Dramatic end to Sydney siege as police storm cafe with guns and stun grenades as terrified hostages run for their lives

Gunman said to be killed

Jewish community ‘in lockdown’ following Sydney attack  "Jewish schools across Australia sent students home in the wake of an ongoing hostage crisis in a Sydney cafe Monday morning, where at least one gunman took multiple people captive in an apparent politically motivated attack."
 Times of Israel

UK Daily Mail

Man Haron Monis was named as the gunman.

 Arriving as a refugee in Australia in 1996, the hostage-taker was charged as an

 accessory  to the murder of his ex-wife - who was allegedly stabbed and set

 on fire on a flight of stairs in her western Sydneyapartment block in 2013

 

"Police stormed the cafe in central Sydney where a gunman held hostages for more than 16 hours"

•  Police moved in firing automatic weapons and throwing grenades as hostages were seen fleeing in terror from the café
• Live TV footage showed hostages running frantically from the cafe at shortly after 2am in small groups 
• It came hours after Man Haron Monis was named as the gunman holding people hostage in a Sydney café
• The 49-year-old man lives in southwest Sydney, but is originally from Iran and a self-proclaimed sheik 
• He was charged with accessory in the murder of his ex-wife - who was allegedly stabbed and set on fire on a flight of stairs in her western Sydney apartment block
• He was also arrested for the sexual assault of a 27-year-old woman in 2002 in April this year after luring her to his clinic following claims he was as 'spiritual healer' 
• Monis was slapped with an additional 40 charges in October after more victims to come forward 
• Monis received 300 community service hours for sending hate mail to the families of Australian dead soldiers  (Somewhat like the Westboro Baptist Church does)
• The seige follows an unsuccessful attempt to have these charges overturned in the High Court on Friday   
• He stormed the Lindt cafe in Martin Place during the morning rush hour on Monday stopped anyone fro
• He forced hostages to hold up black flag with white writing in Arabic, an emblem linked to terror groups 

 

"Police firing automatic weapons and lobbing stun grenades stormed the cafe in central Sydney early on Tuesday where a gunman had been holding more than a dozen hostages, bringing a dramatic end to a siege lasting more than 16 hours.

 

"There were reports that two people were killed and at least three others were injured, but this could not immediately be confirmed.

 

"Live television coverage showed at least two people being taken away from the scene on stretchers. One hostage was seen being carried out of the building. She appeared to be in pain, and blood flowed down her legs.

 

"Nine News reported that eleven hostages had been accounted for after the police raid, which occurred shortly after 2am."

Brief headlines

Berkeley protesters bum rush stage, shut down speech because #Ferguson
"This is what America could look like."

 

2 Years After Newtown, Small Steps Toward Healing

 

ISIS Is Trying To Sell The Body Of U.S. Hostage James Foley For $1 Million  "Middlemen in touch with ISIS or its associates say the group has turned a grim new page in its deadly hostage trade — by trying to sell the remains of at least one of the U.S. citizens it has executed in Syria."

Moonbats defend fable not the facts

... "Now, not so much. As the UVA rape story in the rag known as Rolling Stone has fallen apart, the “rape advocates” and moonbats have closed ranks, defending the fable rather than the facts." ...
Plus: Fake but accurate revisited  ... "We are inundated with BS courtesy of the Democrats and their mainstream media adjunct. It is amazing how little has changed. From inside CBS News itself, we now have the testimony of Sharyl Attkisson in Stonewalled and elsewhere." ...
 

 Germans Rise Up Against Islamization [Wake-up call to America's Left"]

"Notice to America’s “Left”.  Like these Germans, Americans will reject your radicalism, hatred and destruction. " 

 

 "Elizabeth Warren is catching fire."   traditionalguy said...

