Thanks to Mr. McCarville, I find that the Brady Coalition to Ban Firearms doesn't like our state.

OKLAHOMA STATE LAWS — Click On Law Below For Details

Assault Weapons Are there limitations on assault weapons? No	Ballistic Fingerprinting Must handguns be ballistic fingerprinted prior to sale? No
Child Access Prevention - CAP Are gun owners held accountable for leaving guns accessible to kids? No	Child-Safety Locks Must locking devices be sold with guns? No
Childproof Handguns Are only authorized users able to operate handguns? No	Gun Dealer Regulations Must gun dealers adhere to state licensing and/or oversight systems? No
Gun Manufacturer Accountability Do cities have authority to hold gun makers legally liable? No	Gun Show Loophole Are background checks required at gun shows? No
Guns at Work Are businesses forced to allow guns in the workplace? Yes	Guns on College Campuses Are colleges/universities forced to allow guns on campus? No
Juvenile Sale Is it illegal to sell handguns to anyone under 21 years of age? No	Large Capacity Ammunition Magazines Are there limitations on large capacity ammunition magazines? No
License or Permit to Purchase Is a license/permit required to buy handguns? No	Limit Bulk Purchases Is there a one-handgun-per-month limit on sales? No
Limits on Concealed Handgun Permits May police limit carrying concealed handguns? No	Microstamping Must new semi-automatic handguns be sold with microstamping technology? No
Preemption - Local Gun Laws May municipalities enact law stronger than the state's? No	Record Keeping May police maintain gun sale records? No
Registration Are all guns registered with law enforcement? No	Report Lost/Stolen Guns Are firearm owners required to report all lost or stolen guns to law enforcement? No
Safety Standards Are there consumer safety standards on guns? No	Saturday Night Specials Are there limitations on 'junk' handguns? No
Shoot First Is deadly force allowed to be a first resort in public? Yes	Universal Background Checks Are background checks required on all gun sales? No
Waiting Period Is there a waiting period on gun sales?

This is the first time I've looked at their site for their rankings on this crap. Interesting. Note that they call for things like "Are only authorized users able to operate handguns?", in other words the mythical 'smart gun'. Which not only doesn't exist, but laws pushing for them have always, I believe, exempted law enforcement. If they actually exist and work, why would you do that?(I know you know; I can't decide whether the Brady Coalition to Ban Firearms doesn't, or doesn't care. Probably the latter)

And 'Ballistic Fingerprinting', which has been such a spectacular failure in NY and MD. And worked so badly in the study that CA dropped the idea.

And things worded in the most dishonest and nasty way, such as "Is deadly force allowed to be a first resort in public?" Of course, they do think that, if you're attacked, you must do everything down to and including crawling on your belly and licking the shoes of your attacker before you consider any kind of violence. That is, except for the BCTBF members who think you should never be allowed to use force to protect yourself. Which idea is working so well in Britain.

In short, if your state
Hasn't trashed the 2nd Amendment completely,
doesn't make you wait for a gun you buy,
doesn't make you get a license to be allowed to buy,
doesn't limit the amount of ammo you own,
doesn't make you wait to be injured(or killed) before 'lethal force' is an option,
doesn't make you register your arms,
doesn't demand your guns be of a non-existant 'smart' type
etc.,
then YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT THE CHILDRENN!

I, on the other hand, am very happy to say to the Brady Coalition to Ban Firearms, "Screw you, nanny." We care about people, including the chilluns("Grab that extra brick of .22's, we want plenty when we hit the range, kids"),and about freedom. Which you don't.

Well, I guess they were bored:

probably no children to molest or enough women to set up brothels.
Spectacular prehistoric depictions of animal and human figures created up to 6,000 years ago on Western Saharan rocks have been vandalised by United Nations peacekeepers, The Times has learnt.

Archaeological sites boasting ancient paintings and engravings of giraffes, buffalo and elephants have been defaced within the past two years by personnel attached to the UN mission, known by its French acronym, Minurso.

Graffiti, some of it more than a metre high and sprayed with paint meant for use for marking routes, now blights the rock art at Lajuad, an isolated site known as Devil Mountain, which is regarded by the local Sahrawi population as a mystical place of great cultural significance.
Used to be, anyway.

Julian J. Harston, the UN’s representative of the Secretary-General for Western Sahara and head of Minurso, said that he had been shocked by the scale of the vandalism. After visiting two of the sites, including Devil Mountain, this week, he said: “I was appalled. You’d think some of them would know better. These are officers, not squaddies.” The UN would take action against any officers “kind enough to leave their calling card. We will report it to the troop-contributing countries. We can move them.”
That's punishment, all right!

...Minurso staff have felt entitled to destroy elements of Western Sahara’s and the Sahrawis’ cultural heritage, despite being aware of UN ethics in peacekeeping, and in breach of legislation enshrined in the 1954 Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict.”
Them Conventions really got teeth, don't they?
It concludes: “Minurso personnel have played a major role in damaging archaeological sites, and such staff are engaged in the systematic defacement of valuable archaeological sites over a large area . . . the recent damage at Lajuad is unprecedented.”

The vandalism will reignite the debate about the conduct of UN peacekeepers after a series of scandals. Last January the UN admitted that more than 200 of its troops had been disciplined for sex offences, including rape and child abuse, in the preceding three years; in May it emerged that Paki-stani peacekeepers had been trading weapons with Congolese militia.

UN Peacekeepers: Defacing History That Others Won't!

Added: I was thinking about the line as a mystical place of great cultural significance. I wonder if there's some reason they couldn't say 'as a holy place.'

Be it noted

the amount of habanero that just makes a pot of chili nice & warm, makes the same size pot of stew a touch on the hot side.

Good, though. Especially with cornbread.g

Another reason Britain ought to go back to having a death penalty

Islamic extremist gang 'plotted to kidnap British Muslim soldier and behead him like a pig'

An Islamist fanatic plotted to snatch a British Muslim soldier from the streets and film him being beheaded "like a pig" in a lock-up garage, a court heard.

Parviz Khan, 37, built up a terrorist cell in Birmingham and planned to kidnap the soldier before filming his "ghastly" death for release to the media.

The attack was designed to cause "panic and fear" amongst the Army and the wider British public.
...
Leicester Crown Court was told that the terror cell had sent money and equipment to Pakistan for the use of terrorists trying to kill British soldiers on the Afghan border.

Prosecutor Nigel Rumfitt QC said Khan wanted to get "physically involved" in the bloodshed but was prevented by "his bosses overseas" because his supply operation was so valued.

Instead, the court heard, he hatched the plot to kill a soldier in the UK.

Such lovely people, aren't they?

Thanks to Theo for pointing this out.

Monster Hunter International

Finished it last night. Good book, well worth getting hold of.

Remember I said I found myself delaying finishing it for the same reason as the last Dresden book? Something struck me about it: it read similar to the first Dresden book, Storm Front. Not the same story, similarities in being a first book. Not a bad thing, that was a good book too, and look where it led.

Yup, gummint health care

is gonna be great.
Doctors are calling for NHS treatment to be withheld from patients who are too old or who lead unhealthy lives.

And if I remember right, Governor Sibelius has been a bit hostile to CCW, but she's all a-twitter over this:
“Fight your way through six different exciting locations in hopes of being granted parole,” the box reads. “Escape prison riots in the yard, slip glass into the mob boss’s lasagna in the cafeteria, steal painkillers from the nurse’s desk in the Infirmary, avoid being cornered by the Aryans in the Shower Room, fight off Latin Kings in Gang War and try not to smoke your entire stash in the Hole.”

So what influences from a buttoned-down Democratic upbringing led to a sexually charged board game with gang names like Zulu Nation, Texas Syndicate and Nazi Lowriders? A game that stipulates that “a guard finds you after you sold him some bad crack. Lose a turn and 50 packs” or “You slipped in the shower. Big mistake. Proceed to infirmary”?

Ah, the wonders of multi-culturalism

and its effect on gays.

I wrote before about the idiocy of groups like 'Queers for Palistine' demonstrating for a group that would, at the least, beat the crap out of them and tell them "Change or die." Well, here's some of what that good old tolerance for the 'poor muslims' has brought.
Not very long ago, Oslo was an icy Shangri-la of Scandinavian self-discipline, governability, and respect for the law. But in recent years, there have been grim changes, including a rise in gay-bashings. The summer of 2006 saw an unprecedented wave of them. The culprits, very disproportionately, are young Muslim men.

