Amid gun debate, weapons trade show opens in Vegas

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A weapons industry group based in the Connecticut town where a gunman killed 20 children and six adults last month is opening a Las Vegas Strip trade show Tuesday that's expected to draw tens of thousands of manufacturers and enthusiasts.

The National Shooting Sports Foundation was focusing its 35th annual SHOT Show on products and services new to what it calls a $4.1 billion industry, with a nod to a raging national debate over assault weapons.

The group said it has issued credentials to nearly 60,000 industry professionals, recreational gun owners and law enforcers to attend.

"Hunting and the recreational shooting sports are here to stay. And so are we," Steve Sanetti, the foundation president and chief executive, said in a show-opening statement. "A prerequisite to any dialogue involving our industry and its products is an honest recognition of the legitimacy of what we do and the important part of the national culture which we represent."

The Shooting Hunting and Outdoor Trade Show at the sprawling Sands Expo Convention Center is closed to the public, and the organizer limited media attendance after the Dec. 14 shooting in Newtown, Conn.

Foundation spokesman Bill Brassard Jr. told The Associated Press on Monday the organization stopped accepting media applications when it was swamped by requests following the Newtown shooting. At the time, the foundation issued a statement saying family, friends and acquaintances were affected by what it called a terrible tragedy.

In Las Vegas, gun rights enthusiast and activist Eric McGovern, a volunteer area director for the Nevada Firearms Coalition, said his work schedule prevents him from attending the SHOT Show, which runs through Friday.

But McGovern said he was closely watching the gun rights debate framed by President Barack Obama, who has called for gun controls to curb mass shootings like the Newtown massacre, and National Rifle Association chief executive Wayne LaPierre, who has said, "the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun."

New York's Senate on Monday passed the toughest gun control law in the nation calling for a tougherassault weapons ban, restrictions on ammunition and the sale of guns and mandatory police registration of assault weapons. The measure was expected to pass in the Assembly on Tuesday.

In Baltimore, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg argued during a gun violence conference at Johns Hopkins University for greater federal gun control, including background checks for all purchases and a federal crackdown on trafficking. Bloomberg co-chairs Mayors Against Illegal Guns, whose members also spoke out Monday in cities including Portland, Maine; Fort Wayne, Ind.; and Santa Fe, N.M.

McGovern, 37, of Las Vegas, owns a military-style semiautomatic rifle similar to the one authorities say was used in Newtown, and two registered handguns. He has a concealed carry permit.

"Here's the problem we're having right now," he said. "We're all very emotional. We need our elected officials to sit back and think calmly. They're talking about massive laws at the federal level."

Obama on Monday was considering a range of possible executive actions including ordering stricter action against people who lie on gun sale background checks, striking limits on federal research into gun use, ordering tougher penalties against gun trafficking and giving schools flexibility to use grant money to improve safety.

The president told reporters that he also supports legislation to ban assault weapons, limit the capacity of ammunition magazines and institute universal background checks. He is expected to unveil his proposals as early as Wednesday.

The National Shooting Sports Foundation said it was part of a firearms violence task force meeting headed by Vice President Joe Biden last week, along with the NRA.

Sanetti, the foundation chief, is due late Tuesday to talk in Las Vegas about the state of the weapons industry before 2,000 guests who are also scheduled to be entertained by Las Vegas comedian, impressionist and singer Terry Fator.

"Ours is a responsible industry that manufactures and sells lawful products to law-abiding citizens, who in turn exercise their constitutional right to own, use and enjoy firearms safely and responsibly for lawful purposes," Sanetti said in his statement.

US condemns comments from Egypt's Morsi

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration on Tuesday gave a blistering review of remarks that Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi made almost three years ago about Jews and called for him to repudiate what it called unacceptable rhetoric.

In blunt comments, the White House and State Department said Morsi's statements were "deeply offensive" and ran counter to the goal of peace in the region. The State Department, noting that a senior congressional delegation is now visiting Egypt, said the remarks complicated efforts to provide economic and military aid to Egypt.