"Warren has that hard to find cross regional appeal a President must have to get elected. Hillary has never had that without selling Bill's personality in a siamese twin deal. So Hillary shows no personality and just grins an entitled grin at people
"Warren will be nominated. "

 

United We Distrust  "President Barack Obama recently spoke of the "simmering distrust" between many police departments and minority communities. The president is correct in his assessment, but dramatically understates the problem." ...
..."Whether it's the IRS targeting Tea Party groups, regulators targeting small businesses or NSA officials using the agency's excessive spying capabilities to spy on love interests, the abuse of power creates legitimate distrust."

 

 

Dianne Feinstein's Travesty  ... "The committee portrays Gen. Hayden, the former CIA director, as a liar who deceived Congress about the agency’s interrogation program, yet the committee couldn’t be bothered to interview him."

Between the crumbling of a landmark Rolling Stone story and the dynamiting of The New Republic, these have been a bad couple of weeks for journalism

 

How this week looked to Mark Steyn   "On Monday, Mark celebrated the fact that, while America may no longer be the world's leading economic power, it's still Number One in the length of its presidential motorcade: Even if you ain't got it, flaunt it, baby!" ...

 

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Anti-Anti-Underground/500213673410703

Sharpton Visited the Obama White House 61 Times

White House Dossier   "And counting, of course.

"My God, the guy probably has his own desk in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building.
President Obama’s embrace of Al Sharpton, as National Review points out, has helped legitimize Sharpton as the preeminent black leader. Sharpton and his idiotic rantings, his message of victimization instead of self-help, and his fomenting of racial divisions, now takes the place of Martin Luther King Jr., thanks to Obama.

"According to National Review:

Thirty-four of Sharpton’s visits were for White House events like high-profile nominations, bill signings, and soirées. Some, like the February 9, 2010, “Celebration of Music from the Civil Rights Movement,” seem well within Sharpton’s wheelhouse. But many more — including a March 18, 2010, signing ceremony for a “jobs bill” and a May 19, 2010, event honoring visiting Mexican president Felipe Calderón — leave one wondering where Sharpton’s expertise enters the picture. Others — such as the Obamas’ 2011 Super Bowl party, small-scale movie screenings in February 2011 and April 2013, and especially the president’s birthday party in August 2011 — speak to a close personal relationship between Sharpton and the first family.

"The nation’s first black president could have brought us together. He could have pounded home the message to the black community that it’s time to stop complaining about insults, perceived and real, and go about claiming their rightful place in society.

"Instead, Obama feeds the mindset that demands help from the state and coaxes anger from the aggrieved. What a waste.

Network Wars? CBS's "Blue Bloods" takes a great shot at Al Sharpton and MSNBC

It was pretty obvious on a second-season rerun this weekend.

The protagonist is a black minister, a community organizer who heads a church in Harlem that more closely appears to be a parody of Louis Farrahkan/Nation of Islam. Unlike Rev Al, this guy is tall, thin, AND bald (can't risk being accused of type casting here, eh?)

They stage an incident to provoke a confrontation between church members and the NYPD, and two officers are injured.

It turns out that the Rev is trying to "resurrect" his career after being accused of stealing several millions from a community organization that he heads. ( sure sounds like Rev Al and his National Action Network, doesn't it?)  

To make sure EVERYONE get the point, towards the end, while discussing the Rev's latest rabble-rousing efforts to get the PC fired, Selleck's character says.."he just wants to get his own talk show on MSNBC."
 

A little snarky reflection on the Cromnibus bill

http://terrellaftermath.com/

It’s (Still) a TARP!  "Elizabeth Warren, corporate-welfare queen."
... "Senator Elizabeth Warren, the millionaire Massachusetts class warrior who has made the vilification of Wall Street bankers her second-favorite pastime (right behind prospering on the largesse of Wall Street lawyers, the gentlemen and scholars who funded her very generously compensated position at Harvard and fill her campaign coffers) did not exactly make the issue her hill to die on, but the fight did provide her an excellent opportunity for grandstanding. " ...

11 Other Things You Can Use a Cromnibus For   "This week, GOP House leadership passed a controversial $1.1 trillion spending bill infamously known as the “cromnibus.” The bill, supported by the Obama administration, is 1,600 pages long. So how big is that really? Like in real life?"

