Saturday, December 23, 2006

More on Jimmy(Dhimmi) Carter

and his latest book. If you can call this load of fertilizer a book.

From Instapundit followed a link to this opinion on the matter. I just love this part:
A former president whose legacy has rested on bringing about peace between Arabs and Jews has turned his back on that to become a partisan. A man whose Christian values made him see both sides in a tragic conflict has become blind to one side's suffering. A man who walked in paths of peace has now become an obstacle to peace.

For me, it means the loss of one of my greatest heroes. I have never allowed a snide remark about Jimmy Carter's "failed" presidency to pass without contradicting it. I have said countless times that he is the greatest former president, setting a new standard for that role.

I don't recognize Carter any more. I am afraid of him now, for myself and for my children. He has not just turned his back on the balance and fairness that all peacemaking depends on. He has become a spokesman for the enemies of my people. He has become an apologist for terrorists.


This clown has been sucking up to dictators and crapping on Israel for a long damn time, but after THIS book,"I don't recognize Carter any more. I am afraid of him now, for myself and for my children. Snort. Amazing what it takes to finally turn on the light.

Possibly a real problem from the Administration

according to David Codrea. Take a look, and see what you think. And yell as you think and at who you think appropriate.

How not to get customers to come back

Office Depot had a Toshiba laptop on sale for a really good price in the last ad, so I went by this evening to look at it. None there, not even a 'sold out' space. Then it took about five minutes to catch someone to ask.

So she calls to the manager(I think) up front, 'do we have any?', and he says "I don't think so". Without looking up, mind you. Girl says "It's worth checking, at least." So he leaves off whatever the hell he's doing, walks over to the ad posted on the wall, looks at it and says "No, we're sold out." Doesn't check stock, nothing. I say thank you and head for the door, and he suddenly ups with "Do you want us to check the other stores?" I say no, and leave.

And won't go back. Hell with them if they can't even bother to post a 'sold out' in the laptop section, and don't want to bother looking for one.

Friday, December 22, 2006

Ref the Duke 'rape' case,

the chickenshit little excuse for a D.A. has dropped the rape charges. However, he has kept a bunch of others.

I think one of Barber's commenters is right: he's hoping to use pressure from them to keep the actual victims of this mess from suing his ass off for all he now or ever will own. I hope their lawyers ram that right up his ass, and then push every way possible to have Nifong prosecuted for everything possible. And I hope the Justice Department racks his ass, too. This contemptible little canker on the ass of Madame Justice needs to be excised from the system. Permanently.

And I wonder if he's considered if this, along with the confession of his accomplice in hiding information from the defense, is going to cause some of his previous cases to be reviewed?

The latest on Haditha

It's been in the news(over and over and over) about the murder charges being filed on four Marines, and four officers being charged for "failing to investigate and report the deaths properly". Earlier I went over to BlackFive to see what he had to say. Along with the current, he's got links to two earlier pieces on the mess.

Here's the part of his post that really, truly pisses me off:Back to those officers, none of whom was a shooter. They are ultimately responsible for the actions of the enlisted men they lead. That responsibility sometimes leads to accountability, and charging four of them leaves plenty of sacrificial lambs and scapegoats. I would bet the case against Wuterich and the other three is too weak for comfort and the officers are charged to make sure somebody fries. We shall see what a trial brings.

What pisses me off about it is that I have the sick feeling he's right.

The problems for the accused are two, I think: lots of political heat pushing for some kind of punishment for somebody no matter what, and lots of politicians in uniform willing to do that. I realize that's a fairly drastic thing to say, but I think it's true. Combine that with the services being infested with lawyers who too often don't seem to know their ass from a hole in the ground, and it means big problems for the people at the sharp end. Remember the idiot who decided the match ammo being used by the sniper teams violated the Geneva Convention and ordered use of it stopped? Even though various people pointed out that it had already been cleared? And going quite a ways further back, during the invasion of Panama a group not in uniform attacked a position a squad from the Army held. The sergeant put them down, and wound up charged with murder. He was cleared, but the point is he never should have had to go through that bullshit.

