That’s pretty much what I heard, live, come out of the mouth of Commander-In-Chief Barack Obama, pursuant to a shooting on an army base, during which 12 soldiers were killed and 31 injured. [Update: 13 are now dead.]

The president was hanging with leaders of the Native American tribal nations when the news broke. His response: “What an extraordinary gathering… I thank the extraordinary people who made this extraordinary convention possible … we’re gonna do right by you extraordinary people, yada, yada, yada. Oh, and by the way, some soldiers got shot.”

“The suspected gunman was identified by ABC News as Major Malik Nadal Hasan. Fort Hood, on which this shooting spree occurred, “has suffered more deaths in Iraq than any other US home base. ” Most soldiers on the base had been deployed at least four times (as Bush cleared brush on his ranch and Barack vacationed at Martha’s Vineyard).

All told, there were three shooters; one was killed, two are in custody, (Update: subsequently released, so they could not be shooters).

Via the NYT: “CNN reports that the soldiers who were at the readiness center were getting ready to deploy to Iraq.”

On Fox News, Major General Robert H. Scales says that his sources tell him this was not the act of a madman—this was no spontaneous act committed under duress—but, rather, a planned and deliberate assassination. The venue was picked, and the men targeted mowed down with diabolical precision.

Developing.

NYT: “Update | 6:16 p.m. According to the Marine Corps Times, a Pentagon source said the suspected gunman killed at Fort Hood, Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, ‘was a psychiatrist recently reassigned from Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., to work with soldiers at Darnall Army Medical Center on Fort Hood.'”

Hasan was 39 years old.

Update I: Huffington Post on Hasan’s military records:

“Military officials say the suspected shooter at Fort Hood was a psychiatrist at Walter Reed Army Medical Center for six years before being transferred to the Texas base in July.
The officials had access to Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s military record. They said he received a poor performance evaluation while at Walter Reed.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because military records are confidential.”
The Virginia-born soldier was single with no children. He was 39 years old.
He is a graduate of Virginia Tech University, where he was a member of the ROTC and earned a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry in 1997. He received his medical degree from the military’s Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md., in 2001. At Walter Reed, he did his internship, residency and a fellowship.”

[SNIP]

I’d like to know more about the nature of the “poor performance evaluation” the killer received, and whether this information might have been followed up on as a possible harbinger of what Hasan was capable of.

Update II: Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan IS ALIVE. I have no idea why media were told he was dead, at first. Perhaps the military was ashamed that the base police came upon a man mowing down soldiers and did not take him out. On the other hand, maybe they want to interrogate him. Gently, of course, in case the libertarian and liberal Left squeal about the trauma the placing of a bug in the bug-phobic Abu Zubaydah’s “confinement box” caused them.

But interrogation and correctly reporting Hasan’s status are not mutually exclusive.

Update III: “Muslims have a right to rise and attack the aggressors,” Hasan is purported to have told a retired colleague. Now this is an intellectually consistent position. Perfectly consistent. What is inconsistent and incongruous is the conduct of our liberal military. Given his poor performance and his views, why on earth was he not kicked out of the force? Why were his passing comments dismissed as mere hot-hotheadedness? Liberalism, that’s why. The military has an obligation to expunge elements like Hasan from its ranks. The brass’ duty is to preserve its own; not display tolerance for diversity.

Via Jihad Watch:

Update IV: Shep Smith said Nidal Malik Hasan was a convert to Islam. Nonsense on stilt. So much of it. The WaPo reports that “Hasan is a U.S.-born Muslim of Palestinian descent whose parents came to the United States from the West Bank. He joined the military after high school and earned medical degrees as he rose through the ranks, family members said. A doctor in the Medical Corps, Hasan was promoted to major last year, according to the Congressional Record.”

Wait for this. According to NPR “Hasan was put on probation early in his postgraduate work at the Uniformed Service University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md. He was disciplined for proselytizing about his Muslim faith with patients and colleagues, according to the source, who worked with him at the time.”

