Oklahoma City Anniversary
[Guest post by DRJ]
Today marks the 15th anniversary of the terrorist attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. The attack killed 168 innocent victims, including 19 children, and injured hundreds more.
Monday night, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow aired “The McVeigh Tapes” that reportedly include audio of McVeigh’s confession. Tulsa World provides this excerpt:
“Lou Michel recalls without hesitation the moment on a May day in 1999 when Timothy McVeigh delivered a soliloquy so dark, so chilling that the hair rose on the back of the veteran reporter’s neck.
Caught in the act of being himself, nothing else McVeigh would say during a 45-hour confession matched that moment for defining America’s worst mass murderer.
“I’ve heard your stories many times before,” McVeigh began, as if speaking directly to the survivors of the Oklahoma City bombing rather than into the tape recorder of his biographer.
“The specific details may be unique, but the truth is you’re not the first mother to lose her kid. You’re not the first grandparent to lose a granddaughter or a grandson. I’ll use the phrase…and it may sound cold but…it’s the truth: Get over it.”
McVeigh’s voice isn’t the only one heard:
“Credit union worker Patti Hall describes her crushed body, the 16 surgeries and re-learning how to walk and to talk.
Susan Urbach shows the scars on her face and recalls the 4 feet of stitches she needed after her window shattered in the Journal Record Building across the street from the Murrah.
Jannie Coverdale speaks of her two grandsons lost in the second-floor day care; Aaron would be 20 now, and Elijah, 17.
She speaks of “screaming at God,” of wishing that McVeigh would have apologized but that he never did.
“It took me a long time to get over some of that anger….You just don’t murder little kids. Sometimes I cry during the day, something is going to remind you of the bombing and then you’re… right back where you were on April 19, 1995. We don’t ever get too far from there.”
Never forget.
— DRJ
It was also the 17th anniversary of the end of the Branch Davidian standoff in Waco if I have my dates correct.
daleyrocks (1feed5) — 4/19/2010 @ 11:15 pmyes you do……
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 4/19/2010 @ 11:48 pm…20 Children…burned to death!
AD - RtR/OS! (2f7dee) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:04 amThanks, Janet…no telling what crimes they would have committed if they had been allowed to live.
And McVeigh is dead. I just wish that the powers-that-be would enforce sentences against those that kill “little people” as swiftly and surely as they do those that raise their hand against the state. US mass killers who still live on:
Gary Leon Ridgway, WA, 48-90 dead. Life sentence.
Donald Harvey, OH, 36-87 dead. Life sentence.
Juan Corona, CA, 25 dead. Life sentence.
Charles Cullen, PA, 18-45 dead. Life sentence.
Herbert Williams Mullin, CA, 13 dead. Life sentence with possible parole.
Richard Ramirez, CA, 13+ dead, others maimed. Death sentence 1989, still on appeal.
Robert Lee Yates: 13 dead. Death sentence 1999, still on appeal.
William Suff, CA, 12-25 dead. Death sentence 1995, still on appeal.
Kenneth Bianchi, WA, 12 dead. Life sentence.
What is surprising going through the list of serial killers is how few of the American ones have been executed, or even condemned to death.
Yes, McVeigh earned his place in Hell, but the system seems to work better when the victims work for the government.
Kevin Murphy (5ae73e) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:09 amCharlie Manson….
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:11 amI’ve read the book, “American Terrorist”, that is the supposed source for this TV special. I think it’s very very interesting that the editorial choice was made to leave out of the broadcast one of the most interesting pieces of information from the book.
Even though the broadcast mentions that McVeigh put his plan into action in September 1994, the broadcast doesn’t say why. Why September? But the book does. It turns out the final straw for McVeigh was passage of the so-called “Crime Bill” in September 1994, which contained the Clinton ten year ban on so-called “assault weapons”. So even Waco wasn’t enough to convince McVeigh to start his stupid war against his own country, it was the Clinton gun ban that was the final straw for McVeigh.
Why was that information left out of the broadcast?
Brad (b75b87) — 4/20/2010 @ 2:09 amI won’t forget his crimes and punishment. I also won’t forget that with a little orientation change, he could have wound up an educator and advisor to presidents like another bomber, William Ayers. Fate is a strange thing Indeed.
tehag (9418fd) — 4/20/2010 @ 3:05 amRemember, this POS was *NOT* a Christian. See This CNN Article for instance:
It just burns me when they trot out the “Christian Terrorist” lie.