It’s not just Oslo, of course. The problem afflicts most of Western Europe. And anecdotal evidence suggests that such crimes are dramatically underreported. My own partner chose not to report his assault. I urged him to, but he protested that it wouldn’t make any difference. He was probably right.

The reason for the rise in gay bashings in Europe is clear – and it’s the same reason for the rise in rape. As the number of Muslims in Europe grows, and as the proportion of those Muslims who were born and bred in Europe also grows, many Muslim men are more inclined to see Europe as a part of the umma (or Muslim world), to believe that they have the right and duty to enforce sharia law in the cities where they live, and to recognize that any aggression on their part will likely go unpunished. Such men need not be actively religious in order to feel that they have carte blanche to assault openly gay men and non-submissive women, whose freedom to live their lives as they wish is among the most conspicuous symbols of the West’s defiance of holy law.
...
Alas, it is now very clearly the opposite. The number of reported gay-bashings in Amsterdam now climbs steadily year by year. Nearly half Muslim, the city is a front in the struggle between democracy and sharia, under which, lest it be forgotten, homosexuality can be a capital offense. Things have gotten so bad there that even on the part of the exceedingly politically correct, there has been a degree of acknowledgment that something has changed, and is still changing. After a group of Amsterdam Muslims beat up Chris Crain, the six-foot-five editor of the gay newspaper The Washington Blade, in May 2005, the head of the Netherlands’ leading gay-rights organization admitted that tolerance of gay people in that city was “slipping away like sand through the fingers” and that “gays and lesbians are less willing to walk hand-in-hand because they might be beaten up.”

I can testify that this is true. Yet politicians, journalists, activists, and others who cling to the multicultural mindset can’t bring themselves to acknowledge the Islamic foundations of all this bullying. Instead, they offer the same kind of nonsense that was served up by a Human Rights Watch spokesman after the Chris Crain incident. “There’s still an extraordinary degree of racism in Dutch society,” that spokesman said. “Gays often become the victims of this when immigrants retaliate for the inequities they have to suffer.”

Yeah, the muslims are ALWAYS the victim. Not just in their own eyes, but in the eyes of the PC-at-all-costs brigade. This is in Amsterdam, mind you, where they've bent over backwards to the point of no longer having a spine to show their 'tolerance'. Which, at this level is more accurately known as their society death wish.

In any event, another mayor, London’s Ken Livingstone, has already blazed that trail. In 2004, playing host to Sunni scholar Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who has supported the execution of gay people, Livingstone hailed him as a “progressive.” When gay activists called him on this ridiculous assertion, Livingstone retaliated by putting out a dissertation-length report whitewashing Qaradawi and smearing his critics as racists.
Progressives, aren't they cute?

And for an illustration of a big part of the problem, the unwillingness of so many muslims to criticize anything done by the radical/traditional types, or- if they do speak a criticism- their making excuses for it, no matter what, we go back to Norway:
Perhaps younger, well educated Muslims are more enlightened? Another participant in the University of Oslo debate, Muslim Student Association head Usman Rana, said that he personally didn’t support making homosexuality a capital crime, but that he would not criticize other countries’ practices. “There is unfortunately a tendency in Norway to degrade religious people,” Rana told Universitas, the college newspaper. “It is due to an extreme secularism among the Norwegian public. I fervently hope that our participation [in the debate on the death penalty for gays] helps to create a more nuanced view of Islam. The Norwegian public needs to become more liberal.”

Got it. If you speak out against wanting to make being homosexual a death penalty offense, it means you're 'downgrading religious people', you're not 'liberal' enough. And, again, muslims are the victims, no matter what.

Happily, not all buy into this "We must be the victim, no matter what, no matter who" crap. These folks, for instance, seem quite willing to point things out. And just how much publicity do they get? Damn little, and I'll bet if you asked a lot of 'progressives' why they don't bring them up, you'd hear something along the lines of "We shouldn't criticize, or help those who do criticize Islam, it's insensitive." Even if the people criticizing are trying to keep their religeon from completely devolving to nothing more than a murder cult wanting total power. It's already that to far too many, we need to encourage those who want to save it from that.

Some absolutely amazing pictures of Great Whites

to be found here.

Retired Green Beanie court martialed:

Trial Enjoyed by All

BREVARD, Jan. 19, 2008 – Retired Army Green Beret Smokey Taylor got his court martial this weekend and came away feeling good about it.

Taylor, at age 80 the oldest member of Chapter XXXIII of the Special Forces Association, was on trial by his peers under the charge of “failing to use a weapon of sufficient caliber” in the shooting of an intruder at his home in Knoxville, TN, in December.

...

Taylor said nothing in his own defense, choosing instead to allow his peers to debate the matter. After the trial he said the ammunition was indeed old and added the new information that the perp had soiled his pants as he crawled out of the house.

“I would have had an even worse mess to clean up if it had gone through his forehead,” Taylor said. “It was good for both of us that it didn’t.”

I had to create a 'Disarmament idiocy' link

for this crap.
"I would have stopped him," Knox said. "Because when I went to school, I carried a gun. It was legal; I did it."

Goddard, a Virginia Tech senior who was shot four times in the April 16 massacre, was taken aback, then said: "I feel sorry for you - the fact that you feel you need to protect yourself in every situation.

"You're afraid of crazy situations happening. I've lived through this and I know that I can't continue in my life afraid of things," he said, adding that he put his "full trust" in the police to protect society.

I have to sit here and marvel at the idiocy of this. He's sorry for someone who 'feels the need to protect himself'? SORRY?!? "...I know I can't continue in my life to be afraid of things," but is SORRY for someone who's not afraid, only prepared just in case?

Just frickin' amazing. Of course it fits in with the ADL jumping into the Heller case, commented on by the Pistolero here.

People who think A: there's something very moral about being disarmed and unwilling to protect themselves and B: want the rest of us to be forced into the same mindset, or at least forced to act like it. Wonderful.

Book update

Monster Hunter International

I'm about 3/4 through it, and I like it. I realized the other day the reason haven't finished it yet, I've been reading it same as I did the last Dresden Files book: don't want it to be over too soon, so haven't been reading the way I usually do.

Soon, soon...

More information on the latest SWAT raids gone wrong

Sebastian had this with this link to Balko on this raid. And it does not look good. It looks like they set up the raid based solely on the statement of the informant with no investigation to see if the information was good. Looked a bit more recently and he's got this:
That’s not the case with Frederick. It took five days just to reveal that the police found drugs. We’ve yet to be told what quantity of drugs police found in his home. We do know that they didn’t find the major grow operation described in the warrant. It’s also probably time to start inquiring about the informant whose tip led to the raid. Who is he? Did he have a grudge against Frederick? What exactly did he see that made him think this was a major operation? Does he know enough about marijuana to know what a major grow operation would look like?

Here’s another scary thought: Frederick says one reason he was frightened was that three days prior to the shooting, someone had broken into his house, rummaged through his belongings, but didn’t take anything. The search warrant says that the confidential informant was in Frederick’s home within 72 hours of the raid. Could it be that the informant was the one who broke into Frederick’s house? Might be worth asking Frederick who was in his home in the previous week.

and this:
He told me a couple of interesting things that didn’t appear in the paper’s interview with Frederick. First, Frederick told the reporter that as the police were taking him out of the house in handcuffs, he told them he was sorry, and that he was scared because his house had been burglarized earlier in the week. According to the reporter, Frederick says the police arresting him then told him they not only knew about the burglary, they knew who had done it. Neither the reporter nor Frederick made the connection at the time that the person who broke in could well also be the informant.
...
More interesting, though, are the comments from neighbors who not only also vouch for Frederick’s credibility, they also say they never heard the announcement the Chesapeake Police Department insists was given before officers forced entry. One was outside at the time of the raid. That’s not to say there was no announcement. It is to say that if someone standing outside didn’t hear it, how could we expect Frederick, who was inside and in bed, to hear it?
among other things.

At this point it looks like the end result of this mess is that an unnecessary 'dynamic entry' was done on lousy reason, with no prior investigation of the information, on the home of a gardener who had a little grass for personal use. Who apparently had NO marijuana growing at all, let alone the 'sophisticated grow operation' the informant claimed. And a lot of other very flaky information as to who did what. Which led the the completely unnecessary raid and the death of a police officer.

