I don't know the in's and out's of Japanese politics, and what had led the poor guy to assassinate the former Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe. What I will comment about, is the failure of the security detail to protect the former Prime Minister. Which led to him being killed.
I have seen the video, that NDTV had acquired. As you can see, there was a first shot. And the former PM have even saw his assassin. Then there was the second, as you can see, Abe hold his neck and fell down.
I'm no security expert. I'm a jobless bum. But it is very clear, there is something wrong in the execution of duty, by the security detail. First is, not securing the perimeter. Shinzo Abe is not just a mere politician, he is a former Prime Minister, head of Government of Japan. How can that man, came so close to the former PM. In the US, former presidents are still under the protection of the Secret Service. Again I don't know about Japan, there are bodyguards, but they definitely failed in protecting Abe.
Second, there was a first shot. Abe even looked back to see the commotion. It's right to apprehend the assassin. But shouldn't have they secured Abe? They just let him stood there, until the second shot happened, and Abe fell down. What should have they done, is after that first shot, take Abe away to some secure spot, while it is happening, disarmed that assassin. If they have done that, the former Prime Minister may have been be still with us.
I don't know what will be the implications, of a former politician dying by a gunshot in Japan's politics. Philippines has also it's own episodes of assassinations too. And Filipino's are still polarized if his death, have done good or bad for the country. It had cause a revolution, and toppled Ferdinand Marcos. His wife become President, and also his son 3 decades after that. The only weird thing is, just one full presidential term away. The son of Ferdinand Marcos, became President. They are only separated by Rodrigo Duterte. Yes, if you don't know yet, I am talking about Ninoy Aquino. Whose name might be removed in the airport, in which he was assassinated. Just like Abe, a behind the back shooting.
Again I don't know about the implications, but there will be. In the Philippines, we are feeling the results of the assassination of Ninoy. In the worldwide sense, Gavrilo Princip killing Archduke Francis Ferdinand, launch World War 1, in which leads to the establishment of Communism in Russia, by the help of the Germans. Fascism, because of the unfair treatment of Italy, despite being with Allies. Nazism, because of the unfair and heavy punishment on Germany. And also, Imperial Japan. All of those led us to World War 2, to the Cold War Era, and the wars inside of it, Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, African wars. To the Gulf War era, Yugoslav wars, 911, Iraq, Afghanistan, ISIS, to the present Russia-Ukraine conflict. All because a Serbian, assassinated an Austrian Monarch. There will be implications. I just don't how big or small it is.
I have my reservations about the incident, that happened in happened in Mandaluyong last Sunday. It's only supposed to be a shorties. But I think, my thoughts will be too long for that.
I am saying this without knowing all the details. Even though it's already out and completed. I can be corrected by anyone, who fully knows all the details. I am only saying my opinions, based on that short video.
Let's examine the first bump. Again I'm saying without knowing all the details. But I think the first bump, will not be enough, for someone to go down like that. I think the guard acted up, to high up the drama, knowing their is a lot of CCTV and dash cams, around. Maybe has has one with himself too. Little did he know that the SUV driver would ran him over. Unless the guard have past internal injuries for that to happen. But without that, I don't think that's enough to be lay down.
And not to acquit the driver of SUV, but you can't fully condemn him a 100%. Did he ran over him on purpose, with an intention to kill? Only he can say. You don't know how scary to be stopped by on the street, whether you have violations or not. Especially when have hidden bones in the chest. But knowing, unconfirmed, that the driver surrendered. Maybe he just panic, and that's the result of it.
Should the driver be jailed? Absolutely. The guard suffered injuries, because of what he had done. A lot of expenses will come out, that the poor man, may not afford. Hospital fees, lost of day's work, resulting to debt because of daily expenses. If he has family, schooling fees. The man should pay for damages, and be jailed to learn his lesson. But we can't judge him fully, that he ran him over with an evil intention. I think it's a result of panic, that he loses his mind. He needed to tried at court and let the judge examine by evidence, testimonies by witness and experts. Before we can fully judge that he really was trying to killed the man, or otherwise. But the action of him doing that is enough for him to be jailed, at least. And that's my opinion on this matter.
August 2019, James Corden, host of The Late Late Show compiled a video of him consoling his viewers, about different mass shooting. And on that day, another one happened. His first five words are, and here we are again.
And here we are again, now James Corden openly dismayed, and had lost hope, that nothing will ever change. And you can't blame him, they have been apologozing the farthest that I remember, was since Obama. Obama, Trump, Biden. Three presidents has come, and nothing changes. All these presidents are saying, after all has been said and nothing done, was our thoughts and prayers are with you. I'm not discounting the thoughts and prayers. But people expect more than that, since you are the most powerful person in the world.