"We believe that President Morsi should make clear that he respects people of all faiths and that this type of rhetoric is unacceptable in a democratic Egypt," White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters.

Morsi was a leader in the Muslim Brotherhood in 2010 when, according to video broadcast last week on Egyptian television he asked Egyptians to "nurse our children and our grandchildren on hatred." Months later, in a television interview, Morsi referred to Zionists as bloodsuckers who attack Palestinians, describing Zionists as "the descendants of apes and pigs."

"We completely reject these statements as we do any language that espouses religious hatred," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told reporters. "This kind of rhetoric has been used in this region for far too long. It's counter to the goals of peace."

A group of senators, including Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and Christopher Coons, D-Del., is currently in Cairo. Nuland said she expected they would make their views known to Egypt's leadership.

Morsi's remarks and the Obama administration's rebuke marked a new point of tension in the complex relationship between the U.S. and Egypt's fledgling democracy.

Since being elected in June of 2012 in the aftermath of the revolution that ousted former President Hosni Mubarak, Morsi has promised to abide by Egypt's decades-old peace treaty with Israel. Morsi was also instrumental in facilitating a cease-fire in November between Israel and Hamas leaders in the Gaza Strip, despite his refusal to speak directly with Israeli officials.

The White House and State Department did acknowledge Morsi's willingness during that crisis to work with the U.S. toward mutual goals, and said Egypt's continuing commitment to its peace treaty with Israel is essential for U.S. relations with Egypt.

Egypt receives more than $1 billion a year in military and development aid from the U.S. as part of a package linked to its historic 1979 peace deal with Israel. The peace accord is a cornerstone of U.S. Mideast policy.

Nuland said Morsi's actions as president in support of the peace treaty with Israel are laudable but only one part of picture.

"We will judge him by what he does," she said. "What he has been doing is supporting that peace treaty, continuing to work with us, and with Israel on common goals, including in Gaza. But we'll also judge him but what he says. And we think that these comments should be repudiated and they should be repudiated firmly."

An official in Israel, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak public about an issue of such sensitivity, said the comments were a "big concern" but that Israel did not want to fuel tensions with Egypt.

The two sets of comments were first reported on Tuesday by the New York Times.

A Muslim Brotherhood official in Egypt reached by The Associated Press refused to comment on Washington's reaction to Morsi's remark. Repeated requests to the Morsi's comment received no response.

The silence reflected the deep sensitivity of the issue for Morsi and the Brotherhood, which is fiercely anti-Israeli and anti-U.S.

__

Big Chill vs. Global Warming: What's Going On?

The recent, rare snow in Jerusalem and parts of Lebanon, along with freezing temperatures forSouthern California have not nixed the reality of climate change. The planet is warming, and chilled weather doesn't negate that fact, say climate experts.

In fact, such "rare" storms are expected in a warming world.

"As the globe warms, regions of the Earth that have cold winters will still have cold winters, and we will still see the random rolls of the weather dice, like we are seeing this winter," climate scientist Michael Mann of Pennsylvania State University told LiveScience. "But climate change is loading the weather dice, so that 'sixes' are becoming more common, and 'ones' are becoming less common."

No single weather event can be pegged to climate change, which is a long-term trend that over time affects weather, and it affects the weather in different regions in different ways. Rather, as the planet warms, the chances of an extreme-weather event, including very large snowfalls, increase. That is, the dice are loaded for extreme events. [The Reality of Climate Change: 10 Myths Busted]

"Climate is the statistics of weather over the long term," Ken Caldeira, a senior scientist at the Carnegie Institute for Science at Stanford University, told LiveScience last year. "No specific weather event can by itself confirm or disprove the body of scientific knowledge associated with climate change."

Global warming with a side of chill

A big chill crept over California this weekend, with temperatures in a San Diego county dipping to 23 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 5 degrees Celsius), breaking a record set in 2007. And, according to news reports and the National Weather Service, San Diego beaches may have gotten a coating of morning frost, while a freeze warning remains in effect until Tuesday morning for the San Joaquin Valley.

