The brilliant effing ELF--setting fires protesting pollution

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

This morning both the hubby and I were awakened by several loud, circling helicopters in our area. We flipped on the TV to find someone has set fire to several Hummers, as well as one of the buildings, at a local dealership.

They’d also sprayed painted various brilliant phrases on the cars that didn’t burn…phrases like “Fat, lazy Americans,” “American Wastefullness [sic],” “Polluter,” and “I love pollution.” Another had “ELF” painted on it (not a reference to a D&D game, but likely for “Environmental Liberation Foundation”).

:dubious:

Brilliant logic, chowderheads. It’s not like setting fire to a building and several cars doesn’t release enormous volumes of toxic chemicals into our environment. The fire chief said that the amount of pollutants released from this lovely “eco-terrorism” act is more than the ruined cars would’ve produced in their lifetime.

As Wally would say:

:wally:

2

ELF both scares me and pisses me off. Pure domestic terrorism, carried out by a bunch of stupid yet strangely effective people.

I would think that a dealership like that would have better security though.

3

I bet they were Drow.

4

From what I’ve read ELF stands for Earth Liberation Front, a loosely organized cadre of people opposed to anything and everything that hurts the planet (in their opinion). Auto dealerships and construction sites have been the favored targets to date.

Earlier this month, they allegedly torched an apartment complex under construction in San Diego causing an estimated $20 million in damages. According to the article, they left a sign stating, “if you build it we will burn it”. For the article: http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20030803-9999_1m3firefolo.html

Not unlike PETA, these folks will devise situations proving potentially fatal to police, firefighters, and EMS workers, as a means of furthering their cause.

In addition, they produce literature on how to construct firebombs, time delay detonators, and similar devices which have no legitimate purpose.

I knew that being a volunteer firefighter had inherent dangers, yet I don’t needs asshats trying to kill me or my crew.

5

danceswithcats, you hit it straight on the noggin’. When I was with 20th Security Forces Squadron at Shaw AFB, we had a few incidents where the ELF and Greenpeace broke into the Pointsette Bombing range and set tires ablaze using time-delayed fuses. Some sort of magnesium/calcium and water setup. Burning tires to obscure a bombing range? Well, they did it three times before we posted a guard on 'em and boy, let me tell you what! 16 year old asshats. Thats who they were. Four sixteen year old sonsofbitches who, in the end, we kept locked up for a total of seventy two hours before turning them over to the FBI.

The ‘great’ thing is, though, are that these kids are going to become the Tim McVeighs of our future, and the world doesn’t seem to give a damn. I really, really do wish (note the “I”, being that I am the only one who feels this way) that we (the Air Force, and other branches of the armed forces, who may or may not share my point of veiw) could acutally start living up to the “Use of Deadly Force” signs on our fences. Killing a dozen or so of these sonsofbitches would get a great point across. When we caught these kids, they were like “Oh, big and bad, ain’tcha?” When we locked 'em up on bread and water, they whined about getting a lawyer (military jurisprudence doesn’t allow for council unless undergoing a general court martial, or Article 15 hearing,) how their ‘civil liberties’ were being violated, and how they were only doing what was ‘right.’

My Chief, (er, my squadron’s Command Chief Master Sergeant) talked to 'em for a bit, and explained to 'em about how they were doing more harm than good to the enviroment, how they could have been hurt, and how in the end, all the pilots did was to act as if the range was obscured by smoke. Aparently, this helped in our recent dealings with Iraq ( :wink: )

But all that aside, I really would love to see these bastards not just put out of business, but put out of the gene pool. Why? They’re gonna breed, and they’re gonna spread their criminal thoughts to their children, and soon enough, I’ll have my Chief’s stripes and have to shoot one of these bastards kids to protect my base. Anyway, that’s my rant. Back to y’all!

6

Apparently these ELFs (thanks for the acronymn correction, danceswithcats…heard it a few times on TV and thought “D’oh!”) also did some spray painting in Duarte and Arcadia. What sucks is that in one of those cases (don’t recall which) they just had fun defacing SUVs parked on the street–not on a seller’s lot.

I heard some ELF loser interviewed on TV today, talking about how they’ll continue doing this kind of stupid shit until it makes enough impact to allow them to use more legal, “ineffective” means of getting their point across. The lack of logic is mind numbing.

They also showed a clip (sans sound) of a videotaped lecture at a university that was essentially “How to make a fire bomb.” Some of those in the video were arrested, thankfully. BTW…heard a few times that ELF was in some ways a spin-off of the Animal Liberation Front (or something like that)–think PETA on crystal meth.

Idiots. All of them.

7

A link to the local paper’s online article about the vandals (has a pic of a scorched H2, too):

http://www.sgvtribune.com/Stories/0,1413,205%7E24659%7E1586024,00.html

They don’t keep articles up long, so I’ll quote a few sections of it (don’t worry moderators, it’s less than half the article):

8

This seems to be an appropriate place to link to my Open letter to poseur4x4 and EarthOnEmpty re: the “ticket” you put on my Cherokee.

9

Not sure if this is posted elsewhere on the web, but AOL’s top headline says: “SUVs burn gas, and vice versa.” I got a sadistic giggle out of it.
-Lil

10

The stupidity of this is ridiculous. I also feel for the car dealer, because after working in the car industry, I know how hard it’s going to be for him to have that stock replaced. Now, Chrysler corporate is going to do their best to get him stock quickly, but with popular models, they almost go directly from factory to dealership, and very little stock is built up. Its more effiecient, and with predictive flow, you actually get the cars the dealer will sell to the lot just before he will sell them. I was always amazed at how well it worked. I am sure the owner of the dealership is thinking to themselves “Why couldn’t they have burned those 5 SUV’s from last year that I can get rid of over in the back of the lot? No, the morons had to burn the popular units!”

11

Well, y’know, when you’re a teener, the only thing more fun than sex… is vandalism.

And the only thing more fun than vandalism is Vandalism With A Just Cause.

I believe I made a pretty good point about my feelings on the subject in this thread.

There’s an important difference, though. Terrorists are willing to die for their berserk weird-assed beliefs. Gangbangers aren’t so hot to die, but they realize it’s part of the possibilities.

A lot of your so-called “urban terrorists” who embrace vandalism as a legitimate form of social protest… not only aren’t willing to die, but have never seen the inside of a jail. Particularly the younger ones.

I’d suspect that more than a few of these :wally 'es would be inclined to drop the hell out of the “protest” scene after getting to do a little time, and pay some restitution. Vandalism is one thing, but those SUV’s cost some serious money…

…which, if the perpetrators were busted, leaves them two options: spend the next couple decades working like a galley slave to pay it all off… or drop out of sight, go completely underground… and give up your life.

An interesting choice to leave in the lap of a teener, no?