? — meadowgirl (@meadowgirl) March 21, 2012
Everyone heard about the FIREBOMBING, right? I’m going to keep tweeting it and capitalizing the word every. single. time.
— scATX (@scATX) March 21, 2012
Here is senator Wendy Davis’ front door! lockerz.com/s/194324383
— Monica.Is.Liberal (@monicaisliberal) March 21, 2012
I have no words. It’s scary and I can’t help but feel like the Republican party is stalking me.
[via Keep Your Boehner Out of My Uterus; image via @monicaisliberal]
[cross-posted at ABLC]
Lojasmo
Inb4 burnsie starts squawking about religious free speech.
Fuckers.
David Koch
This is understandable.
apparently Wendy Davis was wearing a hoodie and holding a pack of Skittles.
Anoniminous
It’s sick that I’m relieved it was “only a firebomb.” It so easily could have been some nutter with an AK-47.
TaosJohn
OT, but this site is really all fucked up and shit. I click on the link to read the whole post and get hijacked to the mobile site. Happens all the damn time. A mobile site on a real computer looks like hell. FIX THIS SUCKER, por favor.
Peregrinus
Un-fucking-believable. But you know, they once slashed the tires of GOP staff, so both sides do it!
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
Holy rollerskating fuck.
What I did earlier this evening. I drafted an example letter women can send to their ob-gyns:
Dear Dr. Speculum,
Should a patient request safe, legal termination advice or treatment from you, will you put her medical interests ahead of a law that dictates how you practice your medical specialty? A law that was drafted by legislators with no medical experience? Will you put the health of your patient(s) ahead of a law that requires you to coercively administer a medically unnecessary procedure, a procedure that is not without risk?
If your answer is “yes,” thank you and please encourage your colleagues to employ the same level of medical ethics. If the answer is “no,” please consider this my written authorization for you to forward my medical records to:
G. Stirrup Papanicolaou, MD
4 Womenpower Circle
Enoughalready, AZ 85226
If I do not receive a written response to this inquiry, I will have my counsel deliver a signed authorization demanding transfer of my records to Dr. Papanicolaou, who has agreed in writing to place his patients’ medical interests above any attempted legislative interference. Given our physician-patient history, I wanted to offer you the same opportunity. I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Frankie Fedup
cc: S. Violet Wallfleur, Esq.
Perhaps by bring market forces to bear against the medical community (American College of Ob-Gyns, I’m looking at you), we can persuade the fucks to speak the hell up about medical ethics and risk. Standard of care, ladies and gentleman, heard of it? I’m sure your malpractice carrier is well acquainted with the concept, and strongly prefers that you practice in accordance with it, as opposed to below it. Scalzi has an anonymous letter from a physician.
Dee Loralei
These people scare me more and more. I’m still doing my damndest to get Obama re-elected though. I can’t imagine how much it will escalate through the election. But I’m pretty convinced there will be another Murraugh bombing once he wins re-election.
RSA
A local news station says investigators are looking for a “disgruntled constituent” who’d visited the office earlier. They also write,
Jesus–why not hire some writers to write articles?
Drive-by Nomad
Unclear?
TaosJohn
Wow. And when I posted that last comment, I got taken BACK to the regular website.
And BTW, this news from Texas (land of my birth) is downright gruesome. NOTHING NEW for Texas, however. In the late ’60s, the Pacifica radio station in Houston I used to listen to while teaching in a godforsaken junior college to stay out of Vietnam had their transmitter blown up twice. There was a cafe in the Montrose district I used to visit. They had a Navy cargo net hung over the entrance to keep out KKK firebombs. Hard to relax in that place.
I wonder when the Feds will get hip to the spontaneous (?) insurrection that’s underway in this country. Apparently it’s OK to kill people now because they’re liberals or blacks. Hell of a way to run a railroad, if you ask me.
Soonergrunt
But don’t you know? The only real terrorists are the ragheads!