Ranten N. Raven (240170) — 4/20/2010 @ 4:09 am“So even Waco wasn’t enough to convince McVeigh to start his stupid war against his own country, it was the Clinton gun ban that was the final straw for McVeigh.”
There’s got to be some way we can blame america first.
imdw (11b8ad) — 4/20/2010 @ 4:30 amWackos come in every form; from every walk of life. The last straw might be something big, might be something as small as a word said in passing. Generally, wackos are just looking for a reason to go off – they want that last straw.
We all know that – so why do some people continue to prod and push the buttons? They want the wackos to do their thing so they can point and say look at how those in that group are.
Corwin (ea9428) — 4/20/2010 @ 4:52 amIf McVeigh did not exist people like Maddow would have to invent him to serve as a vessel for all the stereotypes liberals hold for conservatives.
No one has any evidence that McVeigh ever listened to Rush, was radicalized in a Christian church,was angry about tax increases etc. But Clinton felt justified in blaming the tenor of right-wing hate for his actions.
McVeigh is dead and good riddance but Janet Reno is still revered by those on the left despite the death of those in Waco.
MU789 (25b69d) — 4/20/2010 @ 5:08 amSomeday, Bill Clinton may face his own role in mass murder of children.
[T]here is the post hoc justification for the use of CS tear-gas in the raid offered by the US Justice Department and senior Clinton administration officials. The public generally, and even the Congressional hearings, seem to have accepted that the children at Waco were gassed and then died as, in effect, “collateral damage” in the course of a raid aimed at their parents.
This is not quite the case, however, by the Clinton administration’s own admissions. CS gas was used at the compound, in order, as senior White House adviser George Stephanopoulos said, echoing senior Justice Department statements, to “try and pressure” those in the compound. It was hoped, he said, that as this “pressure was increased, the maternal instincts of the mothers might take over and they might try to leave with their kids” (Washington Times, April 23, 1995).
But the FBI knew beforehand that adults in the compound had gas masks; the gas therefore would not put pressure on them. On whom, then? If the FBI knew that the adults had gas masks, but went ahead with the gas attack anyway, it is plain that this “pressure” was brought directly against the children because, as the FBI knew, they could not fit into adult– size gas masks. “Maternal feelings”, the FBI hoped, would be unleashed in the mothers by watching their children choking, gasping and blistering from the gas.
The plan Reno approved and took to President Clinton for approval contemplated the children choking in the gas unprotected for forty-eight hours if necessary, to produce the requisite “maternal feelings”. By taking aim at the children with potentially lethal gas, their mothers would be compelled, according to the FBI plan repeatedly defended by the Clinton administration afterwards as “rational” planning, to flee with them into the arms of those trying to gas them. [Emphasis added.]
Just one more mass murderer and now he is pontificating again.
Mike K (2cf494) — 4/20/2010 @ 6:32 amI thought this was the day for the new server. The site loaded as slow as usual.
Mike K (2cf494) — 4/20/2010 @ 6:33 amAs Governor, Clinton executed a mentally – retarded man who had been convicted of murder, all in order to get re – elected. Hey, what’s a few dozen kids to him, considering he needed to get re – elected again? He’s going to seriously regret opening his traphole yet again on this one – everyone’s revisiting the horrific events in Waco and his culpability in those actions.
Dmac (21311c) — 4/20/2010 @ 6:46 amUntil the last two days I had never heard clear commentary on what rationale, twisted and wrong as it was, McVeigh had for the bombing. Reno and Clinton are responsible for their own actions, not the actions of McVeigh, but it is also important to know what McVeigh’s rationale was and that it was not that he was a fringe “Christian” or that he hated America per se, but that he was attacking what he saw was an illegitimate federal government.
In some ways you would think Ayers would find this guy to be a hero, as he “did more” against “the system” than he ever did.
MD in Philly (59a3ad) — 4/20/2010 @ 7:21 amMcVeigh was well I can’t quite enunciate the bottom dwelling weasel he was. That’s why the Vidal apologia for him, in the summer of 2001, is equally
Rich, but there’s a whole undercurrent of leads, including this Strassmeir character, the FBI agent who was under cover, with the group,which makes for a much more nuanced perspective.
Maddow is clearly salivating, a revolting image I know, for a reprise so the left can not only dismiss
ian cormac (422538) — 4/20/2010 @ 7:22 ambut destroy any opposition to Soros’s agenda
In some ways you would think Ayers would find this guy to be a hero, as he “did more” against “the system” than he ever did.
He was just more competent than Ayers.
Brother Bradley J. Fikes, C.O.R. (9eb641) — 4/20/2010 @ 7:33 amit was the Clinton gun ban that was the final straw for McVeigh.