 
"This is what a cromnibus looks like printed out:"
"For reference, it’s just a little taller than a Starbucks Venti."

7. A passenger so you can ride in the HOV lane

 

And this is what it sounds like when you drop it on the floor:  

 

 

More here.    "Now that the bill has passed the House and will odds-on end up on the president’s desk, what other uses could you have for your cromnibus? "

 

Freedom of speech? Juan Williams: Hacked Sony e-mails expose white liberal hypocrisy on race; Star chamber justice at Smith College

drawfortruth

Fear liberals; they are watching and listening.

Hot Air  "And Juan Williams should know — he’s had first-hand experience with the phenomenon. NPR fired Williams four years ago for admitting in a segment on The O’Reilly Factor that travelers boarding commercial flights in “Muslim garb” cause him to “get worried … get nervous.” Never mind that Williams and our own Mary Katharine spent the entire segment arguing that Bill O’Reilly was painting Muslims with too broad a brush and that a distinction had to be made between moderate and extremist Muslims; NPR cashiered Williams for the one sentence he uttered, calling it “inconsistent with our editorial standards and practices, and undermined his credibility as a news analyst with NPR.” The experience became an epiphany for Williams about which side of the political spectrum actually practices the tolerance that the other preaches, although Williams himself remains as liberal as ever." ...
 

College president apologizes after offending students by saying “all lives matter”  ... "Could be that she was genuinely sorry for the misunderstanding, but maybe not; maybe the impetus to grovel was less about sincere regret than about quickly short-circuiting any nascent attempts by junior Social Justice Warriors to turn this into an excuse to protest her office, hold sit-ins..."

Who is Al Sharpton?

Andrew Klavan    "In which our politically correct host, Andrew Klavan, takes a look at the disturbing history of the Reverend Al Sharpton – called reverend because he is revered, by Al Sharpton. [Full transcript here.]
 

The Feinstein Report Is Going to Cost Us; The so-called torture report is worthless as an investigation, but it’s valuable to our enemies.

Andrew C. McCarthy   "Jihadists are still waging their war against the civilized world. Check that: Jihadists are currently winning their war against the civilized world. Thank Barack Obama, who fails to grasp the difference between being “the president who ends wars” and the president who retreats from wars, and thus surrenders while the enemy is on the rise.

 

"What is the response of Senate sages to this predicament? Dianne Feinstein and her fellow Democrats saw it as the perfect time to savage the CIA, further burn America’s bridges with anti-terrorism allies, and hand jihadists a huge propaganda victory.

 

"The Islamic State had a response, too: They beheaded four Christian children for refusing to renounce Jesus Christ.

 

"You see where this is going, no?" ....Keep reading... 

http://comicallyincorrect.com/2014/12/12/cia-waterboarding/


http://www.investors.com/editorial-cartoons/michael-ramirez/730413

Dianne Feinstein, Friend of Terrorists  ... "Thanks to Dianne and her insistence that a report exposing the CIA’s overseas handling of 119 terrorists be released, America is getting a good dose of absurd liberal reasoning.

 

"Dianne Feinstein is among those who have the audacity to point the finger of accusation at CIA operatives for splashing water in the face of the confessed architect of 9/11, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, but have no problem with the paper-thin skin of an unborn baby being peeled away from its fragile bones while still in the womb. " ...

Back To The Future On Cold War, Thanks To Obama

Investors.com

"I'm not going to wear rose-colored glasses when it comes to Russia, or Mr.

  Putin," Republican nominee Mitt Romney said during the third presidential

 debate in Boca Raton, Fla., on Oct. 22, 2012

"Russia: Moscow has a new intermediate-range missile violating a nuclear arms treaty. Now the Obama administration may return cruise missiles to Europe in response. A new Cold War, caused by U.S. decline, heats up.

"It sure was a great debate quip: "In the 1980s, they're now calling to ask for their foreign policy back because, you know, the Cold War's been over for 20 years."

