as alive as you need me to be
Solidarity to a another survivor, though we're probably from different sides of the continent, and the doctrine and rituals may differ somewhat, the underlying psychology is largely the same at its core.
'Well, bless your heart' + a shit eating grin ain't exactly a common saying where I'm from, but I know exactly what it means.
She has not truly forgiven him, she is being a manipulative psycopath.
She will not press for mercy, she will not work to heal divides, beyond possibly those within the right wing so as to shore up the basis of her own political power.
And she absolutely will not condemn calls for retaliation, unless a scenario arises where she personally would stand to lose social status or material wealth by not doing so.
She is a heartless fascist, sure, she has emotions, but her whole life is mostly all about learning how to weaponize that.
Just as horny men grovel and simp for a woman showing skin, 'Godly' men have a perfect excuse to be extremely angry when they witness a 'Good Christian Woman' making a show of being distraught, but tough, and ultimately leaving it all up to God.
Its like move 1, page 1, on the sympathy generating playbook for these people.
While Gandhi is a much more uh, morally complex figure, shall we say, than a lot of people know about, and this quote may be apocryphal, it nevertheless roughly sums up how I feel about Christian extremists:
"I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."
Oh no, its a reverse Amigara Fault situation, ooohhh noooo....
You're being rude.
I don't care.
From my perspective, you are being rude, with your immense ignorance about firearms and wounds generally, and not being appreciative that I am deciding to apparently waste hours of my time doing a lot of research and analysis that you likely are not capable of, in an effort to explain the answers to the questions and concerns you are asking.
I do have experience with firearms. I don't have experience with a .30-06, or shooting people. I'm assuming you probably don't either.
Evidently you have much less experience than myself.
No, I have not shot a person.
I have shot an array of pistol and intermediate rifle and high powered rifle cartridges though, out of a similarly diverse array of guns.
I myself do not even presently own a firearm, but, I grew up in a household that owned a good deal of them, and had 'gun buddies' who would allow us to use their weapons at various ranges as well.
Usually we would try to do some kind of even swap for fired rounds, or occasionally reimburse someone if one side chewed through a lot more, or a lot more pricey ammo than the other.
I have only myself shot 30.06 a few times, as I have a fairly thin build and frame, and the recoil is extremely unpleasant.
But I have certainly watched other people shoot 30.06, in person, spotted for them or did range callouts or whatever.
I don't think you can know that. It hit an artery, which has high pressure. It will gush no matter what. It doesn't matter if it's the entry or exit wound.
See, I said 'Here's the idea' to convey the concept that it is a theory.
If your only criticism of this theory is that I cannot be 100% certain of it, then congratulations, I guess you don't believe in any empirically based theory of any kind.
Also, it matters a lot, actually, whether or not the neck gushing wound is an entry or exit wound, because that massivelt alters a forensic reconstruction of the trajectory of the fired round, and thus the position of the shooter.
You evidently did not go for Visual Calculus in your Disco Elysium playthrough.
As to the JFK comparison:
Yes, I know its a rough comparison, I'm trying to baby you through this because you have apparently never seen for yourself what kind of exit wound a 30.06 produces on a deer.
I proposed an alternative hypothesis specifically saying I don't know if it'd make sense.
Congrats, it doesn't, you can thank me for explaining why later, or never, your choice.
Short answer:
No, a 30.06 round that underpowered would not be capable of making that shot.
Longer answer:
The wound profile at that point doesn't matter, thr shot itself is... not technically impossible, but absloutely absurdly unlikely to make an accurate hit on Kirk, on the first shot and only shot, if Robinson is the shooter, to Kirk's front.
Also, I am not just taking peoples words for things.
I am a shooter. I have shot weapons. I have gone to different ranges, many times, with different weapons, and different targets.
I can also do the math to try to explain this in technical terms, to convince people like you, who have absolutely no experience with firearms.
I say you have absolutely no experience with firearms, because it is immediately obvious to anyone who does, that none of this makes any fucking sense.