Meanwhile, a storm system dumped 4-6 inches (10-15 centimeters) of snow on Jerusalem last week, killing at least eight people. And sleet and freezing rain will stretch across parts of the Southeast today and Tuesday, according to weather.com. [The World's Weirdest Weather]

Amidst the chilly headlines, however, Earth continues to break heat records left and right. "It's easy to cherry pick and find places that might be unusually cold at any given time, for example Southern California right now," Mann told LiveScience in an email. "But meanwhile, daffodils are coming up in Cincinnati.

"Over the past decade, we have seen daily records for all-time warmth broken twice as often as daily records for all-time cold," Mann wrote. "The year 2012 had the highest ratio we have ever recorded, more than four to one. That's like 'sixes' coming up four times as often as 'ones.'"

Here's how cold temperatures and snowfall can abound in some regions while the Earth warms: Warm air holds more moisture than its cold counterpart. That means if the temperature is low enough, "those warmer winters will counter-intuitively favor larger snowfall events," Mann explained.

And modest cooling is expected to result from global warming in some regions. For instance, Mann explained, models forecast a slowdown of the warm, poleward-moving ocean current in the North Atlantic, a slowing that will modestly cool that part of the ocean.

Most of Earth getting hotter

"But these are highly seasonal and regional effects," Mann said. "The vast majority of the globe will warm substantially over the next century, likely with profound negative consequences, if we continue to heat the planet by increasing greenhouse gas concentrations through fossil-fuel burning."

In fact, at least in the United States, 2012 was the hottest year on record, smashing the previous warmest year, 1998. And the past decade set itself apart in terms of extreme weather, from heat waves and drought to flooding, something scientists say can be, in part, attributed to climate change.

"It is very likely that several of the unprecedented extremes of the past decade would not have occurred without anthropocentric global warming," study researchers wrote in the March 25, 2012, issue of the journal Nature Climate Change. In that study, two scientists reviewed extreme weather events going back to 2000 as well as research into possible connections with global warming.

Since 1950, human-caused climate change seems to have brought on more extreme weather, with even more such extremes expected this century, reported the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the international body charged with assessing climate change, in 2011.

So far this year, the United States has set 630 records for highest maximum temperature versus 114 records for lowest minimum temperature, according to the National Climatic Data Center.

"When you step back and look at what is happening overall, it is very clear that we are seeing overall warming, and a dramatic increase in record-breaking heat around the world," said Mann, pointing out the record heat and wildfires happening in Australia right now and the record heat experienced in the United States this past summer.

"They are both symptomatic of the perceptible and profound impact that climate change is already having on our weather," Mann added.

10. I know that conspiracy theories aren't allowed, but I watched this trash and got so pissed...

Last edited Tue Jan 15, 2013, 01:01 AM USA/ET - Edit history (1)

Quote:

Latest American conspiracy theory claims Newtown mass shooting a hoax

By Lee-Anne Goodman, The Canadian Press | Associated Press – 1 hr 10 mins ago

WASHINGTON - The United States has long been a breeding ground for conspiracy theorists, spurred by an often violent history riddled, in particular, with shadowy political assassinations.

But the latest conspiracy movement seems custom-made to underscore the need for a national debate on mental illness. Some of the Sandy Hook Truthers, as they've been dubbed, believe last month's mass shooting in Newtown, Conn., was a hoax.

The Obama administration perpetrated the hoax, the conspiracy theorists claim, in order to ratchet up support for tougher gun control measures.

They call themselves Operation Terror, and many of the movement's adherents appear to have ties to the so-called 9-11 truthers who have long held that the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were an inside job by the George W. Bush administration.

Their theories on the Dec. 14 shooting in Sandy Hook appear to lack any basis in fact, reality or common sense. But Google Trends suggests the movement is gaining momentum with both a Florida college professor and a libertarian Fox News anchor in Cincinnati questioning the official narrative on the events.

