Wednesday 12-19-12

Survivalists worry ‘preppers’ will be scapegoated for Newtown shooting

Ever since a relative of Newtown, Conn., shooter Adam Lanza suggested that his mother, Nancy Lanza, was a "survivalist" who stockpiled food and weapons, "preppers" have gone online to express concern that they may become targets of unwelcome attention.
"She prepared for the worst," Nancy Lanza's sister-in-law, Marsha Lanza, told reporters last weekend. "Last time we visited her in person, we talked about prepping—are you ready for what could happen down the line, when the economy collapses?"
Preppers, also known as survivalists, have been popularized by the National Geographic reality show "Doomsday Preppers." They range from people who believe the world will end soon to those who want to be better prepared in case a natural disaster hits.
Some preppers pursue "shelter in place" strategies, turning their homes into fortresses and stockpiling food, while others plan to flee their homes when the time comes and survive in the wilderness. Many swap tips and stories on online message boards, where discussions about Nancy Lanza and the possible blowback on preppers from her apparent connection to the community sparked debate over the weekend.
Adam Lanza, 20, is believed to have shot his mother while she slept before driving to a nearby elementary school and killing six adults and 20 children. People who knew Nancy Lanza, 52, and her son have told reporters that she took Adam to shooting ranges and legally owned five guns. It's suspected that three of the guns recovered at the scene of the crime belonged to his mother. On Sunday, the New York Post ran a cover story that seemed to lay blame for the shooting at her feet, titled "Gun-obsessed mom taught murderer son to shoot: Trained to Kill."
One leading prepper, Daisy Luther, was outraged by the cover, and wrote on her blog the Organic Prepper that the media is using the shootings to "demonize" preppers and that the tactic may be a form of "psychological warfare."
"I don’t know why Adam Lanza went on a rampage and killed 26 people last week. But I do know that it wasn’t because his mother was a homeschooling prepper who stored up food and taught him to fire a gun at a paper target," she wrote.
An anonymous poster on the conspiracy website GodlikeProductions also worried that preppers may now become "targets" to blame for the tragedy. "If I was you guys I'd keep any prepper type activities close to the vest," the poster wrote.
Others commented that preppers need to be more careful in keeping their weapons locked away. "I may be out of line (and i know you guys will let me know if i am!) but i am thinking that if i had guns in the same house with a [mentally ill] son, i would have invested in a gun safe and kept the keys on me," wrote one prepper named Peter Simcox on SurvivalistBoards.com. "A good prepper is going to secure the arms almost as a first reponsibility."
Other preppers chimed in to say that it's still unknown how Adam Lanza accessed the weapons in the first place and that they might have been locked away. A friend of the family told NBC's the "Today" show that Nancy Lanza insisted her son use weapons responsibly and taught him to do so when they went to ranges for target practice together.
"Guns require a lot of respect, and she really tried to instill that responsibility within him, and he took to it," friend Russell Hanoman said. "He loved being careful with them. He made it a source of pride."

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/survivalists-worry-preppers-scapegoated-newtown-shooting-213541985.html

TSA claims sick girl tests positive for bomb residue

DALLAS - A 12-year-old girl in a wheelchair was detained for nearly an hour at DFW Airport while trying to get through security.
Shelbi Walser was traveling with her mother on Sunday for a trip that's become routine. The seventh grader lives with a genetic bone disorder and was on her way to Florida for another rare medical treatment.
She's never had a problem flying, but this time Transportation Security Administration agents claimed she had bomb residue on her hands.
"It was frightening. I kinda got mad," she said.
The agents would not allow Tammy Daniels to get close to her crying daughter so she started recording on her cellphone.
"Are you kidding me? We're going to get you out of here in a second, okay?" she said in the video.
"I said, 'What do you mean? What did you test her for?' 'Oh she tested positive for explosive residue.' Okay… at that point you would think they would test her wheelchair, but they did nothing. Everything just seemed to spiral out," Daniels said.
The mother and daughter said a bomb specialist showed up and several agents began talking on their cellphones all while other passengers were speaking up in support of the girl.
"There were people saying, 'Really? You're going to do this to her? Y'all have to take her somewhere private where she's not out in the public and everyone can see her,'" Shelbi said.
Daniels said the agents then suddenly told them they were free to go and offered no explanation about it being a false alarm or anything.
"It was a little much. I don't know what to learn from this one. Somebody, they need to go back to the drawing board on this one," she said.
The TSA responded to questions about the encounter with a statement that said in part, "TSA's mission is to safely, efficiently and respectfully screen nearly two million passengers each day at airports nationwide. We are sensitive to the concerns of passengers who were not satisfied with their screening experience and we invite those individuals to provide feedback to TSA through a variety of channels."

http://www.myfoxdfw.com/story/20341065/tsa-claims-sick-girl-tests-positive-for-bomb-residue#ixzz2FVDZ7QMs     Marine double-amputee’s treatment on Delta flight angers other vets