Damn.

We need some joys in the evening

from Sondra









And from Seraphic Secret:

1. Israel allowed 50 trucks full of food supplies into Gaza today. Before that, most Gazans had been forced to eat surplus explosives.

2. Palestinians say the supplies of flour and milk Israel allowed into Gaza today were "insufficient"... mostly because they can't figure out how to set them on fire.

3. The European Commission is condemning Israel's actions to stop Palestinian rocket attacks as “collective punishment"... because stopping the attacks unfairly keeps Palestinians from dancing in the streets when Jews die.

4. Israel has shut off all power to Gaza. Apparently, suicide bombers and exploding rockets are not an acceptable payment for the electric bill.

5. Hamas leaders are strongly protesting the move, especially since darkness makes it hard to continue killing people.

I'd love to have seen the face of the Arab

when he looked up:
As he grew, he became a key member of the unit, being trained to carry mortar shells.
In the heat of summer, he reportedly learned to work the shower of the unit's bath hut.
On one occasion, Voytek was delighted to find the door ajar - and discovered an Arab who was spying for a raiding party.

The intruder confessed all, and the enemy were rounded up. Hailed a hero, Voytek was given two bottles of beer and allowed to spend all morning splashing happily in the bath hut.
I'll bet he was.

It's not a Righteous Shooting,

unfortunately, but at least the bad guys got hammered.
Despite being temporarily knocked unconscious and then stabbed three times in the head, he said he became "invigorated" by the sight of the attackers threatening his 13-year-old daughter Aisling.

In a rage he wrestled a gun from the arms of one attacker and then beat and chased the masked raiders from his home.

The Old Bailey heard how the armed trio turned up at Mr Dwyer's luxury home in Uxbridge, west London, a day after battering to death restaurant owner Helen Chung, 65.

Just a bunch of little choirboys out for a lark, weren't they?
...
"These b**tards were out of control. We were going to die anyway, that's what I thought.

"I thought if I am going to die then I would rather die like a man than a dog. The guy was standing over me with the gun and I thought if I can move the gun with my arm and make the bullet go into the wall I could come up and bash him."

Mr Dwyer described how he pushed the weapon away from his face before rising up to strike his attacker.

"I hit him several times, I hit him plenty," he said.

"The man with the knuckle-duster screamed, 'He's fighting back the b**tard, kill the b**tard, he's fighting back."

Take note of that last(bold mine). These little shits are so used to nobody daring to stand up to them, it's an actual shock when someone does.

But the businessman, who is married to wife Jane and has a second son Shaun, 19, told the court how the pair would not leave and tried to push back into the bedroom.

"So we had another bout of fisticuffs," said Mr Dwyer, "But this time I’m in charge of this battle. I let the door go and let them fall in and then, bam, had a go at them again.

"I have never used a weapon in my life and it was a great feeling. I grabbed the gun and bashed it across the knuckle-duster guy.

"Next thing is they took off and I chased them down the stairs. I bashed knuckle-duster man with the gun and I broke the handle on his head."

The burglars fled empty handed in the car they had stolen from Mrs Chung minutes earlier, the jury has heard.

Mr Dwyer was left with broken ribs in the attack as well as 30 cuts to his body and head including a gaping 3cm wound in his thigh.

What's the one thing that's been pointed out by many over time? The single most important thing is your mindset: if it happens, fight to win no matter what.

Mr. Dwyer, your nation needs more people like you, and if there was a way I'd buy you a drink. It's too bad you don't know how to shoot, you could have punched the tickets of the bastards when you got the gun away from them. Better yet, if your government wasn't so full of GFW nannies you could have had something appropriate of your own.

In any case, as happy an ending as could probably be in Britain these days, brought to you by the Englishman.

Og leads to the Broad,

and the Broad leads to this.

Drink alert is in effect.

On John McCain and

'learning his lesson on immigration'.
The ethnocentrist, border obliteration activist is in tight with the top echelons of the McCain camp. McCain campaign guru Mark MacKinnon is in the foreground. Maybe sending e-mails about their future shamnesty plans with Teddy Kennedy and Lindsay Graham.
...
Hernandez was a close advisor to Vicente “Welcome to North America” Fox and headed up a Mexican bureaucracy called the “Presidential Office for Mexicans Abroad.” It was designed to allow Hernandez to travel across the country, meddling with local, state, and federal immigration enforcement on behalf of millions of illegal aliens in America. He lobbied for illegal alien driver’s licenses and Mexico first, defended Mexican bus operators carrying illegal aliens to the USA, and promoted extending banking privileges to illegal aliens.

Miserable, lying politician. And that goes for both of them.

Idiocy roundup

I've heard a lot of nasty things about New Jersey, and this fits right in:
The administrator walked away when Lonegan said that they had a right to protest a public meeting peacefully and that he wanted to see the board's written policy on the matter. A dozen police officers then insisted that Lonegan move at least one-quarter mile from the school. When Lonegan replied: "Nope," he was handcuffed and placed under arrest. Former Atlantic City Councilman Seth Grossman was likewise arrested for being among those holding signs that read: "No Toll Hikes!!! Repudiate Unconstitutional Debt!" Bold mine

Not enough to say "You can't stand here", they wanted them "at least" a quarter-mile away? What's Jersey for 'bullshit'?

University PC idiocy:
Nor is the University's explanation for its silence remotely justifiable. As best I can tell from the accounts, the University's argument is that it can't describe what specifically was said because it needs to protect the student's confidentiality — but if this was supposedly said in open class, why would revealing the statement jeopardize the student's confidentiality? (The article that quotes Jane quotes her as saying that she "came to [her] professor and said, 'this is crazy'"; presumably she means someone other than Hindley when she says "my professor," but if she did tell him, then I'm still more baffled by how there could be any risk to the student's confidentiality here.)
And at another of our bastions of education:
But in any event, the university doesn't even claim that the student is punished solely because of the alleged threat: It expressly says that part of the reason for the investigation (and, one can infer, the ultimate punishment) was the anti-gay viewpoint of the statements. That's a pretty clear violation of the First Amendment.
But, as we've been told, the 1st only counts if you're not hurting the feelings of a protected group. Or being generally non-PC.

Remember the tiger at the San Francisco zoo? Well, look at this. The damn wall was 1/3 shorter than it should have been. And it looks like there's some other problems there. You know, I don't care if the clowns were yelling at the cat: that makes them jerks, but it does not relieve the zoo of its responsibility in this mess.

On this, I can't decide for certain whether to be worried or not; you could make the case either way, just an unfortunate piece of wording or a sympathizer with the enemy speaking.

It's official: Some of the boys in blue

are out of their frikkin' minds:
...Hello, F-ing cover fire Gents, get the job done! This is really something that pisses me off, we are breeding a bunch of victimsnot warriors! If your fellow Warrior is going to be on point and he/she takes a round or gun fire???? Lay down SUPPRESSIVE FIRE A.S.A.P. so you can get your fellow Officer out of the kill zone! We out here on LAPD had a bunch of Officers serving a warrant on a 187 suspect and after the knock and notice, he put 7 , 45 caliber rounds from a Glock 21 through the door, and NO ONE in the stack laid down any cover fire!!! WTF???...
Sailor Curt has that post on another SWAT raid gone bad, which has gotten a lot of press on the web the last few days.

I wrote a while back about a magazine with an article about "Dallas SWAT: Street Warriors" and commented on the problem with that mindset; up above you've got one of the aspects of the problem. Freakin' SUPPRESSIVE FIRE? In an urban area? Hello, dumbass, have you heard of danger to innocent people? Like in the house or other apartments? Or down the damn street, depending on weapons and just where they're aimed? In a terrorist incident you MIGHT be able to legitimately argue that, but not here. YOU ARE NOT A SOLDIER: you are SUPPOSED to be a LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICER. They are NOT the same job.

Among other things Sailor Curt notes "What I found especially interesting was the list of items seized. Note that there is no mention of drugs or drug paraphernalia." And since drugs were the reason for the raid...