So I- unhappily- think BlackFive is right: the lawyers and politicians in uniform who care more for process and making various brass hats happy than about what they're doing to the troops, are trying to set this up so they can convict SOMEBODY of SOMETHING. Especially considering the reports of how these men were being treated for months after they were pulled from their units. Remember that? Isolated, in chains when allowed out of their cells, etc., all before there were even any charges. After that I think a bunch of clowns are desperate as Nifong to find somebody guilty to deflect from what they did, and to appease various politicians.

Please understand, I very much wish to be proven wrong on this. But considering the past, I'm not hopeful.

The AP demonstrates how collectively full of crap it is

With Michelle Malkin and several others over there looking for their 'reliable source' and finding no sign of him, Malkin sent to AP three questions, to two people. One responded:
Michelle-

I have no additional information for you at this time.

Linda


That's it. No burned down mosques, nobody saw anybody dragged out and burned alive, nobody can find the source for a BUNCH of AP stories, and the one AP official who responded says 'got nothing for you'.

I'll let people like Malkin and Powerline and so forth do the actual damage noting, I'll just say that AP cannot be trusted.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Further evidence of idiocy

is brought to us tonight by Bruce, who's in the act of escaping from the PRM*:
The snake was still strangling Dres when deputies arrived, and the officers had to work with members of an animal protection group to remove the reptile, the sheriff's office said.

Probably too obvious a question but I'd like an answer anyway: if a LE officer arrives to find a big friggin' snake wrapped around somebody, why the HELL was he worrying about idiots from a 'animal protection group' instead of either cutting off the snakes head or shooting the damn thing?

I need a drink.

I started to simply say "Britain circling the drain",

and it's true, but too many people want us to follow the same damn path.
It was the second time this week that immigrants who had been allowed to remain in Britain despite committing a string of offences were found guilty of a brutal killing.

On Tuesday, a court heard how two Somali men involved in the shooting of Pc Sharon Beshenivksy had been spared deportation because their homeland was judged too dangerous for them.

At the Old Bailey yesterday, Diamond Babamuboni, 17, his brother Timy, 15, and Jude Odigie, 16, all from Nigeria, were convicted of the manslaughter of Zainab Kalokoh, 31, a married mother of two children from war-ravaged Sierra Leone.


And what did these worthless bastards(who some God-cursed judge wouldn't allow to be kicked out of the country) do?
As the gang rushed into the hall, Mrs Kalokoh was holding her niece, who had been christened, in her arms.

"She was shot while she cradled the baby," said Mr Altman. ''The effect of the shot to her head caused Mrs Kalokoh to collapse to the floor still with the baby in her arms. Although covered in Mrs Kalokoh's blood the baby was mercifully unharmed."

As the woman lay dying, the gang stole money and valuables from the guests, carrying the spoils in bin bags.

A witness said that as the gang returned home, they were arguing about who had shot Mrs Kalokoh.


Mind you, that was just the latest and biggest offence:
they carried on a life of crime with apparent impunity other than occasional court appearances. They were meant to attend courses run by local youth offender teams but shunned any interventions.

Oh, poor boys, they apparently just couldn't take the stress of 'interventions', I guess. Couldn't possibly be that they're murdering assholes who don't care about the law, now could it?

Please note: A fourth, who cannot be named, was found guilty of her murder at the party in Peckam, south London, in August last year.
and
The Babamubonis and Odigie were cleared of murder but convicted of robbery and possession of a firearm at the time of committing an offence. The fourth defendant was also convicted of robbery and possession of a firearm.
My question here is, why the HELL don't the Brits give up on this multi-culti bullshit and hang the bastards? All four of them? 'Manslaughter' my ass.

Also note that they seem to have had no problem getting firearms, despite all the laws and bans in force on those islands.

Our problem is similar: a bunch of idiots- some of them wearing black robes- who are more protective of a bunch of illegal immigrants than they are of the victims of said illegals.

Jingle freakin' bells, y'all

And we mustn't forget the dumbass troops in the Balkans,


as Sondra reminds us.












Hmmm, and wasn't there something about their being sent there back in the Clinton the 1st reign(Hillary hopes) about, oh, 'only there a year' or something? 'Course, according to Rangel and Kerry & Co., they're probably too dumb to know how long we've had troops there.

I know people with legal qualifications have/will write about this,

I just have two simple questions: why isn't that sorry little bastard Sandy Berger not in prison, and how the hell did the judge manage to justify not putting him there?

