…at the New York Times. They should find this embarrassing, but they won’t.
11 thoughts on “Layers Of Fact Checkers And Editors”
Yea gods…
“Where I grew up, masculinity involved schooling a mean dog to guard your truck or skipping the ignition spark to fire the points,”
Skipping the ignition to fire the points? I think that comes right after adjusting the battery timing and lubing the muffler bearings.
He pulled the hammer back to make sure the chamber was empty?
My read; this guy knows as much about guns as he does about cars: nothing.
“The barrel, however, slipped when I shifted my grip to pull the hammer back, to make certain the chamber was empty”
Good grief – how stupid does someone have to be to buy that, let alone write it.?
“and turned the gun toward the driver’s seat”
And you let it keep pointing at another person you didn’t intend to kill?
“When I let the hammer fall, the cylinder must have rotated without my knowing.”
What the hell else did you think would happen? (Actually, I think the cylinder rotates when you pull the hammer back, not when the hammer falls, but am more than willing to be corrected by someone who’s fired a revolver lately.)
“When I pulled the hammer back a second time it fired a live round.”
AND YOU STILL HAD IT POINTED AT A PERSON YOU DIDN’T INTEND TO KILL?
Plus, pulling the hammer back didn’t fire the weapon; letting the hammer fall onto the primer (or pulling the trigger to make it fall) did that.
If this story were anywhere near true, the investigating cops should have looked really hard at him for intentional murder.
This idiot (who’s probably lying anyway) gives a whole new meaning to the words “too stupid to live,” except in his case it’s “too stupid for his friend to live.”
And of course the NY Slimes lapped it up; it fits their narrative. >:-(
I find it interesting how the author, Bruce Holbert accuses the “gun lobby” of “oversimplifying matters”.
The gun lobby likes to say guns don’t kill people, people do. And they’re right, of course. I killed my friend; no one else did; no mechanism did. But this oversimplifies matters (as does the gun control advocates’ position that eliminating weapons will end violent crime).
My friend was killed by a man who misunderstood guns, who imagined that comfort with — and affection for — guns was a vital component of manhood. I did not recognize a gun for what it was: a machine constructed for a purpose, one in which I had no real interest. I treated a tool as an essential part of my identity, and the result is a dead man and a grieving family and a survivor numbed by guilt whose story lacks anything resembling a proper ending.
No, as Barbara emphasized above, that friend died because a gun was pointed at them (unintentionally or not). That’s pretty damn simple for a cause of death.
So what does the “gun lobby” have to say about this cause of death?
1. ALWAYS keep the gun pointed in a safe direction.
It’s the very first rule. Holbert says he still owns three firearms and he has yet to mention that most important of safety rules. He better get rid of them before he hurts someone again.
Maybe it was one of those British Webleys that are a revolver that weighs a ton and functions kinda sorta like a semi-automatic?
No comment section on that article….hmmm.
No comments at the NYT, but the Of Arms and the Law blog post does have comments, and over there commenter Craig has shown that the event did happen.
I enjoyed Barbara Skolaut’s righteous fisking above.
“Together, my three brothers own at least a dozen weapons and have yet to harm anyone with them.”
.
.
BFD, I own half that many by myself and I have never killed, maimed or injured not even a mole, mouse or gnat! Oh, or people either.
.
.
“…diagnoses of a range of maladies, including post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety and adult attention deficit disorders.”
.
.
He left out, Pseudologia fantastica.
.
.
“Like many other young men, I mythologized guns and the ideas of manhood associated with them.”
.
.
I grew up with guys, ‘many’ of whom could take ‘guns’ out of that sentence and add football, baseball, hockey, motorcycle racing, go cart racing, etc., etc., etc. What he’s referring to manliness is HIS group’s or HIS family’s idea of manliness / manhood. But even within families it can be different.
My uncle, my dad’s brother, was an avid hunter as is his son, as is my cousin’s son. My uncle played HS and college football, my cousin played pee wee, HS and college football, my cousin’s son played football like that too AND baseball. Their family thing is guns / sports.
