Baltimore Riots (courtesy dailycaller.com)

“It’s a very delicate balancing act, because while we tried to make sure that they were protected from the cars and the other things that were going on, we also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well.” – Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake [via dailycaller.com]

88 COMMENTS

  1. Its good to know that the home and business owners that were abandoned were able to protect themselves and their property from the mob.
    Oh wait, this was in Baltimore.

    • Hmmm.Call me crazy, This could explain some of the increase in states passing shall issue laws and people getting CC weapons.

      Internet and youtube, two of the greatest instruments of re-awakening people’s appreciation for the Second Amendment.

    • Since I was out of it this weekend, did main stream media cover this rioting like they did Ferguson riots? I’m not sure if it was because this happened in Baltimore in the deader news time of Friday night to Saturday or are they learning it is better to ignore this for a myriad of reasons; mostly likely not to drive public to gun ownership by showcasing the government incompetence and police inaction?

    • They don’t call people who want to murder everyone in the entire country who doesn’t share their faith “terrorists,” so failing to call property-destroyers and vandals “rioters” comes as a shock to some of you?

      • Yes. They can’t even call the victims ‘Christian’. If it doesn’t fit their narrative, ignore it.

        • You don’t know for sure that they were Christians, you only have the murderers word that they were. For all we know those Muslims executing people could be Christians and the victims could be the Muslins! To be on the safe side we’ll just call the terrorists white conservatives.

          /insane sarcasm

    • It’s not really rioting anymore. It’s open warfare against the police and governmental authority.

      • That can’t be!

        I’ll believe that as soon as I’ll believe the Bloods and the Crips would lay down their arms for one day and stand arm and arm…

        Oh, wait…

      • No, it’s not open warfare against police and government. It’s random violence against people that had nothing to do with it. They ought to be protesting who they have a problem with, not destroying private property.

  2. Waitaminuit…is the mayor openly admitting that they made it safer…for the rioters? Please tell me that’s not what she just said.

    Also, I hate to bring the obvious here, but the statist media will ridicule the peaceful and law-abiding NRA convention for posting pictures where nary a non-white face can be seen, but will say nothing about pics like this where the opposite is true. (Yeah, I see the ONE white guy back there.)

      • Ah, they’re hard to see on my phone, but you’re right. The main point still stands, though.

    • I see at least six…including the guy wearing the ninja mask. I’m sure when he left the house with a mask he was planning to take part in a peaceful protest, not riot and destroy.

      • You have to wear a mask to fit in…Lots of people wearing masks. If you’re not wearing a mask then how can the mob tell if you are one of them?

  3. Without knowing anymore about her than this blurb, I’m willing to put $10 on her being a Democrat.

  4. She (the Mayor), is black. Therefore, she’s down with the “protesters” and made sure they had the ability to “protest” with minimal interference. Nice lockdown of 36,000+ Oriole fans at Camden Yards after the game.

    • That’s a lock-down of 36,000+ TOTALLY DISARMED Oriole fans at Camden Yards after the game…

  5. In the article they were trying to put a spin on it.

    Basically, if you have a bunch of peaceful protesters, you will have a certain number of bad apples in the group. They want to allow the peaceful protesters their rights and deal with the bad apples as they come up.

    Yet, there are millions of peaceful gun owners. It stands to reason there would be a few bad apples in the group. They don’t want to deal with the bad apples, they just don’t want anyone in the group to have their rights.

    • It’s the bad apple defense for groups protesting the actions of members of another group that uses the bad apple defense. So, what’s left to protest against? Both sides agree it was just bad apples. My, that’s a whole lot of bad apples all around.

  6. As a resident of MD (unfortunately) I watched the press conference. She also thank the nation of Islam for their help. True story……..

  7. “We also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well.”

    Isn’t that just pretty much how Baltimore has been run on a day-to-day basis for the last thirty years or so?

    • Haha yea this sounds like a late sat early Sunday thing. I stayed in Baltimore once after a paintball event in VA. We had a good time bar hopping but didn’t see very many people due to the weather. Well until about 4 am when we were woken up by Atleast 200 people fighting in the street outside our hotel. Also that was the first time I’ve ever seen a Walgreens lock up everything pocket sized in the store.

