Friend's mother died a few days ago

Which is more than the usual sadness, because- in part because he didn't marry and have a kid until later in life- his folks treated my kids as if they were part of their family.

She was... good.  That's the proper word.  And she will be missed by a bunch of people.

Funeral's Monday, and I'm not looking forward to it.

Nice evening, but there's work to do

and data to be reviewed, so get to it

December 7, 1941

Bureaucrats who should be decorating trees for the holidays.

When that idiot bump-stock ban by changing definition happened, I told some people that allowing bureaucrats to ban/control something by changing definitions was a horrible idea.  I was informed that it was no real problem, I was exaggerating, etc.

The hell I was.

What’s particularly alarming to LaPant and other farmers familiar with his case is that in their view the Corps saw fit to modify the Clean Water Act without congressional approval, Francois said.

“There’s a pretty broad, clear statement in the Clean Water Act that you don’t need a permit for normal farming activities,” Francois said, adding:

This would include normal ranching, farming, forestry activities. But the Army has added multiple conditions that you have to meet for these protections [for such operations] to continue.

One of these conditions is that the property has to be tilled pretty regularly for this protection to continue. But there are many reasons why a farmer may suspend tilling. For example, cattle may have a higher price than wheat or corn, and so the land might be used for grazing for a period of time.

The Army has definitely added hurdles and obstacles to a pretty clear and simple statement of the Clean Water Act that you don’t need a permit for normal farming activities. In our view, what they’ve done is to change the policy decision Congress made.

It's December, so of course it's chilly out there

I started to say 'so it's a good time to go over the data', but it's always a good time for that.

A range day was had,

and it was good.*  Fairly gusty at times, but still good.

Mostly trying some .45-70 loads, and messing with a couple of other things.  This one is a re-try of one that worked nicely last time, the Lyman 525-grain Postell over 23.0 of A5744:

 Right at 3.75" at 200 yards.  I can live with that.

Also tried it with 24.0 grains

That far-left is my fault.  I was lined up, started pressing the trigger, and realized just as it broke that I'd forgotten to set the trigger, and pulled it off.  Dammit.  The four good ones a bit wider than the 23.0, but this needs to be tried again.

Also a couple of tries using the Lyman 340-grain hollowpoint bullet, cast of 20-1(same as the Postell), this one over 30.0 A5744.  Much higher POI, and the wind affected it more.

Try it again.

Same bullet, this time over 44.8 of Blackhorn 209, after lowering the rear sight just a bit

Nice.  Quite nice.  Need to try both of these again.

The other 'Let's see what happens' was this: I have some RCBS .45 basic cases, which are quite long and you trim to whatever length.  I took five 2.130" cases and loaded them with 66.0 of 2f black** to see if moving the bullet closer to the rifling would have any effect.  This combination spread out over the target, not a winning setup.

The rest of the day involved confirming zero on one rifle, finding out the scope mount on one was loose(and of course I didn't have the right hex key with me), and messing with a .22.




*Almost any day at the range is
**I've gotten pretty good results with a standard length case and 65.0 of that powder.  Since this is a longer case, threw in 1 grain more.

Amazing what turns up in some parts of the seas

Like a remarkably intact 2400 year old shipwreck

Should be a law stating "Politicians who attempt this kind of crap

will be dragged into the street, flogged with a flagrum, and tried for violation of their oath to the Constitution."
Illinois state Rep. Daniel Didech has proposed a law that would require police to screen the social media accounts of potential gun buyers.

If passed, this bill would allow police to disqualify an individual from purchasing a gun and even revoke a currently valid Firearm Owner’s Identification Card if any information on the social media accounts was found alarming.
This being a Evil Party asshole from Illinois, 'alarming' will be defined as "Anything that lets me screw people who don't vote for me, give me money, and/or don't agree with me."

So flagrum, trial, and hanging. 

Even if you ignore everything else, the EffingBI and Do'J' have a lot to answer for

just on this:
5. The FBI’s Systemic Forensic Fraud in Crime Labs

In the early 1990s, Dr. Frederic Whitehurst, an attorney and chemist who worked at the FBI as a Supervisory Special Agent, noticed troubling practices in the in the bureau’s Investigation Laboratory.

There were “alterations of reports, alterations of evidence, folks testifying outside their areas of expertise in courts of law,” said Whitehurst. “[Really] what was going on was human rights violations. We have a right to fair trials in this country… And that’s not what was going on at the FBI lab.”

In 1994, he blew the whistle on the “systemic forensic fraud” he witnessed. Nothing happened. So he took his case to the Department of Justice. The FBI didn’t like that. Whitehurst was eventually chased out of the Bureau, but not before winning a $1.16 million settlement.

Unfortunately, however, the wheels of justice turn slowly at the Bureau.

“It wasn’t until ten years later that Whitehurst was finally vindicated,” notes the National Whistleblower Legal Defense and Education Fund note, “when a scathing 500+ page study of the lab by the Justice Department Inspector General, Michael Bromwich, concluded major reforms were required in the lab.”

But by then, an untold number of people had been convicted with the help of tainted evidence—evidence the DOJ knew was tainted.

