Gyro-Copter Lands On West Lawn of US Capitol, Pilot Arrested

An anonymous reader writes that Doug Hughes, 61, a mailman from Ruskin, Florida was arrested for landing a gyro-copter on the West Lawn of the U.S. Capitol. "A 61-year-old Florida mailman was arrested Wednesday after he landed a gyrocopter on the U.S. Capitol west lawn. The gyrocopter was carrying the pilot and 535 stamped letters for members of Congress urging 'real reform' to campaign finance laws. Doug Hughes told the Tampa Bay Times ahead of the afternoon stunt that he notified authorities 'well over an hour in advance of getting to the no-fly zone, so they know who I am and what I'm doing.' Capitol police sent dogs and a bomb squad to the scene. Nothing hazardous was found. A city block from the Capitol had been cordoned off."

Comments

Shocked he survived

[netsavior]

I mean, I do not advocate the death penalty for stupidity, but I am shocked he wasn't hit by a sniper before he even crossed the property line.

Re:Shocked he survived

[Anonymous Coward]

It'd be fucking stupid to shoot him down like that.

So instead of there being a helicopter in the air with a human at controls, doing what you suggest would result in a helicopter in the air with nobody controlling it.

At least there's a chance of it being landed safely when there's a human controlling it.

When nobody is controlling it, there's a much greater risk of it falling out of the sky and causing harm. It could land on buildings. It could land on vehicles. It could land on pedestrians and tourists. It could land on your own frigging cock and balls, for crying out loud.

Re:Shocked he survived

[Anonymous Coward]

Clearly it depends on the color of his skin, since he lived and wasn't beaten we can assume he was white. If this had been a male of African descent or someone with a really dark tan they probably would have just blow him out of the sky with a missile.

Re:Shocked he survived

[amicusNYCL]

He's a complete jackass for doing it in the first place.

I applaud him. He's protesting what is the #1 problem in government today in a peaceful way that was sure to make headlines. The problem isn't people like him, the problem is people who are apathetic about the issue in the first place.

Re:Shocked he survived

[ScentCone]

He's protesting what is the #1 problem in government today

The first amendment is the #1 problem? This guy is complaining because he doesn't like a court ruling that diminished the ability of labor unions (like his) to be allowed to spend money on political ads when other people weren't allowed to. He's upset about a court correctly finding that unequal protection under the law, and the government directly limiting political speech, was unconstitutional.

in a peaceful way

Yeah, by violating militarily enforced air space that could have involved the use of heavy weapons while he flies his cheeseball gyrocopter over crowds including bunches of children. In other words, he was willing to seriously risk other people's lives in a political stunt.

the problem is people who are apathetic about the issue in the first place

I'm not apathetic about the first amendment, are you?

Re:Shocked he survived

[ScentCone]

If it is correct to limit labor union's ability to spend due to unequal protection, then how can corporations not similarly be limited?

Wow, you are really missing the point. You have it backwards. The law wasn't "loosened," it was struck down, in part, because it allowed some groups to do things like run political ads on TV while barring other groups from doing so. Regardless of that unequal treatment under the law, which favored some groups and companies over others, the main issue remains: telling people that they're not allowed to say things during an election is a direct violation of the first amendment. Period. The court came to the same inevitable conclusion. If you don't like the groups like Greenpeace or a labor union or the NRA can run opinion pieces on cable TV or in a newspaper ad, then you need to figure out how to let the government stop those people from saying what they think while not violating the first amendment. And then you have to apply that new speech-inhibiting law evenly to everyone.

Personally, I think all labor union and corporate campaign contributions should be eliminated. "We the people..."

So when you join a labor union or incorporate your business, you think you're surrendering your rights to free speech? What if you incorporate a landscaping business in your town, and some local politician says he's going to make it the focus of his term as mayor to prohibit all gasoline powered landscaping equipment in town. Do you really think that the would-be mayor should be allowed to say what he thinks about your business practices and equipment, but you and your fellow landscapers in town shouldn't be allowed to run an ad saying, "Don't elect Mr. Smith, because all of your local landscaping companies will end up out of business." Why do you think such political speech should be banned, but only when it's the business owners who speak it?

Re:Shocked he survived

[FlyHelicopters]

I don't know about a sniper, but he was in a no-fly zone. Don't they scramble jets when someone enters a no-fly zone? Especially near the Capitol. I assume they do, but I don't really know.

Yes, usually...

In this case, he wasn't on RADAR and the Secret Service knew he was coming. He was known to them and he had made prior contact to let them know of his publicity stunt.

Re:Shocked he survived

[Duhavid]

>>If it is correct to limit labor union's ability to spend due to unequal protection, then how can corporations not similarly be limited?>Personally, I think all labor union and corporate campaign contributions should be eliminated. "We the people..."