Why was that information left out of the broadcast?
Comment by Brad — 4/20/2010 @ 2:09 am
— Because Madcow won’t allow any suggestion that something she supports could possibly engender a negative and violent consequence.
There’s got to be some way we can blame america first.
Comment by imdw — 4/20/2010 @ 4:30 am
— There’s got to be some way we can get you to think before you type.
Icy Texan (484da8) — 4/20/2010 @ 7:39 amThat is the irony, isn’t it. Bill Ayers, the Richie
ian cormac (422538) — 4/20/2010 @ 7:51 amRich of terrorists, with a touch of Woody Allen,
all set up to play Che Guevara, but then the heat
got too much, turn ‘respectable’ pillar of the community.
Leonard Pitts gets editorials published in my McClatchy rag. Christian terrorist is was McVeigh was. Just as dangerous as Muslims. That was gist of it, then my IQ got sucked out of my brain. Reading Charles Blow, Leonard Pitts, and Eugene Robinson can definitely cause brain damage.
kansas (7b4374) — 4/20/2010 @ 7:56 amIsn’t Leonard Pitts the same one that said “whenever anyone calls Obama “arrogant”, it’s a code-word for “uppity [n-word]”?
Icy Texan (484da8) — 4/20/2010 @ 8:14 amI live in the shadow of McClatchy which gives the both Times and the NY Daily News run for their money in worst paper ever. Rosenberg, the Gitmo
ian cormac (422538) — 4/20/2010 @ 8:43 amdetainee’s best friend, Menendez, our won version of Dowd, thankfully out of the country for a while, but her replacement is equally clueless
“I live in the shadow of McClatchy which gives the both Times and the NY Daily News run for their money in worst paper ever”
They were one of the few, if not only, to get WMD story right.
imdw (72206b) — 4/20/2010 @ 8:59 amimdw
elaborate on your 22
EricPWJohnson (1d0270) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:14 amActually, no, it doesn’t they rarely get any story right, ie: where is the proof that the WMD’s were destroyed, one would think there would be invoices
ian cormac (422538) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:17 amorders, et al, why were we finding them as late as ’98, until the Security Council, headed by France and Russia, pushed to redefine any future inspectors mission
ian
Haij Umran Mustard August 1983 fewer than 100 Iranian/Kurdish
Panjwin Mustard October-November 1983 3,001 Iranian/Kurdish
Majnoon Island Mustard February-March 1984 2,500 Iranians
al-Basrah Tabun March 1984 50-100 Iranians
Hawizah Marsh Mustard & Tabun March 1985 3,000 Iranians
al-Faw Mustard & Tabun February 1986 8,000 to 10,000 Iranians
Um ar-Rasas Mustard December 1986 1,000s Iranians
al-Basrah Mustard & Tabun April 1987 5,000 Iranians
Sumar/Mehran Mustard & nerve agent October 1987 3,000 Iranians
Halabjah Mustard & nerve agent March 1988 7,000s Kurdish/Iranian
al-Faw Mustard & nerve agent April 1988 1,000s Iranians
Fish Lake Mustard & nerve agent May 1988 100s or 1,000s Iranians
Majnoon Islands Mustard & nerve agent June 1988 100s or 1,000s Iranians
South-central border Mustard & nerve agent July 1988 100s or 1,000s Iranians
an-Najaf –
Karbala area Nerve agent & CS March 1991 Unknown
Also the main attack that possibly killed almost 50,000 Kurds in one hour
yeah we shouldnt have looked
EricPWJohnson (1d0270) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:23 amDuring the run up to war, McClatchy consistently said there would be no WMD in Iraq. The rest of the press repeated administration flacks. McClatchy got it right.
imdw (8222e7) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:26 am26
Ummm, was it a 50 50 guess? – can you elaborate how a news service without an office in the middle east somehow new more than the combined intelligence services of:
The USA, Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, Germany, France, England, Russia, Turkey, Saudi, Egypt, Israel, Norway, Sweden, Australia, New Zealand, Denmark, Poland (which has one of the finest services in the world and strong ties to Iraq) and can you point to any other success that this news organization have made in retrospect of the combined billions spent on intelligence by the top 30 world powers?
Just curious
EricPWJohnson (1d0270) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:41 amand, by “administration flacks”, i’m a dimwit means all the Dem’s over the years who were publicly quoted as saying Iraq had Chem/Bio weapons and was a threat to use them.
ESAD, you dishonest thank. some chemical weapons were found, just not mass quantities, which the smart money says made it into Syria while the bed wetters delayed the attack.
