Thread: VIOLENCE Spreads to DC...Politicos FRIGHTENED?

Well now........are they getting NERVOUS??

[quote]http://www.investors.com/editorial/issues02.asp?v=5/26

Mugged By Reality In D.C.

Law And Order: Gang violence has plagued other cities for years. But it wasn't until immigrant gangs started attacking people with machetes around Washington that politicians applied federal muscle to the problem.

The House earlier this month rushed through a bill that expands the range of gang crimes punishable by death. It also sets mandatory minimum jail times and authorizes the prosecution of 16- and 17-year-old gang members in federal courts as adults.

"The Gangbusters Bill," as it's dubbed, was introduced by Virginia lawmakers after a wave of bloody gang crimes shocked the normally quiet neighborhoods of northern Virginia, nestled just across the Potomac from the nation's capital.

A vicious gang based in Los Angeles and El Salvador called Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, is blamed for 10 recent murders including that of a pregnant 17-year-old stabbed 16 times and left to die by a Virginia river bank.

Most alarming for locals, though, has been a rash of machete attacks at movie theaters and other public places in wealthy towns like Alexandria. In one attack, the victim lost three fingers and had his face hacked up. One of his alleged Latino attackers worked as a busboy at the Rain Forest Cafe in one of the area's nicest malls. In another attack, a victim had four fingers cut off.

"These aren't petty hoodlums," said Rep. Randy Forbes, the Virginia Republican who sponsored the fast-track bill. "They're cutting people's heads off, doing countersurveillance on police. They're trained in a type of violence we've not seen heretofore."

Well, maybe not seen inside the Beltway, the most insulated place on earth. But it's almost an everyday event in cities like L.A., which for years has dealt with drive-by shootings by black gangs and is now dealing with horrific violence involving Latino gangs.

Now that violence has spread to the Washington area, where it cuts too close to home for federal politicians. And now they're leaping into action.

Rep. Bob Goodlatte, another Virginia Republican, threw in an amendment that would stiffen penalties for illegal immigrants guilty of gang crimes. It too passed with unusual dispatch.

Of course, there was the usual whining from Democrats like Rep. Maxine Waters of Los Angeles, who worried about tougher gang laws disproportionately affecting minorities, and Rep. Nydia Velazquez of New York, who warned the bill would "worsen our youth violence behavior by enslaving our youngsters into prison."

Yes, and because they'll be in prison, Ms. Velazquez, they won't be on our streets wielding machetes.

We're not happy that gang violence has spread to the Beltway. But we are grateful that politicians there have been mugged by the reality of the gang problem plaguing other cities, and are now taking action.

President Bush endorses the gangbusters bill, but its prospects are uncertain in the Senate.[color=red] There, a competing anti-gang bill contains funding for crime prevention programs and other warm-fuzzies â€â€

Sounds like the Mexican elite forces trained in the Camp of Americas by our government are hard at work.