On Dec. 13, 2011, Marine Lance Cpl. Christian Brown was leading his squad on a foot patrol in Afghanistan’s Helmand province when he stepped on an explosive device that blew off both his legs, one above the knee, the other below his hip. He also lost part of his right index finger.
Last Sunday, almost exactly a year since those grievous injuries forced him to learn to walk on two successive pairs of prosthetic legs, Brown was “humiliated” to the point of tears on a Delta flight from Atlanta to Washington after being clumsily wheeled to the back row of the plane, according to a complaint sent to the airline by an outraged fellow passenger.
Worse yet, according to retired Army Col. Nickey Knighton’s detailed “customer care” report to Delta, efforts by several fellow vets to shift Brown from coach to a first class seat offered by another flyer, were rebuffed by the crew. Flight attendants insisted no one could move through the cabin because the doors were being closed for takeoff, she wrote.
Knighton, a former helicopter pilot with nearly 30 years of service, who turned out to be seated in the same back row as Brown, assumed that because he boarded last, he would be seated up front for comfort and ease of exit in case of emergency. Instead, she wrote in a complaint obtained by “She The People,” he was squeezed into a narrow aviation wheelchair that “bumped up against stationary aisle seats as he was wheeled through the aircraft. [He] was obviously humiliated by being paraded through the aircraft and was visibly upset. I touched Brown on his shoulders and asked if he was okay. Tears ran down his face, but he did not cry out loud.”
Cpl. Christian Brown in physical therapy, after losing his legs in Afghanistan (via Facebook)

What Knighton did not tell Delta, perhaps because she did not know, was that Brown, 29, was also very ill with a high fever. He was returning, via Atlanta, from a hunting trip in Alabama for injured service members to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md. Injured on his second deployment to Afghanistan after joining the Marines in April, 2009, Brown has spent nearly a year at the complex outside Washington, D.C.
After six months in the hospital, including a period when he was in a coma, Brown moved into a two-bedroom apartment on the medical campus that he shares with his mother, Lyn Braden-Reed. He undergoes daily physical therapy to adjust to his new legs, she said. Friends and family follow his progress via Facebook posts and photos.
Brown, a strapping six-footer when he enlisted, was flying back to Washington with a military “escort buddy,” but his mother told me that had she been with her son, “it would have turned out a little bit differently. I just can’t imagine what it was like for him, being that sick. He had a 104-degree fever and he was shaking. He was quite obviously sick.”
Brown and his mother, who live 25 miles north of Memphis in the town of Munford, declined to offer specifics about what he actually experienced on the plane.
But while Knighton’s complaint reflects controlled rage, retired Army Lt. Col. Keith Gafford, also on the flight, held nothing back during a phone interview.
“I have been flying with Delta for a gazillion years and this crew treated Chris worse than you’d treat any thing, not even any body. I did 27 years in the military. I have seen a lot of things and have seen a lot of guys die, but I have never seen a Marine cry,” said Gafford, who served two tours in Iraq. “What the kid said was, ‘I have given everything that I can give and this is the way I am being treated? This is how I will be treated for the rest of my life?’”
In fact, Gafford added, two first-class passengers offered to switch seats with Brown, “but the flight attendant said we have to go. How many times have we sat on the tarmac for 45 minutes? You could close the door and still make an adjustment.” The Texas native blasted the crew for being “hard as woodpecker lips.”
Knighton said time was hardly the issue since the plane took off five minutes ahead of schedule and arrived at Washington Reagan National Airport a quarter hour early. She also said crew members refused to divulge their names or discuss the situation, although one attendant suggested she speak to the captain upon landing. By the time she reached the cockpit, the captain had vanished. The first officer declined to engage in conversation, and urged her to contact customer service.
Michael R. Thomas of Delta’s corporate communications office in Atlanta offered this emailed statement regarding Knighton’s letter:
“The story in no way reflects either Delta’s standard operating procedure or the very high regard we hold for our nation’s service members. We are sorry for the difficulties that transpired and are investigating this event to determine the appropriate next steps.”
Asked to list possible next steps–reprimands, fines, suspension, termination–or estimate how long the probe might last, Thomas sent a second email: “As previously stated, we are actively looking into the incident and have no additional details to share at this time.”
What Knighton, a longtime Delta flyer, seeks is simple. “I don’t want another wounded warrior, a veteran, or anyone with any type of disability to be handled in this fashion. It was just senseless to me to the point of, ‘I can’t believe this is happening.’”
This is not the airline’s first snafu involving military personnel. In June 2011, Delta ignited a national firestorm when two soldiers posted a YouTube video about their experience catching a connecting flight from Baltimore to Atlanta after an 18-hour layover from Afghanistan. Several in the group of more than 30 people were charged $200 each to check a fourth bag. Under public and Congressional pressure, Delta soon announced it would allow military personnel and dependents to check extra bags for free.

This time, the solution may be comprehensive sensitivity training for crew members.
Meanwhile, the Marine–who learned of his promotion to corporal while recovering in the hospital here–can’t wait to return home for good next week with his mother. Between his graduation from Munford High, where he played baseball, and his enlistment, Brown studied for the ministry at a non-demoninational seminary in Pensacola, Fla. But by 2009, “he felt a different calling. God wanted him to go in the military,” said Braden-Reed.
Brown is uncertain about his long-range plans, but is exploring the possibility of shifting years yet again, this time to the classroom as a Marine Corps instructor. He may also want to consider revisiting his earlier calling to the ministry, or become a motivational speaker who turned a personal ordeal into the ultimate teachable moment.
But first there is the near term back home.
“I want to go hunting with my dad and enjoy some good holiday food,” he told me. He’ll also continue rigorous physical therapy.
And does he think he’ll ever fly Delta again?
“Hell, no.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/she-the-people/wp/2012/12/13/marine-double-amputee-gets-help-from-fellow-vets-angered-by-delta-airlines-treatment/