My dad was a gun hater, he died being a gun hater. Hell, he once questioned my sanity because I had purchased my first rifle! My dad’s ‘manhood’ thing was working. 60 – 70 hours a week, every week, except for his vacation time every year. If not at his job, he worked around the house, in the yard, just always working.
My grandfather was a worker too. He was ALL about providing for the family, paying bills early, stashing money away, etc, was HIS idea of manhood. Then my father’s ideas about manhood grew from my grandfather’s. Dad’s disdain for sports was widely known, my grandfather loved watching sports.
My interests lay in among all that, I am, after all, a product of my family. At my house, as taught to my sons, manhood was about being the best you can be, regardless of what your ‘interests’ are. Now, to my sons and grandsons, it’s about being as educated as you can be, about as much as you can learn.
None of most of this has ANYTHING to do with the ‘novelists’ story about killing his ‘friend’.
In fact my crap has AS much to do with his story, as HIS story has to do with guns, gun rights or the ability of a writer to tell a riveting story. And I like my story better too. It ‘speaks’ to me specifically.
Barbara is right about the cylinder rotating when the hammer goes back.
Plus who checks if a revolver is loaded by pulling the hammer back? I’m no expert on all revolvers but I know it’s not even possible with mine. It sounds like something you see in a movie.
Hit the crane latch and look to see if the cylinder has any bullets in it.
If organizations like the New York Times insist on discussing “common sense gun regulation,” their editors need to learn about guns.
They sound like people who want to ban Tom Sawyer from high school libraries because of the explicit sex scenes.
I thought they wanted it banned because of the inter-racial sex scenes!?
The very fact that the ‘novelist’ thinks his brothers are gun guys based on a ‘number’ of guns owned shows his bias, IMO.
If organizations like the New York Times insist on discussing “common sense gun regulation,” their editors need to learn about guns.
From what I can gather, the New York Time’s “common sense” view is that all guns should be banned. They’re ignorant and fearful of guns (and the people who own them).
The Time is just maintaining its traditional role as the Authoritative Voice of Ignorance for the nation.
———————-
Walter Duranty
“Conditions are bad, but there is no famine,”
Editorial Topic of The Times Jan. 13, 1920
Professor Goddard does not know the relation of action to reaction, and of the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react. He seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools
Yea gods…
“Where I grew up, masculinity involved schooling a mean dog to guard your truck or skipping the ignition spark to fire the points,”
Skipping the ignition to fire the points? I think that comes right after adjusting the battery timing and lubing the muffler bearings.
He pulled the hammer back to make sure the chamber was empty?
My read; this guy knows as much about guns as he does about cars: nothing.
“The barrel, however, slipped when I shifted my grip to pull the hammer back, to make certain the chamber was empty”
Good grief – how stupid does someone have to be to buy that, let alone write it.?
“and turned the gun toward the driver’s seat”
And you let it keep pointing at another person you didn’t intend to kill?
“When I let the hammer fall, the cylinder must have rotated without my knowing.”
What the hell else did you think would happen? (Actually, I think the cylinder rotates when you pull the hammer back, not when the hammer falls, but am more than willing to be corrected by someone who’s fired a revolver lately.)
“When I pulled the hammer back a second time it fired a live round.”
AND YOU STILL HAD IT POINTED AT A PERSON YOU DIDN’T INTEND TO KILL?
Plus, pulling the hammer back didn’t fire the weapon; letting the hammer fall onto the primer (or pulling the trigger to make it fall) did that.
If this story were anywhere near true, the investigating cops should have looked really hard at him for intentional murder.
This idiot (who’s probably lying anyway) gives a whole new meaning to the words “too stupid to live,” except in his case it’s “too stupid for his friend to live.”
And of course the NY Slimes lapped it up; it fits their narrative. >:-(
I find it interesting how the author, Bruce Holbert accuses the “gun lobby” of “oversimplifying matters”.
