Family Research Council Shooting Wounds Security Guard (UPDATED) (PHOTOS)

[Valin]

Huffington Post:

 

8/15/12

 

WASHINGTON -- Federal law enforcement officials and D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department are investigating a Wednesday morning shooting at the offices of the Family Research Council in downtown D.C.

 

According to multiple media reports, a security guard was shot in the arm at 801 G Street NW, near the Verizon Center in Chinatown. The alleged assailant was brought into custody.

 

According to WRC-TV/NBC4's Jackie Bensen, sources say Chick-fil-A promotional materials were found in the suspect's backpack, in addition to "2 loaded 15-round ammo clips."

 

MPD Police Chief Cathy Lanier called the security guard a hero, the Examiner reported. "As far as I'm concerned, the security officer here is a hero," Lanier said, according to the newspaper. "The person never made it past him."

 

The security guard was reportedly conscious following the shooting, according to WJLA-TV/ABC7, which said that the guard was able to relay information about the incident to police.

 

(Snip)

 

[Valin]

Bloodshed and Invective in the District of Columbia

B. Daniel Blatt

August 16, 2012.

 

We here at GayPatriot have never been fans of the Family Research Council (FRC). And much as we disagree with many of that social conservative organization’s policies, particularly its narrow (and often inaccurate) portrayal of gay Americans, we disagree as well with those, including the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center, who dub FRC a “hate group.” As John Hinderaker puts it, “gay activists and their allies have consistently smeared the Family Research Council as a ‘hate group’ because it supports traditional marriage.”

 

Support for traditional marriage does not, however, necessarily mean hatred of gay people.

 

Yet, given that the man who shot a guard at the Family Research Center in Washington, D.C. yesterday had volunteered at a local gay and lesbian center, we need to ask if a different climate of hate, a climate that exists within all too many gay organizations and which we read on some gay left blogs, spurred him on. Indeed, there are reports that the shooter ”made statements regarding [FRC's] policies, and then opened fire with a gun striking a security guard“.

 

It is, to be sure, facile and mistaken to attribute this particular madman’s act directly to Democratic or LGBT activists. But it is legitimate to hold gay organizations and particularly their most virulent supporters in the media responsible for the gale of anger that has produced the a good number of threats against advocates of traditional marriage, setting the nation on edge. Many on the gay left have exploited the arguments of division, reaping media favor by demonizing Mormons (and other Christians), or social conservatives, or Republicans. They seem to have persuaded many Americans that social conservatives are not just misguided, but the enemy of the people.

 

And despite these arguments of divisions, to their credit, a number of gay and lesbian organizations released a joint statement yesterday condemning the shooting:

 

(Snip)

 

These groups need to do more than just condemn the attack; they should also examine how their harsh rhetoric may have contributed to it.

[Valin]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfXQFsi2TT0

[pollyannaish]

This event certainly exposed media bias regarding politics. Did they leap to the conclusion it was one of those hateful leftists and call out innocent folks in the phonebook who might be associated with the occupy movement?

[Valin]

Dana Milbank: ‘NOM Is Right’ on SPLC

Maggie Gallagher

August 16, 2012 10:08 P.M.

 

The Southern Poverty Law Center is doubling down on its labeling of mainstream conservative Christian groups as “hate groups” equivalent to the Ku Klux Klan. The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank deserves great credit for saying what should be obvious:

 

(Snip)

 

He goes on: “I disagree with the Family Research Council’s views on gays and lesbians. But it’s absurd to put the group, as the law center does, in the same category as Aryan Nations, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Stormfront, and the Westboro Baptist Church. The center says the FRC ‘often makes false claims about the LGBT community based on discredited research and junk science.’ Exhibit A in its dossier is a quote by an FRC official from 1999 (!) saying that ‘gaining access to children has been a long-term goal of the homosexual movement.’ Offensive, certainly. But in the same category as the KKK?”

 

(Snip)