But you can't fully blame the president, for doing nothing. Even if he pursues, but the Senate blocks, nothing will happen. NRA has them on their pockets, that they will never move a finger, even if something happens. Gun owners and enthusiast, will cite this if you debate them, The Second Amendment:
"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
But when was this written, 1791. America has just won the American Revolutionary War of Independence, against the British Empire. And by the year 1812, another war happened between them, that have resulted to the burning of the White House. If you are against a military power, like the British Empire. Then it's just right to keep and bear arms, for it's wartime, and you're against a big power. But that was then. Now you are the big daddy of the world. No one had dare to attack US soil, with the exception of Japanese and the Al Qaeda. Even Russia and China, will not dare to do that, despite their powers. No one will touch the US. Times have changed, and I think it's also time to change the Second Amendment.
What I'm trying to say is this. I'm not anti gun. But military grade weapons, should only be handled by the military, not ordinary citizens. Some may argue self-defense. One bullet to the knee, or the hand, is enough to incapacitate one person, from doing more harm. Automatics and semi-automatics, are not for self-defense. That's for mowing down people. It's a good defense for repeling an invasion. But in peace time, it should have no place. Sell it militaries that need them, that will pay you millions and billions for it. Not to your own citizens, that will only pay thousands, and will kill innocents just because he has nothing to do. Before I end I will quote the news about it.
19 children and two adults are killed in a Texas elementary school shooting, the authorities say.
UVALDE, Texas — A gunman killed at least 19 children and two adults on Tuesday in a rural Texas elementary school, a state police official said, in the deadliest American school shooting since the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary a decade ago.
The slayings took place just before noon at Robb Elementary School, where second through fourth graders in Uvalde, a small city west of San Antonio, were preparing to start summer break this week. At least one teacher was among the adults killed, and several other children were wounded.
The gunman, whom the authorities identified as an 18-year-old man who had attended a nearby high school, was armed with several weapons, officials said. He also died at the scene, they said.
“He shot and killed horrifically, incomprehensibly,” Gov. Greg Abbott said in a news conference.
As terrified parents in Uvalde waited for word of their children’s safety and law enforcement officials raced to piece together how the attack had transpired, the mass shooting was deepening a national political debate over gun laws and the prevalence of weapons. Ten days earlier, a gunman fatally shot 10 people inside a Buffalo grocery store.
“This is just evil,” Rey Chapa, an Uvalde resident, said of Tuesday’s killings while using an expletive. Mr. Chapa said his nephew was in the school when the shooting took place but was safe. He was waiting to hear back from relatives and friends on the conditions of other children, scrolling through Facebook for updates. “I’m afraid I’m going to know a lot of these kids that were killed.”
Across the street from the school, state troopers were scattered across the school lawn and an ambulance idled with its lights flashing. Adolfo Hernandez, a longtime Uvalde resident, said his nephew had been in a classroom near where the shooting took place.
“He actually witnessed his little friend get shot in the face,” Mr. Hernandez said. The friend, he said, “got shot in the nose and he just went down, and my nephew was devastated.”
In a brief address from the White House on Tuesday night, President Biden grew emotional as he reflected on the attack and called for action, but did not advocate for a particular policy or vote.
“It’s just sick,” he said of the sorts of weapons that are easily available in the United States and used in mass shootings. “Where in God’s name is our backbone, the courage to do more and then stand up to the lobbies? It’s time to turn this pain into action.”
Mr. Biden later added, “May the Lord be near to the brokenhearted and save those crushed in spirit, because they’re going to need a lot.”
The shooting took place on Election Day in Texas, as voters across the state headed to the polls for primary runoffs that would set the stage for the November election at a time when the state and the nation have been riven by political disagreements over race, immigration and abortion.
As the deadly toll became known, the events at Robb Elementary School immediately brought forth wrenching memories of the devastating 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook in Newtown, Conn., that left six staff members and 20 children dead, some as young as 6 years old. Six years later, a gunman killed 17 people at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.
Lydia Martinez Delgado said that her niece Eva Mireles, a teacher of fourth graders at the school, was among those who had died in the rampage. Ms. Mireles had been a teacher for 17 years, her aunt said, and was “very loved,” an avid hiker and took pride in teaching mostly students of Latino heritage. “She was the fun of the party,” Ms. Martinez Delgado said.
For many, the weight of the tragedy appeared to be compounded by its arrival so soon after a deadly mass killing of Black shoppers in a grocery store in Buffalo, in what was one of the deadliest racist massacres in recent American history. It had been the deadliest shooting in the United States this year until Tuesday’s killings in Uvalde.
Mr. Abbott said that the shooter was a resident of the same county where the shooting took place, that he attended high school there and that he had acted alone. He entered the elementary school with a handgun and possibly a rifle, the governor said.