On various websites and blogs, some Sandy Hook truthers crow about the "smoking gun" they say proves the shooting was a hoax — a photo of President Barack Obama, backstage at a Newtown vigil two days after the shooting, a young blonde girl sitting on his lap.

They insist the girl is six-year-old Emilie Parker, one of the 20 child victims of the shooting. TheSandy Hook truthers claim her parents slipped up in their participation in the hoax, and allowed their eldest daughter to cuddle up to Obama.

"The story that she was killed at Sandy Hook is not possible, because here she is sitting on the president's lap after the shooting," intones the narrator of a YouTube video, one of dozens of its kind, this one the recipient of more than 260,000 web hits.

In fact, it's the dead girl's little sister.

The child's father, Robbie Parker, was also faking his profound despair when he tearfully addressed the media shortly after his daughter's murder, the believers claim, and was reading from cue cards.

The family members of the massacre's tiniest victims aren't the only ones being accused of such unthinkable fraud as they continue to grieve.

A town resident who sheltered six youngsters after they fled Sandy Hook Elementary School in terror is even facing harassment from some of the conspiracy theorists.

Gene Rosen, a 69-year-old pet-sitter, told Salon.com this week that he's getting phone calls and emails accusing him of fabricating his story.

One email read: "How are all those little students doing? You know, the ones that showed up at your house after the 'shooting.' What is the going rate for getting involved in a government-sponsored hoax anyway?"

Police are investigating the harassment. Rosen, who also comforted a frantic mother who came to his door looking for her deceased child, told Salon he's furious at anyone who believes in such an outrageous conspiracy theory.

"There must be some way to morally shame these people, because there were 20 dead children lying an eighth of a mile from my window all night long," he said.

"I am rageful about it, both for the children and for the mother of the child who came to my house looking for her son."

Other Newtown conspiracy theorists allege there were four perpetrators from Israeli special forces, and that it wasn't children who died, but a secret United Nations delegation.

Fox News's Ben Swann is among those doubting Adam Lanza was the only shooter.

A Florida college professor also suggested on his personal blog that the Sandy Hook shooting may not have played out the way many believe it did — if it happened at all.

"I said that there may very well be elements of that event that are synthetic to some degree, that are somewhat contrived," James Tracy, of Florida Atlantic University, recently told a local TV station in Boca Raton.

"I think that, overall, the media really did drop the ball. I don't think that the media have gotten to the bottom of some of the things that may have taken place there."

Conspiracy theories, indeed, are part of the national fabric of the United States.

A veritable cottage industry still surrounds the assassination of John F. Kennedy almost 50 years ago, with alleged culprits ranging from the CIA to the mob, Fidel Castro and Lyndon Johnson, or a combination of them all. One book even alleged a UFO connection.

During the Cold War, some believed Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower was a Communist plant.

The 9-11 truthers assert that the twin towers of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan were brought down by timed explosions by those working for the Bush administration. And it was a guided missile that hit the Pentagon, not a jetliner, they allege.

More recently, the so-called birther movement advanced the theory that Obama was born in Kenya, not in Hawaii, and is therefore an illegitimate president.

One expert on the American conspiracy theory phenomenon points out, however, that throughout the course of U.S. history, there have been no shortage of massive government coverups — and they've only served to encourage skeptics.

"There have been so many well-documented conspiracies in American history," James Broderick, a professor at New Jersey City University, said in an interview.

Broderick points to everything from weapons of mass destruction to Lance Armstrong's admission of longtime drug use after years of denials and Robert F. Kennedy's recent acknowledgement that his family has long believed the official government report on JFK's assassination was a whitewash.

"It does seem appalling the way conspiracy theorists, and many people in general, try to exploit for their own petty political purposes a national tragedy — it's sickening and disgraceful," said Broderick, the co-author of the 2008 book "Web of Conspiracy."

