It's late, and I'm tired and yet, that 'Work, work, work' thing

is still hanging on

This is what we're dealing with:

Khaled Sharrouf's son, a child raised in the suburbs of Sydney, struggles with both arms to hold up the decapitated head of a slain Syrian soldier.

He is a seven-year old boy, Australian born and bred. But he's proudly holding up the latest severed head in his dad's collection. "Diversity is our strength", as they say. A family that raises their seven-year-old to participate in the decapitation celebrations certainly adds to the diversity of the Sydney suburbs. Whether it adds to their "strength" is another matter.

And the reactions of far too many people in the west?
Mr Shorten also cautions against attaching any particular significance to that photograph:

"I would be careful about using that shocking image, that shocking evil image, and trying to use it for purposes which it shouldn't be used for."

In other words, now that the Australian Government has caved in on its Section 18C promise, if you know what's best for you, you'll think twice before suggesting seven-year-old Aussie citizens waving around severed heads might be indicative of broader, er, assimilation issues within, ah, certain communities, or anything like that.


Remember Operation Choke Point?
Late last month, the Federal Depositors Insurance Corporation told banks that it had removed a list of 30 examples of “high risk” activities from the agency’s website, stating its list had “led to misunderstandings.”
That translates to "We got caught doing errands and intimidation for the Administration, and the heat is more than we want to deal with."   Much like Fast & Furious was a 'failed plan' in that they got caught.


Speaking of caught, remember that POS 'cop' who murdered the kid being restrained by two other officers, after saying "We don't have time for this" ?  He's been indicted.  Not for murder, but for voluntary manslaughter.  Not what I think it should be, but that he's indicted is a step forward.

Just where to aim in a self-defense situation?

That 3-zone target won't tell you.

Few years back Geek with a .45 had a marvelous post, with illustrations, showing why high center-of-mass was generally best; alas, it's no longer available.  And at the time I didn't think to save the whole thing.

A definite move in the right direction,

if they can get it out of committee:

1. Repeals the arrest and firearm authority granted to Offices of Inspectors General in the 2002 Homeland Security Act.
2. Prohibits federal agencies, other than those traditionally tasked with enforcing federal law—such as the FBI and U.S. Marshals, from purchasing machine guns, grenades, and other weaponry regulated under the National Firearms Act.
3. Directs the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to write a complete report detailing all federal agencies, including Offices of Inspectors General, with specialized units that receive special tactical or military-style training and that respond to high-risk situations that fall outside the capabilities of regular law enforcement officers.

Well, this is not promising:
So far, 2,127 cases of the disease and 1,145 deaths have been reported in four nations — Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone — the W.H.O announced Friday. But the organization has also warned that the actual number is almost certainly higher, perhaps by a very considerable margin.

“Staff at the outbreak sites see evidence that the numbers of reported cases and deaths vastly underestimate the magnitude of the outbreak,” the group said in a statement on Thursday.

The epidemic is still growing faster than efforts to keep up with it, and it will take months before governments and health workers in the region can get the upper hand, Joanne Liu, the president of Doctors Without Borders, said on Friday, calling conditions on the ground “like a war.”
Read a line somewhere, "Biologicals are a far greater threat than nuclear materials"; we may be finding that out.

The final(almost, I think) modification to the Lee powder measure

When last we were on this subject I'd made/modified a couple of pieces to suit.  And it was working nicely.  Then, couple of weeks ago, was loading with IMR4895 powder and a problem occurred: some granules were getting stuck in the brass adapter, then falling out as the case was lowered.  Screws with the charge and dumps powder on/into the press.  And this was with the factory adapter, not my homemade, so it wasn't me.

I think what was happening was the larger(than previously used powders) granules were 'bridging', some of them getting jammed slightly in the throat and not dropping.  Until you lowered the case, and that slight vibration caused them to fall.

Solution(I figured): widen the throat from the top down into more of a funnel.  So ran to the tool store and picked up something I'd wanted at times anyway

Clamped the adapter in a suitably-padded vise, brushed some cutting oil on the reamer, and started cutting.  About every 3-4 turns pull it out, brush the cuttings out of the flutes, then a little more oil and back to it.  When cut it into a suitable-looking funnel*, used the drill and sander to taper a piece of wood dowel to a fairly close-matching taper, split it for an inch or so with the hacksaw, slid some sandpaper into it and chucked that into the drill.  That worked nicely to polish the funnel(I got some chatter marks).  Then flush it off with brake cleaner, let dry, put it in the die and gave a try.

That seems to have solved the problem nicely, as it has not happened again.