  8. My dad told me that if you don’t have something good to say about somebody, don’t say anything at all. I haven’t been entirely faithful to that principle, but will try here. At least she is being honest about intentionally failing to protect citizens and property. It is disturbing what one can get away with and still get reelected much less removed from office and charged with a crime.

  9. Government serving themselves, protecting their pensions, and finally participating in the delicate balance of anger management giving freedom to the people, to let their anger out….AND deny liberty to 36K citizens in an arena.

  10. And anti’s can somehow still say ‘the police will protect you, you don’t need a gun for self defense’ with a straight face.

    • What I find hilarious is that the urban sophisticates love to portray and paint us gun owners as a bunch of paranoid country bumpkins, out in our pumpkin patches with an assault rifle, waiting for the boogeyman to show up.

      Then when these racially inflamed incidents occur in their fair cities, the dainty progressives start going after their cops for use of force on some of these yutes who were “just turning their lives around.” Tie the hands of the police in urban riot situations, and you’ll have opportunistic rioting, looting, etc on a widespread scale. It is just what this particular racial cohort does. Expecting them to act in a self-regulated civilized manner is like believing in the Tooth Fairy – it’s a nice story to tell children, but those of us who have been around the block a few times know full well it is nothing but a children’s fairy tale.

      Well, the natural convergence of these two trends is going to be that the urban Clockwork Orange is eventually go in search of more lucrative looting grounds – ie, the tawny, upscale neighborhoods where these cluck-clucking liberals and milquetoast progressives live.

      Then we’ll see some quality entertainment.

  11. At least in Ferguson you were free to openly arm yourself and guard your property.

    • Yep.

      The thing about progressives is that they are, and always have been, peddlers of political lies, economic superstitions, policy fairy tales and crackpot social theories. This isn’t new. This started 100 years ago, starting with the Federal Reserve, Prohibition (the first social justice movement spawned by busybody women) and then other idiotic ideas (Social Security, et al).

      They live in a mental condition free from accountability for their idiotic twaddle and recommendations.

      I’ve decided from the start of this year forward, I’m no longer going to be a nice guy when debating policy and issues with ‘progressives.’ I’m going to pile on facts, then I’m going to ridicule, humiliate, denigrate, and personally belittle them in any and every way possible. I no longer care about winning a debate or argument. There’s no point in debating policy any more with these people because the notion that they’re seeking to debate policy honestly is a fraud. Their clear, unequivocal agenda can no longer be seen as anything else other than ending civil society. They seek to solve nothing, improve nothing and remedy nothing. They’re simply out to destroy a civil society built by white protestant males and replace it with a third world perspective of savages and elitist rent-seekers. Being one of those who helped build said American society, I see no reason to be civil towards these grifters, poseurs and frauds.

      We’re only a few years from the point where the balloon will go up and the noisy part of the decline of America will start in earnest. I reckon I might as well enjoy seeing the terror in the dewey eyes of these low-IQ people as it slowly dawns upon them that some among us will have a long memories and will be seeking to meet out retribution.

      • There’s no point in debating policy any more with these people because the notion that they’re seeking to debate policy honestly is a fraud.

        I came to that conclusion decades ago too. The whole “have a conversation” shtick nauseates me. 🙂

  12. Without proper eye protection the gentleman in the picture could certainly injure himself. Shocked to see the mayor show such little concern…

    • LOL. And he’s not wearing gloves to protect his hands from glass. We’ll need to make a call to OSHA to see if they can implement safety standards for rioters…oh wait, I’m on hold…They’re already talking to the Baltimore mayor about how they can make rioting safer for the rioters. nm.

  13. It’s OT, but the DC could use some copy editors and/or proofreaders. On topic: I’m kind of not believing this, but it looks to me like the “spin” from the mayor’s office is actually pretty reasonable. Her initial statement could pretty well be read to mean that in seeking to protect/respect the rights of legitimate protestors, the city wound up letting the violent ones run wild, not necessarily purposefully. The effect is the same tho, the violent ones were able to run wild because the city muffed its “balancing act”. Then again–maybe it’s just spin after all.

  14. So, what happens if someone is just passing through town, makes a wrong turn, and finds themselves in the middle of a riot like this where the mayor decided to allow “space” to be “destroyed”? This sounds all benign and well intentioned and all, but the guy smashing the car window looks very like one of the guys who was filmed smashing the SUV’s window during the “Hollywood Stuntz” biker riots in NYC a couple of years ago. My question is what is the difference, here? Is there a difference here?