"But what the 9-11 truthers told me is what's truly sickening and disgraceful is to not look deeper, to just accept pat answers without asking questions."

Some of the people advancing theories of more than one shooter in Newtown might have their hearts in the right place, Broderick said.

"But of course there's also a segment who are just angry at the government and at Obama all the time — the people who believe he's a Muslim and a fascist and everything else — and they have jumped on the bandwagon, posted terrible things on the web and tried to fuel the fires in the most shameful ways."

Quote:
my nephew is a President Obama hater and he believes the school shooting is all made up. he thinks the hoax is to get our guns. there are some awful videos out there by these conspiracy nuts.

thanks miguel for posting this even if I DON'T BELIEVE THE HOAX .
PAT

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Wx9GxXYKx_8

http://www.democraticunderground.com/101792078#post8

this person went through and provided his analysis of why the hoax is garbage.

10. I know that conspiracy theories aren't allowed, but I watched this trash and got so pissed...

Last edited Tue Jan 15, 2013, 01:01 AM USA/ET - Edit history (1)

I decided to decipher the whole thing, time stamps included here... Please feel free to copy/paste to your friends. Too many people actually believe this idiot... It shows how weak minded our country has become...


1:07 - 2 Shooters INITIALLY Reported: Of course the police are going to arrest someone running through the woods, after a school shooting.
2:20 - Footage never aired again? I witnessed it a few times, but after the perp was detained and verified he had nothing to do with the shooting, why WOULD you re-air something not sufficient?
3:18 - Douchey guy saying "They want you to believe this guy doesn't exist" - Did you ask authorities? Viewed a police report? Once again, Not sufficient to the case. I mean, you've never been at a bar where a fight broke out, and were questioned after trying to leave? Suspect in the front of the police car? When was he made a suspect? I'm guessing he verified his story to the authorities pretty quickly.
3:49 - Not Original, INITIAL Reports. Get it right!
5:10 - Every OFFICIAL Report I have read states the assault rifle was IN THE CAR
5:30 - Sorry, my awesome hearing can't hear over the volume increase of the music while the ME makes a statement. Please clarify what was said here
5:45 - Now the ME, who hasn't had time to do an autopsy is a detective? Give me a break, he's speaking from what he knows at the time. You ****ers are clueless
6:09 - Frantic Kids a not so easy target? : Yeah, walking into a classroom, with one way in and one way out is so hard to pick off innocent kids that have no idea what is happening. You were there though, so you know best.
6:17 - Pretty easy to hit your target when you're within 5 feet.
6:26 - Yes, I am sick to my stomach. The fact that you'd perpetuate without sufficient evidence that this was a staged event is enough for me, but I'll keep going.
6:41 - You perpetuate without facts YEARS. It was reported that Adam and Ryan did not keep in touch, this does not mean they had not been together. Why would Adam have Ryan's ID? Maybe for Bars? I mean, it's a STRETCH. Then again, you reported it as VALID. Did you run the numbers from the ID itself? Could it possibly be a fake? It really doesn't matter at this point right?
6:53 - What Police Report did you see? The same one you're discrediting earlier? Or the one that you haven't seen. Nancy Lanza was reported to be a teacher at the school, initially. Nobody gets initial reports wrong, while trying to be the first to break the story though. Duh
7:55 - Not an RN huh? Better double check your facts about School Nurses
8:18 - So there was not anyone behind the cameras, from the Press to take a statement, just cameras rolling and he got "caught". Then he "goes into character". You ever lost a loved one traumatically? I was near death a year ago and this is pretty much how my family reacted.
9:36 - So you have a doctorate in Psychology to know exactly how someone is to act after a tragedy? Ahh Yes...
9:46 - Isn't it funny how technology works. Facebook doesn't give you a TIME, and you cannot prove without a doubt this page was created before anything. Just like the rest of your claims at the end. I can be in another state and make a post and it shows I'm still at home. Hmm, Government Cover up!
10:39 - You do know that not EVERY person is on the Internet, RIGHT?
11:11 - Twins would never have the same outfit. Mind you, the nose on the girl sitting on the Presidents lap is much more the size of Emilie's sisters nose, but hey, she got a nose job done to help with the cover up!
11:41- Gene Rosen - Seems a little OFF to me. But hey, he's just putting it all out there as an act correct? Funny considering you wonder why he didn't ask the bus driver, yet the driver TOOK OFF. Yeah, he needed to leave the kids and chase this bus down, STAT!
11:56 - So you've got the exact address where Gene lives. If you do, why did you not provide it as evidence that these kids were taken past the Firehouse... I mean, you've got the evidence RIGHT?
12:35 - You have no idea if he did or did not call the Police. Wouldn't it be funny if he actually DID call the Police, and was told that something terrible had happened, to keep the kids inside and they would be there in due time? WOW, Shocking "Spin" on my end HUH!
12:52 - Most young children refer to all teachers at their grade level as "Our Teacher". My 6 year old daughter does it daily when I pick her up from school, although she has 1 teacher, the other 3 Kindergarten teachers are "her teachers". Must be another Government Conspiracy HUH!