By the way, I saw a comment at one site by someone that 8:30 PM isn't too late, people aren't generally asleep, etc. Some shifts I work, that time is about halfway between when I go to bed and get up: I'm sound asleep. Somebody yells "Police!" and then breaks in my door, all I'm going to hear is the door breaking and intruders in my home. Considering how many people work different shifts, that would cover a bunch of folks.

A site you might want to check out

These folks left a comment in my last post about the nonsense in Canada. I've only had a couple of minutes to look over it, but I'll be checking it out further: Muslims Against Sharia.

Also, Iowahawk has snitched, uh, stolen, uhfound the notes from Ezra Levant's hearing. And Sondra points to some interesting notes from Mr. Levant, including
My lawyer has received two upset calls from the Alberta Human Rights Commission. The first, from Shirlene McGovern herself, complained about the publicity she is receiving. I'm surprised at her reaction -- you'd think someone who regularly interrogates citizens about their private political views would be comfortable with the concept of public scrutiny. Imagine if she actually had to expose her private thoughts, not just her public actions as a government officer.
Yeah, just imagine...

And to touch back on things in Britain,

we find the Home Secretary admitting that it's not quite as safe as she'd claimed:
Jacqui Smith suffered a barrage of criticism yesterday after admitting she would not feel safe walking the streets after dark.

Opposition MPs said the Home Secretary had made an "admission of failure" to the millions of shift-workers who have no option but to brave the threat of violence.

Aides of Miss Smith compounded her gaffe with a desperate attempt to undo the damage by claiming she had recently popped out in the evening to "buy a kebab in Peckham".

In fact, she has round-the-clock police protection.

Kind of like our "You don't need to be armed, just call the police. And ignore the security people who keep my fat ass safe." politicians and celebrities.

She also states She insisted individuals were much less likely to be a victim of crime since Labour came to power, but admitted it was a "big job" to persuade them that towns and cities had not become more dangerous. However, if you look at a response article here, you find this:
The rest of us, of course, who don't enjoy our own personalised police officer, have to play Russian roulette with the risk of being robbed or attacked every time we venture out alone.

Yet the Government's insulting response is to parrot the mantra that crime is going down.

The Home Secretary was at it again when she claimed people were now safer than they had been ten years ago, and that the main problem was to convince them that crime was diminishing.

In other words, the problem was not crime but the fear of crime that was exaggerated out of all proportion.

If this is so, why then does Ms Smith herself feel unsafe when on the streets alone after dark?

The fact is that citizen Smith is right while Home Secretary Smith is wrong. As was revealed yesterday, violent crime by children and teenagers has gone up by a third in only three years, while offences in general by this group have gone up by more than 20 per cent.

And so on. I think it was about two years ago the then-head of the Metropolitan Police made a big speech about how an area had improved so much that 'people don't have to lock their doors'. And was then loudly called a liar and a fool by the people who actually lived there, who would have answered the door with a shotgun if they'd been allowed to own one.

Last week, for example, three teenagers were convicted of the murder of Garry Newlove, who was kicked to death when he confronted them outside his home.

The gang leader, Adam Swellings, had been freed on bail only hours before the killing, despite a history of increasingly violent behaviour spanning more than two years before Mr Newlove's murder.

Yet even though this included the intimidation of witnesses and an attack on a 16-year- old girl, Swellings was repeatedly bailed only to commit more offences - culminating in the entirely preventable killing of Mr Newlove.

What on earth goes through the minds of magistrates who bail someone with this kind of record?

Madam, I'm afraid it's the same kind of bovine excrement that dwells between the ears of your Home Secretary. And a lot of your other political masters.

Oh boy, I think the Canadian Human Rights Commision

needs to do some housecleaning.

Just before they're thrown out on their collective ass.

First, check out what Mark Steyn has up, especially on a clown named Warman.

Then, go to Small Dead Animals, and just start scrolling down, too much stuff to link to each one. For a lot of it, look for 'Warman' again.

After that, if you're interested, go to Five Feet of Fury and- again- scroll down, but especially look at this: a tv show produced by the CBC called (I kid you not) Little Mosque on the Prarie.

And finally, check out this article by Ezra Levant on the current inquisitionhearings he's facing at the hands of the 'Human Rights Officers':
Early in her interrogation, she said "I always ask people … what was your intent and purpose of your article?"

It wasn't even a question about what we had published in the magazine. It was a question about my private thoughts. I asked her why my private feelings were of interest to the government. She said, very calmly, that they would be a factor taken into account by the government in determining whether or not I was guilty.

Officer McGovern said it as calmly as if I had asked her what time it was.
and
One of the complainants against me is someone I would describe as a radical Muslim imam, Syed Soharwardy. He grew up in the madrassas of Pakistan and he lectures on the Saudi circuit. He advocates sharia law for all countries, including Canada. His website is rife with Islamic supremacism — offensive to many Canadian Jews, gentiles, women and gays. But his sensitivities — his Saudi-Pakistani values — have been offended by me.

And so now the secular government of Alberta is enforcing his fatwa against the cartoons.

It's the same for Mohamed Elmasry, the complainant against Maclean's magazine for publishing an excerpt from Mark Steyn's book, America Alone. Egyptian-born Elmasry has publicly said that any adult Jew in Israel is a legitimate target for a terrorist attack, a grossly offensive statement.

Both the Canadian and B.C. Human Rights Commissions are now hearing his complaints against Maclean's.

One question: what the hell happened to Canada, and can they save themselves?

And remember, that miserable bozo McCain

doesn't want to put up a fence.
Aguilar was trying to place spike strips in the path of two vehicles believed to have illegally entered the country from Mexico when one of the vehicles hit him, agent Michael Bernacke, a spokesman for the agency's Yuma sector, told The Associated Press.

And what makes this even worse is if he'd managed to dodge the vehicle, and fired on it, he'd probably have that jackass prosecutor Sutton trying to put him in prison.

Remember the Chicago lawyer who keyed the Marine's car?

The Emperor pointed to this piece in the Chicago Tribune about the hearing. Some bits from it:
Grodner was late to court for the second time in the case. Grodner called Assistant State's Attorney Patrick Kelly, (Marine Corps/Vietnam 1969-1972), informing Kelly that he would be late to court.

"He wanted to avoid the media," Kelly said Friday. "So he's coming a half hour late."
Awww, he didn't like the attention for some reason.

Grodner told me he'd describe himself as a "radical liberal" who's ready to leave Chicago now with all this negative publicity and move to the south of France and do some traveling.

Let's see, 'radical liberal' = chickenshit vandal. Kind of like those clowns in Olympia and Seattle. And he wants to run away to France. BIG surprise.

During the proceedings, the judge described the offense as anger rose in his voice, especially as Grodner started balking on a plea arrangement he'd made with prosecutors.

"Is this what you did? Yes or no," Judge O'Malley asked Grodner.

"Without knowing, yes," Grodner said, sticking to his I-might-have-done-it-but-didn't-really-mean-it defense.
Ok, this has got to be the most chickenshit part of this. He was CAUGHT keying the car, made bullcrap comments about it, and now says THIS?
O'Malley asked again, in a stronger voice, not that of a judge but of a cop on the street or a Marine who meant business.

"DID YOU KNOWINGLY CAUSE DAMAGE TO THIS CAR?" O'Malley asked.

Grodner bowed his head, meekly, and responded in an equally meek voice:

"Yes," he said.

And after the hearing was over:
We stood outside, in the parking lot, talking for 20 minutes. He smoked, and I didn't. He explained that he wasn't anti-military and why he pleaded guilty.
He's not 'anti-military', but he keyed the car. Because it had Marine stuff on it. Yeah.
"The judge, he's the guy with the black robes," Grodner said. He could have been slapped with a felony, but Sgt. McNulty's family said they wanted to put this behind them and let it go as a misdemeanor.
Translation: "I pled guilty because I was afraid of a trial."
Grodner showed no remorse, and I asked if he'd apologize.
This pretty much sums up the 'radical liberal' lawyer:
"Yes, I'd say, 'I'm sorry if I scratched your car.' It escalated. That's when he wanted me locked up and thrown away," said Grodner, always the victim.

Lying piece of crap. If it had 'escalated' the Marine would have put discipline aside and beat the crap out of you. And you'd have deserved it, you miserable bastard.

A fine representative of the legal profession and liberalism, isn't he?

