Friday, June 12, 2009

"Don't you talk to those people,

WE will see it as a hostile act!"
Top aides to Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) called a last-minute, pre-emptive strike on Wednesday with a group of prominent Democratic lobbyists, warning them to advise their clients not to attend a meeting with Senate Republicans set for Thursday.

Russell Sullivan, the top staffer on Finance, and Jon Selib, Baucus’ chief of staff, met with a bloc of more than 20 contract lobbyists, including several former Baucus aides.

“They said, ‘Republicans are having this meeting and you need to let all of your clients know if they have someone there, that will be viewed as a hostile act,’” said a Democratic lobbyist who attended the meeting.

“Going to the Republican meeting will say, ‘I’m interested in working with Republicans to stop health care reform,’” the lobbyist added
.
Hey, Montana, you need to have words with Baucus; he seems to think threatening people to help Obama take over health care is part of his job.

Hope! Change! Threats if you don't go along; it's the Chicago Way! And the Evil Party just doesn't seem to have any tolerance for somone disagreeing, do they?

And let's not forget Obama's speech the other day of "I don't want to run things! I'm too busy! I don't want the government running things!" Flat-out lies, and he expects people to believe them.

Of course, he has all that enthusiastic belief of his mistakes or lies(take your pick) about the mideast, so I guess he expects everyone to believe everything he says:
In the recent Cairo speech, Obama's historical allusions were even more suspect. Almost every one of his references was either misleading or incomplete. He suggested that today's Middle East tension was fed by the legacy of European colonialism and the Cold War that had reduced nations to proxies.

But the great colonizers of the Middle East were the Ottoman Muslims, who for centuries ruled with an iron fist. The 20th-century movements of Baathism, Pan-Arabism and Nasserism — largely homegrown totalitarian ideologies — did far more damage over the last half-century to the Middle East than the legacy of European colonialism.

Obama also claimed that "Islam … carried the light of learning through so many centuries, paving the way for Europe's Renaissance and Enlightenment." While medieval Islamic culture was impressive and ensured the survival of a few classical texts — often through the agency of Arabic-speaking Christians — it had little to do with the European rediscovery of classical Greek and Latin values. Europeans, Chinese and Hindus, not Muslims, invented most of the breakthroughs Obama credited to Islamic innovation...

Obama also insisted that "Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance. We see it in the history of Andalusia and Cordoba during the Inquisition." Yet the Spanish Inquisition began in 1478; by then Cordoba had long been re-conquered by Spanish Christians, and was governed as a staunchly Christian city.

In reference to Iraq, President Obama promised that "no system of government can or should be imposed upon one nation by any other." Is he unaware of how the United States imposed democracies after World War II?

Hopey!! Changey!!! And screw Israel!!!!

And, just to add to the glisten on his halo, Pres. B. Hussein Cartman Obama wants to can an inspector general for actually doing his job. I guess this fits with Pelosi's Most Ethical Congress EVAH!

Thursday, June 11, 2009

"Communism. I’ve seen it, I’ve lived it. I will hate it until the end of my life.

Most of you here say guns in the hands of people can defeat tyrants. Regardless of what you may hear from naysayers and firearms “hobbyists” who will tell you AR’s and AK’s in civilian hands are no match for tanks and machine guns (I remember one such hobbyist posting this here on Calguns), I come before you to tell you that what you believe to be true it is true: on December 22nd 1989 me and thousands of my compatriots we did just that.

The Word, from someone who lived through that time in Romania. Go. Read.

This crap is NOT a good way to wake up

too early. That's bad enough, but then you go online and run across crap like this:
Listen to him. He's talking in what seems to be a glossolalic deluge of issues. One plan a week, each thrown out there while we're still digesting the previous one. He's moving too fast for us to keep up with him. He's talking a private language, to himself, like crazy people do, because he certainly can't be talking to us, his strange, atrophied people, our capacity for large projects and great achievement, let alone for the participation in enlightened self-government that such projects and achievements require, something safely kept reserved for HBO historical miniseries. The muscles have gone slack, the nerve endings gone dead. He's talking about phantoms, about ghosts, about things that aren't really there. He's speaking in tongues is what he's doing.
Insty had a link to this, titled What if Obama's out of his mind? But don't worry, the article makes it clear that Obama is just freakin' WONDERFUL and intelligent and trying to save us; it's most of America that's degraded and full of hate and stupidity. Pierce describes the tea parties:
...On April 15, all around the country, there was an inchoate outburst of public disapproval. There were caricatures of him dressed as Hitler and as Lenin, which is a considerable, if utterly ahistorical, parlay. There was the spectacle of thousands of lower-middle-class people making the noise of hundreds and expressing outrage that Obama intended to raise the marginal tax rate on people making more than $250,000 a year to somewhere around where it was during Ronald Reagan's second term. It was a pathetically thin if noisy spasm of ill-conceived outrage.
If that doesn't tell you the whole of this piece of crap...


