OK, not much info to go on yet, but a single shooter has different implications than multiple shooters. And when it’s on an army base, it looks like a suicide murder, at least eventually. Call me a bigot, but the latter has to make me speculate about the shooters’ religious beliefs. And if that plays out, I think that it could be said that the administration didn’t keep us safe from attacks. But we’ll see.
[Update a few minutes later]
OK, the FBI is saying that this was “not a terrorist incident.” A dozen people dead, a couple dozen more wounded, by multiple shooters, but it wasn’t a terrorist incident? What in the world does that mean? If they mean it’s not international terrorism, or Islamic terrorism, then they should say that, but they just make themselves look stupid if they deny that this is terrorism.
[Mid-afternoon update]
Major Malik Hasan Nadal. Probably a Jehovah’s Witness.
Move along, nothing to see here.
[Evening update]
Had meetings this afternoon, then came home and made dinner, so not much time to follow up.
Just three points:
First, if you want to call this guy crazy, then he has millions of crazy cohorts who agree with everything he said. The only thing different about him is that he managed to survive in the US military with such beliefs for so long.
Second, I’d like to know how far up the chain of command warnings about his behavior went, and at what level they were squelched. This might tell us the degree to which this was a failure of the current administration.
Third, in response to Dave O’Neill, yes, absolutely there would have been many fewer casualties today had the people who have been issued, and trained in the use of, their service revolvers semi-automatic pistols been allowed to carry them on base (not to mention in public in one of the most liberal, using that word in its correct meaning, states in the allowing of carrying weapons by trained citizens, off base). Those military and civilian personnel were just as sitting ducks as people in idiotic “gun-free” schools and universities. I’d like to think that this would result in a rethinking of the policy of disarming military personnel on base, but I won’t hold my breath waiting for it in this administration. <sarcasm>That regulation sure prevented Major Nadal from bringing his own 9mm weapons to the slaughter.</sarcasm>
And Patterico documents the emerging politically correct and false narrative from the media.
One other point. From what I hear, his cousins and family (Muslims) are devastated and cannot understand his actions. I have no reason to believe that they are not patriotic Americans, and my heart goes out to them, as well as to the families of the victims. But that doesn’t take away from the fact that he was, at its root, driven by his own religious beliefs, warped or otherwise. If we continue out of political correctness to refuse to confront that reality, we cannot win this war.