13:26 - The casualty list was released to the PUBLIC. Don't you think those that were involved would be able to view it, you know, like someone holding six children? IMPOSSIBLE!
13:47 - They played with stuffed animals for a half hour before they talked about what happened? Refer to your own footage at 12:32 where Gene says "Over the next 30 minutes they just described what happened"- Shocking HUH!
14:29 - Once again, you have no evidence that Gene did or DID NOT call the Police.
14:41 - Of course, you cannot hear what the Mother is talking about. I wonder why Anderson Cooper would be smiling as well, maybe because they were REFLECTING UPON THE GREAT TIMES IN LIFE? NOOOOOOO, Cry for days!
15:38 - Please, proceed with your "Findings" If they are anything like the rest of the BS, they'll be like the Titanic after the Iceberg
16:02 - No Tears, spare me! You can't see **** on these clips!
16:42 - Sure looks like someone in distress, but I can't see TEARS! FAKE! Come on...
17:38 - Refer to 5:45
18:15 - Considering he more than likely spent years going to school and training for his job, I'd call him qualified. I'm sure your creds are much better.
18:30 - Doesn't appear to me that he thinks anything is funny. I didn't see him laugh, all I saw was some clips cut up and slammed together. Try again.
18:38 - Ok, Lets see the great shots!
18:43 - A static image from Google Earth - WOW, I guess you conveniently forget in your narration that you won't see kids on this shot, please proceed...
19:00 - Out of the 600 Students and Faculty, we did not see ANY of them... those are your words not mine. So these are actors? I mean, right after a massive school shooting, most press shows up before the massacre is finished correct?
19:12 - Only picture you will see of children leaving the parking lot- Once again, you're assuming that press was on the scene during the event. I'll follow up more in a minute
19:40 - As you can see there are no children here - Correct, why would children be wandering around in the chaos an hour or more after? Curious, fill me in.
19:42 - No Teachers, No Parents, No EMS - But they are people walking around on a movie set, because from the very grainy footage, you can clearly depict that none of these people are in fact Teachers, EMS, Police, Students Etc.
19:52 - My 6 year old has no idea what gun shots sound like. So this kid is in on it too right? Or 100 rounds were NOT fired, and nobody died, which is it? I'd say that kicking in of a door would be about right, and of course the child doesn't talk about how long the sounds went on, but you ASSUME he is clueless.
20:36 - Check out this "Scene" - No, the crime scene is inside, try again.
20:50 - Everything is nice and neat, no parents, no children - Once again, you've got some pretty good vision to see no parents. Again you have no clue who the parents are, so if they passed you on the street you wouldn't know them from a homeless man. Same with EMS, but they aren't there.
21:20 - They were on Lockdown - Yeah, they were, quite a while before the Chopper showed up. You project that the news helicopter was on scene while the event was taking place, which it definitely was NOT! Nice Try
21:27 - Not bringing anyone to the hospital - Why would they take dead bodies to the hospital? Just curious...
21:32 - I guess you missed the memo that no bodies would be removed until the next day when all evidence had been gathered... Why bus in ambulances for no reason? Hmmm
21:50 - Why is this guy walking nice and slow, whens this gonna start - Well, he's walking slow because you've got the footage slowed down 50%, remember? Meanwhile, I do see a few people that appear to be civilian talking to Officers. Must be set directors?
22:00 - No, more than one ambulance, of course, because all you have is bits and pieces of footage, you'll run with the one Ambulance...
22:12 - What are we setting up tents for? Oh, remember the ME talking about a Tent earlier?
22:30 - Nowhere near the School Entrance - No ****, he was just asked about what was going on at the FIREHOUSE... Then a stretcher with someone on it is wheeled by. Mind you, we don't know if someone is or isn't on it, but one person pushing a stretcher uphill...
22:50 - You've got all of this other evidence that is mind blowing, why not show us the rest of the "Crime Scene" evidence that you have?
23:01 - 25:25 - There is no evidence that this had anything to do with anything. I can link you to many other coincidental things between the shootings too...
25:28 - Ever happen to look and see what other crisis drills were planned that day? Of course, you're on a State website, maybe they were in on it too! Probably not... because this fits the narrative
27:23 - FEMA Crisis Training was on the SAME Road as Sandy Hook... Please refer to your own map connecting the two at 27:12. All roads are the same under your terms.
27:30 - Our local FD and Police train with Homeland Security quite often. Guess we're next?
27:30 - Again, what does the 10 year "Beautification Project" have to do with the Shooting? Please correlate the two.
27:57 - Victoria Soto Page - So she Didn't die? Want me to let you in on a secret, if the page was created on the 10th and Shooting on the 14th, then why are the comments talking about a death? Of course, nobody would create another fake Facebook Page, using different time stamps would they?
28:22 - No, you didn't show us when the page was created, again, please show us the date the page was Published, not hard to find, but easy to forget when the evidence has been tampered.
28:33 - And it was created by someone in CALIFORNIA! WOW!
28:48 - HERE WE GO, the GRANDE FINALE... You've watched a half hour of bull****, now we're really gonna lay it on ya!