Letterman's a sorry piece of crap, and CBS can't do things honestly at all, can they?
The remark was aired live, but CBS removed it from the transcript it makes available to media, including the New York Times, which publishes Letterman’s opening monologue on its blog site.
They just seem to love memory holes, don't they?


Ten things about the Kennedy-Dodd Shut up and do what you're told, peasantHealth Care bill they're trying to shove down our throats.


Congress and 'transparency', which apparently means "If you don't know about it it's transparent" to these dirtbags.
Lawmakers do not have to reveal homes they own unless they are rental properties. They also do not have to say whether they have mortgages or home equity lines of credit on their non-rental residences, who holds the debt, how much it is or what the terms are. Often, it’s only when scandal occurs that the public learns of financial arrangements that pose potential conflicts of interest.

That was the case when the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, Kent Conrad, D-N.D., received preferential treatment on mortgages. Dodd was an architect of last year’s multibillion-dollar housing rescue plan. The scandal involved a Countrywide Financial Corp., “VIP” program for “friends of Angelo,” Countrywide’s then-chief executive Angelo Mozilo. The Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit this month accusing Mozilo of civil fraud and illegal insider trading.

Dodd’s mortgages don’t appear in his public financial disclosure reports; Conrad disclosed a Countrywide mortgage on a rental property but not one for a vacation home. Both have denied wrongdoing.


So Pres. B. Hussein Cartman Obama ordered the FBI to Afghanistan to read Miranda Rights(something here in the US) to terrorists captured in battle; why yes, the man is insane or a freakin' idiot. Take your pick. Of course, attached to this we also have to thank McCain for his idiocy. God, that the last Presidential election was a choice between these two...


Various media weenies are trying very hard to say the nut who murdered a guard(Stephen Tyrone Johns, who should be remembered) at the Holocaust Museum proves that Napolitano's DHS report saying 'Veterans are a Threat' correct:
"As you watch, bear in mind that Smith and Herridge know they're talking about a guy who claims to be an 89-year old WWII veteran. Unless he crashed a PT boat through the front doors of the Holocaust Museum, any military training from back in '42 was not a factor. But Smith wants to make sure you understand very specifically - this is a former military guy, it's not political, social, or anything else."
Please note the suggestion at Blackfive: You want your e-mail to have impact? Then start contacting advertisers on Fox News and ask them if they agree with the comments and conclusions expressed by Smith and Herridge. Be nice about it, but... That will get action, writing him or Fox will not.

From the gentleman at This Ain't Hell, on the subject of the DHS report,
(U//FOUO) The possible passage of new restrictions on firearms and the return of military veterans facing significant challenges reintegrating into their communities could lead to the potential emergence of terrorist groups or lone wolf extremists capable of carrying out violent attacks.

ME: Hey JT.
JT: [Congressional Staffer] Hey, what’s up?
ME: You covered the whole DHS report debacle right, I have a few questions.
JT: You know they pulled that report, right?
ME: Yeah, I heard that, but why did they pull it?
JT: Because everyone went batshit over it.
ME: Like who?
JT: Well, veterans groups for one. Also all the Tea Party people, a whole host of blogs, most GOP Senators and Congressmen. But, really, it pretty much got pulled when Bennie Thompson the Chairman of the Homeland Security Committe came out and said that “this report appears to raise significant issues involving the privacy and civil liberties of many Americans — including war veterans… As I am certain you agree, freedom of association and freedom of speech are guaranteed to all Americans — whether a person’s beliefs, whatever their political orientation, are ‘extremist’ or not.”
ME: Any idea how long he’s been active in the white supremacist movement?
JT: …….
ME: You there?
JT: What the hell are you talking about? He’s a black democrat from Mississippi who’s on the Congressional Black Caucus.
ME: Does he hate Jews?
JT: Is this going somewhere?
ME: I’m just wondering who complained on behalf of the racists who were in the report so that it got pulled. Anyone stand up for the Klan or anything?
JT: I’m going back to work now.
ME: One last question. How many people stood up for the rights of previously incarcerated wackjobs who tried to kidnap federal officials?
JT: *click*


And, proving we have no corner on idiot politicians, in and out of uniform,
But it has emerged that the Who Dares Wins regiment had been planning a classic hostage rescue.

In a rare breach of protocol that reveals the SAS’s anger, serving members have given us details of the top-secret action.

Operation Aerobic was organised after al-Qaeda’s North Africa wing set a deadline for the release of hate preacher Abu Qatada in exchange for Mr Dyer’s life.

But with time almost up at the end of May, senior military officers in the MoD advised Foreign Secretary David Miliband that the operation must not go ahead.

SAS officers and other ranks across the board were left furious.

A senior SAS source said: “We knew where he was. We are convinced we could have got him out alive, but Whitehall bottled it.

“Whether it was the Directorate of Special Forces, the military chiefs or Government ministers, we don’t know. We have our suspicions.

“Of course there was risk, there always is in hostage rescue. The group said they were going to kill him anyway, so what was there to lose?