It was not immediately clear whether the shooting took place in one classroom or several and officials did not release the names or ages of the students killed or of the teacher. At least three children — a 9-year-old and two 10-year-olds, one in critical condition — were taken to University Health, a hospital in San Antonio, for treatment.
Officials were looking into whether the gunman, whom they identified as Salvador Ramos, had been targeting the school or whether he ended up there by chance, according to a law enforcement official, who requested anonymity to describe the investigation that he cautioned was still unfolding. The gunman appeared to have crashed a pickup truck through a barrier at the school before heading inside, the official said. At least two law enforcement officials who had tried to engage the gunman were injured in the shooting, neither seriously, the official said.
Marsha Espinosa, an assistant secretary at the Department of Homeland Security, said at least one agent with the U.S. Border Patrol was wounded after responding to the shooting at Robb Elementary School. “Upon entering the building, Agents & other law enforcement officers faced gun fire from the subject, who was barricaded inside,” she wrote on Twitter.
Shortly before the massacre, a 66-year-old woman was shot in her home in Uvalde, the official said, and later airlifted to a San Antonio hospital with gunshot wounds. The official said the woman appeared to have been the gunman’s grandmother and had been shot before the shooting at the school; both shootings, and the connection between them, remained under investigation.
The shooting took place just after 11:30 a.m. For much of the afternoon, as word spread, anguished parents were instructed by the district to stay away from the school. “Please do not pick up students at this time,” the school district instructed parents, directing them to a local civic center. “Students need to be accounted for before they are released to your care.”
Ryan Ramirez told KSAT in San Antonio that he could not find his daughter, a fourth grader at Robb Elementary, when he showed up at the school or at a reunification point at a civic center. “Nobody’s telling me anything,” he said, adding, “I’m trying to find out where my baby’s at.”
Even before much was known about the gunman, his motives or details about the weapons he used, the killings thrust the debate over gun control and Second Amendment rights back into the forefront of national attention.
Senator Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut and an advocate for gun control legislation, said, “I think everybody here is going to be shaken to the core by this.” He added: “I have no idea how a community deals with this. There’s no way to do this well. Your community is never ever the same after this.”
The National Rifle Association is set to hold its annual meeting in Houston starting on Friday. Mr. Abbott is among the list of prominent Republicans slated to appear, along with former President Donald J. Trump and Senator Ted Cruz.
“Today is a dark day,” Mr. Cruz said in a statement. In messages posted to Twitter he said the nation had “seen too many of these shootings,” but he did not immediately call for any specific policy proposals to help prevent mass killings.
Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat whose effort at legislation on background checks for gun purchases was blocked in 2013, said, “It makes no sense at all why we can’t do common-sense things and try to prevent some of this from happening.”
Joaquin Castro, a U.S. representative for Texas, described Uvalde, which has about 15,000 residents, as a “wonderful, tight-knit community.” In the neighborhood around the school, more than 40 percent of residents have lived in the same house for at least 30 years, census data shows.
Robb Elementary serves more than 500 students, mostly between the ages of 7 and 10. Roughly 90 percent of the students are Hispanic, according to district records, and almost all of the rest are white.
A sign hanging from the brick school building near the edge of the city center reads “Welcome!” and “¡Bienvenidos!” next to the school’s logo, a heart.
Reporting was contributed by Mike Baker, Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs, Emily Cochrane, Jacey Fortin, Robert Gebeloff, Jesus Jiménez, Alyssa Lukpat, Eduardo Medina, Sarah Mervosh and Michael D. Shear.
When I was a child. There was this ad that tend to look down on the Philippines, from the perspective of a balikbayan that came home to the country from the US. She was criticizing the crooked roads, pollution, beggars, and saying: Walang ganyan sa States. I don't remember what product is it anymore but the point is this. In my 32 years of life. I have yet to see mass shootings here in the Philippines. Yes there are terrorist attacks. But those are terrorist, who have extremist views. I mean we have still to this day, conflict zones, but at least they are combatants to combatants. Incidentally they are victims of crossfires. But again those are conflict zones, to be easily understood warzones. You expect it to happen their. But in an elementary school, of a rich country, and a rich state. And an eighteen year old, has to be the murderer? With the exception of what I have pointed out. I can proudly na walang ganyan sa Philippines.
The opposition has been soundly defeated last election, with both Presumptive President and Vice President, having an overwhelming lead against their co-candidates. And with the Senate composing of 11 pro-administrations candidates winning, and only one from the opposition. Also knowing the trend in the Lower House, most of them, that are not from the ruling party, they will jump ship.
If the trend would continue, will the opposition survive? It will depend on what they will do in the nearest future. And as of how they are acting already, their future is very bleak. And why did I say that giving Marcos a chance, is the only way?