Disciplined? What were they thinking? Speak nicely to the man and he’ll abandon his faith and his anger?

I’ll repeat an ongoing theme on this blog: Hasan acted in character. He is consistent. The people who are, to me, more contemptible than he are the military brass. Infected with PC and liberal do-goodism, they honestly believed that with a few mild warnings and kind reprimands they could tweak Islam out of this man like one would an unsightly nose hair. His superiors need to pay for forsaking their underlings. They abandoned their charges for liberal political correctness.

Update V: What is considered a cause for alarm on a military base? Clearly not a man strolling about the base in traditional Muslim/Arab garb. Tell me that the military is not as liberal as the rest of the country. The madness we endure at airports is the madness we’ve witnessed on this military base.

The American taxpayer paid for this man’s education, years of tuition and living expenses. Hasan is a ponce who lived off the taxpayer and turned deadly when his debts were due.

On the other hand, Major Nidal begged to be released of his duties. The man underperformed and was rotten at his job. Why did the military not cut him loose? Yes, liberalism sees no danger in an abaya-clad, angry, devout Muslim who saw the institution he worked for as an aggressor and oppressor. As an arm of the state, the military mirrors the state’s reckless disregard for those who serve it. Today, we saw proof of it.

Update VI (Nov. 6): Would a military man be allowed to roam the base in a Hare-Krishna robe?

The morons of MSNBC are going the causal route of the trauma victim—Major Nidal of course. A victim of bullying and stress. “Evil, not ILL” says it all:

“To listen to the nation’s psychiatric gurus is to come to believe that crimes are caused, not committed. Perpetrators don’t do the crime, but are driven to their dirty deeds by a confluence of uncontrollable factors, victims of societal forces or organic brain disease.

The paradox at the heart of this root-causes fraud is that causal theoretical explanations are invoked only after bad deeds have been committed. Good deeds have no need of mitigating circumstances. Even though [Major Nidal] went about his business meticulously and methodically, liberals (and, increasingly, conservatives) toss the concept of free will to the wind. They acknowledge human agency if—and only if—adaptive actions are involved.”

“‘Allahu Akbar’ was shouted by the Fort Hood killer Major Nidal Malik Hasan before he opened fire.” Assorted dhimmi are elaborating on the many meanings of the phase. Armed, dressed in traditional Arab garb and shouting “Allahu Akbar”: I think we all know what that means. Trouble.

Update VII: HERE are some of the men and women killed by a coward.

As we all know, the military/the state affords the men and women who join the best of care. That’s why it unleashed Major Nidal on unsuspecting damaged soldiers. Dr. Thomas Grieger, who was supervising Nidal, who clearly needed supervision,” said [that] privacy laws prevented him from going into details but … that [there were] problems … with Hasan’s interactions with patients.”

Only the best.

Via Fox News, more on the abnegation of responsibility in dealing with this individual: “At least six months ago, Hasan came to the attention of law enforcement officials because of Internet postings about suicide bombings and other threats, including posts that equated suicide bombers to soldiers who throw themselves on a grenade to save the lives of their comrades.

They had not determined for certain whether Hasan is the author of the posting, and a formal investigation had not been opened before the shooting, said law enforcement officials.”

The military authorities were in no hurry to do their duty.

Nor is premeditation in question. ABC: “The gun thought to be used in the Fort Hood massacre packs so much firepower, it’s known as ‘the Cop Killer,’ federal law enforcement officials said.”

Update VIII: “An officer and a gentleman was injured while partaking in a preemptive* attack. Get Well Soon Major Nidal. We Love You.” So wrote “The Official Revolution Muslim Website.” Via WND.COM.

Update IX: Col. Jack Jacobs, now an MSNBC military analyst, said it is unlikely Major Nidal caused all the deaths. The Colonel mentioned that oxymoron “friendly fire.”