“And if we did it, it would have sent a powerful message to these sorts of people not to screw with Brits.”
God knows why it was decided not to do this; I can't see a downside to a strike of SAS troops playing "Guess who!" with a bunch of terrorists. And the troops are pissed; that 'rare breach of protocol' says it all.

Of course, this would have indicated the Brits still have people capable of pulling this off and resulted in the whacking of bad guys; maybe that's exactly why some weenies didn't want it to happen.


Ain't things just wonderful at times?

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

On the "We're all gonna DIE!!!' front,

St. Helens might be part of a supervolcano.
IS A supervolcano brewing beneath Mount St Helens? Peering under the volcano has revealed what may be an extraordinarily large zone of semi-molten rock, which would be capable of feeding a giant eruption.

Magma can be detected with a technique called magnetotellurics, which builds up a picture of what lies underground by measuring fluctuations in electric and magnetic fields at the surface. The fields fluctuate in response to electric currents travelling below the surface, induced by lightning storms and other phenomena. The currents are stronger when magma is present, since it is a better conductor than solid rock.

Graham Hill of GNS Science, an earth and nuclear science institute in Wellington, New Zealand, led a team that set up magnetotelluric sensors around Mount St Helens in Washington state, which erupted with force in 1980. The measurements revealed a column of conductive material that extends downward from the volcano. About 15 kilometres below the surface, the relatively narrow column appears to connect to a much bigger zone of conductive material
.
I remember when St. Helens blew in 1980; besides all the general noise, for months afterward every time the thing hiccupped- or seemed about to- the voice on the Civil Defense phone would put out a warning. Assuming it actually is one part of a supervolcano base, if it ever blew for real there'd probably be one warning- "Ok, folks, we're all screwed"- and that's it.

Range day

Though it promised to be hot, I went. Glad I did, too; after all this 30%, it's gonna be bloody awful humidity tomorrow if it does hit the upper 80's.

I discovered a while back that the Hornady Leverevolution .30-30 ammo won't work very well in my Model 94; with the rear sight as low as it goes the stuff still hits almost 8" high at 50 yards. I did have a chance to try it in a Savage 340 with a scope; the stuff seems quite accurate. I'm wondering what the trajectory is like at 150 and 200 yards(I need to find a place with longer range).

Every time I shoot that S&W Target Masterpiece I'm more glad I bought it; even I can shoot fairly well with it.

If I haven't said it before, I heartily endorse a .22 conversion kit for your 1911. Or Glock. Or Hi-Power, or whatever else you can find one for. Mine's a Ceiner, and so far the only problem I've had is when it gets dirty, and can't really fault it for that. Seems to work with all ammo I've tried in it; definitely more authority and the brass flies further with something like Golden Bullet, but even with Centurion or Federal Champion it ticks right along.

I found some Lake City .223 brass someone left, and saved it; of all the brands I've tried, this stuff seems the easiest to form for the Nagant revolver. Otherwise, I think I found three or four .30-06 cases and two .308 on the rifle side; just about everything else reloadable had been cleaned up already. Lots of 9mm, .40S&W and .45acp on the pistol side, though not as much as before. I did find about twenty-five or so .380 cases, especially nice right now.

Remember that sucky Pentax red-dot sight I wrote about a year or so ago? Ran across it and decided to try it one more time, on a .22. New battery, everything clean, and it worked. For about 50 rounds. Then it started wandering all over the damn place; try to adjust elevation and it would change the windage, too, on top of that. I repeat:
Pentax Red-Dot Sights Suck!

I don't know why, but a lot of cast-bullet loads are very consistent in hitting a few inches to the right of where jacketed bullets hit. In something with windage adjustments, no big deal; just crank it over a click or two. In everything else, unless you plan to use cast loads only, you just get used to the POI being a little off.

Guy was trying out a .17HMR Savage rifle he'd just acquired. Seemed very accurate. He hung up a coconut at 50 yards and shot it; little bitty hole up front, BIG hole in back. I do believe that'll leave a mark on varmints.

Just a general day at the range, which ended as a storm was blowing in.

Except for not going to a workplace, doesn't seem like much less work to do so far in retirement; just different stuff. All kinds of little stuff I never had time to get to. Like trimming the holly trees out front, which I realized didn't just need trimming but almost needed to be beaten into submission, they'd grown out so much. So spent a couple of hours cutting them back, and gathering the trimmings into the trash can. I need to look up holly and see if there's a male and female plant; the leaves on one are pointy, but the leaves on the other will flat stab you. I do like the things; green and pretty, red berries in winter and in spring lots of little blossoms that attract honeybees. But trimming them will bleed you if you're not careful. And there's more to do, but it was too hot to continue the other day, so in a day or two out with the ladder and get the stuff overhanging the carport and house.