No, as Barbara emphasized above, that friend died because a gun was pointed at them (unintentionally or not). That’s pretty damn simple for a cause of death.
So what does the “gun lobby” have to say about this cause of death?
It’s the very first rule. Holbert says he still owns three firearms and he has yet to mention that most important of safety rules. He better get rid of them before he hurts someone again.
Maybe it was one of those British Webleys that are a revolver that weighs a ton and functions kinda sorta like a semi-automatic?
No comment section on that article….hmmm.
No comments at the NYT, but the Of Arms and the Law blog post does have comments, and over there commenter Craig has shown that the event did happen.
I enjoyed Barbara Skolaut’s righteous fisking above.
“Together, my three brothers own at least a dozen weapons and have yet to harm anyone with them.”
.
.
BFD, I own half that many by myself and I have never killed, maimed or injured not even a mole, mouse or gnat! Oh, or people either.
.
.
“…diagnoses of a range of maladies, including post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety and adult attention deficit disorders.”
.
.
He left out, Pseudologia fantastica.
.
.
“Like many other young men, I mythologized guns and the ideas of manhood associated with them.”
.
.
I grew up with guys, ‘many’ of whom could take ‘guns’ out of that sentence and add football, baseball, hockey, motorcycle racing, go cart racing, etc., etc., etc. What he’s referring to manliness is HIS group’s or HIS family’s idea of manliness / manhood. But even within families it can be different.
My uncle, my dad’s brother, was an avid hunter as is his son, as is my cousin’s son. My uncle played HS and college football, my cousin played pee wee, HS and college football, my cousin’s son played football like that too AND baseball. Their family thing is guns / sports.
My dad was a gun hater, he died being a gun hater. Hell, he once questioned my sanity because I had purchased my first rifle! My dad’s ‘manhood’ thing was working. 60 – 70 hours a week, every week, except for his vacation time every year. If not at his job, he worked around the house, in the yard, just always working.
My grandfather was a worker too. He was ALL about providing for the family, paying bills early, stashing money away, etc, was HIS idea of manhood. Then my father’s ideas about manhood grew from my grandfather’s. Dad’s disdain for sports was widely known, my grandfather loved watching sports.
My interests lay in among all that, I am, after all, a product of my family. At my house, as taught to my sons, manhood was about being the best you can be, regardless of what your ‘interests’ are. Now, to my sons and grandsons, it’s about being as educated as you can be, about as much as you can learn.
None of most of this has ANYTHING to do with the ‘novelists’ story about killing his ‘friend’.
In fact my crap has AS much to do with his story, as HIS story has to do with guns, gun rights or the ability of a writer to tell a riveting story. And I like my story better too. It ‘speaks’ to me specifically.
Barbara is right about the cylinder rotating when the hammer goes back.
Plus who checks if a revolver is loaded by pulling the hammer back? I’m no expert on all revolvers but I know it’s not even possible with mine. It sounds like something you see in a movie.
Hit the crane latch and look to see if the cylinder has any bullets in it.
If organizations like the New York Times insist on discussing “common sense gun regulation,” their editors need to learn about guns.
They sound like people who want to ban Tom Sawyer from high school libraries because of the explicit sex scenes.
I thought they wanted it banned because of the inter-racial sex scenes!?
The very fact that the ‘novelist’ thinks his brothers are gun guys based on a ‘number’ of guns owned shows his bias, IMO.
If organizations like the New York Times insist on discussing “common sense gun regulation,” their editors need to learn about guns.
From what I can gather, the New York Time’s “common sense” view is that all guns should be banned. They’re ignorant and fearful of guns (and the people who own them).
The Time is just maintaining its traditional role as the Authoritative Voice of Ignorance for the nation.
———————-
Walter Duranty
“Conditions are bad, but there is no famine,”
Editorial Topic of The Times Jan. 13, 1920
Professor Goddard does not know the relation of action to reaction, and of the need to have something better than a vacuum against which to react. He seems to lack the knowledge ladled out daily in high schools