Yes, it's Friday evening, and the storms are off east of here

I'm inside anyway, because I'm beat.  Time to sit and assess.

Ever heard of the Mozambique drill?

Here's where it came from.


Illustration of why "Just shoot them in the leg!" is bullshit.


Don't watch much tv, may have to look up Last Man Standing:
Eve: It's my government class. We have this debate coming up, and my teacher is making us take the opposite side of our political beliefs, which means I have to be a ... Liberal.
Ryan: It's not a curse word.
Eve: Well, it is in this house. So I've been researching liberal positions. I Googled “How to talk out of your ass,” but that was no help.

This crap is beyond rediculous

Laura Kipnis, the Northwestern University professor who faced down a Title IX investigation after writing an essay about sexual relationships between students and professors, is now being sued for defamation.
Short version: "You talked about me and didn't kiss my ass as a victim!  You didn't use my name, and didn't lie but YOU FURTHER VICTIMIZED ME!"
Etc.
Indeed, there's a sense in which this lawsuit actually proves the central ideas of Kipnis's book—that sexual paranoia pervades the modern university campus, where messy relationships are treated like assault, women are presumed to lack agency when it comes to consent, and tribunals are seen as the solution to every dispute.
No shit.

To every asshat out there screaming "Trump is a traitor!",

what, no problem with this?

The Parties agree that, in order to increase transparency in relation to the use of “Trident-II” SLBMs, transferred by the United States of America to equip the Navy of Great Britain, the United States of America shall provide notification to the Russian Federation about the time of such transfer, as well as the unique identifier and the location of each of the transferred missiles. The Parties agree that, upon conclusion of the life cycle of “Trident-II” SLBMs transferred by the United States of America to equip the Navy of Great Britain, the United States of America will send notification to the Russian Federation about the time and method of elimination, as well as the unique identifier for each of the transferred missiles.

“So, let me get this straight,” says Steve Baldwin, former Republican whip in the California state assembly, who brought this travesty to my attention. “Trump shares intelligence with Russia about ISIS, a third-party terrorist group that both countries are fighting. All hell breaks loose. But Obama gives secrets about British nuclear missiles to Russia with no obvious benefit to the West, and our media ignore it?”

Precisely.
To the asshats: as others have already said, "Stop making me defend Trump over bullshit! "  And I'll add "And stop defending Obama when he committed what could actually be referred to as treason."

And if giving a foreign power this kind of information doesn't quite meet the proper definition, it definitely meets the definition of 'back-stabbing piece of shit'.

New York wants to take over ALL healthcare in the state;

should name it the "Destroy The Economy While Showing How Much We Care State Insurance Plan".
New York collected about $71 billion in tax revenue last year. In 2019, when the single-payer plan would be enacted, the state expects to vacuum up about $82 billion. To pay for health care for all New Yorkers, though, the state would need to find another $91 billion annually.
I guarantee that's a lowball estimate.  Probably VERY lowball to try and sell this thing.  And just how do they propose to come up with that money?
To pay for the single-payer system, Friedman suggested that New York create a new tax on dividends, interest, and capital gains that would range from 9 percent to 16 percent, depending on how much investment income an individual reports, and a new payroll tax that would similarly range from 9 percent to 16 percent depending on an individual's income.
Vermont tried to do this same crap; their budget was destroyed because when they decided to punishforce 'the rich' to pay for it, the rich who could moved out.  Leaving a bunch of idiots in the legislature scratching their heads and wondering why, and "Who could have foreseen this?"


Meanwhile, at the University of Michigan: this is the kind of thing you whine about when you have no actual problems in your life.
Anna Wibbelman, former president of Building a Better Michigan, an organization that voices student concerns about university development, stated at a student government meeting in late March that “minority students felt marginalized by quiet, imposing masculine paneling” found throughout the 100-year-old building, the meeting’s minutes state.
...
Current president of Building a Better Michigan, Jazz Teste, stated that Wibbelman’s comment wasn’t necessarily about the wood paneling.

“I believe it was an off-hand comment about how many students felt marginalized by the quiet nature of the building when they entered,” she told The College Fix via email.