David Letterman really is a sorry pimple on the ass of mankind

Pacific Taping tonight's program in New York, Letterman made for him a lengthy explanation or clarification, though no apology. He said that his "joke" Monday about Palin's (unnamed) daughter getting "knocked up" by a professional baseball player was aimed at Palin's daughter, Bristol, who is 18, not Willow, who is 14 and attended the baseball game. "I would never, never make jokes about raping or having sex with a 14-year-old girl...Am I guilty of poor taste? Yes."
So, according to this sorry little shrunken-testicled boob, it's just fine to make jokes about the rape of Palin's 18-year-old daughter, but not the 14-year-old. Yeah. Right.

Letterman, you suck. Like a Rainbow plugged into a 220-volt circuit.

Down in the comments, the first one is by a clown named Peggy, who wrote
Sarah made her daughter and her out of wedlock pregnancy part of her political persona. Sure it's a cheap shot, but Sarah Palin is the one who put her daughter and her daughter's sexuality in the spotlight.
Let me explain something to you, Peggy, since you don't seem to be bright enough to figure it out: her family was on stage with her; that does NOT make them an open target. At least not to anyone with any moral sense or integrity.

And, as I recall, it was the Evil Party and the media who did the whole 'part of her political persona', she just noted she understood some of the hard things families go through, having this problem in their family(while the media who couldn't be bothered to question Obama about anything was sending teams to Alaska trying to dig up dirt). But according to you, that makes it open season on her kids? Uh huh. I'll bet you would've screamed bloody murder if anyone had said a word about Chelsea Clinton, wouldn't you?

"I am afraid I no longer believe"

in a number of things. Like our major media. And President Obama's statements.
No one points out that almost every historical reference Obama invoked in Cairo—from the supposed Muslim role in great world discoveries to Islam fueling the Renaissance and Enlightenment to the Inquisition and Spain—was inflated, but, more importantly, always inflated from a politically-correct point of view.
...
I do not believe any of his numbers concerning, or analysis about, Muslims in America. I do not think he has a clue about the Renaissance and its relationship to the flight of Greek-speaking scholars to Western Europe from the fear of Turkish Muslims, or the Enlightenment’s interest in a Greece suffering under the yoke of an oppressive Ottoman fundamentalism
.
Read it all. And that last bit I quoted reminded me of something: any idea when was the last major invasion of Europe by an islamic power? 1683. The Ottoman army made it all the way to, and laid seige to, Vienna. As in Austria. Damn near conquered most of western Europe. Think President Obama will ever make mention of that when talking about islam's contributions to the Renaissance and Enlightenment?

Once again we hear from the "That is not the pastor I knew!

pastor:
"Them Jews aren't going to let him talk to me. I told my baby daughter, that he'll talk to me in five years when he's a lame duck, or in eight years when he's out of office. ...

"They will not let him to talk to somebody who calls a spade what it is. ... I said from the beginning: He's a politician; I'm a pastor. He's got to do what politicians do."

You know, it must be really handy for a politician to have a religious and moral teacher who has no problem with him lying and hiding what he actually thinks and does.

Ace points out that he might be speaking of one Jew in particular:
Jew not Jews? Several commenters have pointed out that Obama's Chief of Staff and gatekeeper, Rahm Emanuel, is Jewish. I always forget that but it's true. I'm guessing the f-bombs are flying around the West Wing in even greater numbers today.

And, considering Obama spent twenty years listening to stuff like that makes the concerns of Israel very understandable. And very real:
Israel's Channel One TV reported that Netanyahu was told Tuesday by an "American official" in Jerusalem that, "We are going to change the world. Please, don't interfere." The report said Netanyahu's aides interpreted this as a "threat."

The message could not be any clearer: "that's a nice country you got there. It'd be a shame if something were to happen to it."

The only problem with that, is that it's become clear that some of Obama's administration want something to happen to Israel. Soon. Which makes it not a threat but a promise: "Don't mess with us while we're changing things, or you'll get screwed sooner."

Pretty much true


Thanks to Theo

Damn, I've caught all kinds of things, but never a Sidewinder

Despite the danger, Rodney Salomon, a commercial fisherman, reeled in the missile, attached it to his boat and kept fishing in the Gulf of Mexico for another 10 days before returning to port.

"I had it strapped to the roof of my boat as we rode through lightning storms," Mr Salomon said, according to local Tampa Bay's 10 Connects News.

The bomb squad from a nearby military base that promptly dismantled it upon his return to shore said the heavily corroded eight-foot-long missile could have exploded at any moment
.
And he did it again!
He said it wasn't the first one he and his three-man "Bold Venture" crew picked up. Days after the find, Mr Salomon nabbed another.

That one was beeping so he decided to let it go
.
Probably a wise decision; and I'm sure they wouldn't have let him keep it, either.

Last night I watered the garden, and hit a couple of spots

again this morning, so the 30% chance of rain became 100% a short time ago; a nice, soft rain that's soaking in nicely.

Good thing I didn't wash the truck after all, yesterday; there's probably be tornado warnings.

Tuesday, June 09, 2009

Be it noted that David Letterman

is an asshole. A vicious, nasty, slimy, infected asshole.

