Bloomberg aide beaten, carjacked

Perhaps Mr. Bloomberg could lend his aides one of his personal, armed bodyguards when they are out "running errands."

Oh, right. Anyone who thinks they need to carry a gun for personal protection is an "extremist."

Bloomberg's Car Stolen, Aide Beaten By Thieves

(AP) NEW YORK A personal employee of Mayor Michael Bloomberg was beaten by thieves who then carjacked the billionaire's car Wednesday morning in New Jersey, authorities said.

The employee was driving the 2001 Lexus in Hackensack, N.J., on an errand for the mayor shortly before 9 a.m. when he was approached by a woman who came to the window to ask for money, police said. As he declined and began to roll up the window, a man got into the passenger seat and punched him in the face.

"They force him out and take off," said Hackensack police Capt. Frank Lomia.

The car was found about two hours later, abandoned on the side of the road in Fair Lawn, N.J. Police were looking for the two suspects.

Bloomberg's employee was not seriously injured and his name was not released. He is one of many staffers who take care of Bloomberg's personal business and his homes, including his townhouse in Manhattan and country house in upstate New York.

(© 2006 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

Texas Two-Step

1. You try to shoot up our school.

2. We step on your face.


It's about time we start teaching our kids to fight back. This, coupled with armed teachers, will virtually eliminate attacks on schools.

Texas school tells classes to fight back

By JEFF CARLTON, Associated Press Writer
Fri Oct 13, 2:42 PM ET

Youngsters in a suburban Fort Worth school district are being taught not to sit there like good boys and girls with their hands folded if a gunman invades the classroom, but to rush him and hit him with everything they got — books, pencils, legs and arms.

"Getting under desks and praying for rescue from professionals is not a recipe for success," said Robin Browne, a major in the British Army reserve and an instructor for Response Options, the company providing the training to the Burleson schools.

That kind of fight-back advice is all but unheard of among schools, and some fear it will get children killed.

But school officials in Burleson said they are drawing on the lessons learned from a string of disasters such as Columbine in 1999 and the Amish schoolhouse attack in Pennsylvania last week.

The school system in this working-class suburb of about 26,000 is believed to be the first in the nation to train all its teachers and students to fight back, Browne said.

At Burleson — which has 10 schools and about 8,500 students — the training covers various emergencies, such as tornadoes, fires and situations where first aid is required. Among the lessons: Use a belt as a sling for broken bones, and shoelaces make good tourniquets.

Students are also instructed not to comply with a gunman's orders, and to take him down.

Browne recommends students and teachers "react immediately to the sight of a gun by picking up anything and everything and throwing it at the head and body of the attacker and making as much noise as possible. Go toward him as fast as we can and bring them down."

Response Options trains students and teachers to "lock onto the attacker's limbs and use their body weight," Browne said. Everyday classroom objects, such as paperbacks and pencils, can become weapons.

"We show them they can win," he said. "The fact that someone walks into a classroom with a gun does not make them a god. Five or six seventh-grade kids and a 95-pound art teacher can basically challenge, bring down and immobilize a 200-pound man with a gun."

The fight-back training parallels the change in thinking that has occurred since Sept. 11, when United Flight 93 made it clear that the usual advice during a hijacking — Don't try to be a hero, and no one will get hurt — no longer holds. Flight attendants and passengers are now encouraged to rush the cockpit.

Similarly, women and youngsters are often told by safety experts to kick, scream and claw they way out during a rape attempt or a child-snatching.

In 1998 in Oregon, a 17-year-old high school wrestling star with a bullet in his chest stopped a rampage by tackling a teenager who had opened fire in the cafeteria. The gunman killed two students, as well as his parents, and 22 other were wounded.

Hilda Quiroz of the National School Safety Center, a nonprofit advocacy group in California, said she knows of no other school system in the country that is offering fight-back training, and found the strategy at Burleson troubling.

"If kids are saved, then this is the most wonderful thing in the world. If kids are killed, people are going to wonder who's to blame," she said. "How much common sense will a student have in a time of panic?"

Terry Grisham, spokesman for the Tarrant County Sheriff's Department, said he, too, had concerns, though he had not seen details of the program.

"You're telling kids to do what a tactical officer is trained to do, and they have a lot of guns and ballistic shields," he said. "If my school was teaching that, I'd be upset, frankly."

Some students said they appreciate the training.

"It's harder to hit a moving target than a target that is standing still," said 14-year-old Jessica Justice, who received the training over the summer during freshman orientation at Burleson High.

William Lassiter, manager of the North Carolina-based Center for Prevention of School Violence, said past attacks indicate that fighting back, at least by teachers and staff, has its merits.

"At Columbine, teachers told students to get down and get on the floors, and gunmen went around and shot people on the floors," Lassiter said. "I know this sounds chaotic and I know it doesn't sound like a great solution, but it's better than leaving them there to get shot."