I've been pretty impressed with this measure; it doesn't like flake powders(with some, neither does the Dillon measure), but it works with stick powders better than anything else I've ever used.  I can mount it on the Dillon to load with those, and it's been remarkably consistent with them.  All the mods I've done have been to make it work the way I wanted on my Dillon, and that involves the adapters and tube in the charging die set.  I can live with that.



* I did not cut all the way to the exit hole on the bottom, just cut the funnel from the top to a point a little shy of that.

Screw that ballistics stuff, it's time for real SCIENCE

which requires the study of data(to quote Wash: "Work, work, work."

And for the raw data,

A 'Just Because' project comes to mind:

an AR in .30-30.

Added: as Sigi noted in comments, it'd have to be a AR10 receiver set; the .30-30 and .308 have the same case length.  Yes, it's a rimmed case; I'm thinking work the mag lips same way it's done on the PSL, which would prevent rimlock from occurring.

Now to find out if a .308 bolt could be modified to work with a .30-30 case head...

A bunch of leftists have suddenly decided "All these cops with military equipment

is a problem!"  Everybody else is saying "Welcome to the party, dumbass."
Groups on the left and right are uniting behind calls to end what they say is the rise of a "militarized" police force in the United States.

They say the controversial police tactics seen this week in Ferguson, Mo., are not isolated to the St. Louis County police department and warn the rise of heavily armed law enforcement agencies has become an imminent threat to civil liberties.
Lots of conservatives and libertarians have been saying this for years(along with "Get rid of the damn masks, you're supposed to be PEACE OFFICERS, not ninja.")

Want to do something else to help?  Either get rid of qualified immunity completely, or make it a hell of a lot easier to get it taken away with cops and prosecutors misbehave.

Speaking of bullshit in the guise of LE, ran across this thanks to Insty; apparently (former)Officers Friendly want to be operators:
The images at the beginning and end are from The Punisher, the fictional character described by Wikipedia as "a vigilante who employs murder, kidnapping, extortion, coercion, threats of violence, and torture in his war on crime." The audio is the song "Die Motherf—-r Die" by Dope.

Doraville is a town of about 8,500 people, in the northeast suburbs of Atlanta. It last saw a murder in 2009 (at least through the end of 2012, the last year for which I can find statistics).
Take all their damned toys away from them and send them back to school, because they either never learned or forgot that they're supposed to be PEACE OFFICERS.



Nice idea for breaking up asteroids.  Except the difference between
Researchers at the University of Tennessee have discovered that blowing the space rock up could make the collision worse by causing several devastating impacts.
Instead, small changes could be made to its surface to disrupt the forces keeping it together and cause it to break up in outer space.
'blowing up' and 'cause it to break up' seems to mostly be 'We're making it break up a lot further out.'


One socialist making friends with another, and they both want into the Oval Office.   Wonderful.

Yes, it was obviously unintentional

that news crews with cameras and so forth were targeted with tear gas.  Like it was unintentional, or just a couple of untrained idiots with badges that a couple of other journalists were slammed around and thrown in jail by these clowns in military gear. 
The police chief later told him the officers responsible were “probably somebody who didn’t know better” and the he instructed cops “to release them.”
I'm thinking that you stick a lot of these morons in all that free gear the Pentagon has been giving away and they start thinking they're Easy Company and everyone else is the Fritz.  And should be treated appropriately.

Range day

Blew off laundry and such today and headed to the range, partly for practice, partly for fun, and partly to get the numbers I was going to get the last time, but couldn't because- surprise!- the battery in the Chrony was dead.

Primary this time was fire the same load in a 4" barrel .357 Mag revolver and in the 16"-barrel Model 92 clone.  Did this with two loads: first 125-grain X-Treme plated flatpoints over a charge of 2400 powder.  That worked out as follows for four in the rifle(chrony trouble) and five from the revolver:

            Rifle                Revolver
            1457                1109
            1407                1047
            1466                1044
            1474                1094
                                    1042

Average of 1451fps for the rifle, 1067fps for the pistol, so the extra 12" of barrel is giving almost 400fps higher velocity(384 to be exact).

Then moved to some Hornady FTX 140-grain bullets over AA#9 powder, and the Chrony worked as it should this time

            Rifle                Revolver
            1498                1192
            1510                1185
            1501                1130
            1514                1115
            1507                1141

Average of 1506 for the rifle, 1152 for the pistol, difference of 354fps.

The Hornady information shows this load giving 1550fps from a 16" barrel, so just a little below that.  It also shows this giving 1250fps from a 4" barrel revolver, again I got below that.  I really want to get a bunch of water jugs together and fire these into it, see how the bullet expands.