    Nobody wants this to happen but what are you supposed to do if you get caught in something like this? People carry arms in their cars for the express purpose of defending themselves, their property, and their families from being attacked. What happens if someone who’s car is being attacked defends themselves and shoots several “space destroying” rioters? Does the fact that you’re being attacked during a riot instead of a mall-lot car-jacking invalidate you’re right to self-defense?

  15. My son lives about 10 miles from Baltimore…and he loves Maryland. And he won’t have a gun in the house. And thinks I’m a gun nut, Also ex-military(in war zones) and works at DoD(speaks Arabic). I can’t wait to ask him(mess with him) about his democrat-socialist paradise…wonder if this shite will spill over to his little burb?

  16. You voted for people who gave you Marijuana intoxication and homosexual marriage. And that made you happy. Then they took your gun civil rights away. In Colorado and Washington state. It was a wonderful exchange. They said they supported freedom. The state gave you pleasure.

    You voted for people who raise your taxes take your gun civil rights and other rights away. And you still vote for the same people.
    Conservatives have been warning about the things to come for quite awhile now. But they were called intolerant, racist, homophobe, etc, etc.

    Growing up in California I heard “burn it down” all the time. Now those same people are elected officials like the mayor of Baltimore or city council members in San Francisco. And you voted for them. You believed them when they said they supported freedom.

    Over a million people live in SF. That city has only one gun store as of 2010. Gun stores have been closing in the Baltimore area since last year. But in Kentucky and Tennessee new ones including ranges are opening. We don’t have homosexual marriage and Marijuana intoxication there yet. But we still gun civil rights.

    • LOL @ marijuana intoxication.

      I do like your attempt to tie supporting 2A to supporting the drug war and being against gay marriage. At least try to be consistently pro-liberty and not be a douche.

      • It is a fact you choose to lie to yourself about. Liberals support homosexual marriage and marijuana intoxication. Liberals do not support firearms civil rights. This web site is called “The Truth About Guns”. If you want to read about good gay sex and illegal drug intoxication then go to a different web site. Out of the closet Homosexual lawmakers are writing laws restricting gun civil rights. And that is ok with you?

        http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2013/05/29/california-lawmakers-pass-series-of-gun-control-bills/

        -The Assembly passed AB500 by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, which requires gun owners to safely store their firearms when someone who lives in the home is prohibited from owning a weapon because of mental illness or a criminal record-
        -The bill also allows for a seven-day extension on the current 10-day waiting period for weapons purchases if the state Department of Justice needs the extra time to complete a background check and requires dealers to notify the justice department when the buyer has taken possession.-
        -“All components of this bill will keep firearms out of the hands of people who should not have them and ensure our registry system and background checks are working,” Ammiano said on the floor-

        I wonder how many women will be raped or killed or permanently physically disabled because this white homosexual man said they should wait longer to get a gun. Tom Ammiano is the enemy and you would vote for him or any open homosexual who is anti gun civil rights. Pot and gay sex in exchange for the loss of gun civil rights. Here Is some home work for you. Find an NRA, A rated open homosexual elected official. Get back to me on that.

        • It’s funny when social conservatives cannot even fathom the existence of people that supports all civil rights. But… but…. God told me weed is evil. Or maybe God is Nixon and Reagan. 🙂

          • But… but…. God told me weed is evil. 🙂

            Pro-tip: they’re called libertarians.

            And it is Libertarians’ seemingly single-minded focus on marijuana that renders them unserious.

            The world, and our freedoms, are falling apart around us. Who gives a flying flip about weed? I’m completely agnostic about marijuana, but I long for the day that its legalization is the most pressing issue facing us.

            P.S. I view “social conservative” as someone who believes in individual liberty and responsibility, and a “social statist” as someone who would use the power of the state to compel others to act in accordance with one’s own beliefs (regardless of what those beliefs are).

        • ChrisT, are you a little afraid that deep down you might be a poof?

          Alaska has gun rights, gay marriage, and doobage (as far as I know, i don’t live there). These things are NOT mutually exclusive.

          I consider myself an old -fashioned conservative: I’m a Christian, and at the same time I like liberty, evidence-based policy making, guns, and I don’t believe that God hates poofs.

          We are all sinners, and there are something like 600 laws and rules in the Old Testament – why do you choose to focus so intensly on a sin that doesn’t hurt anyone else, unless you are afraid you are one of them?