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:43 am“Ummm, was it a 50 50 guess? – can you elaborate how a news service without an office in the middle east somehow new more than the combined intelligence services of:”
They explain that it was because they talked to intelligence agents:
http://www.ojr.org/ojr/people/robert/200806/1513/
“So what happened in the pre-war reporting, for example, is that folks like Warren Strobel and Jonathan Landay and John Walcott, they were talking to the rank-and-file folks at the respective agencies, the folks who actually did the work; the folks who were actually preparing the reports and reviewing the intelligence. They weren’t talking to the political hacks at the highest level. Those folks were telling them, giving them a different picture than was being fed to the national outlets. By virtue of having to do their reporting at the grassroots level, they weren’t getting the sanitized picture that other folks were getting. That made a big difference. We were consistently saying that there were no weapons of mass destruction, and the intelligence was saying that there were no weapons of mass destruction. But yet our competitors were saying breathlessly, taking the administration line, that there were. It’s a matter of perspective; who were you talking to.”
So which “smart money” says “mass quantities” made it to syria? The same smart money that said it was in Iraq? Or no?
imdw (8222e7) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:56 amIsrael put some missiles on some of the stuff that got to Syria. Any news on what Obama is going to do about Hezbollah getting Scuds?
MadCow, were the world a rational place, would be embarrassed and humiliated by that piece she did on McVeigh, and her and her ilk’s continued attempts to tie that jackass to their political opponents.
JD (9f2abc) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:56 amthey were talking to the rank-and-file folks at the respective agencies, the folks who actually did the work; the folks who were actually preparing the reports and reviewing the intelligence.
So, I guess they were talking to CIA agents ? Employees of the agency that DID NOT HAVE A SINGLE SOURCE IN IRAQ!
That agency ?
God, you are a pain !
Mike K (2cf494) — 4/20/2010 @ 10:31 amSo 3 reporters allegedly got people under penalty of life in prison to divulge top secret information that was somehow channeled only to those informants desks even though all intelligence gathering systems are by design decentralized and are a multi discipline team effort from experts with various backgrounds in physics, manufacturing, chemistry, electrical engineering, genetics, bio engineering, aerospace engineering, spave system engineering, telemetry specialists – you mean these guys found all these experts?
EricPWJohnson (1d0270) — 4/20/2010 @ 10:35 amJust like the 2007 NIE, that proved for a shadow of a doubt that Iran wasn’t developing a bomb, except
ian cormac (422538) — 4/20/2010 @ 10:39 amfor the parts that were, because they relied on one source, Asghari, but ignored the Mousavian letter
to the Ayatollah, that proved the deception.
#22: don’t you love Mr. Non-Apology, a demonstrated partisan tool, commenting on issues of chemical warfare?
Because he knows things.
I mean, when the New Republic or Mother Jones say so.
Why is this character posting? Oh, that’s right: he insulted Patterico’s job, and Patterico insisted that he apologize. But last I heard, he didn’t promise not to be a jackass again.
Actually, it’s fine. He won’t be able to help himself. He’ll get rude to DRJ again, or insult Patterico’s job again, and then get booted for real.
Then we will only have to worry his sock puppetry. But he’ll get caught then, again. Because he ain’t exactly the sharpest knife in the drawer.
It’s who he is.
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 4/20/2010 @ 10:45 am“So 3 reporters allegedly got people under penalty of life in prison to divulge top secret information that was somehow channeled only to those informants desks even though all intelligence gathering systems are by design decentralized and are a multi discipline team effort from experts with various backgrounds in physics, manufacturing, chemistry, electrical engineering, genetics, bio engineering, aerospace engineering, spave system engineering, telemetry specialists – you mean these guys found all these experts?”
Apparently that is all it took to get it right. Don’t know why everyone else couldn’t do the same.
So who says it went to Syria?
“Why is this character posting? Oh, that’s right: he insulted Patterico’s job, and Patterico insisted that he apologize. But last I heard, he didn’t promise not to be a jackass again. ”
I put it on the thread about it.
imdw (66f2a5) — 4/20/2010 @ 10:59 am“…It just burns me when they trot out the “Christian Terrorist” lie.”
Comment by Ranten N. Raven — 4/20/2010 @ 4:09 am
It is particularly easy to demonize that which you have absolutely no knowledge of,
AD - RtR/OS! (2a6962) — 4/20/2010 @ 11:07 amand Christianity is certainly something that is alien to those of the Left;
though they do know terrorism and support it when it is used to advance their political agenda.