The other thing wanted to note, remember that I helped a guy put a load together for his AR15 in 7.62x39?  Would up settling on 22.0 grains H4198 over the X-Treme 123-grain plated bullet; functioned the action fully and reliably, the only problem being that occasionally that flat-nose bullet would catch on the front of the magazine instead of sliding over.  A pain, but not a big deal for a practice load.  Well, we were finally able to run some of those loads over the Chrony, too.  This time we got eight readings before the wind started gusting and causing problems:
1828
1878
1867
1831
1809
1862
1794
1843
Average velocity 1839.  That's a little higher than I expected, and higher than X-Treme recommends for those bullets.  He's had no problems with copper buildup or other nasties in the bore, and he says it consistently gives groups like this:

That's seven rounds at 100 yards, far better than I expected for a light practice load.  Considering these run $42.25 plus shipping for 500, let's say he's happy.

What is it with teachers' union bigshots?

Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis is known for being a socialist who rails against the rich.

Lewis joined the “occupy” movement when it was in full bloom.

She has ripped Mayor Rahm Emanuel as a tool of corporate Chicago, labeled him “Mayor 1%” and described herself as “not egotistical or rich.”

Lewis isn’t as wealthy as Emanuel, a multimillionaire who made his fortune during a short stint as an investment banker. But she makes more than $200,000 a year and has an ownership interest in three homes, records show.

That includes vacation homes in Hawaii and in the upscale “Harbor Country” area of southwestern Michigan, where Emanuel has a second home, property records show.


Apparently Philadelphia REALLY likes theft under color of law; it's been very profitable for them.


Sounds like a lot of cops in Missouri really like the idea of being Easy Company assaulting the Krauts; and since they can't do that, they'll act like they are when on duty.  Yeah, there's a riot; you're not supposed to make it WORSE, guys.

So if the police put you in a situation that increases your danger,

then fail to protect you from said danger, they can't claim qualified immunity to protect themselves from charges that they failed to protect you.

Interesting mess.  First part of this covers something that's been noted before:
“As a general matter … a State’s failure to protect an individual against private violence simply does not constitute a violation of the Due Process Clause.” DeShaney v. Winnebago County Dep’t of Social Servs., 489 U.S. 189, 197 (1989). “DeShaney, however, [left] the door open for liability in situations where the state creates a dangerous situation or renders citizens more vulnerable to danger.”
Once more, the police have no legal duty to protect YOU from violence.  But, if they put you in danger, or increased danger, they DO have some liability, it seems.

It seems the Chicago PD officers were, ah, let's say maybe not 'indifferent', but 'uncaring':
Accepting the complaint as true, Defendants were recklessly indifferent to Vaughn’s safety. This is not a case where state actors were at worst negligent in protecting an individual from state-created dangers. The combination of ordering Vaughn to drop a stick he intended to use for self-protection and then watching — at a distance of only a few feet — while someone beat him to death with a baseball bat shows a reckless disregard for his life that shocks the conscience….
Think maybe?

Because only certain parts of the Bill of Rights are politically correct

Also, only men can be internet trolls.  We know this 'cause a genuine doctoral fellow in the Department of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Emory University says so.
...Unless there’s a secret army of robot bigots out there who have outsmarted every CAPTCHA in existence, it’s pretty clear that Internet harassment comes from actual human men. Yes, cruel online messages are typically typed by fingers which are attached to human arms which are, in turn, attached to the human men that we all, unfortunately, must interact with at some point in our lives.
Etc. ad Bullshit, on and on.

As to her opinion of the BoR, here's a few:
Tenth: Your man is passionate about states’ rights. Racists and homophobes love states’ rights. Be afraid.

Ninth: Your man picked the foundation for Roe v. Wade. Good egg!

Third: If he picks an amendment this useless, you should just dump him anyway even if he’s not a troll.

Second: Run. Seriously, just run! Your man might not be an asshole to people on the Internet because he’s too busy being an open-carrying asshole in real life.

First: This could be a huge warning sign. Trolls cite the First Amendment as frequently as college application essays cite “The Road Not Taken.” They think that it gives them the right to verbally harass, stalk, and threaten whomever they want without any consequences. If your man picks the First Amendment, just ask him to explain what it means. If he thinks it means that “it’s a free country” and “people can say whatever they want,” tell him to go back to the playground he learned his politics from and find a new boyfriend.

Congratulations, madam: you have just given us a fine demonstration of what a bigoted socialist hoplophobic jerk thinks like.  Summed up nicely by one of the comments:
This article is brilliant; it's beyond reproach... because if you were to criticize it you'll be dismissed as a troll.

