I realize I'm late on this latest (possibly NSFW) medical discovery,

but better late than missed:
Staring at female mammary glands is good for a mans' heart health(maybe some women for that matter). Put in less scientific language,
A recent study by German doctors has discovered that staring at a woman’s sweater puppies for ten minutes a day can lower blood pressure and stress on the heart. While this is something many of us have suspected for a long time, it is nice to see a double-boob, er -blind study confirm it.

So, in my ever-present concern for the health of all five or six of you guys(and maybe a lady or two),

So this is what (fG)Britain seems to think of as a good idea

for dealing with electricity needs:
Electricity consumers in the UK will need to get used to flicking the switch and finding the power unavailable, according to Steve Holliday, CEO of National Grid, the country’s grid operator. Because of a six-fold increase in wind generation, which won’t be available when the wind doesn’t blow, “The grid is going to be a very different system in 2020, 2030,” he told BBC’s Radio 4. “We keep thinking that we want it to be there and provide power when we need it. It’s going to be much smarter than that.

“We are going to change our own behaviour and consume it when it is available and available cheaply.”
Translation: The government and/or the greenie dictators will allow you to have electricity when and in the amounts they think you should get it.

Under the so-called “smart grid” that the UK is developing, the government-regulated utility will be able to decide when and where power should be delivered, to ensure that it meets the highest social purpose.
And if it's decided that you can freeze or broil so what some politician deems more 'socially important' gets power, you're screwed.

If Dept. of Homeland Security has the terrorist stuff so in hand

that they have time, money and people to waste on this, then they need their budget cut.

Remember Touching Special Areas searching people at the train station?

Woops.
Amtrak Police Chief John O’Connor said he first thought a blog posting about the incident was a joke. When he discovered that the TSA’s VIPR team did at least some of what the blog said, he was livid. He ordered the VIPR teams off Amtrak property, at least until a firm agreement can be drawn up to prevent the TSA from taking actions that the chief said were illegal and clearly contrary to Amtrak policy.

“When I saw it, I didn’t believe it was real,” O’Connor said. When it developed that the posting on an anti-TSA blog was not a joke, “I hit the ceiling.”
Well, isn't that nice. Does TSA actually care?

O’Connor said the TSA VIPR teams have no right to do more than what Amtrak police do occasionally, which has produced few if any protests and which O’Connor said is clearly within the law and the Constitution. More than a thousand times, Amtrak teams (sometimes including VIPR) have performed security screenings at Amtrak stations. These screenings are only occasional and random, and inspect the bags of only about one in 10 passengers. There is no wanding of passengers and no sterile area. O’Connor said the TSA violated every one of these rules.
And he's surprised?
A posting in late February to the Transportation Security Administration’s blog, which serves as a public relations tool of the TSA, tried to explain why TSA agents took over the Amtrak station in Savannah. But O’Connor said the “facts” as posted on the TSA blog were incorrect. He said the blog indicated that Amtrak had approved of the operation, but it had not. He called the TSA’s posting on blog.tsa.gov “inaccurate and insensitive.” As of the time this story was filed, the same posting remained on the blog.
What? TSA lied? Again, is he surprised?

All this is bad enough. It gets even better:
The group involved is TSA’s VIPR operation, which deals with surface transportation. VIPR is short for “visible intermodal protection and response.” It turns out that VIPR has been far more active than imagined. Teams have searched bus passengers all over the country, have done similar things at train stations, and have even blocked traffic on bridges to search trucks and cars. That even included the busy Chesapeake Bay Bridge near Washington.
Napolitano's power-grab is really spreading; seems she wasn't just talking about searching people all over, she was getting it rolling. Can you imagine the idiocy of blocking a frigging bridge so you can search vehicles?
A: Unless you have some reason to think it's actually no-shit necessary to find something really bad, it's stupid.
B: If you think bad guys have, say, a bomb on a truck, you've just given them a bridge full of stalled vehicles to take down
And when does the head of TSA inform us that driving across a bridge or taking a bus is a privilege for which we give up our rights?

I appears the Federal LEO Assoc. isn't happy

with Obama's statements the other day.
Contrary to what President Obama asserted, all law enforcement officers assigned to Mexico do perform “law enforcement activities.” This may include conducting field interviews, responding to crime scenes, overseeing training and participating in raids. The fact that they don’t actually handcuff suspects doesn’t diminish their role or the risks they face.
And on the 'can't be armed' stuff,
On Friday, FLEOA met with Chairman Michael McCaul’s staff from the House Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee. FLEOA requested that the committee hold hearings in order to demand accountability for why the U.S. government sends unarmed law enforcement officers into hostile, crime-ridden foreign countries. FLEOA also respectfully requested that Congress halt all funding that is used by U.S. agencies to send unarmed law enforcement officers to unstable foreign countries.

"The Real Reason the ATF Smuggled Guns (updated)

into Mexico" over at TTaG. He's got three possibles:
1. To catch the “big fish”: he doubts, and gives reasons why.
2. Empire building: again, doubts and the reasons why.
3. ATF Agents enabled smuggled guns to line their own pockets: likely, he thinks:
As in Watergate, the key to this scandal is to “follow the money.” Never mind the guns themselves—even though drug thugs used the to murder two federal agents. Who paid for the ATF-enabled smuggled guns? How much did they cost? How were the smugglers/informants paid, and how much were they paid? How much did the smugglers get for the guns and what happened to that money?

Occam’s Razor says that if you’re forced to choose between competing theories explaining a given event, the simplest explanation is the most likely to be true. I vote for door number three. The ATF didn’t “botch” Project Gunrunner or Operation Fast and Furious.