Lassiter questioned, however, whether students should be included in the fight-back training: "That's going to scare the you-know-what out of them."

Most of the freshman class at Burleson's high school underwent instruction during orientation, and eventually all Burleson students will receive some training, even the elementary school children.

"We want them to know if Miss Valley says to run out of the room screaming, that is exactly what they need to do," said Jeanie Gilbert, district director of emergency management. She said students and teachers should have "a fighting chance in every situation."

"It's terribly sad that when I get up in the morning that I have to wonder what may happen today either in our area or in the nation," Gilbert said. "Something that happens in Pennsylvania has that ripple effect across the country."

Burleson High Principal Paul Cash said he has received no complaints from parents about the training. Stacy Vaughn, the president of the Parent-Teacher Organization at Norwood Elementary in Burleson, supports the program.

"I feel like our kids should be armed with the information that these types of possibilities exist," Vaughn said.

Thank G-d for Baby Girls

If you'll notice in the About Me panel to the left, my father-to-be status is now "new father."

Early Friday morning, my wife delivered a healthy and beautiful girl and we couldn't be more ecstatic.

That does mean I probably won't be able to keep up with the blog as frequently. But don't forget to check in once in a while.

AP list highlights insanity

After reading this list — and in light of recent events — I don't see how anyone can maintain that "gun-free school zones" is a sane policy. Those who do have these childrens' blood on their hands.

List of some fatal U.S. school shootings

By The Associated PressMon Oct 2, 3:25 PM ET

A list of some fatal shootings at U.S. schools in recent years:

• Oct. 2, 2006: A gunman took about a dozen girls hostage, killing at least three of them, at a one-room Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania's Lancaster County, police said. The shooter was among the dead, and a number of people were injured.

• Sept. 29, 2006: 15-year-old Eric Hainstock brought two guns to a school in rural Cazenovia, Wis., and fatally shot the principal, a day after the principal gave him a disciplinary warning for having tobacco on school grounds, police said.

• Sept. 27, 2006: Duane Morrison, 53, took six girls hostage at Platte Canyon High School in Bailey, Colo. Morrison, sexually assaulting them and using them as human shields for hours before fatally shooting one girl and killing himself.

• Aug. 24, 2006: Christopher Williams, 27, went to an elementary school in Essex, Vermont, looking for his ex-girlfriend, a teacher. He couldn't find her and fatally shot one teacher and wounded another, police said. Williams also killed his ex-girlfriend's mother, according to authorities. He shot himself twice in the head after the rampage and was arrested.

• March 21, 2005: Sixteen-year-old Jeff Weise shot and killed five schoolmates, a teacher and an unarmed guard at a high school on the Red Lake Indian Reservation in Minnesota before taking his own life. Weise had earlier killed his grandfather and his grandfather's companion.

• Nov. 22, 2004: Sixteen-year-old Desmond Keels is accused of fatally shooting one student and wounding three others outside Strawberry Mansion High in Philadelphia. The attack apparently was over a $50 debt in a rap contest. Keels is set to stand trial on murder charges later this month.

• April 24, 2003: 14-year-old James Sheets shot and killed the principal in the crowded cafeteria of a junior high school in south-central Pennsylvania, before killing himself.

• May 26, 2000: 13-year-old Nathaniel Brazill killed his English teacher on the last day of classes in Lake Worth, Fla., after the teacher refused to let him talk with two girls in his classroom. He was convicted of second-degree murder and is serving a 28-year sentence.

• April 20, 1999: Students Eric Harris, 18, and Dylan Klebold, 17, killed 12 students and a teacher and wounded 23 before killing themselves at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo.

• May 21, 1998: Two teenagers were killed and more than 20 people hurt when a teenage boy opened fire at a high school in Springfield, Ore., after killing his parents. Kip Kinkel, 17, was sentenced to nearly 112 years in prison.

• May 19, 1998: Three days before his graduation, an honor student opened fire at a high school in Fayetteville, Tenn., killing a classmate who was dating his ex-girlfriend. Jacob Davis, 18, was sentenced to life in prison.

• March 24, 1998: Two boys, ages 11 and 13, fired on their Jonesboro, Ark., middle school from nearby woods, killing four girls and a teacher and wounding 10 others. Both boys were later convicted of murder and can be held until age 21.

• Dec. 1, 1997: Three students were killed and five wounded at a high school in West Paducah, Ky. Michael Carneal, then 14, later pleaded guilty but mentally ill to murder and is serving life in prison.

• Oct. 1, 1997: Sixteen-year-old Luke Woodham of Pearl, Miss., fatally shot two students and wounded seven others after stabbing his mother to death. He was sentenced the following year to three life sentences.