And by the way, the people working at the Archives shouldn't give a rats ass about who it is or being 'uncertain' about things; when they've got classified documents missing after someone handled them, or see 'suspicious' activity while someone is looking at them, the idiots are supposed to report it, not dither around because "One employee "did not believe there was enough information to confront someone of Mr. Berger's stature" and delayed acting as a result... So why aren't these people either being fired or demoted or something for worrying more about this jerks 'stature' than about the security of the documents?

Wednesday, December 20, 2006

A protest about lawbreakers from the Mexican government

is like a roach bitching about sanitary conditions

Which observation was brought to mind by this post at Hogboy's place. I just love it: a country that will throw you in jail if they find a single fired .22 case in your vehicle and keep you there until you're bled dry, a country that openly shelters murderers and rapists who make it across the border, which bitches and whines that Mexicans should be able to cross our border at will and that we should all switch to speaking Spanish to make them feel at home, has fits because someone dared to arrest a multiple rapist who, because of now being in a U.S. prison, cannot keep paying off the local authorities and whatever Mexican national official was also getting his pocket filled to let him stay there.

The new President of Mexico wants to better his relationship with the U.S., he can start by arresting every dirtbag criminal who ran across the border to escape arrest and sending them back in chains.

Although in some cases we will accept seeing them stood against a wall and shot, just for the sake of saving money on the trial and appeals. Not to mention the entertainment value.

Kim for UN Ambassador!

An idea whose time has come.
# Every time some crappy Third World country starts a speech asking for aid, I’ll take off my headphones and start playing cards with the UK ambassador.
# All countries and cities will be referred to by their names circa 1935: Burma, Southern Rhodesia, Bombay, Tangyanika, Tsingtao, Borneo, etc.
# All Communist countries will be referred to as “those Commie rats from...”
# Issue all U.S. diplomatic staff at the U.N. with Tasers, and instructions to use them at will.
# Speeches addressed to the Usual Suspects will begin: “When your country has paid all their parking tickets and other traffic fines, we’ll consider your proposal. Otherwise, forget about it.”


And for his confirmation hearing:
# Any question put to me by Sens. Leahy, Kennedy or Schumer will be answered with: “Did your masters in Moscow or Peking tell you to ask me that?”
# Any comments from a Democrat senator about my lack of diplomatic experience will be met with: “Well, you talk about climate stuff, economics and morality, don’t you?”
# If asked what my qualifications for the job are, I’ll answer: “I don’t trust foreigners. Any of them.”


I promise, if he gets the nomination I will take annual leave so I can go to D.C. and attend the hearing.

Are YOU a sensitive man?

10 Question - Male Sensitivity Test
(Scoring Protocol is at End of Test)

1. In the company of females, intercourse should be referred to as:
A. Lovemaking.
B. Screwing.
C. Driving Mr. Sausage to Tuna Town.

2. You should make love to a woman for the first time only after you've both shared:
A. Your views on what you expect from a sexual relationship.
B. Your blood-test results.
C. Five tequila slammers.

3. You should time your orgasm so that:
A. Your partner climaxes first.
B. You climax simultaneously.
C. You don't miss ESPN Sports Center.

4. Passionate, spontaneous sex on the kitchen floor is:
A. Healthy, creative love-play.
B. Not the sort of thing your w ife/girlfriend would agree to.
C. Not the sort of thing your wife/girlfriend ever needs to find out about.

5. Spending the whole night cuddling a woman you've just had sex with is:
A. The best part of the experience.
B. The second best part of the experience.
C. $100 extra.

6. Your wife/girlfriend says she's gained five pounds in the last month. You tell her:
A. That does not diminish your affectionate feelings for her.
B. Not a problem ... she can join your gym.
C. A conservative estimate.

7. You think today's sensitive, caring man is:
A. A myth.
B. An oxymoron.
C. A moron.

8. Foreplay is to sex as:
A. An appetizer is to an entree.
B. Primer is to paint.
C. A long line is to an amusement park ride.

9. Which of the following are you most likely to find yourself saying at the end of a relationship?
A. "I hope we can still be friends."
B. "I'm not in right now, please leave a message at the beep."
C. " Welcome to Dumpsville. Population 1 -- You!"

10. A woman who is uncomfortable watching you masturbate:
A. Probably needs a little more time before she can cope with that sort of intimacy.
B. Is uptight and a waste of time.
C. Shouldn't have sat next to you on the bus in the first place.