And you 'Republicans' who crap on Palin and family at every opportunity? You're just as low and dirty.

Awww, the poor little 'muslim convert' murdering piece of

shit considers himself 'innocent' because U.S. military action in the Middle East made the killing justified.
Gee, which action is that, you miserable little excuse for a pimple on the ass of mankind? Building schools? Shooting your chickenshit child-raping brethren who kill children for daring to go to school? Whacking your brothers who murder men standing in line to apply for a job? Keeping your fornicator of swine islamists from killing people who're trying to take care of their irrigation canals?*

Standard excuse-making learned from every islamist dog-humper from Hamas to the local "I dream of murdering women for showing an ankle in the marketplace" imam: "WE ARE VICTIMS! So you can't blame us for ANYTHING we do!"

And this from a local representative of the Religion of Peace:
Muhammad had moved to Arkansas in the spring to work at his father's bus tour company and had never attended the Islamic Center of Little Rock, a mosque frequented by most of the area's Muslims, said Iftikhar Pathan, the center's president.

Pathan said he spoke with most of the nearly 300 people who attend Friday prayers at the mosque and no one knew him. Those at the mosque also spoke with FBI agents in the days immediately after the shooting, he said.

"What he had in his mind, God knows," Pathan said
.
Considering the record of so many of these 'islamic centers' and their members as to speaking the truth on such matters, I'd want proof he 'never attended'; put bluntly, Mr. Pathan, I don't believe you. Am I being unfair? Maybe. After the past record I mentioned of lying about terrorists, making excuses for them, claiming victim status and yelling 'racism' to try to shut people up who ask inconvenient questions, tough shit; show me reason to believe you.

Last week, Hensley said his client, born Carlos Bledsoe, had been tortured and "radicalized" in a Yemeni prison after entering the country to teach English. He was held there for immigration violations, and Yemeni officials have denied mistreatment.

"Those claims ... are all lies," Muhammad said Tuesday. "That never happened in Yemen. The officials dealt with me in a gentle way."

Here we have the dirtbag lawyer(no, I'm not feeling charitable toward lawyers either) trying to set up an excuse, and- amazingly- being called a liar by his murdering client. Oh, and 'entering the country to teach English'? If that was why he was there, why did the FBI catch him using a fake Somali passport?

Gee, a lawyer lying for a shitbird client; whoda thunk it?


*Son said one of their daily activities while on patrol was to find where the assholes had damaged irrigation canals during the night, get hold of the nearest village and, if needed, watch over them while they repaired the damage. Speaks volumes of this pig-boinker this his 'brethren' considered it a brave act in the name of Allah to screw over the locals who were trying to take care of their land and families. Also, when they found out there was a price for it, there was less of it as time went on; being the cowardly little shits they were, they went looking for children to murder or something equally shahid-like.

One of the casualties of the current financial idiocy

The Shriner's Children's Hospitals may have to close some of the hospitals.
The system's board says it may ask the fraternity's membership in July for authority to close six hospitals -- including the one in Greenville -- largely because the endowment fund that supports the hospitals dropped from $8.5 billion to $5.2 billion over the last year as the stock market plummeted.

The others that could close are in Erie, Pennsylvania; Shreveport, Louisiana; Spokane, Washington; Springfield, Massachusetts; and Galveston, Texas. The Galveston hospital's operations have been suspended since Hurricane Ike flooded it last year. See map of where all 22 Shriners hospitals are »

Deflated investments aren't the only reason the fund has dropped. The hospitals normally operate with donations and the fund's interest, but the system's $856 million 2009 budget is outpacing both, causing the hospitals to take about $1 million per day from the fund, said Ralph Semb, president and CEO of Shriners Hospitals
.
This is bad. These places provide care for a LOT of kids, and any of them closing will be a real problem for the kids currently there, and those who need help in the future.


Yeah, I'm heading to the yard; but I saw this and had to post on it.

California unions: "Screw the state, we want your

money!"
The relationship between Democratic leaders and some of their labor benefactors has turned particularly frosty: Many of the programs union members rely on for paychecks -- and the unions rely on for dues -- have been slated for deep cuts.