This is not a fun day in some ways

First, Fred Thompson just dropped out of the race. Just freakin' great. It's come to the point I have to decide if there are any of these clowns left in the race I can hold my nose for, or just say to hell with it. Unless the Stupid & BackstabbingRepublican party can actually straighten some things up, we're looking at looting politicians screwing us over fast or slow. Some damn choice.

As Kim notes, the ADL has decided that supporting gun bans is "to allow states to protect their citizens’ lives, liberty and property by regulating the purchase and possession of firearms. The League urged the Court to ensure that states retain the ability to keep guns out of the hands of “violent bigots.” I pulled up the ADL site and started to write them, but cancelled it; why bother? They've made it plain, in the past and now, that people like me are considered just as dirty as some clown with a swastika on his arm. I mean, hell, I not only posted that quote from George MacDonald Fraser, I commented that it was true; I'm probably on the same list as Kevin.

Which, mind you, is good company. Screw you, ADL.

Gee, why would we worry about the state of university education, and the politics of professors?

And while this would explain some things about Chavez(Stalin Wannabe, VZ), the basic is still that he IS a Stalin wannabe. And any excuse will do for adding to his power.

And while the sun is shining, it's cold and windy outside. I've got a dozen milk jugs, and the lumber to build a rack to set them up to test the .30 Carbine loads, but not in this weather: numb, stiff hands make accurate shooting difficult and this it to test loads, not me.

To quote Raj Whitehall, "How truly joyous."

And as a followon to the previous,

I'll direct you to this article by Mark Stein on the attempted post-birth abortion of free speech being set up in Canada.

If you don't want to read it, I ask you to think about this little excerpt:
Consider this statement, part of the criteria by which the star chamber determines when a Section XIII crime has occurred. What does it look for as evidence?

"Messages that make use of allegedly true stories, news reports, pictures and references to apparently reputable sources in an attempt to lend an air of objectivity and truthfulness to the extremely negative characterization of the targeted group have been found to be likely to expose members of the targeted group to hatred and contempt."

Read that again slowly. Citing news reports, reputable sources, facts, statistics, documentation, quotations, references, scholarly studies, etc., has been "found" to be clear evidence of your "likely" "pre-crime.

Read it. Then the next time some brainless rat's knackerswell-meaning idiot starts talking about the necessity of 'hate-speech' laws, consider some possible way to make them understand. Or just kick them somewhere sensitive since they may have lost the ability to actually think.

A depressing and enraging line of thought

Had a friend from down south visit over the weekend. This was both a good and a bad thing: the Good because it was nice to see them; Bad because I had to clean up(it's not dirty, but messy seems to be my standard operating mode). Overall a nice weekend, but one part far more stressful than I needed and I'd have skipped it if I could.

Friend had never seen the Murrah Building Memorial for the April 19 bombing, and wanted to see it before leaving. I live in Oklahoma City, but I'd never been there. Matter of fact, I'd made a point of not going. I was working that day, and down the road I'll write about what I was doing and what happened on my end, but not now. Let's put it this way, I never went for the same reason I've never watched Schindler's List: I have no desire to get that pissed off. Or angered. Or enraged. Put it as you will.

Night had fallen before we arrived, and as we walked around I did not look directly at the empty chairs, or the names, except in response to a question. Told some parts of the story they hadn't heard. Really, it was about as bad as I'd expected it to be, not only for my reaction to the particular incident, but for the chain of associations it set off.

One of the people responsible died by the executioners hand, one is in prison. But I think there were others, and I don't think McVeigh dreamed- and set up- this on his own. And that started me thinking about our current enemy. About people who speak with enthusiasm of wiping an entire people off the face of the planet. Of people who well send their own children into a restaurant with a bomb around their belly because "You will please god if you kill Jews while you die." Of Beslan. Of the people who want to recreate Beslan, worse if possible, here. People who'll murder a woman for accidentally showing an ankle in the market, or beat them senseless- and maybe kill them- for being out of the house without a male family escort. There's a school a few blocks from my home, and these disgusting excuses for humans would like to take it over and kill everyone in it.

The level of, I don't really have the words for it, 'rage' will have to do, that this causes is almost debilitating, because- barring some flat miracles- I think it'll happen somewhere. Like it was said a long time ago, we have to get lucky a lot; they only have to get lucky once. And when it does, not only will we have to deal with the incident and the aftermath, we'll have to listen to the idiots and freedom-haters tell us how it's our fault, that if only we'd (fill in the damn blank) it wouldn't have happened. And a lot of people, like me, will have to deal with the fact that they cannot individually do anything about it, and that's one of the worst parts.

Friend had never heard of Beslan. Since I'd brought the name up I had to give a basic 'what happened', and I think I nearly made them sick. The told me later that they tried not to think about such things because they couldn't deal with it(they'd made it maybe a third through Schindler's List and left the theater). You know something? I wish I could do that. I wish I could simply not think about it, push those thoughts and the information aside. But I can't.

I'm hoping that there are some amongst the islamists who realize the consequences if they do pull that off here, but I fear that, if there are any, they'll either stay quiet or be ignored. And the followup is that there will be people here who'll work hard to keep us from doing anything about it.

Shit. I need a drink.

Mossberg 702 Plinkster

Range test







I had the chance to help in the shakeout run of one of these today. If you haven't seen one before, this is a .22lr semi-auto rifle. The one I fired has a blue finish(the above picture is a chromed model), and a polymer stock. Sights are your basic bead front with hood and U-shaped rear notch, with the welcome feature that the rear adjusts for both windage and elevation, both screw adjustments. And (of course) the receiver is grooved for mounting a scope. Cross-bolt safety. The barrel is 18", and the overall length* about 37". It does have a bolt hold-open, which is the magazine follower: after the last round is fired the follower sticks up high enough to block the bolt.

This thing is light. That polymer stock is injection-molded from the looks, and hollow, helping the rifle into a total weight of 4.1 pounds. Durability? Open question, I have no previous knowledge of these so time will tell. The forend does leave the barrel free-floated

The owner said the trigger, as it came out of the box, was pretty rough; apparently that was from some crud left on the hammer & sear surfaces, as after wiping them clean and putting a dab of grease on them, it became much lighter and cleaner. He did not take the fire-control group apart, as he could find no information on doing so. You may notice from the picture, that the receiver/barrel looks a lot like the Marlin Model 60; disassembly is very similar, but the FCG does not look the same.

The weather being cloudy, cold and windy, this was tried out on a 25-yard indoor range. And the lights at the backstop were out, which didn't exactly help with aiming. We tried it out with four different brands: Remington Golden Bullet hollowpoints, Winchester hollowpoints, Federal Champion and Russian Vostok target ammo(had a couple of boxes I bought to try.

The trigger broke cleanly, I'd guess at about five pounds. And the thing ate all the ammo, including the Vostok, with only one bobble. At the very end, I loaded a mag with a few of each, all mixed together, and one of the (I think) Vostok cases didn't clear the bolt before it closed. That was the only problem in about 200 rounds, which isn't bad for an inexpensive rifle on its first outing. Ejection varied from forward and left(a long way forward) for the Remington and Winchester, less so on angle and distance with the Federal, and slightly back and only a couple of feet away for Vostok.

As I mentioned above, with basic sights and not-too-good light I'm not going to state "This is the level of accuracy"; I will say that all these cartridges easily stayed within 1.5" groups. I'd love to put a scope on this and try it at 50 yards with a solid rest.

There was one problem, and that was with the magazine. There's an open slot at the back corner on the left side, and I think that's where the trouble lies. You'd get five rounds in and sometimes something would stick. You'd have to push on the top cartridge and/or on the rims of the cartridges below to get things free. It did this several times. Being new to this, I have no way of knowing if it was this particular magazine, or something in the design.

Overall, not a bad little rifle. Short, light, it ate all ammo tried and showed good accuracy. And the guy picked it up for the price of $99. Not on sale, regular price. Kim has referred to a .22 rifle as a household commodity, and this thing seems to fit the bill: something you could stick in the closet or by the door to deal with pests, or put in the trunk or back of the truck for the same reasons.

*The chrome version has a 21" barrel, and it can be had in a 'Bantam' version with a 2" shorter stock.

I kind of like this roundup thing

so I'll keep it going.