"So when you join a labor union or incorporate your business, you think you're surrendering your rights to free speech? "

Absolutely not. Where did I give you that impression?
Talk all you want.
Campaign contributions, on the other hand, are not speech.
They are the mechanism for election, and should be controlled to ensure that We the People are in charge.

"What if you incorporate a landscaping business in your town, and some local politician says he's going to make it the focus of his term as mayor to prohibit all gasoline powered landscaping equipment in town. Do you really think that the would-be mayor should be allowed to say what he thinks about your business practices and equipment, but you and your fellow landscapers in town shouldn't be allowed to run an ad saying, "Don't elect Mr. Smith, because all of your local landscaping companies will end up out of business." Why do you think such political speech should be banned, but only when it's the business owners who speak it?"

The business owners are still individuals and can participate in this debate to their hearts content, as can ( should ) all citizens ( citizens == non corporate, real people with the right to vote ).
Why should business owners be able to effectively ban non-business owner from political speech by drowning them out with money?

Re:I can't really blame this guy

[MightyMartian]

Because having his nuts groped by the Secret Service will be a far superior experience.

Thank goodness the NSA is looking our for us

[gestalt_n_pepper]

So, this guy published the the fact that he was going to do this on his blog and in email before he did it. Here's the quote from "Thehill.com":

On the webpage thedemocracyclub.org, he wrote: ''My flight is not a secret. Before I took off, I sent an Email to info@barackobama.com. The letter is intended to persuade the guardians of the Capitol that I am not a threat and that shooting me down will be a bigger headache than letting me deliver these letters to Congress.''

Tell me again, what our incredible spying and surveillance program is supposed to be doing? Because, I'm pretty sure this is the definition of "intelligence failure" in all senses of the phrase.

Re:Just get rid of democracy instead

[amicusNYCL]

What is the exact ratio between citizens and representatives which defines a democracy?

All of this, of course, ignores the fact that the US is not, and has never been, an actual democracy. It is a Federal Republic.

Re:Delivering the Mail

[amicusNYCL]

No, they arrested an idiot who is supposed to have a pilot license who does not understand the concept of a 'no-fly-zone'.

You might be the idiot. He fully understood all of the implications of what he was doing, and worked out several scenarios. His expected scenario was that a Blackhawk would be scrambled from Quantico, but would overfly him as he was flying so low and slow, and he hoped that by the time the Blackhawk caught up to him that they would have orders to not shoot him down. His biggest worries were that he would be shot down or that he wouldn't have the nerve to do it in the first place. I can't imagine the adrenaline going through him as he was flying across the national mall in sight of the Capitol without a single LEO or military aircraft in sight.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/p...

He's right, too. Campaign finance laws and all of the corruption that goes with them is the single largest problem with the current government, and apathy from people like you helps to ensure that it doesn't get fixed. Go on, citizen, stamp the vote card. R or D, your choice. Whichever R or D you want to pick will be just fine.

Re:I can't really blame this guy

[Noah Haders]

a couple thoughts...
1) this guy is a nut. the fact that he is a post man and shows up with 535 *stamped* letters is super funny.
2) gyrocopters are inherently funny. those things don't fly so much as fall through the air and manage not to crash. they remind me of bumblebees.
3) maybe this is a woosh on my part, but the GP refers to TSA nut grabbing. This was just in the news yesterday cuz there was a bust at denver where a gay tsa officer was using coded signals to other officers so he would ahve the chance to grope people's nuts.

Re:Well that's rather the point

[FlyHelicopters]

What about an auto-gyro with 30 lbs or so of C4? Do you still want the "human at the controls"? You don't know what the intentions are, you just know it's very illegal to be there yet there he is.

This man was known to the Secret Service, they even interviewed him a year or so before this, on a tip that he would do JUST THIS.

In addition, he called the Secret Service an hour before he got there to let them know he was coming and why. The press also called them because he was in contact with the press to let them know this was a publicity stunt.

Re:Balls of steel

[Jeremi]

His message is that he wants the government to limit your ability to engage in free speech.

There's a constant and deliberate conflation of money and speech going on in this country. They are not equivalent to each other.

Re:Balls of steel

[houghi]

The fact that you think it is remarkable that police did NOT beat somebody senseless or kill him is very worrying.

Don't forget the message

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no democracy when corporations are allowed unlimited campaign donations, have the rights of 'people', and can direct their media/news to support their candidates..

If all the information most of the population get is from controlled sources, then theres no hope for "3rd party" and nothing will ever really change..
Republican or democratic parties, Bush, Obama... Other than token issues theres no difference. :(

Remember folks the wealthiest 400(four hundred) people in the USA own more assets than the lower 150 million(150,000,000) people combined.