Small Helicopter just landed on US Capitol Grounds

[Action_Patrol]

Source: Wtop dc local

Apparently a mailman from Alabama just landed a single person Helicopter on the lawn of the Capitol to protest the Citizens United decision

More to come.

Read more: Link to source

[still_one]

1. Good way to get arrested.

[Action_Patrol]

4. Already done.

I'm looking at it. Pretty crazy.

[still_one]

8. I didn't see that. Thanks for the update

[itsrobert]

16. or Killed

n/t

[Action_Patrol]

20. They didn't kill him

But it looks like they are digging through all of his stuff.

[PoliticAverse]

2. NBC news article and picture of the copter...

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Small-Helicopter-Lands-on-Capitol-Grounds-299870111.html

[Duval]

14. Thanks for the link! nt

[jwirr]

39. Thank you. I hope someone delivers the letters inside to the congress.

[TexasMommaWithAHat]

48. Ha. More likely to be used as evidence of a crime

nt

[jwirr]

56. Hey the mail must go through. Seriously I think he was placing not only himself but others in

serious danger but as protests go this was a unique one.

[onehandle]

3. Uh... What?

[leftofcool]

5. Sure, that will make em take notice, but not in the way you think.

[Historic NY]

6. Lucky they didn't shoot'em down.

[7962]

25. They should have. No way of knowing what the hell he was going to do.

This does not send a good message to crazies and terrorists

[bigworld]

54. Agreed

Why it's almost as if the billions we spent in the name of national security has been an absolute farce.

[bigworld]

55. Where did he take off from? Anyone know?

[mahatmakanejeeves]

63. Gettysburg, Pennsylvania

Heard on the afternoon radio news reports. The same report said that a reporter from the Tampa Bay Times had accompanied him on his trip north, saw the takeoff, and knew exactly what he had in mind. The reporter, recognizing that Hughes wasn't kidding around, called the Secret Service when Hughes was a half-hour from his destination.

I'm sure this is all preliminary, so tomorrow we might hear a different story entirely. It wasn't Gettysburg, Pennsylvania; it was Gettysburg, South Dakota, and so on.

[Xithras]

62. No, they should not have.

In America, most of us prefer that our law enforcement officers not have the ability to summarily execute people who are committing crimes. Especially when they haven't actually harmed anybody, or demonstrated/showed evidence that they were planning to do so.

[RufusTFirefly]

7. Lesson: Only kooky people oppose Citizens United

"Yew whut? Don't tell me yer wun of those cry-z heel-o-copter tops?"

[jtuck004]

9. Thought perhaps it was someone from the bank, come to see how things are doing. n/t

[7962]

26. Ok, that was a good one.

[Surya Gayatri]

10. There goes one chopper confiscated...

Appreciate the sentiment, though.

[LongTomH]

11. Well, that should keep the Press Corpse busy for the rest of the day.........

No need to talk about real issues, of course!

[951-Riverside]

12. Only white people can get away with stuff like this

Doug Hughes, the man identified as the pilot, flies his gyrocopter near the Wauchula Municipal Airport in Wauchula, FL.

Let me guess, he'll get to keep his job, he'll get a petty fine which will be overturned later, he'll get his helicopter back and not serve any time in prison whereas anyone with brown skin would have been turned into swiss cheese like Miriam Carey was.

[951-Riverside]

17. Oh and he told the Secret Service what he was going to do a year ago and they did nothing to stop it

FUCKING WHITE PRIVILEGE! UNFUCKINGBELIEVABLE!

About 1 a.m. one night last spring, a Secret Service agent accompanied by a Hillsborough County sheriff's deputy rang Doug Hughes' doorbell. Lights went on inside his spare little house in Ruskin. The plainclothes agent showed his badge. Hughes stepped outside and closed the door behind him.

The agent asked him questions about his plan to save America, he said, and Hughes was honest in his replies, if not totally forthcoming with details. Yes, he did own a gyrocopter. Yes, he keeps it in a hangar at the small airport in Wauchula. Yes, he had talked of doing something big to bring attention to the issue of campaign finance reform. No, he was not planning to crash into any buildings or monuments in Washington, D.C.

I'm not a violent person, Hughes remembers saying. All I want to do is draw attention.

Someone inside his circle of secrecy had reported him, telling the Secret Service that Hughes was talking about committing a daring act of civil disobedience that also happened to be a federal crime.

The Secret Service won't confirm the agent's visit because there was no arrest. But Hughes says he was questioned for about 45 minutes, and he has an agent's business card. Two days later, Hughes said, the same agent showed up at the post office where Hughes works and asked more questions . He also talked to one of Hughes' colleagues with whom he had discussed his plan. The colleague told the Tampa Bay Times that he, too, answered questions. Hughes even gave the agent permission to talk to his doctor, to assure him he wasn't suicidal or homicidal.

And then, for months, nothing. That was it, Hughes said. No other questions. No other contact. So Hughes, who sees himself as a sort of showman patriot, a mix of Paul Revere and P.T. Barnum, put his plan into action.