I'm sickened by this video, and decided to put my anger to good use. Please distribute, as this atrocity is being spread like wildfire.

Quote:

Latest American conspiracy theory claims Newtown mass shooting a hoax

By Lee-Anne Goodman, The Canadian Press | Associated Press – 1 hr 10 mins ago

WASHINGTON - The United States has long been a breeding ground for conspiracy theorists, spurred by an often violent history riddled, in particular, with shadowy political assassinations.

But the latest conspiracy movement seems custom-made to underscore the need for a national debate on mental illness. Some of the Sandy Hook Truthers, as they've been dubbed, believe last month's mass shooting in Newtown, Conn., was a hoax.

The Obama administration perpetrated the hoax, the conspiracy theorists claim, in order to ratchet up support for tougher gun control measures.

They call themselves Operation Terror, and many of the movement's adherents appear to have ties to the so-called 9-11 truthers who have long held that the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were an inside job by the George W. Bush administration.

Their theories on the Dec. 14 shooting in Sandy Hook appear to lack any basis in fact, reality or common sense. But Google Trends suggests the movement is gaining momentum with both a Florida college professor and a libertarian Fox News anchor in Cincinnati questioning the official narrative on the events.

On various websites and blogs, some Sandy Hook truthers crow about the "smoking gun" they say proves the shooting was a hoax — a photo of President Barack Obama, backstage at a Newtown vigil two days after the shooting, a young blonde girl sitting on his lap.

They insist the girl is six-year-old Emilie Parker, one of the 20 child victims of the shooting. TheSandy Hook truthers claim her parents slipped up in their participation in the hoax, and allowed their eldest daughter to cuddle up to Obama.

