Stunning, the number of cases of Muslim violence since 9/11 -

http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/

You know what I dont get? I mean I dont know if Massacustes has the death penalty, I'm guessing not, but the US government does; and a bombing like that they aught to have know it would become a federal case.

And no one ever really gets away with high profile shit like that anymore, so why werent they on a train towards the canadian boarder the minute after they dropped their bombs?

re: lujlp

Unless they have something lined up in Canada, what were they supposed to do in Canada. Also, by leaving immediately after the bombing, they do risk of being exposed by their absence.

We have to be careful about saying stuff like this, because we don't want to minimize what they did. They may not have been that smart, but they were smart enough to kill and maim a whole bunch of people at one go.

People like this are, from what I've seen, equipped with massive allottments of narcissistic and borderline personality disorders, which is why they don't think their escape plans through: they just assume they won't get caught, becuase they're Special Snowflakes. That in no way diminishes the severity of what they do. In this particular case, it assures that they won't get the chance to do it again, but these are the exception to the rule. But there seems to be an endless supply of people like them, most of whom commit smaller crimes that they routinely get away with.

I've stated my theory here before, that the amount of trouble that the personality-disordered in a society cause is proportional not to their percentage of the population, but to their absolute number. As the population grows, eventually the ranks of the PD's reach a critical mass, which makes it impossible for the society to continue functioning. I'm afraid that we are beginning to see that happen.

"And no one ever really gets away with high profile shit like that anymore, so why werent they on a train towards the canadian boarder the minute after they dropped their bombs?"

lujlp,
We may never know, but I don't think it's out of line to speculate that Tamerlan Tsarnaev (older brother) was on a suicide mission. He may never have intended to escape.

@JFP: Times like these I try to recall Hanlon's Razor, "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity." My personal thought now is that Tamerlan just had one too many sparring sessions without his headgear. The one comforting thought I take away from any of these kinds of episodes is that most criminals/terrorists really aren't very bright.

That is a comforting thought, but these guys were actually on the terrorist A team. Faisal Shahzad's car bomb fizzled away in Times Square on May 2010, and he got arrested at JFK before he could leave the country. When Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab set his underwear on fire, the other passengers beat the living shit out of him, and now he's doing life without parole. Kafeel Ahmed tried to blow up Glasgow Airport in June '07, and instead he set himself on fire, got kicked in the nuts, then died of severe burns, Etc etc.

Keep in mind also that the Tsarnaevs could have caused ten times as many fatalities if every last one of the injured hadn't been whisked away to world-class hospitals within 10 minutes.

"They may not have been that smart, but they were smart enough to kill and maim a whole bunch of people at one go."

This isn't hard. The escaping part is.

"This isn't hard. The escaping part is."

I know, but that's not the point. Their being caught doesn't make any of the fatalities any less dead. The Slate article gives me a "you don't have to worry about this because terrorists are stupid" vibe. There's a big difference between an explanation of risk, and an apologia for acts already committed.

"Times like these I try to recall Hanlon's Razor, 'Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.' "

Cousin Dave's Electric Shaver: "Never attribute to stupidity that which is adequately explained by narcissism."

Preliminary interviews with Tsarnaev indicate the two brothers fit the classification of self-radicalized jihadists, the source said. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, wounded and held in a Boston hospital, has said his brother -- who was killed early Friday -- wanted to defend Islam from attack, according to the source. The government source cautioned that the interviews were preliminary, and that Tsarnaev's account needs to be checked out and followed up on by investigators.

Seems reasonable to me that this was their motivation, or at least the older brother's motivation (and he convinced his little brother to go along with it.)

Defend Islam from -- an 8-year-old boy who wanted to go to school the day after the Marathon, but ended up dead?

I think that Islamist extremists perceive Islam as under attack by Western-secular ideas like, for example, the separation of church and state. In addition, many Islamist extremists seem convinced that the invasion of Iraq by the U.S. -- as wrongheaded as it may have been -- was an "attack on Islam" and that the invasion of Afghanistan was also an "attack on Islam." When the U.S. invasion of Iraq ended up giving power to a majority of Muslims (the Shiites) in that country, and freed others (the Kurds) from Saddam's oppression, one would think that a reasonable person would be hard-pressed to conclude that this was an "attack on Islam." But that's the problem: Islamist extremists aren't reasonable; they're fanatical.

There's one other problem, unfortunately.

As Gandhi (allegedly) said:

"I like your Christ.

I do not like your Christians.

They are so unlike your Christ."

Don't know if this has been mentioned here yet:

"Tamerlan Tsarnaev - Was He Named After Islamic Ruler Tamerlane?"

(Among his accomplishments were annihilating Delhi and much of Baghdad, building pyramids with hundreds of thousands of his victims' skulls, and burying 2,000 victims alive. He died in 1405, just as he was about to attack China.)

http://www.policymic.com/articles/36671/tamerlan-tsarnaev-was-he-named-after-islamic-ruler-tamerlane

By Alasdair Denv

Last two thirds:

......But we should be careful about attributing motives for the bombing. At the same time, we should never let a crisis go to waste, if only because they're good opportunities to learn history. So, first, who was Tamerlane?