He bought a burner cell phone and a video camera, and tested a livestream video feed from his gyrocopter ( tbtim.es/gpa). He built a website offline that explains who he is and why he's doing what he's doing. He bought $250 worth of stamps and stuffed 535 two-page letters into 535 envelopes, each addressed to a specific member of Congress:

"I'm demanding reform and declaring a voter's rebellion in a manner consistent with Jefferson's description of rights in the Declaration of Independence," he wrote in his letters. "As a member of Congress, you have three options. 1. You may pretend corruption does not exist. 2. You may pretend to oppose corruption while you sabotage reform. 3. You may actively participate in real reform."

He also learned how to fly.

Late last week, he loaded the gyrocopter onto a trailer and headed for an undisclosed location outside the nation's capital.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/elections/ruskin-mailman-tries-flying-to-capitol-in-gyrocopter-to-deliver-campaign/2225584

[onenote]

18. I'm curious. What should the Secret Service have done about it?

[951-Riverside]

21. The same thing they would have done to any brown person who made the same threats

but since its a white man its "oh gee golly, we don't know what to dooo! He does have a first amendment right into the US capitol".

Fuck that!

Can you imagine if a bunch of heavily armed blacks, arabs or hispanics descended on a town and pointed guns at law enforcement like the Bundy Ranch Mooch Militia did, the remaining survivors would have been sitting in prison for life today but nooo since good ole Bundy and the rest of the militia were white, no one was arrested, no guns were taken and he gets to continue mooching off federal land without paying fees.

[onenote]

22. Still looking for an answer

What specifically, after interviewing this guy, should they have done?

[951-Riverside]

28. Had he not been White he would have been placed under arrest and fired from the postal service

I know you're going to keep asking me what they should have done because you want to avoid talking about a clear cut case of white privilege so I'll answer your question.

It is a felony to make criminal threats and saying that you're going to fly into restricted airspace is likely a federal crime but since he's white "golly, he's just exercising his first amendment right" just like Cliven Bundy and the mooch militia was doing when they pointed guns at federal agents.

[Xithras]

31. Arrested for what? Until today he committed no crime.

He did not make a threat against the President. He stated his intent to violate federal law, but that is not a crime in and of itself. The Secret Service cannot arrest someone for stating that they plan on carrying out an act of civil disobedience.

The closest our laws come to criminalizing intent are "threats" that involve harm to a person or structure, or "conspiracy", which requires that TWO people work together to plan a crime. This guy didn't fall under either of those legal umbrellas.

Brown or white is irrelevant in this case. No laws were violated.

[951-Riverside]

37. Because he's white its "a first amendment" issue thus no crime was committed, I get it.

Just like Cliven Bundy and his clan were allowed to point guns at law enforcement, set up checkpoints, harass media on public land and none were arrested because its their "first amendment right".

Meanwhile Miriam Carry a black woman was turned into swiss cheese for making a uturn and trying to drive AWAY from a white house checkpoint



And how could we forget about the black transgender woman who was blown away for going around an NSA checkpoint but Mr. White Privilege here can fly an aircraft into restricted airspace, tell everyone about his plans a year in advance and now only did he get to keep his US Postal Service job but they sit back and let him carry out his plan.

#WhitePrivilege

[onenote]

49. other than you no one is talking about the first amendment

And if Miriam Carey had, while sitting at home, said "i'm going to drive into a WH checkpoint" she wouldn't have been arrested.

And if the pilot of the copter had attempted to flee, or posed an imminent threat to safety, he might well have been taken out.

As I pointed out, apart from Miriam Carey, there have been several non-white WH intruders and they've been stopped without deadly force. The difference is that Carey was driving a vehicle that itself could pose a threat to those trying to stop her.

[snooper2]

33. you positive?

[onenote]

34. Really? There's a general prohibition against "threatening" to break the law?

And its a felony. Please provide a citation. I'm sure you have it at your fingertips.

And since the Secret Service probably investigates dozens of "threats" (real threats to harm the President, his family or another federal official) every day, I'm sure you can point to the dozens of prosecutions that have followed.

Finally, for the record, several of the gate jumpers at the White House have been "brown skinned" and they were taken into custody without being shot.

But thanks for injecting your nonsense into the thread.

[7962]

29. Doesnt matter, cause "white privilege".

Seems like the only people i've ever seen arrested for threatening this president or any other, have been white. Whate color were those who actually made good on their threats? hmmmmm

But some here want to hijack every thread and make it about race.
YOU have a valid question, of course, but it doesnt matter.

[bigworld]

50. I'm not sure you could tell what race this guy was while he was flying around

I think that he got so far has more to do with the incompetency of the police than any sort of institutionalized racism.

[7962]

61. Well, post #12 thinks he shouldve been arrested before he ever got into the chopper,

but wasnt simply because he's white

[CentralMass]

46. What a waste. He undoubtedly will never fly again

[kelly1mm]

30. What threat did he allegedly make? nt

[7962]

27. Hey! Only 12 posts before it turns to racism! Not a record, but close.

[LanternWaste]

51. And only 27 posts in pretending racism doesn't exist. Not a record, but close.

And only 27 posts in pretending racism doesn't exist. Not a record, but close.