I am just one of the rarer of those people who can do the math and the theory as well.
Here's the idea:
The gushing neck wound we all saw?
That's the exit wound.
Meaning, the round did not come from the front, it came from somewhere in the right to the rear of Kirk.
A normal 30.06 round, from the front, where the neck wound is an entry wound, that would have produced roughly a volume the size of a softball being blown away from Kirk's neck, if not larger.
We have not seen any evidence of any exit wound, if the gushing neck wound is the entry wound.
Were the entry wound the neck gusher, from a 30.06, we should have seen a much larger chunk of flesh removed, there should have been blood and viscera spatter all across that white tent wall behind Kirk, on the ground behind Kirk, and probably also the interior 'ceiling' of the tent as well, possibly even on the people standing nearest him.
We should have seen this from basically any close in angle of the shooting.
It would have been apparent from the footage of Kirk's body being rushed into a car to be driven to a hospital.
There is 0 chance that a normal 30.06 round would not cause a massive exit wound.
None.
There is also a near 0 chance a ludicrously underpowered, custom or massively degraded 30.06 round could have made 'Robinson's shot', in one shot.
Please, go watch footage of guntubers shooting ballistic dummies or other things with a 30.06 to get an idea of how powerful this round is.
If the gushing neck wound is the entry wound, there should be a massive blow out exit wound, like, JFK level chunks of flesh blown off.
The caliber used to blow out Kennedy's brain was of similar size and power to a a 30.06, from a similar range, if you go with Oswald took that shot.
In fact, that round, the 6.5mm x 52mm Mannlicher-Carcano, is smaller and less powerful than a 30.06, which equates to 7.62mm x 63mm in metric notation.
Source is me, asshat, I grew up in such a family and culture and had to fucking escape it.
Hah! I think so? Might have to rob a museum.
When an evangelical christian 'forgives' you for something, what that actually is is them forgiving themselves for literally anything they do to you after that.
That is them saying that you are totally lost, do not count as a real human being with agency, and thus anything further they do to you is justified, because in their minds, you are not capable of making sensible decisions.
It is a threat, framed deceptively as kindness, and yes, they know they are lying.
Lol, add a tactical phonebook, just to be safe.
Awesome.
Wonderful.
I love this timeline.
... God damnit.
I have also seen videos of guntubers actually testing the same caliber and range, against a level 4 plate, and they aim the shot at the top edge of the plate, such that it could maybe kind of plausibly do the internet theorized 'it bounced off his plate into his neck' test.
Yeah, the top chunk of the plate breaks off.
Not even level 4 plate is guaranteed to totally stop a 30.06 at such a close range.
And we... would have seen a chunk of plate blowing off in the up close, higher res videos.
I actually don't know that, what is your answer?
For a 30.06 round to be packed with so little, or such degraded powder that it would not penetrate through human bone at 150 yards, to even stand a chance at doing what the surgeon has described, it would need to have a KE of roughly less than 200 FT/LBs at 150 yards.
You typically only see that kind of wound behavior when the rounds invovled are roughly at or less than that amount of KE, either low powered pistol rounds, or moderately powered pistol rounds that have travelled a significant distance, or rifle rounds that have travelled a very, very, very significant distances.... or from rounds that are actually ricochets and have thus already bled off a lot of energy, and also likely mass.
What is being described is a straight on shot where the bullet stops 'just under the skin', presumably against the collarbone, possibly against a vertebrae.
No wacky internal terminal ballistics trajectories, no shattered bones, nope, just a bit of skin and soft tissue in the way, under an inch.
Also, no body armor, just a tshirt, no one has yet claimed officially that the shot ricocheted off of either armor or the ground or a wall or anything.
An average 30.06 bullet weighs ~180 grains.
To achieve only 200 FT/LBs of energy in that weight, you are looking at about 700 feet per second of velocity.
The average KE of a normal 30.06 round is around 2,200 FT/LBs at 150 yards of travel, has an average muzzle velocity of about 2700 feet per second.