Brian
This is what happens when we (not me or any of us so much) legitimize stupid-ass-hateful candidates. (hyphenated because they are really both the same).
Keith G
Was this a quote from a member of State Sen. Wendy Davis’ staff or did you just go and make this story about you?
Martin
This never would have happened if Davis was armed with a firebomb herself.
CaseyL
This madness is not going to end because, except for the oasis that is Austin, sane people are a minority in TX.
TX has been sh*thouse rat crazy for as long as I can remember. (JFK’s murder was cheered in TX schools.)
I don’t know how the people living there have managed to put up with the mean sadistic insanity for lo these many years, but all I can come up with now that the war on women has been formally declared is: Leave.
Really. Pack up and go somewhere where your rights will be respected and your votes won’t be wasted.
If you have children, esp., you need to GTFO of TX.
I know that sounds harsh. I know it probably sounds flippant. It isn’t. I swear it isn’t. Texas is a Bad Place; it has been a Bad Place for as long as I can remember; it will never be anything other than a Bad Place.
(And I feel the same way about the other states enacting these mandated-rape policies. They’re states that have always been bad and dangerous places for anyone who isn’t a RW nutter, and which will never be any better. Why stay there?)
Steve
Sounds like terrorism to me. But whoever did it, at the end of the day the usual suspects will prove he was actually a leftist, you can bank on that.
piratedan
@Keith G: please, just go away….
nothing to see here folks, just another isolated, random incident of violence that has no ties whatsoever to someone raising a voice and opposing Republican policies while being female, gay, a minority or a liberal.
Boudica
Senator Davis is my state
senator. I hadn’t heard about this. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.
rb
All this would end if women would just be reasonable about the whole sex and abortion thing /douthat
Peregrinus
@Steve:
He’s probably for legalizing marijuana, so of course he’s just a dirty leftist. Good conservatives would’ve used guns, don’t you know?
rb
@piratedan: Ayup. Some things in life should remain mysterious. Sometimes you just need to keeep walkin’.
Chris
There ain’t nothing more pro-life than firebombing a live person’s office, boys and girls!
Chris
@Dee Loralei:
Ditto. The more we win, the more acts of terrorism will go up. Should we get our wish and consign them to long-term minority status, I suspect the resulting backlash from militia types would look like the OAS’s activities in France circa 1960.
Frankensteinbeck
@piratedan:
Odd that these only seem to happen in one direction, don’t they? Strange coincidence.
Corner Stone
@CaseyL: You’re in California, correct?
David Koch
Fire bombs don’t kill.
Christian fundamentalists do.
*
*
If fire bombs are banned, then only christian fundamentalists will have fire bombs.
handy
@Corner Stone:
I took a trip up I-5 to see some friends in Sacramento, which is basically farmland and truckstops. I lost count of the many signs along the way the screamed about the “Pelosi-Created Water Crisis.”
Geoduck
Whether or not Obama wins, I predict this country will face a serious right-wing secessionist movement within the next ten years. Texas is one of the more likely ground-zeroes.
Peregrinus
@Frankensteinbeck:
I pointed this out a few months ago. My favorite reply, by a guy I know (my predecessor as op-ed editor on the campus paper), was that because Sarah Palin had been pied in the face and a bunch of GOP staff had had their tires slashed, well, we’re just about even, aren’t we?
Keith G
@piratedan: Dude, I will not go away. Just over one year has passed since the Giffords shooting and all of us need to take violence against public officials very seriously. Nothing should remove focus from the very real danger faced by the men and women in that office – men and women who, by the way are proud Texans who love their state. They should be the focus of our fears and concerns. They, not bloggers, are in harm’s way.
RossInDetroit
@Geoduck:
I think that depends somewhat on demographics. If 10 years puts the top 15% of The Crazy in Hoverounds, they’re not going to get far with that. I hope we’re looking at the death throes of an obsolete world view that will just age out and not be spoken of for the sake of the children.