"President Obama in 2012 got laughs slamming his Republican foe for believing that "the biggest geopolitical threat facing America" was "Russia, not al-Qaida."   Read More At Investor's Business Daily:

Did any of your liberal friends smirk and yuk over Obama's response?

Why can’t we have a “conversation” about militant Islam?

Legal Insurrection  “The conversation about militant Islam has been systematically repressed.”

"If you’re paying attention to what the mainstream media is selling, you know that when it comes to militant Islam, the world has a big censorship problem. The Lawfare Project just released a new video that offers up a laundry list of examples of times when the criticism and discussion of radical Islam has been censored, repressed, or fought via “lawfare.”
 

 

"I think Lawfare has an excellent point; right now, we’re in the middle of the annual “War on Christmas,” in which the entire country (world? probably) “has a conversation” about the propriety of hosting a Nativity scene during a holiday season that celebrates the Nativity.

 

"By “conversation,” of course, we mean “conversation about how best to push religious expression into the shadows (unless it involves the Koran, in which case, rock on.)”

 

"I don’t think we’ll ever win the war against censorship—they’ll keep trying, and we’ll keep fighting to have our voices heard. But the key to make sure the world hears the voices of those radical Islam has touched is to keep speaking."   Related: The Lawfare Project

While on the subject...

Cornell Univ. Police Chief apologizes for saying #AllLivesMatter instead of #BlackLivesMatter
"College Insurrection and others recently reported how the President of Smith College apologized to the student body for using the term “All Lives Matter” rather than “Black Lives Matter.” A Cornell engineering student just tweeted to me about a similar statement from the Chief of the Cornell University Police, Kathy Zoner, in an all campus email." ... More on this.

Holder was right; we are a nation of cowards.

How's this for torture?

 

Energy Townhall   "Whether it’s the costliest regulation in history or the coal-killing power plant rules (that Obama’s law professor says raise “constitutional questions”), it’s clear that the CIA isn’t the only government agency engaged in torture. At least the CIA isn’t torturing Americans."

"On Your Hands" (aka The Axis of Idiots ), criticizes foreign policy stances of Democrat politicians.

Snopes  "Command Sergeant Major J.D. Pendry served in the U.S. Army (not the U.S. Marine Corps, as stated in some altered versions of this piece) from 1971 to 1999 and is the author of the The Three Meter Zone: Common Sense Leadership for NCOs. In 2006 he penned an e-mail entitled "On Your Hands," which has been widely circulated on the Internet under a variety of titles (including "Axis of Idiots", " "No Punches Pulled Here," and "Insight of a Sergeant Major") and has since been altered by others. "  His site

Sgt. Major Pendry writes:

 "Jimmy Carter, you are the father of the Islamic Nazi movement.  You threw the Shah under the bus, welcomed the Ayatollah home, and then lacked the spine to confront the terrorists when they took our embassy and our people hostage.  You're the "runner-in-chief."

"Bill Clinton, you played ring around the Lewinsky while the terrorists were at war with us.  You got us into a fight with them in Somalia and then you ran from it.  Your weak-willed responses to the USS Cole and the First Trade Center Bombing and Our Embassy Bombings emboldened the killers.  Each time you failed to respond adequately, they grew bolder, until 9/11/2001".

"John Kerry, dishonesty is your most prominent attribute.  You lied about American Soldiers in Vietnam.  Your military service, like your life, is more fiction than fact.  You've accused our military of terrorizing women and children in Iraq.  You called Iraq the wrong war, wrong place, wrong time, with the same words you used to describe Vietnam.  You're a fake!  You want to run from Iraq and abandon the Iraqis to murderers just as you did to the Vietnamese.  Iraq, like Vietnam, is another war that you were for, before you were against it."

