A nasty little imp sitting on my shoulder is telling me that this case wouldn’t be getting the saturation police response that it is if some of the victims/targets were not themselves police officers or their family members. We now have the Kafka-esque spectacle of police officers (who have been named as targets of the killer) being given round-the-clock police protection.

The suspect was travelling in a grey Nissan pickup. On Thursday, two women driving a blue Honda pickup were shot by mistake by officers who suspected that they woz the bad guy. Their pickup was riddled with gunfire – more than 30 bullet holes, looks like Swiss cheese – yet both women have non-life-threatening injuries. I guess in the dark, all trucks are grey.

Truly, the gang that can’t shoot straight. Or at the right car. But this is who we’re going to call to protect us?

llater,

llamas

For my response – what PdH said, plus my usual pablum about how the perfect is the enemy of the good.

One thing’s for sure – violent thugs (of whatever stripe) always flurish wherever there is a virtual guaratntee that their victims will not be able to effectively resist.

I like the dogs and cans-of-lager approach, having regard to my usual rants about keeping a dog to do what you’re not prepared to do for yourself. But it’s not always practical to take your Doberman wherever you go. Is it, Bogie?

llater,

llamas

What’s the good answer? Is there a good answer?

Not really but there are less-bad answers. And the worse answer is to appease or tolerate or not confront them.

Our political class and institutions do not fill me with confidence so the less-bad answers need to come from elsewhere. But in truth, they usually do.

Thus, those who specialize in violence will almost always have a tactical advantage. They can mass – attacking two or more to one. They can choose the time and place. They can select their targets.

What stops them? Getting caught – if not in the act, being tracked down afterwards – and severely punished. But this is only useful against criminals who commit violent acts that individually merit serious punishment.

In a law-bound society, that leaves an opening for criminals who commit small acts of violence. The costs of administering formal punishment are such that such small violence may be committed with near-impunity. And since it is rarely committed for gain, the usual legal classifications don’t fit.

Individual self-defense fails for the reasons given in the first two paragraphs. Informal counter-intimidation works; but it is a cure nearly as bad as the disease. It empowers a class of uncontrolled “enforcers”, who may turn around and demand deference and rewards from those they “defend”.

State action can work – by forcing the bullies out of public spaces, and suppressing all their ways of “marking” territory. But that is intrusive.

What’s the good answer? Is there a good answer?

I notice you skipped away from your claim that welfare states aren’t prevalent in Muslim countries.

Skipped away? Actually I answered it… most are poor, and thus could not be welfare states.

I’m not Chinese.

And I did not say you were, indeed I assumed you were a white guy with a Chinese wife. So what? That does not mean you do not share the ‘hierarchy of races’ attitude.

And the ‘observation’ that Muslim immigrants are disproportionately heavy users of welfare is an empirical fact.

Yes, but what is not an empirical fact is why that is the case and as I have said before if you bothered to read it, is that the fact they are muslims is not the reason why that is. I am told a high proportion of Romanians in the UK, who are not muslims, are also heavy welfare spongers. Welfare inevitably attracts too many of the ‘wrong’ kind of immigrants.

Yet you seem somehow convinced that I’m the one suffering from debatable assumptions.

Indeed you are. In fact you seem to be either unwilling or perhaps incapable of making an argument rather than simply making assertions.

They do have gangs, they’re dispersed and don’t go around looking for trouble, but if someone gets in some bother everyone is there like a shot.

Sounds quite civilized to me, although I’m not sure the term ‘gangs’ is appropriate.

My deeper point is that gangs of thugs such as you describe only come to pass in places where a) they are officially sanctioned by the State (the mutaween) or b) where there is no effective law AND individuals (and specifically, women) are powerless to resist them (places like the banlieus of Paris and (allegedly) the streets of the UK).

As I suggested, the mere chance of effective resistance usually makes clowns like this (whether alone or in groups) dissolve away.

If you accost a random person on the street in Michigan, the odds are about 1 in 40 that that person is licensed to carry a concealed weapon. And those are just the licensed carriers. Based on my own street experience, I would say that the odds are more-like 1 in 30. And the rate is higher in urban areas – like Dearborn.

Your figures for the population and demographics of Dearborn are no-doubt correct – but they cover the entire city, and they also ignore the adjacent muncipalities. My on-street experience is that the main corridors through Dearborn and the surrounding cities of Westland and Melvindale (Michigan Avenue and the Southfield) are majority-populated by an Arab/Muslim demographic, with Lebanese, Syrians, Iraqis and Iranians as the main ethnic origins.

llater,

llamas

I’m not Chinese.

And the ‘observation’ that Muslim immigrants are disproportionately heavy users of welfare is an empirical fact.

Yet you seem somehow convinced that I’m the one suffering from debatable assumptions.

I think it’s best we stop now.

Poor Muslim countries are not because well, they are poor.

Indeed. And most muslim countries are poor. Which is why your remarks about ‘muslim’ culture & welfare are so meaningless.

Isn’t this just a pretentious way of saying I’m a racist?

No, it says what it said and unlike you, I try not to leap to conclusions without more information. So I avoid calling you a racist even though you present many of the distinctive ‘markers’ of a racist and so perhaps you share the sort of implicit ‘hierarchy of races’ notions (indeed so often found amongst the Chinese, but you probably place yours at the top of course). But I am guessing and do not care enough to really want to know. A statist, without doubt, and a very authoritarian one (your example of Singapore is a useful clue), so a bit of a post-modern fascist I would surmise.

It’s rather empirical, you see.

Nope. You seem to think your views are the product of dispassionate observation of things that are self evident, as if simple observation could produce understanding. In reality your views are loaded with debatable assumptions.

Rich Muslim countries are among the biggest welfare states in the world. Poor Muslim countries are not because well, they are poor.

“And you also make incorrect deductions from your ‘rather simple empirical observations’, presumably because you regard ‘immigrants = bad’ as axiomatic, but then I am just guessing as you do not really say why you think the things you do. ”

Isn’t this just a pretentious way of saying I’m a racist?

I have an inter-racial marriage and my three kids are a roughly equal mix of ethnic Chinese, Indian and Western European.

And I think immigration can be a very positive development if, as done in Singapore, immigrants are linked to work visas and unable to draw on the state for money. In other words, they are a net benefit to the economy.

It’s rather empirical, you see.