A normal 30.06 round will have bled off maybe 300 to 400 fps after travelling 150 yards, from air resistance, down to 2300 to 2400 fps.
That means our theoretical underpowered, 180 grain, 30.06 for this scenario has to have a muzzle velocity of around 1000-1100 feet per second, less than half what a 30.06 typically does.
So, there, it would have to be a roughly 1/2 to 1/4 as much powder loaded, potentially also just less potent powder, as compared to a typical 30.06 180 grain round.
Sure would be neat if any of the casings with the messages etched into them....were, you know, photographed, and we could see those photos?
As far as I am aware, no pictures of the shell casings and or unfired cartridges have actually been published.
Hand loaded or custom loaded rounds usually have a number of tell tale signs you can use to differentiate them from factory rounds.
Anyway, reduce the muzzle velocity that drastically and you also drastically reduce the accuracy of the shot.
That likely is not even enough speed for a 30.06 to stabilize in flight, it would be tumbling over or around itself, 'yawing', not remaining stabilized, on point.
The most underpowered 30.06 rounds I am aware of, without going into custom reloaded rounds...
(which no one has yet even officially posited at all, and which there would be physical evidence of, reloading presses / crimpers, and powder stores and such, but they already searched his home and didn't mention any of that)
... are managed recoil training rounds, which fire a 125 grain bullet at approximately 2175 feet per second of muzzle velocity.
Thats about 1300 foot pounds of KE leaving the muzzle (thus between roughly half and a third the recoil, thats why they are training rounds), and after 150 yards of travel, it would have about 830 foot pounds of force, and be travelling at about 1725 feet per second.
Still roughly 4x too much energy to just be gently caught by a bone.
It is certainly possible, arguably even almost easy, for someone with moderate marksman training to make the shot Robinson is purported to have made with a normal 30.06 with a scope.
But uh, reduce the muzzle velocity down by more than half, and there is not a single sniper in the world who would tell you they could make that shot, on the first shot, in one shot, because they know how amazingly innacurate such a shot would be, no matter their shooting technique.
https://www.vcalc.com/wiki/30-06-springfield
Here, theres a bunch of ballistics calculators for you, if you wanna run all the numbers yourself.
Yeah.
So... this means...
Either it was actually Robinson who took the shot, but not with a 30.06...
Or... It wasn't Robinson, and there was another / different shooter, Kirk was not actually shot from the front, the blood geyser was an exit wound, not an entry wound, again from not a 30.06, but with a smaller caliber and different bullet trajectory, where the bullet could actually have made the neck geyser wound, and then lodged itself not too far away, near the skin ... and Robinson is being set up as a patsy...
Or, whoever this surgeon is, is lying.
Or, the TPUSA person claiming some surgeon said this, is lying.
EDIT:
It is also probably worth mentioning that uh, Netanyahu denied Israel was involved in the shooting... before anyone made that accusation.
Because we all know everything Israel and Mossad does is above board, totally morally perfect in all ways.
Netanyahu’s response comes after MAGA commentators have claimed Kirk was privately far more critical of Netanyahu’s Israeli government than he let on publicly.
See, nobody of major prominence on the right wing had actually said 'I think Israel killed Kirk' before Netanyahu denied killing Kirk.
What people on the right were saying was that relations between Kirk and some Israeli donors had gotten tense in the days and weeks prior.
... But nobody had actually directly said or implied that Israel killed Kirk... but Netanyahu felt compelled to deny that, explicitly.
And just in case anyone reading this needs a refresher on how words work:
Israel != All Jews
Anti-Zionism != Anti-Semitism
Also, most American Jews are uh, you know, highly critical of Israel's ongoing genocide... its white evangelicals that have a hard on for Israel, by way of hating Muslims, and the destruction of Israel being necessary for their apocalyptic end times prophecy.
Also also, Tiktok is currently ablaze with a mass religious/spiritual psychosis trend of many American Christians believing the rapture, the apocalypse, is going to happen on... this upcoming Tuesday.
