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I am skeptical on this being a political crime. In most politically motivated crimes, the perpetrator wants people to know specifically what their cause or motivation are, that's kind of the whole point, and they usually offer it up on their own volition. In my opinion, the hijacker made nothing clearly or unmistakingly known of any political cause. He shared only a few pieces of unprompted information: - My name is Dan Cooper (could the name imply a political motive?) - I want $200k (could the number mean something? ) - I want to go to Mexico (interesting, could be part of an underlying motive) Some of the above could have some hidden meaning I suppose...but it isn't definitive in any way. Outside of this, every other piece of information he shared was prompted by a questions from Tina or within the context of instructions to carry out the crime: - right place...right time ( it met HIS needs). - i don't have grudge against your airline(s)...just have "a grudge" The "grudge" statement is the closest he comes to acknowledging some motive but we are ultimately left to wonder what his grudge was. To me it sounds more personal in scope rather than a bigger cause. I do agree that there is a fine line between expressing motive and getting caught and there is a trade off there. But I feel like most political criminals aren't as concerned about getting caught, their goal is "the cause" more than their freedom. Just my thoughts, I could be wrong and am open to the contrary.

military radar techs, civilian radar techs, Air Force pilots, air traffic controllers, and the flight crew don't work for the FBI. People who apply conspiracy theories to the Cooper case don't realize that Cooper wasn't special. There were 150 skyjackings in the previous four years over American skies. He was the first successful parajacker, sure, but much of his success was due to being first. The FBI quickly adapted and every parajacker who came afterward were apprehended. The Cooper skyjacking was nothing more than a clever bank robbery. Even today with modern crime fighting techniques and forensics, the FBI only solve 60% of bank robberies. There didn't need to be a conspiracy or cover up for Cooper to have successfully eluded the FBI for all those years.

I'd be willing to consider measures that would ACTUALLY MAKE A DIFFERENCE. Unfortunately, I haven't seen a single proposal that isn't anything more than 'security theater'. It's the old 'Do something, do ANYTHING to make us feel safe!!!' Even if it doesn't make any difference. Someone mentioned airlines & the TSA a few posts up (not my sarcastic one). Remember October 2001? No toenail clippers, no lapel pins that were miniature guns, no nothing that even looked like it could be a threat. Even if it was totally harmless. Even Bic lighters. Totally fucking stupid, totally useless, total 'theater'. Remember also, how many people managed to sneak stuff like box cutters and knives on board? Remember the shoe bomber? So now everyone has to take off their shoes. Remember the plot in London to blow up the airliners over the North Pole with binary liquid explosives? And in the aftermath, liquids were sharply restricted. I'm somewhat surprised that nobody has attempted to smuggle an explosive device shoved up their butt. I don't want to see what the aftermath of that would look like. I haven't flown commercial airlines in over 20 years. Mostly because I have no reason to, but partly because of the stupidity. And, back to gun control, as I noted earlier - It's a dangerous issue for politicians to take up. If the Ds manage to pass restrictive gun laws (which is very unlikely to happen), they'd be in serious danger of getting voted out of office. Which would put the Rs back in control. The Rs taking both houses in 96 (and putting Gingrich in as Speaker) was horrible for the country. I supported it at the time because I was largely a single issue voter. I didn't see the danger the Rs posed to our country and our society. Not going to make that mistake again.

Today's award goes to Oklahoma school superintendent Ryan Walters. When Biden cricitized schools for banning books, he fired back with this tweet: "In Oklahoma the shelves are not empty. No porn, no indoctrination. We are fighting back to keep our classrooms from going woke." He also showed a picture of some officially approved books. Contained in one of the books was this child-friendly, non-porn text: Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emissions were like that of horses. So today's Hero of the Non-Woke award goes to Mr. Walters, forcing children to read porn so they won't be woke. After all, what's more important for kids to know? How to relate to their classmates who might be gay or nonbinary, or how much horses ejaculate, and how much Biblical women love that?

People commonly hatch such stories in a vacuum - facts are left out for a variety of reasons - the motivation is not fact-based! For some reason these stories never backfire on their tellers - people are never held to account for these stories.

Dude. You're not even on TV! Does it include a small bottle of jesus tears, aka holy water?

In which case, you CAN protect people in schools, just about every country in the civilised world has managed it, there are just far too many people with money invested in not wanting to do so, mainly on the right hand side of the isle, but the left is not blameless either.

Oh dear, you really are struggling aren't you. Vietnam is probably not a bad analogy, in that the larger more powerful invading aggressor got schooled by the underdog.

If only Reca had told a more cohesive lie you wouldn’t have to be bending over backwards claiming that military radar was wrong, civilian radar was wrong, the chase plane pilots were wrong, the air traffic controllers were wrong, and the pilots of Flight 305 were wrong. The flight path surely couldn’t have been where ALL of these different witnesses agree on, it was actually 140 MILES away. Everyone is agreeing an event took place in New York City and you’re claiming that it actually took place in Baltimore. Cle Elum to the the Cooper DZ is almost that far in distance. That’s how utterly ridiculous supporting Reca makes someone.

Russian gas sales to the EU have dried up. So the main Russian gas company Gazprom had some employees sitting around. The Russian PM ordered Gasprom to form two companies to fight in Ukraine. According to the Wagner group they are already in Ukraine fighting. Other Russian private military contractors in Ukraine include "RSB-Group, MAR, ATK-GROUP, Slavonic Corps Limited, Wagner Group, E.N.O.T. Corp, Cossacks." No word yet if Russian trolls operating in the west. May be sent to fight as well if their engagement in western internet forums is insufficient.

I don't think it's impossible that Cooper could've had a secondary motive, or something that he found even more important than the money... I really can't buy him not caring about the money at all, though. He clearly cared about it when it came on board, what with flaunting it to Florence and being frustrated with how it was being stored. He took care in securing it before jumping. The observational evidence of his behavior indicates that the crime must have at least been partially about the money to me.

Just like back in the days of the Wilmington Insurrection, when white supremacists knew that science proved blacks were inferior.