BTW, the reason there is no acknowledgement of female trolls because we don't call them trolls. We call them academic feminists

meanwhile, in the Dark and Fascist State of New Jersey,

get stabbed, call the cops, wind up in jail for having more black powder than they approve of.  And they destroy your gun safes.  And their evidence-handling procedures suck:
Township Police Chief Robert Kugler said investigators expected to find more than 100 long and short guns, which would be brought out in barrels overnight and that ”they will be identified and catalogued at a later date.”
Oh no, no problems at all there, right?  No chance of anything disappearing or anything...

Actually put some people in jail for this,

it'll probably cause a big change:
Twenty different Obama administration officials have lost or destroyed a portion of their email traffic. Email traffic that was, in some cases, under subpoena or in others requested as part of a larger inquiry into the conduct of the executive branch.
And the answer to this question:
The conclusions get even uglier when you realize that the IRS dismissed the government contractor responsible for maintaining back-up files of their emails concurrent with Lois Lerner and her band mysteriously having their computers flatline.
The question is, where are the Democrats in the face of this obvious malfeasance?
Since the writer is apparently either blind or stupid, the answer is 'They're DEFENDING it, dumbass.' 

Bloomberg doesn't like pro- self-defense cops, either

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has his eyes set on a new target: pro-self defense Sheriff David Clarke of Milwaukee County. According to the Washington Times, Bloomberg has dumped $150,000 for advertising into the race between Clarke and Milwaukee Police Lt. Chris Moews, who are running against each other in a Democratic primary. 

Clarke and Moews have traded barbs in the past regarding the best way to handle crime in Milwaukee and surrounding areas. Clarke also has a long standing feud over firearm self-defense with Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, who has endorsed Moews.
Clarkes' offense:
...With officers laid off and furloughed, simply calling 911 and waiting is no longer your best option. You could beg for mercy from a violent criminal, hide under the bed or you can fight back. But are you prepared? Consider taking a certified safety course in handling of firearms, so you can defend yourself until we get there. You have a duty to protect yourself and your family. We're partners now. Can I count on you?" Clarke stated in one radio ad from early 2013.

And when you're dependent on government-run health care, guess who gets to choose

who lives and who dies?
Older patients would effectively be written off on the grounds that they no longer make a big enough financial contribution to society.

The Department of Health is demanding the changes in an attempt to cut the crippling NHS medicines bill.
...
In the latest onslaught on the elderly, drug rationing body the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has admitted that ministers want workers who are still contributing to the economy to come first.

NICE has been ordered to take into account the “wider societal benefit” when considering which drugs to fund.
The drugs watchdog already admits that such criteria would “inevitably take age into account to some degree”.
Remember, this is the NHS that Obamacare designers said should be a model for us.  They freakin' LOVE this system.  And this is a big reason why: control of who gets treatment.  "I'm sorry, but you are no longer contributing to the economy by working, so for the good of the collective you cannot be allowed this medication, it's too expensive."

A Department of Health spokesman said: “We want to make sure we get the best possible results for all NHS patients with the resources we have, which means using taxpayers’ money responsibly and getting good value for money.

“That’s why we have asked NICE to look at the way drugs are assessed so that patients can get the treatments they need at the best value for the NHS and the price the NHS pays is more closely linked to the value a medicine brings.
Isn't that a nice way to say "If you're not contributing enough to Society in our opinion, you're screwed"?

Hey, Mr. President, think you could take some time from your latest vacation

and time on the golf course to at least pay a little attention to this?
(warning: they say 'graphic images' and they're not kidding)

Children are having their heads cut off for being of the wrong religion to these savages, and he's taking another damned vacation.  And whining that 'it's not HIS fault all the troops were taken out of Iraq'(You're the fucking PRESIDENT, you bastard, yes it IS your fault).

'Elite Daily' my ass

Short version of this: "Men don't even grow up until they're 30, men don't know what they want, they live with mommy, they're not as able to get along as women', etc. ad Bullshit.  Borrowing from Michael Z. Williamson on Bookface(where I found this):
There are also scads of assumptions and generalizations in this article. If you did that about females, it would be sexist, but because it's about males, it's okay.
And a great many men don't marry precisely BECAUSE they understand western liberal women. Why invite the spoiled, leeching, social-climbing weasel into your house? (Oh, sorry, was that a generalization based on gender?)


