Too tight a focus, considering the statement I was commenting on, Fang, Count 'em all up and we’re back where I said… orders of magnitude.
Either the ‘kill all the abortionists’ message lacks the kind of funding the ‘kill all the infidels’ message does, or it doesn’t really resonate with it’s target group. Of course, it could be that the respective groups aren’t equally susceptible to killing people over an idea.
Doubt it’s that one is more proficient than the other, which puts the lie to the whole ‘they’re equal’ thing that keeps popping up.
The danger, fostered by rhetoric and ideology, is equal for those whose lives are targeted. And equally devastating to the people who died and their families.
The reason the Colorado Springs killer didn’t kill more people is that Planned Parenthood expects terrorists and has plans to wall them off. The killer couldn’t get to a lot of the people in the building, because of Planned Parenthood’s security measures. It’s not because the killer didn’t want to shoot more people.
(PS, NoVaDad and everyone who is unclear about orders of magnitude: an order of magnitude is a factor of ten. So let’s say that Harvard has about 33,000 applicants, and Hope College has about 3300 applicants, then Harvard has an order of magnitude more applicants than Hope College. The Colorado killer shot 12 people. An order of magnitude bigger would be around 120 people. We can all be glad that the San Bernardino couple didn’t shoot 120 people.)
I didn’t mean that the body counts of the two attacks were identical; I meant that the “danger” (in the sense of risk) of a similar attack happening in the USA in the future is just as great. In any event, I’m sure Cardinal Fang is correct that the number of people Dear shot in Colorado would have been far higher if Planned Parenthood didn’t have such tight security (such as interior locked doors and safe rooms, etc.).
[q]Boom! cc style [/q]
Condolences to whoever got hit. And congrats to Fang for sneaking a math lesson into a discussion of mass killing. Pretty much as it should be taught and it’s never too late to learn it.
New York, yes. Also, Fort Hood, Boston, etc.
When the pro-life movements takes down planes, drops a skyscraper, shoots up a military base, and kills/maims sports spectators, I think you’ll then be able to claim parity when comparing them to hardline Islamists. And, have a leg to stand on when you do.