For example, there are pledge forms being passed around to lawmakers by a major labor union that might have attracted takers in budget battles past. The union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, wants the legislators to sign statements of support for up to $44 billion in new or higher taxes on the wealthy, oil companies, tobacco and other industries, products and people
.
Because not enough businesses and wealthy people are leaving the state now; we want to speed it up!
But so far the drive hasn't produced a single signed form, even from the Democrats who normally march into California's budget fights in lock-step with organized labor.
Gee, I guess when it gets bad enough, even Evil Party politicians can see that knee-jerk tax-raising isn't the answer for everything.
"Many public employee unions, teacher unions [are] thinking that they were thrown under the bus in the last budget," said Assemblyman Charles Calderon (D-Montebello). "So now they're asking themselves: If these Democrats are not going to stand up for us, then what good is it to have them there?"
Translation: "We thought we owned these politicians, but they're not taking our orders!"
The union leaders say they are appalled that Democratic leaders are talking openly now about decimating government programs without first making a stand for bigger, broader tax hikes that could substantially offset budget cuts
.
Got that? "Don't you dare think about cutting programs where some of our members get paid until you've taxed the state into oblivion!" Which is what it amounts to.
"Democrats came to Sacramento to help people," said Marty Hittleman, president of the California Federation of Teachers. "I know they did not go there to destroy government. For some reason, they are unwilling to stand up and say 'This is not what I was elected for.' "
Because cutting spending and trying to stop the idiocy that's screwed the state is to be defined as 'destroying government' so as to try to scare the politicians and scare people who don't belong to unions.
But even some of the most liberal Democrats say some union leaders are ignoring the reality of an angry public, a sour economy and a state government approaching insolvency. Moreover, more taxes would require Republican support in the Legislature, and the minority party has made clear that there will be none
.
So here it is: even Evil Party "We can always raise taxes" politicians have finally faced the fact that they can't; they've brought the state to ruin(I have doubts they can prevent it at this point), and enough people are finally pissed and yelling enough about it to make them realize they can't keep doing the 'raise taxes' crap. And some unions are so busy worrying about keeping their dues flowing that they don't care how bad it screws the state(and all the jobs that will flat go away if things continue), just "Raise taxes, dammit, don't you mess with OUR situation!"

I don't excuse most of the people in CA for this; they kept voting these clowns into office, and-until now- never said "Enough, we can't take any more tax increases"; they just kept wanting goodies and wanting someone else to pay for it. Also, I think a part of the halt to tax-raising is that the CA politicians are listening to the noise from other states at the thought of having their taxes raised to buy CA out of the hole; probably lots of Reps and Sens are telling their little friends in CA "If I vote to pay your bills out of our pockets, I'll be on the street next election. If they don't drag me out of the office and hang me. So I won't be voting for your bailout."

I shall now adjourn from my analysis of crap in another state, and go cut grass.

Monday, June 08, 2009

Speaking of idiot politicians and bureaucrats,

including those in the Secret Service,
Graduating midshipmen of the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis are being told in writing to leave at home or in their vehicles all "ceremonial swords" and anything else "that might be considered a weapon or a threat by screeners" for Friday's outdoor commencement ceremonies featuring an address by President Barack Obama.

Inside the Beltway has obtained the academy's list of prohibited items for this year's graduation exercises, which, besides ceremonial swords, includes umbrellas
.
Because someone who just spent four years working his ass off to get there is going to charge the stand with a dull sword just because- I have no freakin' idea- and the Secret Service and their sidearms and sub-guns are going to become magically useless or something.

Years back I knew a professor who was very big into Revolutionary War recreation. At one of the BIG ones in 1976, the President was going to speak. Couple of- as the prof put it- SS bastards walked up to the gate of the fort where Gen. Washington was meeting with his staff. Two guys on guard at the gate crossed their bayonetted muskets and asked what they wanted.
"We're going to look the place over." They didn't say "We're Secret Service and need to look things over for the President's trip", just tried to bull in.
"Do you have permission from General Washington?"
"We don't need it!"
"Without it, you're not going in." At which point they did ID themselves, but the guards wouldn't budge; they knew, like everyone else, the Pres wasn't coming to the fort, and the agents attitude just didn't help matters at all.

They would not let the guys in, despite various threats; one of them started to push through and one of the guards stepped back, prepared a buttstroke and said "I wouldn't try that." He meant it, too. The pair finally went away promising Dire Punishments for those guards for daring to prevent them from going where they wanted. Nothing happened, some supervisor apparently asking something like "Do you really want to arrest two guys guarding a gate because they wouldn't let you in? The President isn't even going there!" This prof had had high respect for the Secret Service before that few days, just on general principle; after spending a couple of days with them acting as some of them tend to, he referred to them as 'the SS'. When he wasn't using a word or two referring to their doubtful parentage.

Quote of the Day

Referring to our State MoronsDepartment:
You've gotta be a special kind of stupid to appeal "on humanitarian grounds" to a nation which fences its people in with guard dogs and electrified barbed wire while they starve to death so that their Dear Leader (not our Dear Leader, North Korea's,) can afford imported booze and hookers.

Ah, Monday,

stuff to do. Starting here; Kofi Annan is a liar and alarmist, so what else is new?
This is a heroic set of assumptions, even if you agree that emissions are causing adverse changes in climate. Take the supposedly heightened risk of conflict: The authors suggest that "inter-clan fighting in Somalia" is a product of climate change. A likelier explanation is the collapse of a functioning Somali government and the rise of jihadists in the region.

Enter Mr. Pielke, who, we hasten to add, does not speak for us (nor we for him). But given the headlines the Annan report has garnered, his views deserve amplification. Writing in the Prometheus science policy blog, Mr. Pielke calls the report a "methodological embarrassment" and a "poster child for how to lie with statistics" that "does a disservice" to those who take climate change issues seriously
.