Here's an interesting piece: I hadn't heard of cut-bar bullets before

Thanks to Oleg Volk for finding this one

Never forget: this is how the BATFEIEIO treats its own agents;

we're supposed to believe they're honorable and honest with anyone else?  Like us or Congress?
...ATF violated an agreement he had with the agency to protect him and his family after credible threats of violence were made. His fears were realized when his house was set ablaze with his wife and children inside, and his alienation from management became complete after the bureau attempted to smear his reputation by maliciously pursuing him as a suspect, despite “two of the nation’s leading arson investigators determined that [he] was not involved." 

Instead, real-time leads were ignored, true suspects were not pursued and Dobyns’ telephone calls were illegally recorded. A veteran investigator of numerous high-profile incidents who declared “Jay [is] clean” was removed from the case. That removal was ordered, Dobyns writes, by the same supervisor first named in connection with Operation Fast and Furious “gunwalking” and the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, by insiders discussing agency abuses on the CleanUp ATF website.


Also, don't forget that of the ATF brass involved in this(and who-knows-how-many other similar operations), NONE have been fired, or charged, or prosecuted for everything from lying under oath to false documents to violating an international border.  But we're supposed to trust them, and the AG who's still hiding documents under Obama's skirt.

I've got an idea how he probably felt,

but to run in denial and kill who-knows-how-many because of his fear?

He'd seen his sister die of this, and gotten her blood on him, so he knew he was exposed.  Suffering the symptoms he got on a friggin' plane and ran(ignore for now the idiots who let a visibly-ill anyone get on a plane under the conditions).  Exposed people at the airport, everyone on the plane, then people at the next airport and the medical personnel(who've been dying like flies).

That's him, one terrified guy.  THIS idiocy, on the other hand:
The hospital would later report that it resisted immense pressure to let out Sawyer from its hospital against the insistence from some higher-ups and conference organizers that he had a key role to play at the ECOWAS convention in Calabar, the Cross River State capital.

In fact, FrontPageAfrica has been informed that officials in Monrovia were in negotiations with ECOWAS to have Sawyer flown back to Liberia.
I don't care what his position was and who he worked for/with, nobody with a brain should've tried to do anything but keep him in that hospital.

This mess just keeps getting more and more funner, doesn't it?

I was told that and excess of fabric

was contaminating some of the data, so I'll try a fix:

In comments on the knifemaking post,

Gerry said alcohol will remove epoxy from things.  As I just got some on my hands, I tried it.

Damn, it works!  Wish I'd known about this a long time ago.

Translation: "Afraid of being seen sitting on his thumb while people died, again,

the President decided to Do Something."
Also, bullshit:
But interviews with multiple officials at the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department and other agencies paint a portrait of a president forced by the unexpectedly rapid deterioration of security in Iraq to abandon his longstanding reluctance to use military force.
He's been QUITE willing to use military force, when it suits whatever's going through his head.  Libya?  Syria?  In Libya he said he didn't need to be bothered with going to Congress; only reason he didn't try that in Syria was it was made clear it'd be his ass if he did.  Borrowing from Insty, He was quick to use it in Libya, and he was eager to use it in Syria until Putin outsmarted him. He is, perhaps, reluctant to use military force when it’s obviously in America’s interest, but that’s a different thing.



This will not come as a surprise to Reason regulars: More than 40 percent of the people on the United States federal government terrorism watch lists have no discernable connection to anyterrorist group.

280,000 out of 680,000 people on the list of those whom authorities are keeping their eyes on and pulling aside for further examination at airports and border crossings have no actual connection to terrorist groups. The analysis comes from journalists Jeremy Scahill and Ryan Devereaux at The Intercept. They just recently exposed the complicated yet also terribly vague guide the federal government uses to put people on the list. Now they've gotten their hands on a classified document detailing the National Counterterrorism Center's (NCTC) list of accomplishments for 2013 and have crunched the numbers to provide the lovely graph below:

And while various politicians are playing "Let's get all these illegals in and register them as Democrats!", this is happening.
The Sheriff leading the investigation into the brutal slaying of a Border Control Agent by two illegal immigrants has revealed local farmers in his county have reported spotting gangs of armed Mexicans 'in military fatigues' marching through their fields.
That's along with all the other crap, of course.


This is pretty damn cool; small underwater drone designed to follow the tags on some Great White sharks.  Occasionally, one gets annoyed.  Or decides to see how it tastes.

Victory!

It's a small one, but I'll take it.

Figured out that the thread on the project bike flywheel is M28x1.0.  And they do make inside-threaded pullers for that.  And I got the sucker off.

Progress.  Slowly, but it's coming.

By the way: according to EVERY source I can find, not only is the flywheel on this threaded differently, but it faces the opposite direction from everything I've seen for this year/model...

Be it known that the .25acp CAN produce a one-shot stop

Especially when you do it to yourself.