Just look at the presidency of Rodrigo Duterte. The opposition attack him early on his term. Not giving him a grace period, that he deserved. Investigations started on the alleged extra judicial killings, so on and so forth. How did the voters saw this? They saw the opposition, as an obstructionist, and an usurper opposition. That they will do everything for Duterte to fail, and put Robredo in power. And that became very clear, on the midterm elections, where no candidate from their side won a seat in the Senate. And again this presidential and senatorial elections, only one from them came forth.
But what will be different from the Marcos and Duterte Presidency? Marcos' mandate was much larger, it was double Duterte's numbers. And I don't know if I'm right, please correct me if I'm not. Marcos is the first majority president, or if not, it's years, decades since the Philippines have one. Again I'm not really sure of that. But I voted on two Presidential Elections, PNoy, whom I did not vote, and PRRD. both of them won by plurality, and not majority. It's the first time that I have seen a majority win, with an overwhelming lead.
But what does it mean? It means that Marcos has a larger base of voters. It means that he has endorsing power. If the opposition, will antagonize him too early, repeating the same mistake they did with Duterte, they will be politically eliminated. That's why I am saying that they should give him a chance. A chance for what? Everything, but especially to fail, without opposition's insinuation.
I mean it's like this, if you attacking, hindering him, early on, and he fail. He can now pinpoint the opposition, as the cause of it. And people are inclined to see it that way. However if you don't unnecessarily attack and hinder, then he failed, the blame is on him. Just like Duterte, he wasn't all ups and highs. But he was attacked too early, that the later accusations, didn't matter. Was only seen as useless politicking.
But these strategy has pro's and con's. Pro's if he will fail, the con's if he succeeds, now more people will flock to him. And as of what the opposition is doing lately, they are about to do the same mistakes, they did with Duterte. I'm not saying that there will be no more opposition. That will only happen, if we became a dictatorship, as they feared. I saw the Red Cliff movie, and have come to like this quote, in the context of my blog. From division comes unity, from unity, division. This alliance of the incoming administration, will eventually crumble. But if they will kept it, just a little longer, a certain faction, particularly the Liberal Party, might ceased to exist, or the very least be politically insignificant. That is if they will not heed my advice. But then again, who am I, for them to listen.
Although I promised, that I will post a prediction formula, that will see who will win this Presidential Election. It's too obvious that he will win, and he did by an overwhelming lead. I will post the chart, and we'll see if I have time to post it in the near future. Although it's now a hindsight, and not a prediction anymore.
But could VP Leni, have a chance? I think not. Maybe with a smaller lead, by the frontrunner and not this wide. And why I am blaming the supporter's especially, of the defeat of the VP, against the former senator, whom she defeated when they last face each other on an elections? Let's enumerate.
It's not also, that VP Leni has no faults of her own. Like I've said before, politics is a combination of many things. One of them is being subtle, she directly oppose Duterte from day 1. Not giving Duterte a grace period as a newcomer, that past Presidents enjoyed. In turn, his based harden on their support, and saw the opposition as an obstructionist, and usurper opposition. Even if they throw heavy rounds of accusation as the days revealed, the support didn't wind down. And it became very obvious in the midterm elections, that they have little support, and Duterte has massive one.
Adding to that is the grievance, of the supporters, of the now presumptive-President, Bongbong Marcos. Because of the loss of their bet on the VP race, because of an alleged rigging of the results.
Now at the start of the campaign. Why do I blame the supporters? Because they exalted themselves, as the superior voters, for voting the right candidate as they perceived. Calling the others, that are not with them stupids, enablers, etc. Things that are not pleasant to someone's ears. And phrases like, let me educate you.
First of all, you should exalt your candidate, and not yourselves, meaning the supporters. And second of all, elections is a numbers game. It's not about who has superior voters, in terms of being right, had credentials, knows all, holier than thou, but with the superior number of voters. It's addition, not tribalism. You should have learn your lesson in the midterms, that acting like that, will not win you elections. But you have to repeat the same mistakes of 2019, to this much more crucial 2022 elections.
And that's what you get. Not that VP Leni deserves it. She, as a candidate, in campaign, is just fine. Messaging, planning, all is good. But the supporters, ruined it for her. I don't think that she can win, but the gap will not be that wide. And it's not all of her supporters. But the extremist and the loud ones. They even ask out of nowhere who is your candidate, and if it's not her, they will try to convert you on the spot. Again with a not so good communication. They dissuade, instead of convince.
Again, not that VP Leni deserves to lose. But those loud and extremist supporters, that are holier than thou, may very well deserved this, not really an upset. She was never in the lead, from the beginning. Especially those who disown relatives, cut ties with friends, just because of this election. Especially your parents, who brought raised you to the world, and you will disown just because of politics? It's not worth it. It's just an election, and they are just politicians, who you may have not touch their hands. Again it's not all of you, on the pink side. But some of you, really ruined her.
Learn your lesson. Change your approach. And someday you might comeback into power.