        • @Chip Claiming libertarians are single-mindedly focused on pot is simply proof of your ignorance.

          On the flip side, anyone who has studied the history of the drug war can see how Nixon and his gangsters singled out pot as a target to demonize due to its harmless nature (i.e. if pot can be demonized, the other drugs will be automatically condemned). That criminal lied and started a war that killed thousands of Americans, why do you continue to believe his lies?

          I do like your wacky attempt to separate social conservative from social statist, considering social conservatives have been using the government to impose their brand of morality on everyone else for a half century.

          • @Chip Claiming libertarians are single-mindedly focused on pot is simply proof of your ignorance.

            Reading comprehension fail? I said seemingly single-minded focus.

            Which, ironically, you then proceed to support, by talking about the war on drugs (and making a false assumption regarding my opinions on it). So, thanks for making my point.

          • I do like your wacky attempt to separate social conservative from social statist, considering social conservatives have been using the government to impose their brand of morality on everyone else for a half century.

            I infer that you believe that all conservatives/Christians want to use the state to impose their morality on everyone? If you believe so, you are very, very wrong.

            My definitions of social “statist” and “conservative” are political definitions. Yes, there are some conservatives who have attempted to use the state to force their brand of morality on everyone. Is it any better that progressives are now attempting to do the same? I oppose both.

            I am a Christian, and want nothing more than to be left alone to live my life as I see fit. I want the same for everyone else. I support liberty and self-responsibility for all. I am of the camp that it is as anti-freedom as it is futile to attempt to legislate morality. I do not agree with legislating Christian morality, Muslim morality, atheist morality, LGBT morality, or any other morality.

        • We’re talking about drugs because that is the topic at hand. I can talk about all the other crap that social conservatives are ruining for everyone, if you want. 🙂

          By the way, if you really believe social conservatives shouldn’t be interfering with other peoples’ business, you should tell them yourself. Because they (as a political group) have been doing so for decades. I doubt *all* Christians agree with this vile movement, but enough of them do to make life hell for many people.

          • By the way, if you really believe social conservatives shouldn’t be interfering with other peoples’ business, you should tell them yourself. Because they (as a political group) have been doing so for decades.

            What leads you to believe that I’m not?

            And regardless what has happened in the past, at this point in time, it is the social progressives who are doing the most interfering in other peoples’ business. By a long shot.

        • Mac is mad at the facts. 🙂

          Standard propaganda from the drug war fanatics, anyone who dislikes the drug war is a leftist, soft-on-crime hippie, etc. Line is getting old, brah.

          • @Sexual/Statist Tyrannosaurus/Tyrant, bro, smoke all the dope you want. I could care less…shoot the shit in your veins, I’ll sit by and laugh. It’s you Leftist wackjobs that want to DICKtate what kind of lightbulbs, toilets, drinks, food, guns, ammo, cars, trucks, books and so on, that we – the little people – are to consume/use, etc. Leftist statist punk.

        • >it is the social progressives who are doing the most interfering in other peoples’ business. By a long shot.

          Really? Are gays now murdering people or throwing them in prison for decades for refusing to side with their point of view? Because that’s what the drug war zealots have been doing for four decades, and the drug war is the emblematic effort of the social conservative movement.

          Fining cake shops for refusing catering is abominable, but it is hardly a comparison.

          • Can you back away from the weed, even for a moment?

            The so-called “War on Drugs” does not represent or encapsulate the entirety of social conservatism. In fact, social conservatives aren’t even anywhere near agreement on the issue.

            How about social progressives getting people fired (or attempting to do so) for expressing their beliefs? Or forcing businesses to shut down, either through the courts or through unlawful interference?

            Was it a social conservative who attempted to dictate to New Yorkers how large their soda cups could be, or how much salt they could consume? Was it a social conservative who forced every person in the country to change their health care plans? I know! It is a social conservative who is forcing school children to eat 100-calorie “lunches”.

            Need I go on?

        • >In fact, social conservatives aren’t even anywhere near agreement on the issue.

          Really? Did Nixon and Reagan not use moralistic language in pushing the drug war, in their cynical attempt to pull white voters away from the Democrats in socially conservative areas in the South? Is the religious right not the primary driver for the drug war in its four decade lifespan?