Mhm. Yep. This all seems very normal.
Uh.
I was unaware of that.
... Well that's fucking odd.
Oh no.
Got it, you have no familiarity with firearms nor the physics involved, understood.
Yeah, I am enough of a gun nerd, and video game /software nerd, that I have actually made more than one milsim level ballistics simulations as mods or sort of toy models from which to then try and optimize down to something that could work in realtime with many players as a reasonably true to life ballistics and player damage / effects model.
And I've also shot a decent bit in real life.
I actually originally taught myself matrix algebra and transforms simply to be able to properly do richochets as a Source mod, way way back.
... Maybe not quite the same degree of fidelity as the people that code say, the actual material physics simulations used to model exactly what different tank rounds would do to exactly what kind of tank armor, how much spalling there would be...
But yeah.
The scenario we are being presented with is indeed miraculous, as in, it completely defies the laws of physics and is literally impossible.
Like, the reason world militaries went down from something like a 30.06 as a mainline infantry combat round, down to something closer to a 5.56 ... is that a 30.06 is massive overkill when it comes to killing a human.
You do not need that much power, you rarely need that much range, that much recoil, you can down caliber and still be very deadly, but also now your soldiers have a lighter weapon, more ammo, and can more easily get off multiple, accurate, lethal shots in a shorter time frame.
You do not need your entire armed force to be equipped with roughly 'sniper rifles'.
I mean, if it were up to me, it would be illegal to purchase or possess a firearm without some kind of certificate you've passed some kind of firearms training course and also hold a first aid / trauma response certification.
Yes I've seen it, but that is from a shot hitting roughly dead between the eyes.
Yes, that is what a 30.06 would do had it entered there... but what we are being told is that it entered around where the neck meets the shoulders, on Kirk's left side of his neck.
When bullets of sufficient energy hit a human head, the head tends to basically crack like an egg.
The neck / clavicle region would not... explode to quite that same degree, but the wound should be larger for a 30.06, roughly at least the size of a soft ball should be completely blown out of his neck area.
Mass televised or otherwise public grieving is almost never sincere, at the very least, it is almost never healthy.
Grieving, truly processing a loss, is done in private, or with a few close friends or family... it is a process of self reflection and self exploration, not self projection.
The other element here is the rank hypocrisy with the religious context and framing and the other speeches she has allowed to occur here, which she surely knew would be given, and at least largely endorsed.
A whole lot of Jesus' sayings are about how one should practice their faith in private, one should lend to charity anonymously.
There is a solid undercurrent of discretion, of not making grand public displays of faith, of your own self righteousness, etc.
... Would you invite a bunch of bombastic hate mongers to the funeral of your loved one, agree to have it as a mass public hate rally?
Or would you prefer a smaller, private gathering, and to... be given some space, for a bit, with occasional checkins or close friends on standby for help if needed?
As to me calling her display psycopathic as bad PR:
You may note that I am not blasting that message outward to millions of people.
You may note I have not accompanied that messsge with a jubilant mocking video and audio display over her husband's death, nor likewise with a snobbishly toned monologue rantsona dripping with venom in my voice.
Looking like around 30 ish people is my audience size.
For reading some text.
Intentionally leaving intonation and body language and speech timbre and tempo soley up to the reader.
If anything, what I intend to convey is solemnity.
PR is not even close to the same as how I actually feel.
How I actually feel is terrified on a grand societal level, genuine concern for the safety and well being of millions likely to be seriously harmed by what her display, and the rest of it, presages.
I did not instantly jump on TikTok like a vengeful spirit and record a snarky video of myself celebrating Kirk's death.
What I actually did was go into a PTSD shock / panic attack episode for an hour, upon seeing, up close in HD, the column of blood erupt from his neck, the life leave his eyes basically instantly, because I have seen too much shit like that already in the real, it has scarred my psyche.
I do perhaps share your fear of bad PR, but at a very, very deep and visceral level...
And for myself, what I would absolutely never wish to convey is any kind of performative inauthenticity.