I know you've probably heard about this idiocy, but if you haven't, it was NewsWeek(NewSpeak?) editor Evan Thomas actually saying
"I mean in a way Obama’s standing above the country, above – above the world, he’s sort of God."
We're used to seeing 'journalists' and commentators slavering and drooling at the mere sight up The Obama up close, but this takes the disgusting to a whole new level. If Obama stopped walking, Thomas would die; his breathing passages would become clogged with fecal matter. And this clown thinks he is annointed to tell us what we 'need' to know?


I got pretty much all the old grease and oil out of the P14 stock. After cleaning I rubbed in a mix of linseed and mineral spirits(the spirits thins the oil and lets it penetrate deeper) and let that dry about three days, and it's now got it's fourth coat of the finish drying. The surface is sealed, and the wood looks nice, and it should no longer bleed old ick when it gets hot.


I'd forgotten, yesterday was the date of Operation Opera, the Israeli operation to destroy the reactor Saddam Hussein was building. I remember reading about it after; a maximum-range(if everything went right) strike that went off flawlessly. And it kept Saddam from getting nukes.


Why do so many traitors turn out to be like this courtly State Department intelligence analyst from a prominent family who loved to sail and peruse the London Review of Books. Occasionally, he would voice frustration with U.S. policies, but to his liberal neighbors in Northwest D.C. it was nothing out of the ordinary. "We were all appalled by the Bush years," one said. ? 'Witty, intellectual' people with prep-school backgrounds?


Another fine example of major media ethics:
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is currently being interviewed by ABC's George Stephanopoulos, a former employee of former President Bill Clinton. So far, ABC has not disclosed that conflict. I guess he's just continuing his role as a spokesman for Clinton. In my world, that would be a firing offense.
Stephanopoulos is as big a whore as you'll come across; this is just the latest example of what ABC bought when they hired him.


And, as Ace notes, Hezbollah lost in the Lebanon elections.


And now I need to go do constructive things. Or take the long walk I've been trying to do every day to keep my fat ass under some level of control. One or the other.

Sunday, June 07, 2009

I first read this by EJ Dionne a few days ago,

but saw it again today at ShrinkWrapped and had to say a couple of things:
Yes, you read that correctly: If you doubt that there is a conservative inclination in the media, consider which arguments you hear regularly and which you don't. When Rush Limbaugh sneezes or Newt Gingrich tweets, their views ricochet from the Internet to cable television and into the traditional media. It is remarkable how successful they are in setting what passes for the news agenda.

The power of the Limbaugh-Gingrich axis means that Obama is regularly cast as somewhere on the far left end of a truncated political spectrum. He's the guy who nominates a "racist" to the Supreme Court, wants to weaken America's defenses against terrorism, and is proposing a massive government takeover of the private economy. Steve Forbes, writing for his magazine, went so far recently as to compare Obama's economic policies to those of Juan Peron's Argentina
.
Let's see, lots of media weenies quoting Rush and Gengrich and generally casting them as nuts when they do, counts as 'a conservative inclination in the media', huh?

Only if you're delusional.

This was brought home at this week's annual conference of the Campaign for America's Future, the progressive group that supports Obama but worries about how close his economic advisers are to Wall Street, how long our troops will have to stay in Afghanistan, and how much he will be willing to compromise to secure health care reform. In other words, they see Obama not as the parody created by the far right, but as he actually is: a politician with progressive values but moderate instincts who has hewed to the middle of the road in dealing with the economic crisis, health care, Guantanamo and the war in Afghanistan.
'Progressive values but moderate instincts'? 'Hewed to the middle of the road'? I'll use the word 'delusional' again.

SW's post is on the failure of the media to do its job. Which, they seem to have forgotten, is to report information. NOT decide what we should hear(in their opinion), NOT to slant it to fit their view, NOT to act as a mouthpiece for one political party, but to REPORT INFORMATION. Which is why I refer to so many of these clowns as 'sorry excuses for reporters'. They're not reporters, they're 'journalists', and damn well off the rails at that. That so many of them(and a lot of leftists and 'progressives') seem to think that their work to cast Rush as a 'spokesman of the Stupid Party' so they can demonize and try to sideline him(and anyone who agrees with any of what he says) think that means the media has a 'conservative inclination'... That's just flat effing stupid. But a lot of them seem to actually believe it.

Just flat amazing, isn't it?

Oklahoma summer has arrived

Oh joy

I don't have a problem with summer, it's just that when the higher temps and humidity gang up, it can make the day something less than pleasant. It's great when there's time to sit in the shade out back with a book; the dog gets scratched, then finds one of her spots where she can snooze and make sure I don't sneak out on her, and the birds visit the feeder(which reminds me, more bird seed). But tilling the garden, or pruning, or mowing... as Lawdog put it, There I am, poaching nicely in my own perspiration, which does nicely cover it(although, I must note, if any rattlers are in the immediate vicinity, they keep well out of sight and don't curl up next to the hose).