          The drug war is not the entirety of the social conservative movement, but it most certainly is its flagship effort. Maybe gay marriage has approached the drug war in terms of the level of fearmongering peddled by the moral crusaders, but at least the gay marriage issue doesn’t get thousands of people killed or cost several billion dollars a year.

          I do like how you prefix the war on drugs with “so-called”, as if it doesn’t exist. Despite that term being the literal language used by politicians who support and push its existence.

          Also LOL @ Obamacare having anything to do with social conservatism.

          • Really? Did Nixon and Reagan…

            You mean to imply that Nixon (out of office for 40 years) and Reagan (out of office for 25 years) define the unanimity of social conservatives in 2015? How absurd.

            The drug war is not the entirety of the social conservative movement, but it most certainly is its flagship effort.

            And you keep proving my point. Give your dopamine receptors a break for just a minute, would you?

            Also LOL @ Obamacare having anything to do with social conservatism.

            Is it your reading comprehension that failed again, or your sarcasm detector? Obvious sarcasm was as obvious as it was intentional, to prove a point. That point, obviously, was that social progressives are responsible for Obamacare – which is one of the single, biggest intrusions into peoples’ business, ever.

        • No, economic progressives are responsible for Obamacare. Note that plenty of economic progressives are also social conservatives in regards to the drug war, not for some fake moral stance, but for the sheer power.

          As for Nixon and Reagan, they started the drug war and all the standard lies and propaganda invented by their regime are still applied today, such as scaremongering, dehumanization, circular arguments (immoral = illegal = immoral), and scientific denial. Nixon and Reagan are long dead but their “moral argument” for the drug war is as alive as ever, and fervently embraced by today’s social conservatives.

  17. Don’t think of it as rioting. Think of it as urban renewal. You know, like Sherman’s March to the Sea.

    • Like what happened on the westside of Chicago…it’s still not renewed. Dumbazzes burn their own neighborhood…

    • The difference is, folks rebuilt what Sherman burned, razed and wrapped around trees.

      Detroit was subject to the same sort of urban renewal policies, and it will not be rebuilt any time soon. I suspect that Baltimore will soon be like the Pattersons, Newark in NJ, Detroit, Buffalo NY, et al.

      • if people live in a nice place, and thugs, war, or a disaster come through and destroy it, generally they rebuild. if lazy, stupid, people live in a shiite hole such as 2/3 of baltimore, and thugs (or an earthquake, in the case of Haiti) come through and wreck it, it pretty much stays wrecked no matter whether outsiders pay lots of money to help out.

  18. Baltimore mayor wanted the rioters to exercise their First Amendment Rights. Would she also be supporting if ordinary Baltimore citizens exercised their Second Amendment Rights in this situation?

  19. She is covering something. The police chief certainly is. Seems there have been two lawsuits already against the city after one death and a paralysis from past police joy rides to the station. The cap was $250,000 paid by the city when the court awarded in the millions.
    How hard is this to investigate? Did the police transit van roll over? Was it involved in a serious G inducing deceleration? No? Then Coppers, you’re fired and see you in court where you can perjur yourself.
    As for the violent protestors. I hate to add laws but up the fines and jail time if someone really did it. Oh wait…another way for police to exaggerate a situation.

  20. My money is that the federal regime (including the AG office) sent the mayor a “in case of rioting” playbook for her to follow. ‘Let them riot, it has been determined it is best for the media and the narrative.’

  21. I’ve lived in Baltimore. It’s mostly a crap hole with some islands of beauty. Many of the people are nice, but crime is much higher than many other places – I’ve never seen so much crime as when I lived in Baltimore. And MD has high taxes and gun control that disarms the law abiding but does ansolutely nothing to prevent every thug who can scrap up a few hundred dollars from illegally buying and carrying a stolen gun. I’m never moving back.

  22. The mayor couldn’t care less. The rioters voted for her, so they’re happy that they’re allowed to destroy. The white leftists voted for her, and they’re so riddled with pathetic white guilt that they’ll bow down and give the poor, oppressed rioters free access to their shops. And both groups are too staggeringly stupid to realize that all their misery comes from their voting practices.

  23. “…we also gave those who wished to destroy space to do that as well.”

    So, when you hear yourself talk, does it sound like dolphins?

  24. I’m sure that if asked, the mayorette would swear that she is the mayorette of all the people…..

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