The morning crew at KIRO-FM had several quick discussions Tuesday morning about a sign that the Seattle Police Department suggests shoppers could put on their car dashboards to discourage car prowlers.
It’s an idea, revealed reporter Linda Thomas, that SPD evidently borrowed from authorities in Vancouver, B.C. The sign, which bears the SPD logo, simply reads “Nothing to steal but this sign. Please don’t steal the sign.” Well, golly, it does say “please.”
Thomas and her colleagues chatted with a reporter from Vancouver who recalled that when the sign was tried a couple of years ago, it really didn’t seem to make much difference to the number of car larcenies.
The Seattle Police Department is recommending you print a sign and put it on your dashboard. It reads "NOTHING TO STEAL BUT THIS SIGN. PLEASE DON'T STEAL THE SIGN" and it includes the police department's logo.
Yeah, but it’s the thought that counts, right? After all, Seattle – like Portland, where we have all seen in the last 72 hours just how well their 2005 decision to opt out of a terrorism task force worked out as a deterrent (more about this in a moment) – seems to have a collective philosophy that if you just exhibit a big group hug mentality, your problems will be solved or maybe just go away.
Contrast that with another message, this one on a remarkably popular bumper sticker and window decal from the Bellevue-based Second Amendment Foundation. The two cities may be separated by a big lake, but their philosophies are light years apart. SAF has gone through tens of thousands of these stickers/decals, and here’s why:
SAF’s message tells would-be thieves “The owner of this property is armed and prepared to protect life, liberty and property from criminal attack. There is nothing inside worth risking your life for!”
This column neither advocates nor supports vigilantism, but we must be candid. Public sentiment might just lean toward a little “curbside justice” for smash-and-grab thieves in mall parking lots or on downtown streets and in parking garages. It is tempting, after all, to imagine “pulling a Denny Crane” (William Shatner’s character in Boston Legal) on some miscreant. Successful armed self-defense doesn’t only happen in the movies or on television and my book with SAF founder Alan Gottlieb – America Fights Back: Armed Self-defense in a Violent Age proved it.
THE OWNER OF THIS PROPERTY IS ARMED and prepared to protect life, liberty and property from criminal attack. THERE IS NOTHING INSIDE WORTH RISKING YOUR LIFE FOR!
Which message offers more discouragement to a thief, one that appeals to his inner good nature (which he probably doesn't have), or one that suggests he just might get shot? You be the judge, and comment below please.
MEANWHILE, let’s talk briefly about Portland’s Mohamed Osman Mohamud, the 19-year-old naturalized citizen from Somalia who is now charged with plotting to bomb the Rose City’s Christmas Tree lighting ceremony last week.
Whatever else this case reveals – and there are already defense suggestions of entrapment by undercover federal agents – the monumental hypocrisy of the ultra-liberal Portland city leaders should not go without notice. They wanted nothing to do with a terrorism task force when it was a Bush administration effort, but now that the far Left-tilting Obama administration is running things, especially after Mohamud allegedly tried to blow up their city center when it was full of innocent families, they seem to be changing their minds.
Nothing like a good mass bombing plot to snap Utopian airheads back to real world consciousness.
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Comments
Reading liberal posts about this incident is educational; many try to put this as an entrapment issue by the evil FBI and include hysterical rants against republicans, conservatives, tea party activists, etc. The libs appear to hate these groups with a white-hot intensity that is almost frightening, yet they give the would-be mass murderer, and islamic terrorists in general, a pass. They really believe Mohamed was probably a victim of a right wing conspiracy who was lured into the bomb plot by manipulative FBI handlers. If you don't believe denial of reality is a defining characteristic of the liberal mind, just read the reader responses from liberals.
Forest Gump said it best. "Stupid is as Stupid Does" or something to that effect.
Interesting use of "Wisdom" Dave; perhaps in this case it could be construed as an oxymoron, as in the good judgement of a criminal.