SCORING PROTOCOL

If you answered "A" more than 7 times, check
your pants to make sure you really are a man.

If you answered "B" more than 7 times, check
into therapy. You're a little confused.

If you answered "C" more than 7 times,
"You Da Man!"


Sent to me, by the way, by a female friend.

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Back to December weather

We had a few days with temps in the 60's & 70's; now it's 40-something, foggy and raining. Go about 50-60 miles west or northwest and it's snowing and light freezing rain. Supposed to be wet here till late tomorrow, then clearing but still cold.

And I don't care if it's -5 wherever the hell up north you are, 30's and 40's and wet here is cold. So say my joints

We've got that bastard McCain trashing amendments

in the Senate, and now- as part of her 'cleaning up the place', of course- we have that bitch Pelosi working in the House to trash them. In this case, the 1st specifically. As Kim says, remove breakables before reading this crap.

Monday, December 18, 2006

Drugs, War On, and associated things

Yesterday at Anarchangel I read his piece on this misbegotten adventure. Which made me think on the current attention on no-knock raids as part of the WoD and all the waste that has involved over the years. Waste of time, waste of effort, waste of money, waste of lives.

My general view is simple: if you're an adult and want to take something and screw yourself up, go 'head. I refuse to put a large part of society and our legacy to the future in the can in order to save someone too stupid to live. When the subject of drug legalization comes up, I say fine, but I have two caveats:
First, anyone who sells or gives drugs to a kid gets either a minimum ten years at hard labor(real Hard Labor) or a long drop at the end of a short rope.
Second, there has to be passed a law that if you mess yourself up, your health is shot and you're broke and you can't get/hold a job and have no place to live, well, tough shit. You have NO call on the public purse for one damned penny. If a charity or church wants to help you, that's fine, but NOT ONE PENNY gets taken out of other peoples' pockets to take care of you.

Which is where it falls apart, because most of the legalizers insist we have to set up treatment centers and provide medical care and food and on and bloody on. I say no, you can't have both, either you say it's a personal matter only, or it's not. And if it's personal, the aforementioned druggie can straighten up or die on his own.

And please, nobody tell me that 'victimless crime' crap. This is no such thing, and you damn well know it. Friends and relatives are victims of the dumbass: sometimes just from watching them destroy themselves, sometimes robbed, and sometimes the dumbass decides he doesn't have the guts to kill himself or just die so he winds up taking someone with him.

All this comes up because I'm remembering something that happened at Med Fair. There's a girl I've known since she was a little kid. She's about a year older than my daughter, and they used to play at Scottish gatherings. I've only seen her once or twice a year for the last seven or eight: she's had problems, but I thought it was general stuff for a kid her age.

She showed up at the fair, not in garb, just visiting. She looked good at first glance: she'd lost some weight, seemed very up. After a few minutes talking while I worked on a piece I noticed she seemed a little too bright-eyed, a touch too up, but nothing I could really put a finger on. She mentioned somewhere in this she'd been working at/hanging around biker places, and that put a chill through me. Most bikers I've known were good folks, but some are nowhere near 'good', and I knew which she'd been hanging around.

We talked a bit, then someone asked a question and she went over to the table to look at the stuff on display. Friend of my daughter was helping watch the place and he talked to her a bit while I was hammering and talking. She finally said bye, she'd be back later and left. I'd finished the piece I was working on, the current crowd had moved on, and when she was a ways off in the crowd he looked over and said "She's on meth". No question in the voice, just flat statement. I had that flat 'part of your guts just fell out' feeling and asked how he knew? Daughter said that a couple of their friends had messed themselves up on it and he listed the points of note, including one I had never heard of: scratching. She'd been kind of aimlessly scratching herself as we talked but I'd not known it meant anything. Until I now got the explanation.

I didn't look after her, she was too far into the crowd, and I didn't know if I dared to. I just stood there for a minute listening to the information and diagnosis and feeling that dread. She was an adult- I've not seen her since, and don't know if she's still alive or not- and could screw herself up as she chose. But I'll tell you something:

If the one who started her on that shit stood in front of me and said "Yeah, I sold it to her", I'd shoot them and never miss a beat or lose a moments sleep over it.