CaseyL
@Corner Stone: Washington. Moved here from Florida ages ago.
ABL 2.0
@Keith G:
If I post some of the death threats and hate mail that I get for speaking out on these issues or for spearheading my uterati wiki project, then will you shut the fuck up and let me feel how I want to feel and blog how I want to blog?
Probably not.
clayton
@Keith G: That’s some fancy back-peddling you got there young man.
Gex
Frankly, it’s time to stop calling it a war on women and point out we’ve been in a religious war for quite some time. Gay bars and clinics get bombed a lot and guys like Eric Rudolph are shielded by the populace and possibly law enforcement. Religious leaders whip up ferver over abortion and then George Tiller gets gunned down. And hell, if you even look too gay to the wrong people you can get killed or have medical service refused, whichever.
Meanwhile, the RCC essentially has immunity for the gravest of crimes (this applies only to my moral compass. if your moral compass is okay with child rape and frowns on two consenting adults in love, I cannot help you) as it wages this war on us. All while receiving some sweet, sweet taxpayer coin.
I’ve had it. There’s a religious war and I’m not going hinder my ability to fight it just because others refuse to see the ground troops surrounding them. I’m going to call it what it is.
scav
@Keith G: If you don’t see how all women are legitimately freaked out and threatened by the pattern of activity directed at all women of which this incident is a part, then you are seriously missing a few clues.
Mnemosyne
@Keith G:
Dude. It’s about ALL WOMEN. They’re trying to take away my access to birth control. They’re trying to take away my access to abortion. The Republicans are trying to hurt ME PERSONALLY because I had the audacity to be born a woman.
I realize you don’t have the faintest idea what it’s like to realize that one of the two political parties in this country has decided that you should have no individual rights because you don’t have the correct genitals, but it is not a good feeling.
Gex
@rb: I thought DoucheHat was more of the, “conservatives are just going to behave this way over abortion, so if liberals still want to make the procedure legal, *they* are responsible for right wing violence inspired by legalized abortion” ilk.
@Peregrinus: Did he proceed to lecture you on destructive leftist moral relativism after that? Because that would seem about right for a conservative.
Corner Stone
@Geoduck:
Based on what? Rick fucking Perry?
Gex
@RossInDetroit: Hell, the way the elderly GOP/TeaTards/TheoCrats treat the budget and Medicare/Social Security, they’re going to bury themselves before they can do too much more damage.
piratedan
@Keith G: Dude…. you don’t have to tell me.. I LIVE in Tucson, I WORKED the phones for Gabby. All ABL has done is bring this to the light of day while the MSM is busy telling us that there is a controversy about contraception. This post had zippity do dah about her self aggrandizement, when her entire focus over the past month has been the culture war that the GOP is waging against women (team uterati, et al). Was the only item you grokked out of that entire post was just the last line?
Oedipus Tex
Typical liberals. There are no known facts about the case, so they simply invent the most convenient “facts” to best bludgeon their political opponents. Perhaps this is the best way to reinforce nonsensical beliefs. I’ve long held that contemporary liberalism is the political philosophy of adolescents and this page offers yet another example.
Corner Stone
Wow.
Take that back. Not surprised.
Gex
Derailing for Dummies
No reason. Just randomly posting that here. Carry on.
Felinious Wench, Team Uterati
@CaseyL:
Let’s try this yet again.
1. City of Houston is a solid democratic area. Blue as blue can be. Our mayor is a lesbian. Suburbs, depending on where they are, can be blue or red.
2. City of Dallas, another solid blue area. Same pattern as Houston.
3. San Antonio, yep, blue again. Same pattern again.
4. And then, there’s The Valley. Lots of Hispanic workers, lots of labor issues, lots of poverty. Blue again, thank God.
In Texas, it’s the same pattern we see across the U.S. Big cities, blue. Purple or red outside of the cities, except for spots where there is a high labor presence or desperately poor people. HOPEFULLY, those are blue too.