The criminal is a moron because he did not use good judgement before breaking into that car with the sign in the window.
While in ID i stopped to look at the elk at a farm... In the farmers yard there was a sign that read, "If you can read this sign, your within Range! Be polite and so will I..." That is the kind of sign i think makes a difference!
I wonder if Gil Kerlikowski had placed such a sign in his window, if the miscreant who stole his service pistol would have paused and followed the true path to enlightenment, instead.
Of course, since crooks steal things from patrol cars, including the cars themselves sometimes, and sometimes shoot up the occupying cops in the process, perhaps invoking the SPD on this plea to their good nature is a mistake. Maybe there should be a photo of a fuzzy baby fur seal, or a cute little Orca instead?
Dave,
Two things:
[1] With regards to Portland's current contretemps:
There's absolutely ~nothing~ like a false flag operation to convince the unknowing that 'something' --anything-- must be done, including taking away our rights.
[2] Regarding all else:
"Be not afraid of any man, no matter what his size; when danger threatens, call on me and I will equalize."
- Slogan of a 19th century gun manufacturer.
"Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people."
- Oscar Wilde
"On the question to fill up the blank of the duration of the first branch of the National Legislature, Mr. Madison was for three years, though Mr. Gerry was afraid that the people would be alarmed at that clause savouring of despotism.
"On the motion to fill up the blank of the duration of the second branch of the National Legislature, Mr. Madison was for seven years -- and declared, that considering this branch as a CHECK ON DEMOCRACY, it could not be too strong."
- The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, June 9, 1787.[Farrand's Records, Volume 3]
CCCX. Extracts from Yates' Secret Proceedings.
"As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron."
~ H.L. Mencken
“Did I say "republic?" By God, yes, I said "republic!" Long live the glorious republic of the United States of America. Damn democracy. It is a fraudulent term used, often by ignorant persons but no less often by intellectual fakers, to describe an infamous mixture of socialism, graft, confiscation of property and denial of personal rights to individuals whose virtuous principles make them offensive.”
~ Westbrook Pegler ~
A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.
-Thomas Jefferson
"An imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics."
"Justice will only exist where those not affected by injustice are filled with the same amount of indignation as those offended."
- Plato
"He that accepts protection, stipulates obedience."
- Samuel Johnson
"The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws."
- Tacitus
"When the state is most corrupt, then the laws are most multiplied."
- Tacitus
Huh, or WTF! I'm going to advertise that my car or my home has weapons in it? This is a competition between dumb and dumber. Yes I did look over the article before I resonded. I want the element of surprise when I draw.
As for entrapment, that actually may be an issue in Portland. It seems that justice agencies routinely have a problem distinguinshing between a sting and entrapment. Time, and the courts will tell.
You may have read the column, but you apparently didn't understand what you read. It said the owner of the car is armed and will defend himself/herself and their property. It's much better to use a deterrent, no matter how small, than to deliberately set yourself up to have to use that gun you seem to be so eager to draw on someone.
Couldn't Portland - like other enlightened locales - put up signs at their border saying "Terror Free Zone." To back that up, pass a law forbidding terrorism within its borders. That should send the Mohamuds packing.
In a sanctuary city, how many languages should this sign be printed in?
In many cities cops set up bait cars and after the well publized captures in major malls the crime rate seems to drop. All the cops do is ask people not to leave expensive stuff in plain sight. No signs, not guns, just put everything in trunks or cover it if it is not too large. Seems to work well. Thieves see the bait cars, break in, and that dude with the plaid shirt on walking by puts a gun in their ear and flashes a badge to let them know they just hit the bait car and won a free trip to jail. Does it stop all crime? No, but it does seem to slow it down the more the cops publize the programs and the people caught on video. As for the kid there is no question by his behavior and statements what he wanted to do. Let him contemplate it for the next 100 years in a dark cell with one hour a day for exercise. He is innocent until a jury finds him guilty but I don't think entrapment played a part here but only a jury can decide that.
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