Day before yesterday I cast some bullets. Be it said that something like the Lee bottom-pour melter is a wonderful thing; doesn't put off an excess of heat like the gas burner I once used, keeps things at temperature, and is a lot easier than a pot full of lead and a ladle. However, it DOES put off heat; combine that with ambient temps of upper 80's-low 90's, and it gets just a bit poaching even if you aren't in the sun.

I was using one of these Lee molds, which are good, but they do have their problems. They cost considerably less than a comparable Lyman or RCBS, and a LOT less than Saeco; they're also less finished when you get them(Carteach0 has a nice piece here on a couple of things to do to a new Lee mold before you use it). I've got molds from Lee, RCBS and Lyman, the two big differences I've noticed in use are
The Lyman and RCBS are pretty much ready as they come out of the box; degrease them, smoke them and go. No touchup needed.
These two are much less temperature-sensitive than the Lee. Once you get them warmed up, just keep going; Lee, because of the aluminum blocks, are much more likely to cool a touch and have to be warmed back up if you set them down for a minute. They can also be damn picky about what temperature lead gives good bullets. I've had one give good castings with the temp set at '5', and the next time I use it have to set it all the way up to '8' to get the damn thing to fill properly.

The Lee molds do work, you just have to keep in mind you may have to fiddle with settings a bit more with them.

I mentioned smoking the molds. Sometimes a bullet won't want to fall out of the mold after you open it, causing you to have to tap on the hinge pin to shake it loose(NEVER tap on the mold blocks!). One thing that helps here is to put a layer of soot in the cavity. Matches work, but I keep a candle handy, as it works much better than a match. There are spray-on mold-release agents you can buy, and they do work; it's just that candles are cheap and I already had one.

I'll throw in that this mold, for .30 Carbine, has given very good results; used with a gas check, I've fired hundreds through my Carbine with no sign of lead fouling. And I've used this RCBS mold to load for .30-30, .30-06, .308 and 7.5x55 Swiss with good results; the only problem is with some bolt rifles, the flat nose will occasionally hang up(most always, I've noticed, when feeding from the left) in some rifles. That problem is the main reason I got this Lee mold, as the pointed bullet should eliminate that problem.


On news other than what makes me sweat half to death,

Well, looks like some of the Evil Party people are getting a bit worried/upset about dealers being closed at the will of The Obama, and the losses of jobs and tax revenue it's causing/will cause. Most of them don't have the pull of that dirtbag Frank to 'save' dealers in their district, so they're getting a bit antsy, it seems. Of course, they have to properly massage The One's ego:
We recognize that efforts by your Auto Task Force prevented the total liquidation of General Motors and Chrysler, as well as their dealership networks. We commend your efforts to help these businesses survive these challenging economic times.
Well, yes, if he hadn't gotten into the middle of this they'd have had to file bankruptcy months ago BEFORE he poured billions of dollars of other peoples' money into them, and while the union brass would have been pissed, everyone else would have been better off.

One more celebrity discovers that- "WHAT?!?"- when you help elect a tax-raising socialist, he'll go after your stuff, too.
Today, though, I’ll cast him as Captain Louis Renault in Casablanca for his shock, shock! that a redistributionist Democratic Party might tax his industry into default
Yep.

Ah, yes, a proposal that the White House is somehow supposed to not have known about:The NY Times covers a trial balloon that would provoke outrage from the left if Bush-Cheney had proposed it. However, as the Times tells it, the proposal has no sponsorship at all - apparently it just fell from the sky, or something. Here we go:

The Obama administration is considering a change in the law for the military commissions at the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, that would clear the way for detainees facing the death penalty to plead guilty without a full trial.

The provision could permit military prosecutors to avoid airing the details of brutal interrogation techniques. It could also allow the five detainees who have been charged with the Sept. 11 attacks to achieve their stated goal of pleading guilty to gain what they have called martyrdom.
...

And Obama's position? Who knows?!? The Times is utterly mystified:

The draft legislation includes other changes administration officials disclosed last month when President Obama said he would continue the controversial military commission system with changes that would increase detainees’ rights. It is not known whether the White House has approved the proposed death penalty provision. A White House spokesman declined to comment.
Hope! Change!


Victor Davis Hanson has a very good piece that deals with Obama Versus the Way of the Universe. Well worth reading, although I'll argue with this:
Obama will come to his senses with his ‘Bush did it’, reset button, moral equivalency, soaring hope and change, with these apologies to Europeans, his Arab world Sermons on the Mount to Al Arabiya, in Turkey, in Cairo, etc., his touchy-feely videos to Iran, his “we are all victims of racism” sops to Ortega, Chavez, and Morales. It is only a matter of when, under what conditions, how high the price we must pay, and whether we lose the farm before he gains wisdom about the tragic universe in which we live.
Hell, Jimmy Carter, who seems to be Obama's model on some things, STILL doesn't get it. And if we lose the farm before he does get it, we're still screwed.

Ah well, things to do.