Why oh WHY do people keep engaging this thread-jacking, sniveling, pseudo-intellectual dim-witted troll-pile???
[note: fished from spam filter. –Stashiu]
SPC Jack Klompus (471dfa) — 4/20/2010 @ 11:45 amAnd Eric Rudolph was a pot growing pagan, who got too short a sentence, by comparison when the likes
ian cormac (422538) — 4/20/2010 @ 11:49 amof Joe Stack recreates the Duran flight, and posts an anarchist manifesto, he’s labeled a tea partier
as is pot smoking 9/11 denialist Bedell and all around wacko Amy Bishop, all from the left side
“Apparently that is all it took to get it right.”
See, if you talk to one person, and that person gives you the answer that happens to be right, that is better than reviewing information from two dozen countries spanning decades of intelligence gathering.
Flip a coin. If you are right, see… that’s all it really takes to make those tough decisions.
I was beginning to feel sorry for imdw; it would seem this is the only place he/she can actually interact with other humans. To take such abuse must be difficult. But he/she just makes it so easy to dislike he/she. It’s a wonder he/she keeps coming back for more.
Corwin (ea9428) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:12 pmNice grammar, imdw.
So do you promise not to be a jackass?
More accurately, can you promise not to be a jackass?
Inquiring minds want to know. I mean, based on your history.
Eric Blair (0b61b2) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:13 pmSo who says it went to Syria?
I say some WMDs went to Syria; afterall, I asked my dog and he barked once for yes. Don’t know why everyone else couldn’t do the same.
Corwin (ea9428) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:24 pm“… imdw; it would seem this is the only place he/she can actually interact with other humans…”
Someone needs to remove those chains from the cellar doors.
AD - RtR/OS! (2a6962) — 4/20/2010 @ 12:58 pm“I say some WMDs went to Syria; afterall, I asked my dog and he barked once for yes. Don’t know why everyone else couldn’t do the same.”
It’s really shocking isn’t it, that they were able to call it.
imdw (017d51) — 4/20/2010 @ 1:57 pmNo WMD’s went to Syria, not a one. Those convoys of trucks streaming from Iraq to Syria seen from overhead before the end of the waiting period were filled with:
MD in Philly (59a3ad) — 4/20/2010 @ 2:28 pmA. As much of Saddam’s gold that they could carry
B. hmmm?
C. Sand, lots and lots of sand
D. Copies of documents that Sandy Berger shredded
I put it on the thread about it.
Please link to it.
Dmac (21311c) — 4/20/2010 @ 2:29 pmJust checking: has imdw said anything about the Oklahoma City Anniversary in this thread?
No?
Okay. Everything is normal then.
Carry on.
Icy Texan (484da8) — 4/20/2010 @ 2:32 pmGoogle “terror bombing” Amman 2002.
Richard Aubrey (14a01a) — 4/20/2010 @ 3:03 pmWhere do you think that stuff came from?
Go over to Talk Left and see the post about McVeigh and the Maddow show. She represented McVeigh and has an interesting perspective on him and his motivations.
MU789 (25b69d) — 4/20/2010 @ 3:29 pmWhere’s that link, douchey? Let’s have it.
Dmac (21311c) — 4/20/2010 @ 3:39 pmIf you’re the one that wants it so hard, you’re going to have to be the one that finds it. Sucks, but that’s life.
imdw (603c39) — 4/20/2010 @ 3:58 pmIOW, you’re just making sh1t up again…. typical leftard. why don’t you just thank off?
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 4/20/2010 @ 4:32 pmcan’t we just pump it full of CS until he surrenders? he’s okay with the tactic on others, so he can’t object if we use it on him. 😀
redc1c4 (fb8750) — 4/20/2010 @ 4:36 pmHmmmm. You know, imdw, you shouldn’t get all puffy. Did you or did you not apologize? If you did, for being an ass to Patterico, let’s see if you can act like a grown up now.
If not, I doubt Patterico is going to be all warm and fuzzy with you.
After the time-out your rudeness merited, isn’t it up to you to demonstrate good behavior?
As if.
Eric Blair (969700) — 4/20/2010 @ 5:48 pmThere’s got to be some way we can blame america first.
They were one of the few, if not only, to get WMD story right.
Such bizarre and strange comments to make on a post about the OKC bombing.
To each his own.
I remember the day and I remember the loss.
Ag80 (f67beb) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:35 pmI think there are a few things wrong with the Non-Apologist Troll, Ag80.
Eric Blair (f4bc41) — 4/20/2010 @ 9:43 pm