With our Hispanic population and the Republican’s ability to piss them off, we’ve been seeing a turn to Texas going purple. But, we’ve got entrenched Republicans we’ve got to get out. Doesn’t help that they’ve gerrymandered the state so badly.
Austin is not the only liberal bastion. Texas is too big to distill down into that big of a stereotype. Like anywhere else, it depends on where you are.
And I still miss Molly Ivins.
Marcellus Shale, Public Dick
while everyone was worried about zombies.
the unborn have learned how to control the minds of conservatives. its the unbornapocalypse.
seriouse this is fucked up.
Gex
@Felinious Wench, Team Uterati: Meanwhile, I saw a surprising number of “SECEDE” stickers when I was in Austin last time. At the pita sandwich place, for instance. WTF?
Corner Stone
http://icanhascheezburger.com/
No reason. Just randomly posting that here. Carry on.
Corner Stone
@Gex: Three?
Felinious Wench, Team Uterati
@Geoduck:
Um, no. What you see in the media is our 27%. They bluster, we make fun of them. Better to identify them that way.
All the “Secede” movement consists of is a few morons in jacked up trucks who put the stickers on their bumpers above their Truck Nutz. There is no there there.
Gex
@Gex: I guess I can’t edit my own post, so I want to clarify.
Not ragging on Austin. Just meant to say you can’t take Austin for granted much like you shouldn’t write off others for the reasons FWTU mentions.
Gex
@Corner Stone: I didn’t take a tally for you CS. Sorry. Let me know ahead of time next time.
Keith G
@clayton: That’s a fancy assumption and a wrong one to boot.
@ABL 2.0: Then by all means please write about that. We all have stories to tell and you seem to have a compelling one. Don’t use “the Republican Party is stalking me” as a throwaway line in a story about someone else. Such facts are too important to gloss over. I type this from an honest place. I think threatening behavior needs to be made as public as possible and needs to become part of the narrative of how our society is not progressing.
Corner Stone
@Gex: Ok. Next time, before you talk shit, please take a mark for each one you see in Austin.
Thanks
Felinious Wench, Team Uterati
@Gex:
Austin has a deep strain of Ron Paul love. Those are his people. Dallas has it too. Houston has, thus far, seemed to be pretty immune to the infection.
It’s the Libertarian contingent of the 27%.
RossInDetroit
@Gex:
That is remarkably comprehensive. I’m afraid I see a little of myself on those pages.
Gian
they kill media people too: Alan Berg:
http://wfmu.org/LCD/GreatDJ/berg.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Berg
Death
At about 9:30 p.m. on June 18, 1984, Alan Berg returned to his Adams Street townhouse after a dinner date with Judith, with whom he was attempting a reconciliation.[5] Berg stepped out of his black Volkswagen Beetle and gunfire erupted. He was struck twelve times. The murder weapon, a semi-automatic Ingram MAC-10, which had been illegally converted to an automatic weapon, was later traced to the home of one of The Order’s members by the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Hostage Rescue Team.[6]
Four members of The Order were ultimately indicted on federal charges: Jean Craig, David Lane, Bruce Pierce and Richard Scutari. However, only Lane and Pierce were convicted, though neither of homicide (which is a state crime).[7] Rather, they were convicted of racketeering, conspiracy, and violating Alan Berg’s civil rights (which are federal crimes). Both were sentenced to what were, for all practical purposes, life terms; Lane’s sentence was 190 years; Pierce’s was 252 years.