"The story that she was killed at Sandy Hook is not possible, because here she is sitting on the president's lap after the shooting," intones the narrator of a YouTube video, one of dozens of its kind, this one the recipient of more than 260,000 web hits.

In fact, it's the dead girl's little sister.

The child's father, Robbie Parker, was also faking his profound despair when he tearfully addressed the media shortly after his daughter's murder, the believers claim, and was reading from cue cards.

The family members of the massacre's tiniest victims aren't the only ones being accused of such unthinkable fraud as they continue to grieve.

A town resident who sheltered six youngsters after they fled Sandy Hook Elementary School in terror is even facing harassment from some of the conspiracy theorists.

Gene Rosen, a 69-year-old pet-sitter, told Salon.com this week that he's getting phone calls and emails accusing him of fabricating his story.

One email read: "How are all those little students doing? You know, the ones that showed up at your house after the 'shooting.' What is the going rate for getting involved in a government-sponsored hoax anyway?"

Police are investigating the harassment. Rosen, who also comforted a frantic mother who came to his door looking for her deceased child, told Salon he's furious at anyone who believes in such an outrageous conspiracy theory.

"There must be some way to morally shame these people, because there were 20 dead children lying an eighth of a mile from my window all night long," he said.

"I am rageful about it, both for the children and for the mother of the child who came to my house looking for her son."

Other Newtown conspiracy theorists allege there were four perpetrators from Israeli special forces, and that it wasn't children who died, but a secret United Nations delegation.

Fox News's Ben Swann is among those doubting Adam Lanza was the only shooter.

A Florida college professor also suggested on his personal blog that the Sandy Hook shooting may not have played out the way many believe it did — if it happened at all.

"I said that there may very well be elements of that event that are synthetic to some degree, that are somewhat contrived," James Tracy, of Florida Atlantic University, recently told a local TV station in Boca Raton.

"I think that, overall, the media really did drop the ball. I don't think that the media have gotten to the bottom of some of the things that may have taken place there."

Conspiracy theories, indeed, are part of the national fabric of the United States.

A veritable cottage industry still surrounds the assassination of John F. Kennedy almost 50 years ago, with alleged culprits ranging from the CIA to the mob, Fidel Castro and Lyndon Johnson, or a combination of them all. One book even alleged a UFO connection.

During the Cold War, some believed Republican president Dwight D. Eisenhower was a Communist plant.

The 9-11 truthers assert that the twin towers of the World Trade Center in lower Manhattan were brought down by timed explosions by those working for the Bush administration. And it was a guided missile that hit the Pentagon, not a jetliner, they allege.

More recently, the so-called birther movement advanced the theory that Obama was born in Kenya, not in Hawaii, and is therefore an illegitimate president.

One expert on the American conspiracy theory phenomenon points out, however, that throughout the course of U.S. history, there have been no shortage of massive government coverups — and they've only served to encourage skeptics.

"There have been so many well-documented conspiracies in American history," James Broderick, a professor at New Jersey City University, said in an interview.

Broderick points to everything from weapons of mass destruction to Lance Armstrong's admission of longtime drug use after years of denials and Robert F. Kennedy's recent acknowledgement that his family has long believed the official government report on JFK's assassination was a whitewash.

"It does seem appalling the way conspiracy theorists, and many people in general, try to exploit for their own petty political purposes a national tragedy — it's sickening and disgraceful," said Broderick, the co-author of the 2008 book "Web of Conspiracy."

"But what the 9-11 truthers told me is what's truly sickening and disgraceful is to not look deeper, to just accept pat answers without asking questions."

Some of the people advancing theories of more than one shooter in Newtown might have their hearts in the right place, Broderick said.

"But of course there's also a segment who are just angry at the government and at Obama all the time — the people who believe he's a Muslim and a fascist and everything else — and they have jumped on the bandwagon, posted terrible things on the web and tried to fuel the fires in the most shameful ways."