First, (and I already told you this) Hillary Clinton is a socialist without the courage or integrity to admit it:
According to the New York Times, Hillary Clinton says that if she becomes president the federal government will take a more active role in the economy “to address what she called the excesses of the market and of the Bush administration.” Scary stuff for anyone who still believes in the free market.

Second, remember a few days go, the post on canaries in the coal mine?
The government officers who entered the sprawling, country club-like complex were ostensibly looking for a stash of weapons and for evidence of “subversive activity.” They found neither. In the subsequent days, the Venezuelan Jewish community’s umbrella organization, the Confederation of Israelite Associations of Venezuela, fired off a statement denouncing the raid as an “unjustifiable act” aimed at creating tensions between the community and the government of socialist President Hugo Chavez.
Ooooh, yeah, Chavez will really straighten up! A statement has been made! Especially considering this:
Jewish communal leaders also believe that another element might be at work. Sultan noted that Tarek al Assaimi, a former far-left student leader whose father was the representative of Saddam Hussein’s Baath party in Venezuela, is the deputy Interior and Justice minister in charge of internal security and, as such, could have been involved in initiating the raid.

Third, George Clooney: Messenger of Peace. Question is, will the Messenger do anything about the child abusers and porn rings? Or are they not worthy of notice by the Messenger when it's UN personnel doing it? And that mass murder/slavery thing in Darfur, it's really annoying, isn't it, Georgie?

Fourth, Kevin has one of his pieces up, this one on media bias and the blindness of so many media weenies to it. Which includes this quote from Bernard Goldberg:
"I understand how you feel," I told him, trying to diffuse a bad situation. "But I didn't say anything in the piece about how even you, Andrew, have agreed with me about the liberal bias."

Instead of calming things down, my comment made him go ballistic. "That would have been like raping my wife and kidnapping my kids!" he screamed at me.
Talk about a telling statement...

Fifth, will you third-world peasants stop trying to become un-Gaia-friendly? Your betters like it so much better with you living in dung huts.

Sixth, "Buy GloballyLocally Grown!"

And finally, some information on how the gun and self-defense bans in England have helped matters:
Violent crime rate wasn’t the only type of crime that skyrocketed. As a matter of fact, gun crimes period increased. Read that again: handgun crime increased. Gun control utterly failed. AsBBC reports in 2001, “[a] new study suggests the use of handguns in crime rose by 40% in the two years after the weapons were banned.” The crime rates didn’t stop there. AsBBC reports in 2003, “Gun crime has risen by 35% in a year, new Home Office figures show. There were 9,974 incidents involving firearms in the 12 months to April 2002 - a rise from 7,362 over the previous year.”
...
Other forms of crime increased too. As the same BBC article in 2003 reports, “Overall crime in the year to September was up 9.3%, with domestic burglary up 7.9%, drugs offences up 12.3% and sex offences up 18.2%.”
Amazing how that works, isn't it?

It should not surprise me that this piece of walking crap

is from California. Poor little baby caught lying, and demands he face no penalty for it.
Alvarez, an elected representative to the Three Valleys Municipal Water District, said last year at a water district meeting that he was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for his deeds as a Marine.

After admitting he never served in the military, he was charged with violating the Stolen Valor Act. He pleaded not guilty to the misdemeanor charge.

Alvarez's lawyer Brianna J. Fuller argued in the motion to dismiss, which will be heard Jan. 14 in federal court, that "protecting the reputation of military decorations" is not a compelling enough reason to place "restrictions on false statements."

I'm guessing you actually know this, you miserable bastard shyster, but this is not to 'protect the reputation' of a decoration: it's to punish stinking bastards like your client for claiming they served at this level and were decorated for it.

Your abscess on the ass of mankindclient couldn't simply lie, oh no, he claimed not only to have been a Marine, but to have committed such an act of bravery as to be noted by the Medal. And now he thinks it 'not fair' that he pay the price for his lies.

Make you a deal: all charges dropped, and we offer a selection of Marines the chance to make their displeasure with him known. How 'bout that?

The Last Testament of George MacDonald Fraser

is found here. And I very much thank Sondra for linking to it, as I hadn't seen it before.

I'll just take note of two things here. The first:
Furthermore, it makes grieving part of the national culture, as it was on such a nauseating scale when large areas were carpeted in rotting vegetation in "mourning" for the Princess of Wales;
Shortly after the death, I was at the Scottish country dance group that used to run every Thursday night, started and run by a gentleman named Ellis. He'd emigrated here after WWII(once mentioned, looking at my bike, that he'd been a motorcycle messenger in the Royal Greenjackets), set up a tailor business and did quite well. Just before the night ended a guy mention to Ellis that "There's a card downstairs at the bookstore that people are signing to send to the Royal Family, if you want to sign it." Ellis just looked at him and said "Why?" It shocked the guy, Ellis was supposed to be ready to run right down and put his signature on the card. But Ellis was of Mr. Fraser's generation, and that didn't happen.

The other:
Whether the public can be blamed for letting them pursue their ruinous policies is debatable.

Short of assassination there is little people can do when their political masters have forgotten the true meaning of the democracy of which they are forever prating, are determined to have their own way at all costs and hold public opinion in contempt.

I feel I speak not just for myself but for the huge majority of my generation who think as I do but whose voices are so often lost in the clamour.

Damn. It's a good thing this was printed now; I can see a variety of politicians and bootlickers having cows over that passage and demanding 'something be done' about him for saying it if he were still walking around. Especially since it can be argued to be quite true.

Ah well, he was a good man.

Roundup time

Digging around, remember the "We're all gonna get Mad Cow Disease and Die!" dance a while back? Not so fast, Guido. Lots of "Everybody who eats meat isn't dying, but we might still be in danger" stuff, with this at the end:
But Frances Hall, of the Human BSE Foundation said she would rather see researchers focus on developing a test that could pick up early signs of the test in those who were affected.

"I don't think estimates of numbers makes a lot of difference to people who have been affected, or people who are worried about it." Bold mine

That's part of the damn problem: a lot of media weenies worked damn hard to scare people to death over it. And if you're one of the unlucky few the numbers mean little; if you're one of everyone else, they point out just how overblown this was.

Next, something on the atrocity against free speech known as the Alberta Human Rights Commission:
...Levant was the clear winner in the debate and that offended Soharwardy, who marched down to a Calgary Police station and demanded that they arrest Levant for offending him during the debate and simply discussing the cartoons in the media.

After the officers explained that they didn’t do that in Canada, Soharwardy filed a complaint with the Alberta Human Rights Commission. The Commission is made up of individuals appointed by the government to hear human rights complaints. The commissioners are a mish-mash of lawyers, nurses, politicians, engineers, who may or may not have direct legal experience. It costs nothing to file a complaint, so Soharwardy could avail himself of it at no charge while the defendant bears the cost of his defense.

Wonderful, isn't it? Any jackass of the legions of the perpetually offended clown who feels 'offended' can complain at no cost to themselves, and- if nothing else- try to bankrupt whoever offended them. I remembered something about these people, and dug this up:
"'I told him that it seemed to be an abuse of the Human Rights Act for someone to try and use it as an instrument of censorship. And when I said that, on the phone, there was a pause and then he said, in a somewhat astonished tone: "But the Human Rights Act is about censorship." Then it was my turn to be silent on my end, because I found that breath-taking. For the Human Rights Commission's own mediator to acknowledge that censorship was the purpose of their Act."

Next up, Insty pointed to this at the Huffer-Puffer site, summed up by this:
At one end of the spectrum, former Senator Gary Hart warns that Democrats are vulnerable and unprepared. "The ghost of Karl Rove will raise the specter of terrorism and swift boat whomever the Democrats nominate. The fear card is the last resort of the collapsing W. coalition," he said.
GARY FREAKIN' HART!?! "The ghost of Karl Rove"?!? "The fear card"?!? As Lawdog might say, Sweet Shiva, these people are nuts! And this:
Similarly, Brookings Institution foreign policy scholar Ivo Daalder argued, "Terror and fear are the only things the Reps can run on -- and so they will. Every Democrat knows that. But the country is clearly hunkering for a leader who can also address their real and current fears, which are economic first and foremost. So the Democrats have to talk about these issues, which surely aren't peripheral to the voters. That doesn't mean that they should not talk about national security -- they should, they do, and they will."
Well, Ivo, I've got to tell you something: I have concerns about the economy, but that thing about the people who want to kill us all, that kind of takes a serious position, too. Being the dumb guy in flyover country that I am. Damn, this is enough to make me wonder if these people have had their shots.