"The late John Murtha, said our military was broken.  He said we can't win militarily in Iraq.  He accused United States Marines of cold-blooded murder without proof and said we should redeploy to Okinawa.  Okinawa?  And the Democrats called him their military expert!  Maybe he suffered a traumatic brain injury while he was off building his war hero resume?  He was a sad, pitiable, corrupt, and washed up old fool, not a true Marine.  He wouldn't amount to a good pimple on a real Marine's ass, a phony and a disgrace".

“Dick Durbin, you accused our Soldiers at Guantanamo of being Nazis, tenders of Soviet style gulags and as bad as the regime of Pol Pot, who murdered two million of his own people after your party abandoned Southeast Asia to the Communists.  Then you wanted to abandon the Iraqis to the same fate.  History was not a good teacher for you, was it?  Lord help us!  See Dick run!"

"Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Carl Levine, Barbara Boxer, Diane Feinstein, Russ Feingold, Pat Leahy,Barack Obama, Chuck Schumer, the Hollywood Leftist morons, et al, to name a few ad nauseam:  Every time you stand in front of television cameras and broadcast to the Islamic Nazis that we went to war because our former President lied, that the war is wrong and our Soldiers are torturers, that we should leave Iraq, you give the Islamic butchers - the same ones that tortured and mutilated American Soldiers - cause to think that we'll run away again, and all they have to do is hang on a little longer.  Now Obama wants to start his own war and half of you idiots support him!  "American news media, the New York Times particularly:  Each time you publish stories about national defense secrets and our intelligence gathering methods, you become one united with the sub-human pieces of camel dung that torture and mutilate the bodies of American Soldiers.  You can't strike up the courage to publish cartoons, but you can help Al Qaeda destroy my country.  Actually, you are more dangerous to us than Al Qaeda.  Think about that each time you face Mecca to admire your Pulitzer." 

Pendry

"You are America 's 'AXIS OF IDIOTS.' Your Collective Stupidity will destroy us.  Self-serving politics and terrorist-abetting news scoops are more important to you than our national security or the lives of innocent civilians and Soldiers.  It bothers you that defending ourselves gets in the way of your elitist sport of politics and your ignorant editorializing.  There is as much blood on your hands as is on the hands of murdering terrorists.  Don't ever doubt that.  Your frolics will only serve to extend this war as they extended Vietnam.  If you want our Soldiers home as you claim, knock off the crap and try supporting your country ahead of supporting your silly political aims and aiding our enemies".

"Yes, I'm questioning your patriotism.  Your loyalty ends with self.  I'm also questioning why you're stealing air that decent Americans could be breathing.  You don't deserve the protection of our men and women in uniform.  You need to run away from this war, this country.  Leave the war to the people who have the will to see it through and the country to people who are willing to defend it."  "Our country has two enemies:  Those who want to destroy us from the outside and those who attempt it from within.   J. D. Pendry - 

"In a May 2008 blog entry on his (now inactive) web site, J.D. Pendry explained his original motivation for writing the piece:"

["On Your Hands" was] a mailing I sent to my private email list on June 24, 2006. I don't feel a need to explain myself, but I wrote this right after someone sent me pictures of the mutilated bodies of two young American Soldiers. Since the original posting, this letter has made a few laps around the net and been posted in many different places. Other than to my private email list, I originally posted it at Free Republic and it's been posted there several more times and to a Geocities Website that I once maintained. I've even received inquiries from people that heard it read on radio programs. There's been some minor editing of my original post as it's traveled around and I've seen it renamed several times. Frankly I prefer my title because my title is my point.

Other sources:

Just an Old Gnome 

Progressive War Hawks

 Hat tip to Robert Hope; Sacramento, CA

Charles Krauthammer: A travesty of a report

http://terrellaftermath.com/

 

Charles Krauthammer: A travesty of a report  ... "We were so blindsided that we established a 9/11 commission to find out why. And we knew next to nothing about the enemy: its methods, structure, intentions, plans. There was nothing morally deranged about deciding as a nation to do everything necessary to find out what we needed to prevent a repetition, or worse. As Feinstein said at the time, “We have to do some things that historically we have not wanted to do to protect ourselves.' ” ...