The name "Tamerlane" is based on a derisive epithet used by Persians, which translates to "Timur the Lame." Despite being hobbled by injuries sustained early in his life, Timur (1336-1405) rose quickly from what is now Uzbekistan to rule a huge empire stretching from Baghdad in the west to Delhi in the east. Timur fancied himself as being both an inheritor of the throne of the Mongolian conqueror Genghis Khan (c. 1162-1227) and a good candidate for Islamic Caliph. But Timur never had the credentials to officially hold either title, so he contented himself with being de facto ruler.

Timur is remembered as a brilliant military thinker who was ruthlessly brutal to his opponents. His conquests of Baghdad and Delhi were particularly bloody. He was also a patron of the arts (funny how often the two go together), and turned his capital city of Samarkand into a place of architectural innovation. European leaders were gleeful at Timur's successes against the Ottoman Empire, even as they feared that he would turn his armies on them, too. They needn't have worried, because Timur died as he was gathering together a campaign to invade China, which was in the early stages of the Ming Dynasty. His empire gradually fell apart after his death.

Many Hindus and Christians have a dim view of Timur, given his atrocities, but the same can be said about many Muslims. Timur's victims were often Muslims living in what is now Iran, Iraq, Turkey, and elsewhere. But the name "Tamerlane" (or variation of it) is nonetheless popular, particularly in Russia, Uzbekistan, and other parts of Central Asia. (Perhaps it became a favorite among people who didn't like the Ottoman Turks.)

Tamerlan Tsarnaev may share a name with Timur, but that could be all they share. Timur certainly wanted to craft a large empire with Islam as its religion. But Chechen rebels and terrorists, though they are frequently Muslims, typically don't have the same designs. They're separatists who want the Russian government out of Chechnya, not creators of a new Islamic world order.

That being said, it's still not clear what the motive of the Tsarnaev brothers was. Maybe they were Al-Qaeda-style jihadis. After all, it's not clear how bombing Boston helps the Chechen separatist movement (though it's not clear how the 2002 Moscow theater or 2004 Beslan school hostage incidents helped, either). And, certainly, some Chechen rebels likely are in agreement with Al-Qaeda, or at the very least work with them.

But there's also the possibility that the Tsarnaev brothers are terrorists with a simple separatist agenda. Or maybe they're just antisocial sociopaths looking for a reason to kill, using Russian bullying as a justification the same way Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold used school bullying as a reason to shoot up Columbine High School.

That would still make them terrorists and terrible people. But it wouldn't make them part of a larger plot to impose a religion on anyone. They would be terrorists who are Muslims, not Islamic terrorists.

(end)

And:

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/136226.html

'I Am a Watertown Resident...'
Posted by Lew Rockwell on April 21, 2013 09:21 AM

"...and I have to let you know that today, I do not feel relieved or safe, I feel more uneasy than ever. I am not cheering with the throngs of blood-lusting MA residents that this "s%!tbag terrorist a$#hole" was caught or thanking our "selfless" state and federal agents for risking their lives to save the masses. No, I am left with a terrible feeling because I see this for what it is and am dis-heartened at the ignorant mob-mentality around me.

"I am saddened that no one realizes that what happened on Marathon Monday happens every day in the countries that the US currently occupies and that what descended upon Watertown on Friday is experienced by families abroad at the hands of US forces every single day. I am disgusted by the willingness of those around me to be spoon fed fear and then to truly believe that the only people that can protect and save them is the military force that came out in droves and forced people under house arrest (oh wait, excuse me, "Shelter in Place" is the PC term).

"It is happening before my eyes. Liberty was born here, and this week, Liberty has officially died. It is playing out like a bad predictable movie and the masses are too caught up in the bread & circuses to notice. As a daily LewRockwell.com reader, I see the stories in print every day and have intellectually understood the patterns. But this week, in my backyard, I have seen it first-hand and there is no going back. Welcome to the militarized United States of America.

"Disheartened Watertown, MA, Resident"

https://groups.google.com/forum/#!searchin/alt.obituaries/%22Could$20the$20Cops$20Be$20Lying%22/alt.obituaries/I1GKIdX6zY8/fKu4aiY4brIJ

"Could the Cops Be Lying in Boston? Surely Not!"
Posted by Travis Holte (at Lew Rockwell) on April 21, 2013 8:02am

During the occupation of Boston it was widely reported that the bombing suspects had robbed a 7/11. That turned out to be false. The robbery was perpetrated by others. That's right; with a massive police state presence, criminals were undeterred. But how convenient for officials to let the story float for nearly a day?.....

....."Linda explains how the shootout transpired in Watertown during the early morning hours. She saw the first suspect mortally wounded and police beginning the manhunt for the second suspect." [start at 3:10 in the audio report where she confirmed the POLICE in the SUV ran over him]

(end)

For some reason, the above link includes references to a "Simpsons" cop. Don't know if that means we can ignore the whole thing or not.

An "Islamic Reformation" cannot help or be hoped for, because Islam is the Reformation...of an Eastern Christianity that was navel-gazing an ever-finer and ever-more sterile set of formulae on the Hypostatic Union.