David Lane was a former klansman who later joined the Neo-Nazi Christian Identity group Aryan Nation. He steadfastly denied any involvement in Berg’s murder, but neither did he regret that Berg was dead. In an interview presented as part of the History Channel documentary, Nazi America: A Secret History, Lane admitted to calling the show and goading Berg into an exchange and stated: “The only thing I have to say about Alan Berg is, regardless of who did it, he has not mouthed his hate-whitey propaganda from his 50,000-watt zionist pulpit for quite a few years”. Lane, incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Complex in Terre Haute, Indiana, died of an epileptic seizure at age 68 on May 28, 2007.[8] One of the alleged gunmen in the Alan Berg assassination, Bruce Pierce, who was incarcerated at the Federal Correctional Complex in Union County, Pennsylvania, died of natural causes at age 56 on August 16, 2010.[9] Craig and Scutari were convicted of unrelated crimes. The leader of The Order, Robert Jay Mathews, believed, although never proven, to be a lookout in the Alan Berg shooting, was burned to death during a standoff with federal authorities on December 8, 1984, at his home in Coupeville, Washington.[10]
Years before Alan Berg’s assassination, Dr. William Luther Pierce, a former member of the American Nazi Party who went on to co-found what eventually became the National Alliance, wrote the white nationalist themed novel The Turner Diaries. Robert Mathews had named his organization, The Order, after the fictional group of the same name in the book.[11] The Turner Diaries has also been described as the inspiration for the Oklahoma City bombing on April 19, 1995, due to the similarity to the book’s account of the destruction of a government building in Washington, D.C., and the fact that Timothy McVeigh was an avid reader of The Turner Diaries.[12]
gwangung
@Keith G: That’s OK. From my perspective, you’re far from honest and the rhetoric is purely venal and personal.
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
@Keith G:
Most everyone on this thread knew what ABL was saying, and has been saying that the republicans are in effect stalking the female population for the purpose of controlling their bodily functions related to reproductive health, as a metaphor, not literal. You decided to take another shot at ABL, but ended up sounding like a moronic douchebag. Which seems to have become your calling card.
gwangung
Well, judging from what he’s been writing in this thread, he’s trying to be consistent. Gotta give a little credit for that.
Corner Stone
@General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero):
I thought you owned the copyright on that here?
Don’t forget to feed your parakeet and don’t take no wooden nickles.
Oh, wait, I forgot the meespellings needed.
Some tings are all about the tales involved but other things take ships to do. Then coffee pots make captains forget about a 13 and 3 record.
So spaketh the prez stuck. And wooden nickles.
clayton
@Keith G: No, son, you just keep digging.
No different than any other thread.
Oh wait, I don’t see you pulling this same shit with others. You’ve got just one that you look out for to “criticize”.
We know what you are, son. You and Corner Stone make a “great” team.
Fortunately neither of you are on the same side as I am, so I only have to worry about others misunderestimating you.
Keith G
@General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero): Oh golly.
Peregrinus
@Gex:
No, just on how depending on the points of information I chose I could come up with a narrative friendlier to conservatives or to liberals because I was obviously ignoring the things lefties had done to the right. I did agree that I wasn’t aware of a lot of his examples, but on the other hand, it was a fucking pie versus Ken Aden’s campaign manager’s cat being killed.
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
@Corner Stone:
So glad you came back CS, dazzling us with your crystal clear prose. Or is that an Armadillo in your mouth?
Mayken
@Geoduck: Let’s let them go this time!
Keith G
@clayton:
That assertion is not correct.
Gex
@Corner Stone:Are you disputing that I saw the stickers? Or are you disputing that I was surprised by the number?
Because I didn’t COUNT them doesn’t mean I wasn’t SURPRISED by them. But naturally, I’M the one talking shit, quite possibly because I reported an emotion I thought I had, but you know I didn’t.
Corner Stone
@Gex: There are 25 million+ people in Texas. Almost a million of which live in/around Austin. I’m often in Austin yet I don’t live there.
So to say you “saw a surprising number” could mean…2?…3?…75?
How bout you give us a grab bag estimate?
You were there 3 days and saw 5. You were there 2 days and saw 10. You were there on layover and may have seen 1.
Citizen_X
@Oedipus Tex:
The “invented fact” is the firebombing of a Democratic, PP-supporting, female State Senator’s office, you fucking terrorist supporter.
Yutsano
@Oedipus Tex: So then why was her office bombed?