I've written about how much better things are from the past

in so many way, before: well, Kim just noted this post by the Mrs. on the subject of 'poverty'. Read it. All the way through.

And remember, without all that nasty industrialization and progress the 'progressives' like to spit on, we'd ALL still be living this way.

Would you give the local PD your serial numbers?

Just to keep on file? I've gotta say, Hell NO! Not on my car, not on my firearm, not on my pc or my stereo.

I've got a list of all that tucked away in a safe place, and if needed I can get them. But to just turn said list over to the PD? I'm not happy that to get a C&R license you have to send a copy of the app to the chief's office, so why would I give them this information?

Also, found this article on the good news from Ohio. I just love this part:
"It's really arrogant for them to just ignore the will of the people," said Toby Hoover, executive director of one of Ohio’s anti-gun organizations. "It shows they just don't have any respect for us at all. We're terribly disappointed. It's a pretty determined bunch of people in favor of the gun lobby."
A: yeah, we're determined. And B: Whether you like it or not, this WAS the will of the people: House Bill 347 originally passed a Senate committee, the Senate floor, and the House floor with overwhelming numbers on the same afternoon! It then survived a veto override that is very hard to achieve. Heck… it hasn’t been done since 1977. How was all of this possible? The people wanted it.

courtesy of Keyboard and a .45

And on the subject of legal problems,

if you haven't been following the 'rape' case at Duke U., check out Durham In Wonderland. With the latest revelations of either stupidity, criminal activity, arrogance or some combination of all.

One more no-knock mess

in Georgia, early news article here, later followup here(courtesy of Publicola). This has been bouncing around some gunboards and blogs the last couple of days, with the various reactions you would expect.

I'm not going to say much about it, there's still a lot of uncertainty in the 'who & when'. I will note a couple of things. From the first article:
“They knocked and announced their presence,” Jackson said. After they entered the apartment, he said, “they were met with gunfire from within the residence.” Which sounds nice. But later we read:
Edward said he received a phone call from a neighbor saying, “Someone’s kicking in your door.” He said the neighbor screamed and told him, “Somebody’s shooting.”
'Knocked, announced and entered' sounds not too bad; neighbor's report doesn't sound nearly so nice.

And from the second article, from the 'informant':
“I’m confused,” Reed said. “They came to me out the blue, to my parents house, asking me questions about what was supposed to have happened with the gun, and I was frightened. I told the truth about what I knew, but I was scared into telling them.”

Reed says she told the ATF a different story than what they used to issue the warrant.

“No, I never told them that he stole the gun from me, because he stayed at the same house. They implied that someone had got killed with one of the guns, is what they said. They wouldn’t tell me which one, basically saying he stole the first one, trying to say he still had it.”

Which does not sound good at all. If accurate, it means a couple of agents basically intimidated this woman into telling them something they could use, and may have lied about what she said in getting the warrant.

Happily, nobody's dead. Unhappily, without the kind of noise and attention generated by a death, I very much doubt the full truth of all this will every be known.

Yeah, I have become cynical about things like this.

Sunday, December 17, 2006

Santa's Bad Day



Courtesy of Sluggy

If I knew it'd be done right,

I'd almost get cable just to watch it. Just found out the Sci-Fi channel is going to have a series starting in January called The Dresden Files. It's based on the books by Jim Butcher(#1 of the series here) .

Harry Dresden is a wizard for hire in Chicago. Advertising in the Yellow Pages and all. The White Council is pissed at him for (among other things) going public, he gets called a phony a lot, and he's made some serious enemies.

It kind of straddles the line between sci-fi and fantasy: there's magic, but it works in predictable ways, there's an actual system to it. Pretty good stories.

By the way, anybody else remember a tv show called Special Unit 2? It was in Chicago, too(and I wish the two seasons were on video, I want them). One of the best exchanges in it was when the lead character(officer in SU2 of Chicago PD) was sent to an anger management class: "So I chased the little troll down an alley, hung him from a light fixture and beat him like a pinata." "That's so insensitive! Not only abusing that poor person but calling him a troll!"
"What if he really WAS a troll?"
"Now you're just being silly!"
Smile.