In 2012 the Washington Post published an extensive review of the FBI and DOJ failures to properly review the cases impacted by the FBI lab scandal, based on Whitehurst’s research.

As a result, the DOJ agreed to conduct yet another review of hair cases in collaboration with the Innocence Project and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL).

The EffingBI knew what was going on and did nothing to stop it.  The Do'J' knew the evidence they were using was tainted at best, and neither of them did a damn thing about it.  Partly "Protect the Bureau Reputation at all costs, including putting innocent people in prison" and partly "Who cares if this is tainted, we can put this guy away and mark the case as a win!"

But we're supposed to trust these bastards...

This is going to get sporty

Protesters in southern Guangdong province, China, took to the streets last week to demand the communist government not build a polluting crematorium near their town, adopting slogans common to the Hong Kong protest movement, Time magazine noted on Monday.

The Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily, which openly supports the anti-communist movement, reported the use of slogans such as "revolution of our times," which China considers seditious hate speech, and "just like you, Hong Kong!" in Guangdong. As China heavily censors coverage of the Hong Kong protests and bans all statements of support from the few permitted social media sites in the country, the adoption of the Hong Kong movement's slogans and tactics is a sign that people within Communist China are informing themselves regarding the protests through unapproved means.
Since they've got a lot less in the way of 'get news out' I'd imagine the PRC army stomped all over the place.  Because any such resistance to what the .gov wants cannot be tolerated.

But if it happened in one place, what's going on under the surface?

NTeffingCITY: "Our new verion of the law says this, but

it could actually mean that, and we promise this won't be abused, so you really shouldn't hear this case."
NYeffingCity, and all their little friends like Watts, really don't want the Supremes to hear this because it would almost certainly cut into their 'screw with any of those peasants who want a gun' space.  Like this:
Dearing assured the justices that the NYPD would not look askance at "reasonably necessary" stops for coffee, gas, or bladder relief, prompting Gorsuch to wonder, "Is coffee reasonably necessary?" While that remark prompted laughter, Gorsuch emphasized his point: "What's going to qualify? I'm just a little unclear about that."
Sure.  This is the NYPD that, for years, arrested people on a bullshit 'gravity knife' law.  If you believe they wouldn't do everything they could to arrest people(and yank their license) for this, you're an idiot.

Pay careful attention to the second paragraph here:
So was Dearing. Justice Samuel Alito, who like Gorsuch remarked upon "the quite extraordinary step of trying to moot the case after we granted review," wondered about a gun owner who drives to a range in New Jersey and stops to "visit his mother for a couple of hours to take care of a few things for her." Dearing(the NYC lawyer) was unsure whether that would be allowed. "I think that would have to be a question now to be litigated under the state law," he said. "I hadn't considered the mother or mother-in-law example before."

Speaking for the plaintiffs, Paul Clement said Dearing's assurances are not good enough to make the case moot. "The city took it on itself in Section 7 of the new regs to tell you what they, at least at that point, thought was sufficiently direct, which is 'continuous and uninterrupted,'" he said. "They're now making representations that the reg doesn't mean what it seems to mean….My client[s] shouldn't have to rely on those representations. They should get that in writing in an injunction that would be enforceable. That would be effectual relief."
Exactly.  The bastards are playing games to try to leave a way to screw with people, and it shouldn't be allowed.

Since I brought up (formerly Great)Britain,

A man famously lauded as a “hero” in 2017 for fighting off terrorists on the London Bridge has been forced by British authorities to attend “de-radicalization” classes “over fears he may become extremist” after being stabbed eight times, British papers reported.
...
Larner has now been added to a terrorist watchlist know as Britain’s “Prevent” program after fears he could become an anti-Islam extremist, the Sun reported Monday. 

Larner told the paper “They treat me like a terrorist but I’m not political at all.” The Sun reported he was added because people in the “far right” who were anti-Islam had contacted Roy because of his role stopping the terrorist incident.
Again: I'm so damned glad some of my ancestors got the hell out of those islands and came here.

Another point of "How screwed in Britain?

THIS screwed."
A furious political row broke out today after it was revealed that the London Bridge terrorist was released automatically from prison last year.

Usman Khan, 28, was sentenced in 2012 after being arrested in 2010 for terrorism offences for his part in an al Qaeda-inspired terror group that plotted to bomb the London Stock Exchange and kill Boris Johnson.

The Stoke-on-Trent-based radical, along with two co-conspirators, originally received an indeterminate sentence for public protection with a minimum of eight years behind bars - meaning he could be kept indefinitely if he continued to pose a risk to the public.

However, this sentence was later quashed, after a ruling from judges including Justice Leveson gave him a determinate 16-year jail term, meaning he could be automatically released after eight years, half of his sentence.

Leveson also said at the time when reversing the original indeterminate sentence that the Parole Board was best placed to decide when he would be safe to be released from jail.

But today the Parole Board has released a statement saying they played no part at all in Khan's release as he was freed automatically, suggesting a failure at some point in the Justice System, and ultimately from the Government, to review Khan's case.
This level of stupid and 'caring' for the bad guys is... I'll go with 'amazing'.

These dickheads turned a terrorist loose.  Now innocents are dead and others wounded, and I'll bet in private discussions said dickheads are really annoyed at being criticized for what they did.