Speaking of which, Peters has this on the 'study' the NYEffin' Times put out on vets:
To a darkly humorous degree, all this reflects the Freudian terrors leftists feel when confronted with men who don't have concave chests. But it goes far beyond that.

Pretending to pity tormented veterans (vets don't want our pity - they want our respect), the Times' feature was an artful example of hate-speech disguised as a public service.

The image we all were supposed to take away from that story was of hopelessly damaged, victimized, infected human beings who've become outcasts from civilized society. The Times cast our vets as freaks from a slasher flick.

The hard left's hatred of our military has deteriorated from a political stance into a pathology: The only good soldier is a dead soldier who can be wielded as a statistic (out of context again). Or a deserter who complains bitterly that he didn't join the Army to fight . . .

Lastly, this from Michelle Malkin on the 'housing crisis'. Which I'm not all that impressed with, so far as a lot of the people being whacked by it.(I'm very concerned with how it screws with the economy). When I was looking for a house, I was pre-approved for a loan that was, let us say, rather generous. As in "I can make payments on a loan that size. If I don't eat too much or buy any clothes for the next few years." I only looked at houses that I could afford the payments on. I've got damn little sympathy for someone who 'bought' a house they couldn't really afford the payments on, or got one of those idiot 'interest only for x years' loans. Especially when they start whining now that everyone else should bail them out.
And let us not forget the idiots who approved these loans, and the ones who made them, who are now coming around with their hands out: Screw you, dumbass.

Dirtbag lawyer who keyed Marine's car

GUILTY.

Go read the whole thing at BlackFive. I will put two of the comments from WP91 at the courthouse, because it's just too good not to:
The case was called at 13:33, and the Defendant did not show up. There were 2 heavy hitter State's Attorneys here to handle it. The Judge increased his bond to $20,000.00 or 10 percent cash, and put out a warrant for his arrest.

The Defendant called at 13:40 to say that he will be a half an hout late and was waiting for the media to leave. The Judge said in open court that if he does shows up he will be taken into custody, and if he doesn't he is fair game for any law enforcement agency that wants to pick him up. Will report further developments as warranted.

Which was followed by:

The update: At 1400 hours the defendant showed up, and was told that he was half an hour late. The Judge stated on the record that the defendant had done the same thing during the previous court date, and he said that the defendant called and said that wanted to wait for the media to leave. The Judge said "That is not the way I run my courtroom." He increased the bail and took him into custody and told him to try and work out a deal with the State. About 25-35 marines and assorted military were there.

The case was recalled at 14:22, and the State said that the defendant had asked for permission to put his belt and such back on. The Judge said, "Treat him like all the other prisoners." The defendant was brought out and the plea deal that they had worked out was entered into the record.

The Judge asked him if he had committed the specific acts he was accused of. The defendant hemmed and hawed, and the Judge raised his voice to make him say yes or no. The defendant agreed, and the Judge read the facts into the record. Several times, the Judge said if there were no deal, he would be given a court date just like any other defendant, and he could try and make bail soon.

The deal: 1 year Social Service Supervision, restitution of 600 dollars to be paid to Social Services and which would go to the Injured Marine Semper Fi fund, to be paid by February 25th, 2008, and $50/month in supervision fees.

The Judge then, in as angry a voice as I have ever heard him use, scolded the defendant, saying that the Marine license plates the complaining witness had were not vanity plates or about ego, but the proceeds go toward the Marine and Navy scholarship fund for the children of fallen soldiers, sailors and marines. These Marines protect his very existence "so people like you can enjoy their freedom." He further said that the reason there were so many in the courtroom and so much public interest is that the Marines have a tradition since 1775 that "No Marine gets left behind." Several Hoorahs in the courtroom.

And then the deal was done, and he was taken away by the sheriffs to be released later. Bold mine

Ah, the scent of self-righteous asshole roasting on an open fire...

They found Bun-Bun

Or a close relation, at least

As a follow to yesterday's note about Coburn

endorsing McCain, Senator Coburn was on a local show on KTOK at four this afternoon giving his reasons. To say I was unconvinced would be a rather drastic understatement.

Which I noted in the e-mail I sent to the Senator's office a few minutes ago, as a followup to the one yesterday asking, in polite terms, "What the HELL is wrong with you?" After hearing at the end of the interview that he and his family are on a ski vacation, I'm tempted to think one of two things:
There's some kind of deal with McCain for some reason(God knows what, but odd things do happen), or
Coburn ran into a tree- headfirst- shortly before thinking "McCain is the man!"

In either case, damn.

I read of this atrocity known as H.R. 1955 before,

and- having lost track of it- just got whacked with this and this. Just bloody wonderful. Especially since I found out my Rep. Mary Fallin voted for it. I had to find that out at GovTrack(which I now have bookmarked). I also found this:
Oct 23, 2007: This bill passed in the House of Representatives by roll call vote. The vote was held under a suspension of the rules to cut debate short and pass the bill, needing a two-thirds majority. The totals were 404 Ayes, 6 Nays, 22 Present/Not Voting.

When the congresscritters 'suspend rules' to cut debate like this, it's usually not a good thing for us. And yes, I'm telling her what I think of it.

And just to make my day complete, I found out that Sen. Coburn has endorsed McCain for President.

Appropriately for both, it's overcast, cold and raining outside.

I once read of an early Islamic scholar saying "All history before Islam

is without merit", something along those lines. Apparently it an especially important view when Jews are involved in the history.
"The government is in the final stages of constructing a dam in southern Iran that will submerge the archaeological sites of Pasargad and Persopolis - the ancient capital of the Persian Empire," the report states. "The site, which is considered exceptional in terms of its archaeological wealth and historical importance, houses the tomb of the Persian King Cyrus."

Cyrus, who lived from 576-530 BCE, liberated Babylonian Jewry from their exile in the famous Declaration of Cyrus (mentioned in the book of Ezra in both Hebrew and Aramaic).

You'll note the Iranian scholars are asking the ICC to do something. I'd suggest they not hold their breath on that.

Well, one guy got some restitution for being slimed

by the PC Police.
A former BBC presenter has won damages after being wrongly arrested on suspicion of inciting racial hatred for "light-hearted" remarks at a country fair.

Robin Page, who hosted TV's One Man And His Dog, fought a five-year campaign to clear his name after being locked up in a cell for his jokey introduction to a pro-hunting speech.

He told a meeting in Framptonupon-Severn, Gloucestershire, in 2002: "If you are a black, vegetarian, Muslim, asylum-seeking, onelegged lesbian lorry driver, I want the same rights as you."
OOOH, he said something INSENSITIVE!
Two officers from Gloucestershire Police travelled to Cambridgeshire to arrest Mr Page at his cattle farm.

He was held in a cell at a police station for 40 minutes before agreeing to be interviewed without a lawyer present.

Mr Page, 64, said yesterday: "I was told I had committed a 'hate crime', interviewed under caution-and given police bail."

No charges were brought but he was never given any explanation for his treatment.
"...agreeing to be interviewed without a lawyer present." Isn't that interesting?

And after receiving a settlement,
"Annoyingly, the police sent my cheque in an unstamped envelope.

"I had to go to my local post office to pay £1.24 to pick it up. I'm not all that convinced it was a mistake."

He said the Freedom of Information disclosures had also revealed he was on a police "homophobic incident record" and he fears his name has not been removed.

He said: "How can you be included on a homophobic incident record for using the word lesbian once in a speech? It is just incredible. Political correctness is the new McCarthyism."

Police hate to be asked "Don't you have any actual crime to deal with?" But those involved in crap like this should have it asked of them. Often.

Of course, they'll probably consider it 'hate speech' and write you a ticket.

Thanks to Theo for pointing this out.

Jeff transcribes what the miserable socialist

hoplophobes say, so you don't have to sit through this crap.

Senator Clinton, when you ran for the Senate in 2000, you said that everyone who wishes to purchase a gun should have a license, and that every handgun sale or transfer should be registered in a national registry. Will you try to implement such a plan?