Mnemosyne
@Citizen_X:
But you don’t know that it was done by someone who is anti-Planned Parenthood just because anti-abortionists love to attack PP offices with firebombs. Maybe it was someone from Firedoglake who was still upset that they didn’t get a public option with PPACA. Didja ever think of that? Well, didja?
/moron
gwangung
Well, given that the person you’re talking about has a family and community history of being bludgeoned (literally. not metaphorically), I think their reaction is quite rational and a pro-survival trait.
Typical of idiots to think that this is a failing.
ETA: This is NOT saying that ABL’s conjecture is necessarily correct. But you’d be stupid not to be slightly paranoid when you have a history of people who ARE out to get you.
Origuy
I miss Molly Ivens, too, but Susan Bankston, aka Juanita Jean, has been carrying on the tradition. One of her commenters made this button:
GOD
GUNS
GAYS
+ GYNECOLOGY
THE REPUBLICAN
4G NETWORK
Larkspur
@Felinious Wench, Team Uterati:
I love this along with everything else about your comment.
Polar Bear Squares
@Oedipus Tex:
Silly liberals. Always assuming we’ll attempt to kill you just because … we always threaten to try and kill you.
Wait until all the facts come out. And by facts, I mean some conservative blogger who idolizes Andrew Breitbart points out something innocuous and we try and turn this potential tragedy into a narrative that’s more comfortable for us.
Joel
@Oedipus Tex: I have thoughts of my own about your type of people, as well…
Basilisc
A very, very old story.
Step 1: Use violent rhetoric.
Step 2: Violence ensues.
Step 3: Demand/Implement authoritarian measures to stop the violence.
This was, of course, the core strategy of the Confederate Party for generations. Now it has been adopted by their subsidiary (the Republican party) in non-Southern regions. Wonder how it will all end.
Lee
@Felinious Wench, Team Uterati:
One of the issues with Texas is that the eastern and western boonies are solid red.
Most of the suburbs of those metropolitan areas are also solid red (except Houston). In the Dallas area there are now more people in the suburbs than in Dallas.
I live in the northern suburbs of Dallas and we are a wonderful shade of wingnut red. The only thing that might tip the scales is this new focus on the War on Women. There are a lot of those ‘sluts’ around here that think they should have control over their own body.
Unsympathetic
Republicans have crashed the Calvin and Hobbes GROSS party. For those of you who didn’t grow up to Bill Watterson, GROSS stands for Get Rid Of Slimy girlS.
They’ve missed one thing, however: GROSS was imaginary.
bjacques
Folks, just be glad that it didn’t have a much worse outcome, and keep working to turn Texas from magenta to a fine violet or even indigo. It’s a great place, but it has its share of assholes, who can number in the millions, because Texas is also a big place. Don’t let the assholes win.
@CaseyL:
When JFK was killed, those schoolkids cheered because it was announced that the day of the funeral would be a school holiday. At least, that’s according to the Rev. Dr. Ivan Stang, founder of the Church of the Subgenius and a Dallas native who was in primary school then. I remember being happy when LBJ’s death was announced, for the same reason. I was 9 years old.
DaBomb
@Felinious Wench, Team Uterati: Pretty much agreed with everything you said. As a Houstonian, it is annoying to be consistently lumped with crazy people.
And Austin does have a deep love for Ron Paul. Always has.
Tokyokie
@Boudica: She’s my state senator as well, and likewise I didn’t hear about it until this morning. A suspect has been detained already, but no information about him is available yet. And yes, it’s kinda scary.
A Humble Lurker
@Corner Stone:
You gave Stuck your copyright? I didn’t think that was the kind of thing you were apt to give up. Though you do share that racist southern defender one with Wyld so maybe I shouldn’t be that surprised.
And by the way, for all the nastiness you sling, you could learn to take it once and a while. I don’t bat an eyelash when folks make fun of Illinois and its Governor problem. Then again I am over the age of twelve, so that could be a factor.