(six of one, half a dozen of the other-- and both as petulant as the other. Insert distinction without a difference below to maintain creative pretense of objectivity)

[7962]

60. Still looking for the last black man arrested for threatening a president...

I only know of ONE, and he actually threatened Obama.

[Enthusiast]

40. "Black people cannot be trusted with a Helicopter, or the presidency", Said the Republicans.

[drm604]

13. It looks like it has a Post Office logo on it.

Does the Post Office have helicopters?

[onenote]

19. Nah, it's his own copter. He put on the logo because he works for the P.O. and he was

"delivering a message."

Even though I agree with his anti-CU message, his method was just stupid.

[underpants]

35. I just saw it in NBC News article. No mention of Citizens United

It just has a quote from his email to news organizations and Congressmen "this issue is important enough..." but the article never mentions what the issue is. Typical.

[IDemo]

66. ABC just now mentioned it n/t

[PoliticAverse]

23. Hey they have to compete with Amazon's drones. n/t

[El Supremo]

47. +1 Forever Stamp!

[BumRushDaShow]

15. Well if this sort of thing can happen here

This was an interesting tidbit -

Wheeler added that Hughes' protest move, urging campaign finance reform and a halt to corruption in the government, raises questions about our country's national security apparatus.

"This is just another question for Homeland Security," Hughes said. "We still have a lot of questions to ask."

Richard Burns, 27, who said he works for a marijuana lobby group in Washington, stood in wonder and solidarity.

"I don't know whatever it was he was doing but I support him."

More info: http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/elections/ruskin-mailman-tries-flying-to-capitol-in-gyrocopter-to-deliver-campaign/2225584

[jtuck004]

24. Non-violent protest - took a lot of courage, and work.

Let me say first – this is a non-violent demonstration. I have no intention of hurting anyone – I have taken every precaution to prevent any injury to anyone, including me. There is no way I can prevent over-reaction by the authorities, but I have given them as much information and advance warning as my fuel supply allows. When I took off, I was over an hour away from the no-fly zone...

http://thedemocracyclub.org/?p=28

Easier to sit on one's high horse (or in a computer chair) and criticize him if one is inclined that way, sure, but this guy is protesting against Citizens United.

Ain't that First Amendment somethin'?

[PoliticAverse]

41. The First Amendment doesn't cover this.

This would fall under 'civil disobedience'.

[jtuck004]

43. 500+ letters to Congress, a web site, etc. Lots of message out there, though the stunt

may or may not overshadow it.

We will see.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

32. I went to have a look as soon as I heard about this.

Last edited Wed Apr 15, 2015, 04:10 PM - Edit history (2)

He had already landed by the time I became aware of the incident. With so many tourists out and about today, there must be scads of smartphone videos of him as he flies overhead.

I was on the roof of a nearby building. The gyrocopter was on the west lawn of the Capitol, near Garfield Circle. Garfield Circle is next to the Capitol Reflecting Pool and the Botanic Garden. People are being kept away from the area with that yellow police line tape.

I did not see him approach, but due to the buildings, it's possible that he flew in over the Mall from the direction of the Air & Space Museum. Had he been shot down, it is likely that tourists on the ground would have been killed by falling wreckage. As it is, they had a visit they will always remember.

[Action_Patrol]

36. Agreed.

Not much you can other than just let him land.

[liberal N proud]

38. He is lucky he was not shot out of the sky

[PoliticAverse]

42. CNN article with close-up picture of the copter...

http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/15/politics/aircraft-lands-on-capitol-grounds/index.html

[Playinghardball]

44. And neither White House, snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night, nor the winds of change,

nor a nation challenged, will stay us from the swift completion of our appointed rounds. Ever...

[PoliticAverse]

45. Video of the copter flying in taken by a witness (via Associated Press)...

Last edited Wed Apr 15, 2015, 06:19 PM - Edit history (2)

[progressoid]

57. The kids don't give a shit.

[bigworld]

58. I know! The teacher's the only one who's like um, something's wrong here!

[mahatmakanejeeves]

64. If I had been standing there on an April 15

and this guy flew over with the USPS logo on his craft, I would have figured that this was the USPS's way of reminding us to get to the post office by midnight to get those taxes in on time.

I mean, what other explanation could there be? Surely this was all on the up-and-up.

[wordpix]

52. one way to give Citizens United a higher profile

for the low information voters who watch Housewives and WWE instead of reading/viewing real news.

[JHB]

53. He was shot down by Ted Cruz

[Action_Patrol]

59. Hilarious!

[mahatmakanejeeves]

65. The good old days

Hat tip: DCist.com: Man Lands Gyrocopter Near U.S. Capitol, Is Immediately Arrested

A commenter submitted this picture from 1911:

[PoliticAverse]

67. Video of him announcing what he intended to do...

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/elections/ruskin-mailman-tries-flying-to-capitol-in-gyrocopter-to-deliver-campaign/2225584