For the picking-up-babes-challenged among us

Can't remember where I first heard of this, but: How To Pick Up A Really Hot Babe

Fire works

Fuel-wise, that is. If all you're needing heat for is hardening/tempering, there are some very nice electric furnaces out there for the purpose, but if you're planning on forging, you're looking at one of three fuels: gas, coal, and charcoal.

Gas
Natural or LPG. You can buy a gas-fired forge, or there are a lot of plans out there to build one. It costs about the same as running a coal forge from what I'm told. It burns clean(very nice in any case, especially if you're in a city), it's fairly easy to set a heat and keep it there, anywhere from low forging heat to welding. The one real problem with it is that once it's lit, you have to keep it going; you can't turn off the blower for a while and then pump the fire back up later, it's either on or off. You can turn it down, but that's it.

Coal
Probably the most used fuel. It's plentiful, it's Traditional, and it works. Once the fire is going you can keep the draft going a long time, just pushing fresh coal in from the edges of the fire; if you turn the blower off, the fire dies down but will take a long time to go out. Increase the air blast and you get more heat, reduce it and it cools down. You can make a forge that has a relatively small fire for most work, and there are ways to add in a different air grate to make a much wider or longer, more narrow fire.

Coal definately has drawbacks. You need to get good low-sulphur coal both for reducing smoke and because sulpur in a fire where you work steel is bad. You need to break it up to small pieces before adding it in. And it's dirty(spend a while breaking up/shoveling/whatever coal and see what your hands and arms look like).

Charcoal
Probably the earliest fuel, and definately the most favored for many centuries. It burns fairly clean(little smoke, no sulphur), and will do anything a fire with coal can.

Drawbacks to charcoal are two: cost and availability. You can use commercial charcoal briquets, but it's a mess; the binder they use to hold the powdered charcoal in that nice shape causes the fire to produce a lot of ash, and it clogs up the fire grate. And it can blow out of the fire like a pyroclastic flow in miniature when you bump up the blast. Raw charcoal works very nicely, but finding it in quantity- which is also the only way to get it at a decent price- is not easy. And it takes more charcoal to get the same amount of heat as a given amount of coal.

Let me deal with one other thing here. It's kind of folklore that working steel in a charcoal fire will make it better. Not true. This came from people thinking that 'charcoal is carbon, and carbon added to steel is good, so a charcoal fire will add carbon to the steel'. But it doesn't work that way.

When you heat steel to the critical temperature, that needed for forging medium and high-carbon stuff, the crystilline structure changes, it 'opens up' and the carbon atoms that were locked in the matrix can move around. Not only inside the metal, but those on the surface, and moving to the surface, combine with oxygen in the air and go away*. Which means that every heat you do, you lose carbon from the surface. It's also a factor in scale formation, which causes you to actually lose metal from the bar with every heat.

You can reduce this in a couple of ways. One is to keep the fire going so that the area where you actually place the steel has a 'reducing' atmosphere, i.e. most of the oxygen burned out(though you still lose a bit when you pull it out to hammer/punch/twist/whatever). The other is to use something to coat the steel. This is one of the things flux does when used in welding: it both lowers the melting temperature of scale or other impurities that may have gotten between layers to it'll melt and be forced out when you set the weld, and it coats the surface and keeps oxygen off. It works, but it's not really practical for general use.

So, back to the main subject. I've used coal(still do) and charcoal. If I could find charcoal at a good price I'd use a lot more of it, especially for hardening blades. I haven't used a gas forge, so I have to go by reports from people I know and what I've read, which are enough to make me want to build one in the future if I can keep doing enough forging to make it worth it.

So take your pick, they all work, and find the one you like.

*Case-hardening does often use charcoal as one element in a sealed atmosphere to increase the carbon content of steel. 'Sealed atmosphere' being the key, because you have to have the metal surrounded by the carbon-bearing material and sealed away from the air. In the old days that generally meant inside a clay crucible or chest with a lid sealed on. Although for small pieces you can wrap them with thin pieces of leather, maybe put some other stuff on or in the wrap, then coat it with clay to seal it. Then the whole thing is placed in a fire or furnace and brought up to heat and kept it there a while. There's enough carbon around the steel or iron that some migrates into the surface, I seem to remember reading either 1/64 or 1/32" per hour. You can keep it going long enough to convert a bar of iron to steel all the way through, though if you're not careful it tends to be of uneven quality from end to end(which is one reason laminated or pattern-welded steel was developed).