CLINTON: Well, I am against illegal guns, and illegal guns are the cause of so much death and injury in our country. I also am a political realist and I understand that the political winds are very powerful against doing enough to try to get guns off the street, get them out of the hands of young people.
...
And we need to enforce the laws that we have on the books. I would also work to reinstate the assault weapons ban. We now have, once again, police deaths going up around the country, and in large measure because bad guys now have assault weapons again. We stopped it for awhile. Now they’re back on the streets.
Lie, bullshit, etc. What else would we expect from Clinton?

RUSSERT: Senator Obama, when you were in the state senate, you talked about licensing and registering gun owners. Would you do that as president?

OBAMA: I don’t think that we can get that done. But what I do think we can do is to provide just some common-sense enforcement. One good example — this is consistently blocked — the efforts by law enforcement to obtain the information required to trace back guns that have been used in crimes to unscrupulous gun dealers.

That’s not something that the NRA has allowed to get through Congress. And, as president, I intend to make it happen.

No mention, of course, that law enforcement agencies were against the measure he speaks of(Uncle and Kevin, among others, have covered that); much better to blame the NRA for not 'caring about the victims', etc. Along with the obligatory
And it is very important for many Americans to be able to hunt, fish, take their kids out, teach them how to shoot.

And from Edwards:
...And I think it is enormously important to protect people’s Second Amendment rights.

I don’t believe that means you need an AK-47 to hunt. And I think the assault weapons ban, which Hillary spoke about just a minute ago, as president of the United States I’ll do everything in my power to reinstate it. But I do think we need a president who understands the sportsmen, hunters who use their guns for lawful purposes have a right to have their Second Amendment rights looked after.
As Jeff says, "Well thank you very much but I think I have the right to decide for myself what I’ll hunt or sport shoot with."

And all these clowns, as noted above, are being very careful to talk about the rights of 'hunters and sportsmen' as their way of dumping the real core of the 2nd.

Quote of this day,

borrowed from Kevin:
"...if one does accept the plausibility of any of the arguments on behalf of a strong reading of the Second Amendment, but, nevertheless, rejects them in the name of social prudence and the present-day consequences produced by finicky adherence to earlier understandings, why do we not apply such consequentialist criteria to each and every part of the Bill of Rights?"
Sanford Levinson

A quick note of two levels of nanny-state BS

First, from Britain:
Ministers are planning to implant "machine-readable" microchips under the skin of thousands of offenders as part of an expansion of the electronic tagging scheme that would create more space in British jails.

Amid concerns about the security of existing tagging systems and prison overcrowding, the Ministry of Justice is investigating the use of satellite and radio-wave technology to monitor criminals.

But, instead of being contained in bracelets worn around the ankle, the tiny chips would be surgically inserted under the skin of offenders in the community, to help enforce home curfews. The radio frequency identification (RFID) tags, as long as two grains of rice, are able to carry scanable personal information about individuals, including their identities, address and offending record.
Undoubtedly as a field test before admitting the idea issaying that safety and security demands all subjects have these injected.

The other is this idiotic 'code of responsibility' Bergen Community College demands of all students. Years ago, I heard someone on a radio show say something idiotic and then claim that the criticism of it was 'censorship'. Kids were in the truck with me and I explained that this is the United States, and that means two things:
I have the right to say what I think about what you say, it's freedom of speech, not censorship.
I have to acknowledge your right to speak your piece; that does not mean I have to respect you or your views.
Somebody needs to remind this campus idiotPresident Ryan of those things.

Finish the draw! Modified

When you're practicing drawing your sidearm, there's a natural inclination, when you bobble the grip or pull or whatever, to stop, holster, and try it again.

Stop that.

Finish the draw. No matter how badly you mess it up, finish the draw. If things go to hell and you grab, you get no chance to do it over, so get used to correcting as you go. If your grip isn't perfect, if your draw isn't quite right, if your shirt or jacket gets in the way, whether you're using a pocket carry or belt or in-the-waistband holster or shoulder rig or whatever, finish the draw. Fix it as you go, every time.

If you ever need it for real, pretty doesn't matter, perfect doesn't matter: getting the sidearm out, aimed and speaking accurately does. So get used to things going wrong. Finish the draw, every time.

Added:
In the comments Panday said something very, very true: As the old saying goes, "Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast".

Oh, yeah. I should have specified in the original post, "You start learning this slowly. Reach, get a correct grip, draw, etc.... Once you have the motions down, once you understand what you're doing and how and you start working on speed..." Beginning any new physical activity you start slow.

The most amazing pistol man I've ever personally seen was Capt. Dan Combs of the OHP, who I've mentioned before. Spooky-fast and accurate(with damn near anything). He said that when starting this he began by moving slowly, making sure he had each motion right, and once he had that locked in he began speeding up. The time I saw him he would hold a foam coffee cup on the front lip of his holster, flip it down to the ground and draw & blow it up before it hit. Then, commenting that "Trooper ( ) says that's just luck, so let's try it again," would do it again. Only this time he'd deliberately miss the first shot and blow the cup with the second, still before it hit the ground. And he did this with a S&W Model 19(polished action, no other mods) and a standard-issue Sam Brown belt & holster.

Start slow and get it right. Then, when working on speed and positions, finish the draw.

I hate to say this, but

GodDammit, some of these people need to be horsewhipped. In public. Then have salt thrown on their back.
He said the Special Agent in Charge, Jody Keeku, asked for a re-test and specified that the tests use "soft primered commercial ammunition."

"FTB has no standardized testing procedures, in fact it has no written procedures at all for testing firearms," Savage said. "They had no standard to stick to, and gleefully tried again. The results this time...'a machinegun.' ATF with a self-admitted 50 percent error rate pursued an indictment and Mr. Olofson was charged with 'Unlawful transfer of a machinegun.'. Not possession, not even Robert Kiernicki was charged with possession (who actually possessed the rifle), though the ATF paid Mr. Kiernicki 'an undisclosed amount of money' to testify against Mr. Olofson at trial," Savage said.
...
"Haanstad claimed the law does not exempt a malfunction. He claims that it states 'any weapon that shoots more than once without manual reloading, per function of the trigger is a machinegun.' To clarify when I was on the stand, I asked him, 'Are you saying if I take my Great Granddaddy's double barrel out and I pull one trigger and both barrels go off, it's a machinegun?' He went back to … 'any weapon that shoots…'" Savage said.

Lawyers and FBI and ATF agents. And we're supposed to TRUST these people? About ANYTHING?

Uncle, you ruined my whole morning when I read this.


Added: I believe a lawyer takes an oath to 'uphold the law' in any state, and I think someone in the Justice Department takes an oath to the same effect: therefore, any lawyer working for the government who acts to prevent a defense attorney from presenting information proving his client innocent of the charged crime should be disbarred. At the least. For a start.

Kim points out

a petition you should check out.

See if you can spot the conflict of interest

in this.
The Government will launch an overhaul of the system next week, which will put pressure on doctors and nurses to identify more "potential organ donors" from dying patients. Hospitals will be rated for the number of deceased patients they "convert" into donors and doctors will be expected to identify potential donors earlier and alert donor co-ordinators as patients approach death.

But Mr Brown, who carries a donor card, has made it clear he backs an even more radical revamp of the system, which would lead to donation by "presumed consent". The approach is modelled on that of Spain, which has the highest proportion of organ donors in the world.
Yeah, having the authorities assume you wanted to give up your body parts would tend to raise the number of 'donors'.

What, you thought you should have a say in what happens to your parts after you shuffle off this mortal coil? Oh no, silly peasant, WE know better than YOU what should be done.

It admits to a possible "conflict of interest" between medical staff, trying to save lives and those keen to ensure every possible organ is harvested. Dr Kevin Gunning, an intensive care consultant at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, and a member of the UK Transplant's advisory group, said the measures could put doctors and relatives under pressure. "If, as a doctor you have turned your thoughts to your patient being a donor when they are still living, that is a real conflict."
Damn, you think maybe?

Dr Bruce Taylor, of the Intensive Care Society warned that early indicators of death were not reliable. "The only way to be sure is to do all the tests which show brain stem death; anything in advance of that is only a prediction."

But Chris Rudge, of UK Transplant, the authority in charge of organ donation and transplant, insisted patients would not be considered as donors at any point where survival was possible.

Uh huh. Sure. I'm really going to trust that, aren't I?