[deandrecooke]

via 3 Officers Reported Dead in Pittsburgh Shooting - NYTimes.com
A man opened fire on officers during a domestic disturbance call Saturday morning, killing three of them, a police official said. Friends said he had been upset recently about losing his job and that he feared the Obama administration was poised to ban guns.What do you get when you mix a stunning economic collapse, violent right-wing hyperbole and guns? Cops are already on edge after the Oakland killings, and many in our communities are on edge after– well, after everything. The last thing we need is a hot summer to add to the recipe. Have mercy.

[deandrecooke]

The post above is from Jack and Jill Politics.

[xesvideo]

I was just getting ready to post this.

Yup... That's a great way to make your argument for the right to bear arms... Shoot and kill three cops. Another strike for devolution.

::

RIP, and thank you for your service.

[deandrecooke]

The whole thing sounds like an ambush. It's just terrible.

[deandrecooke]

It's clear that this guy is unstable, but one has to wonder how calls for armed revolution from unstable people in our government and on the airwaves like Michelle Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Chuck Norris, Rush Limbaugh, et alia, plays a role in pushing these people over the edge.

Especially in such tough times.

[mvjvz]

Smells like another republican.

[rhybrisee]

The whole thing sounds like an ambush. It's just terrible.

PITTSBURGH — A gunman wearing a bulletproof vest and "lying in wait" opened fire on officers responding to a domestic disturbance call Saturday, killing three of them and turning a quiet Pittsburgh street into a battlefield, police said.

Police Chief Nate Harper said the motive for the shooting isn't clear, but friends said the gunman recently had been upset about losing his job and feared the Obama administration was poised to ban guns.

Richard Poplawski, 23, met officers at the doorway and shot two of them in the head immediately, Harper said. An officer who tried to help the two also was killed.

Poplawski, armed with an assault rifle and two other guns, then held police at bay for four hours as the fallen officers were left bleeding nearby, their colleagues unable to reach them, according to police and witnesses. More than 100 rounds were fired by the SWAT teams and Poplawski, Harper said.

The three slain officers were Eric Kelly, Stephen Mayhle and Paul Sciullo III. Kelly had been on the force for 14 years, Mayhle and Sciullo for two years each. Another officer, Timothy McManaway, was shot in the hand and a fifth broke his leg on a fence.

Poplawski had gunshot wounds in his legs but was otherwise unharmed because he was wearing a bulletproof vest, Harper said. He was charged with three counts of homicide, aggravated assault and a weapons violation.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/0..._n_183130.html

[xesvideo]

Smells like another republican.

Owen, you are aware that we have Republicans among our memberships and they happen to be perfectly fine people, right? They might find this persistent line of posting quite hurtful, and I'm pretty sure that's not your intent.

[deandrecooke]

One of my high-school boyfriends was named Richard Poplawski.

[mvjvz]

Owen, you are aware that we have Republicans among our memberships and they happen to be perfectly fine people, right? They might find this persistent line of posting quite hurtful, and I'm pretty sure that's not your intent.

I meant to copy craigs limbaugh, beck, post. I know we have republicans here and I know that they are not all bad people, I just associate guns more so with republicans than any other group.

[deandrecooke]

Thanks to some sleuth work on the Internet, we're starting to learn more about Richard Poplawski, the 23-year-old who killed three police officers yesterday in Pittsburgh, evidently out of fear that his guns were going to be taken away.

It appears that what police may be looking at is a budding white supremacist who frequented one of the most popular neo-Nazi websites and harbored an apocalyptic dread of the federal government.

The Village Voice's True Crime Report has done a lot of the sleuthing. The thread of connective tissue involving the evidence they've uncovered isn't perfectly solid, but the strands are all well connected enough to suggest the general thrust is reasonably accurate.

The key is to look a little harder at the MySpace page of Poplawski's self-described "best friend," Eddie Perkovic -- the one that contains that anti-Semitic, anti-black racist rant, recommending that folks read David Duke and the Protocols. You can see Perkovic above, spouting the gun-nut line about how "he was gonna stand by what his forefathers told him to do." http://crooksandliars.com/david-neiw...ard-poplawski-

[deandrecooke]

From the article above:

Finally, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review has some corroboration from other sources that indicates he fits this profile: Richard Andrew "Pop" Poplawski's ex-girlfriend said he dragged her by the hair and threatened to shoot her.

He slept with a gun under his pillow in a basement room filled with firearms and ammunition, convinced that Jews controlled the media and President Obama was scheming to take away his arsenal, friends and relatives said Saturday.
"He was a violent, abusive man. He dragged me by the hair, pulling me across the floor. I saw him choke his own mother. He was controlling," said Melissa Gladish, 23, of Verona, his former girlfriend who received a protection from abuse order against him in 2005. She said she had no doubt he would kill someone.
"He was never afraid of anyone. Once, he accused me of cheating on him, which I didn't do. He told me he had a gun he kept buried ... and that he would dig it up and get me," she said.

... Despite nearly four years of estrangement, Gladish said Poplawski phoned her in the midst of his standoff with police.
"He said, 'I'm dying. I'm dying. I want you to know that I always loved you. You're still my baby,' " Gladish said. "I tried to calm him down. He said he was shot and that he was dying. He said, 'I'm lying in a pool of blood.' Then I heard a lot of noise, like a scuffle, and the phone went dead."
Finally, his old friend Eddie Perkovic pipes in too: Perkovic said Poplawski usually was affable and kind, but grew angry recently over fears Obama would outlaw guns. He said Poplawski owned a bullet-proof vest, an AK-47 assault rifle and at least seven other weapons, but obtained the firearms legally.

He said Poplawski feared America was "going to see the end of our times." Poplawski had little interest in clubs or sports in high school, but was a diehard Penguins fan, Perkovic said.

Another Stanton Heights friend, Aaron Bire, 22, said Poplawski "talked about Zionists controlling the media and thought Obama had good press because of his race."

[lopesmili]

I hope that some people who think Obama "might be" the anti-christ read this article and realize how crazy that kind of thinking is.

[markphata]

It's clear that this guy is unstable, but one has to wonder how calls for armed revolution from unstable people in our government and on the airwaves like Michelle Bachmann, Glenn Beck, Chuck Norris, Rush Limbaugh, et alia, plays a role in pushing these people over the edge.

Especially in such tough times.

I blame Glenn Beck for this tragedy. He should be arrested.