Fine demonstration of just what an asshat Joss Whedon is

How this clown managed to produce Buffy and the Firefly crew...

Remember: when seconds count, the DC cops

are wondering how to deal with actual bad guys.

Pitiful, isn't it?
And I guarantee you, if any of those protesters had been one of the rare people with a DC carry permit and used the sidearm to protect themselves, these same cops would've landed on top of them with all feet and hauled them off to jail.

"The police will protect you", bullshit.

Obviously, not enough people in Rome own spears or javelins anymore.

And Decius Metellus the Younger* would be really pissed at what's happened to his city.
Wild boar are taking over Rome, attracted to the Italian capital by mounds of rotting rubbish.

That’s the claim of increasingly angry residents frustrated by mayor Virginia Raggi’s apparent inability to organize efficient refuse collections.

In March, a 49-year-old man was killed when his scooter crashed into a hungry boar prowling the city’s streets. Last month a family of boar invaded an elementary school’s garden hunting for food. And a massive boar was recently caught on video running in traffic near the Vatican.


*If you're not familiar with the gentleman, I suggest you start here

"We're/Someone's all going to DIE!!" Etc.

A massive Italian volcano is at a “critical stage” in the build-up to a devastating eruption, scientists have warned.

They say the Phlegraean Fields supervolcano, known in its native Italy as Campi Flegrei, could blow sooner than predicted.
Yes, this would be bad.  There's also that, since an Italian court decided a couple of years ago that scientists could be liable for not predicting earthquakes(which nobody can), the authorities might be a bit over-enthusiastic about warning people.

Yes, sometimes public schools are child abuse

In the beginning of the Progressive era, the attack on knowledge was straightforward. The basic claim was, who needs it? John Dewey sneeringly dismissed academic progress as "mere learning." 

Two famous professors, in their 1929 textbook, unapologetically stated that most school material is a waste of time: "Subjects such as arithmetic, language, and history include content that is intrinsically of little value." That clearly reveals an ideology. 

But communities sometimes fight back, so the Education Establishment had to be ever creative, ever conniving.
People ignorant of everything, including- maybe especially- history, are much easier to control and lead.

Courtesy of Correia and Baen

some shorts from Straight Outta Tombstone

'talking itself into violence'? Hell,

they're already committing violence.


Speaking of,
We took that marvelous Icelandic greeting as a cue to leave. But the damage had already been done. About fifteen minutes later, when I got back in my hotel room, I began to feel numbness in my face, hands, and feet. I began trembling and vomiting. My heart was racing dangerously. I spent the night in a Reykjavik hospital.

What had happened quickly became clear, and was soon confirmed by a hospital test: one of these local Icelanders who had approached me (probably the one who said he was a big fan, as he was much closer to me than the “F**k you” guy) had dropped drugs into my drink. I wasn’t and am not on any other medication, and so there wasn’t any other explanation of how these things had gotten into my bloodstream.
Which could have killed him.  Not that they'd consider that a problem.


Oh yeah, it was 'Russian hackers' who got into the DNC.

The federal investigator, who requested anonymity, said 44,053 emails and 17,761 attachments between Democratic National Committee leaders, spanning from January 2015 through late May 2016, were transferred from Rich to MacFadyen before May 21.

On July 22, just 12 days after Rich was killed, WikiLeaks published internal DNC emails that appeared to show top party officials conspired to stop Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont from becoming the party’s presidential nominee. That controversy resulted in Debbie Wasserman Schultz resigning as DNC chairperson. A number of Sanders supporters refused to back party nominee Hillary Clinton, and some subsequently formed groups to work against Clinton and the party.

This has interesting possibilities to blow up in the Democrats faces.  Couldn't happen to nicer people.


This says the EffingBI is mad at the President and might 'go to war against him'.
Sounds like time for a special prosecutor, and everyone involved in doing such being fired.  This is such bullshit it would be toxic to plants.

Well, yesterday was fun

I've been having a problem with one foot.  Short version: regular doc kept saying 'gout', even though the blood test didn't bear that out.  Finally gave up on him, went to podiatrist.  "NOT gout" says he, which led to x-ray, which led to finding cracked bone in foot.  So 'be easy on it and use these pads, and hopefully it'll heal.  Otherwise, surgery.'

That was followed by taking Security Staff(Jr.) to the vet, where what I thought might be an infected tear duct or something was diagnosed as a tumor(hopefully benign), which will require surgery.

Today?  Besides getting ready, there's a chance of some weather later today, and the news station I usually listen to will spend half their time yelling "SEVERE!!  WEATHER AWARE!!"  Etc.

Bleah.

I couldn't find this particular shooting correction chart,

so made it

Made one of the instructors very happy

Scene from the range

Guy's girlfriend wants to try shooting, so he brings her in.  And wound up renting four or five different firearms.  She was absolutely delightful to look upon, but-

possibly even better was her face when they were done and asked if she'd enjoyed it.  Almost literally lit up, smiled, laughed, told us she'd had a ball and planned to come back again.

And one more joins the clan.

And the answer is "Hell NO, I don't trust them. You shouldn't either."

Although I sympathize with the needs of law enforcement, I fear that my libertarian soul sides with the bad guys on this one.

By “bad guys,” I mean us -- people -- individuals -- who are not happy at the thought of governments snooping around our private lives. When the head of the FBI says to the tech companies, “Please help us,” he is in effect saying to ordinary users, “Please trust us.” And that’s where the problem lies.

Little in recent history -- or, for that matter, not-so-recent history -- offers any particular reason to believe that government officials, once granted a power, will use it sparingly.
It's not just that they can't be trusted to use it sparingly; they can't be trusted to only use it for legitimate purposes, to keep information secret... hell, they can't be trusted.  Period.

High-ranking officials lie to Congress, and submit false documents; when was the last time one of them paid any real  price?  Comey violated ethics(at the least), and it took how long for someone to kick his ass out?  Intelligence services turn out to have been violating the law on a regular basis: any one punished for that?  The damned IRS violated both federal law and its own regulations; anybody fired for it?  Prosecuted? 

The damned BATFE violated a bloody INTERNATIONAL BORDER, and only God knows how many bodies have been piled up in connection with their crap, and NOT A SINGLE ONE OF THE BASTARDS INVOLVED WAS PROSECUTED.  Or even fired.

And we're supposed to trust ANY of these bastards?

Saturday evening, and it's been a lovely day;

unless you have a life and are out enjoying the weather(or it sucks where you are and you're indoors), here's something that might be a nice cap to the day

And people wonder why I make comments about the New Red Guard...

Administrators at the University of Arizona are now accepting applications for “social justice advocates,” whose job it is to snitch on other students accused of bias. They’re also expected to hold educational programs about “the mosaic of diversity, multiculturalism and inclusivity” and maintain “social justice bulletin boards” in student residence halls.
...
Part of the job description reads:

“The position also aims to increase understanding of one’s own self through critical reflection of power and privilege, identity and intersectionality, systems of socialization, cultural competency and allyship as they pertain to the acknowledgement, understanding and acceptance of differences. Finally, this position intends to increase a student staff member’s ability to openly lead conversations, discuss differences and confront diversely insensitive behavior.”

Wonder if they'll require sessions of public self-criticism and flagellation for the evildoers?

Three years and several thousand hours later,

I think da Vinci would be happy with the result.


Oh, joy
A new Ebola epidemic has been declared in the Democratic Republic of Congo after the deaths of three people thought to be linked to the virus.


Snork... Humans are Weird


Some older insults


On the idiot gun bigots in Washington:
So much for Michael Bloomberg’s I-594 living up to its promises. Not that anyone expected it to have any effect whatsoever on predators. What it did do, aside from forcing “law-abiding” gun owners to give up private transfers, was create and put a new class of “criminal” at risk for life-destroying consequences —the previously “law-abiding” who chose “I will not comply” civil disobedience over submission to new Intolerable Acts.

This new reporting law, Substitute House Bill 1501 also raises some questions I don’t see being addressed in “mainstream media” accounts.
Remember: the law can be an utter failure in stated purpose, but if it makes it more difficult for a citizen to own arms, they'll still consider it a success.

Friday night

Do something useful, get some studying under your belt