I reckon they started out setting up straw purchases, and then “forgot” to stop the guns before they crossed the border. They subverted the normal rules of a police sting—NEVER LOSE TRACK OF THE DRUGS/MONEY/GUNS—for cash money.
If I had to guess, #2 and #3 are the big ones, with #1 being the excuse. Reading this brought something into focus I'd wondered about, and that was just exactly what BATFE could expect to gain toward 'getting the bosses' with this: bosses don't deal in stuff like this, subordinates do. And all that nice noise about 'wanting to take down a cartel' doesn't wash, either. Unless as part of the empire-building action: ATF isn't supposed to be doing that, it's not their job. But if they get expanded(lots more agents and money and authority involved there) it could be. Being legally expanded would require real changes in their charter, etc., but if they decided to expand out without worrying about those niceties(counting on some of the Congressional cover that's helped them out before)...


With Mexico finally deciding to start asking questions about Gunwalker, things stand to get really messy, which is actually a good thing: it's going to take it getting monumentally nasty to actually get the truth out AND have any real possibility of those responsible being punished for their actions. At least any punishment more nasty than "You were a bad boy, go to your room; and your next pay raise will be delayed."

On the latter, couple of days ago Sipsey Street had a piece saying good things about John Dodson, the ATF agent who came out into the open to put a line from the compressor on that whistle; Vanderboegh is catching some crap for it. Well, bullshit. Dodson has said some things about the 'why' that I don't care for, and may well have done things in the past I'd not like; neither of which changes the fact that he's put his balls in the vise here and is hoping Grassley and a real investigation can keep the BATFE brass from closing it. And respect is owed to the other honest cops at ATF who've been trying to get something done but whose names we don't know; considering the reputation this agency has for screwing people over they're taking real risks, too, from the miserable excuses for lawmen running that agency


Update: ref the reason #3, I fear I wasn't thinking it through all the way; yes, there could well be some corrupt agents involved getting money, but as Vanderboegh points out this was set up and approved by DOJ and the bigshots in BATFE; while there's the possibility of someone spreading some money around to influence things I don't think it explains Gunwalker. I'll have to go with #2 combined with something else:
Gunrunner, I pointed out to him, predated the Obama administration. "Yes, but 'walking guns' didn't." I told him it seemed to me that given the dates on the documents that the meetings crafting this policy must have taken place sometime in mid-2009. "And who took power in January, 2009?" he replied.
...
...The ATF controlled the reporting of the statistics, the headlines were lurid and if the rest of us gunnies knew that you don't get automatic weapons, hand grenades and RPGs from gun shows and gun stores, most of the American people were too ignorant of the issue to care about the distinction. But the fact was, as the IG report and other sources concluded, the amount of weapons from those legitimate American sources did not meet the allegation. More importantly the statistics didn't meet the policy need. So, how to "fix" that? Project Gunwalker. If there weren't enough semi-auto "assault rifles" in Mexico, the ATF could fix that. And the murders would follow, justifying the policy change of cracking down on "assault rifles," gun shows and the like.

"So," I said, "you're saying that this was a deliberate attempt by policymakers at the highest levels of the Obama administration to subvert the Second Amendment and further diminish the free exercise of firearm rights of honest citizens?"

"You got it. Sucks, huh?" He laughed bitterly.
And, unfortunately, entirely possible.

Ah, those wonderful people at TSA: they want to irrardiate

people everywhere:
Newly uncovered documents show that as early as 2006, the Department of Homeland Security has been planning pilot programs to deploy mobile scanning units that can be set up at public events and in train stations, along with mobile x-ray vans capable of scanning pedestrians on city streets.
Isn't that a wonderful thought?

Ah, but they deny it. Kind of.
A TSA official responds in a statement that the “TSA has not tested the advanced imaging technology that is currently used at airports in mass transit environments and does not have plans to do so.”
I have to say, I'm an amateur at this but I could drive a truck through the loopholes in that statement: 'has not' doesn't mean isn't or won't, 'does not' leaves in 'can change our minds at any time'(or did). Etc.

Just imagine, they want to feel you up or dose you with possibly damaging radiation(have they YET released the safety studies on this crap?) before they'll allow you to get on a bus. Or train. Or subway. Or into the mall, or game, or anywhere else they can get away with it, all for 'public safety'.

Found at the Advice Goddess

Further demonstration of why I'd never live in the People's Republic of MA

And there you were, thinking that micro-stamping was the be-all, end-all of the government’s attempts to keep track of personal firearms. Nope. It’s micro-tracking. The latest affront to gun rights and privacy is on the table, again, courtesy of the Big Brothers in the Bay State. State Senator Andrew Petruccelli has re-introduced a bill calling for a commission to study GPS tracking for firearms. I’ve belled the Senator’s office. No joy. He might call back. He might not. The text of the bill reads as follows . . .
Yes, those merry socialist bastards aren't satisfied with pushing microstamping, oh no, they want a friggin' chip on your gun so they can track it.

Wonder how long before they want all gun owners chipped?

Keith points out the BBC has noticed Gunwalker,

and the report seems oddly biased toward BATFE and the JD.

I wonder why...

I do tend to think they might have had to damp out the sound

of his teeth grinding as he said this.

Couple of other thoughts:
Thank whatever deity you have fond thoughts of our founders didn't trust ANYONE or any single arm of government to be given overall power.
Can the Pres of Mexico veto a part of their Constitution? Or did the reporter not understand how ours works?
Don't you just love that the reporter basically blames us for all the dead Mexicans?


Pic stol- borrowed from Rob

Oh, just freaking wonderful: some pieces of actual history,

some 'lost' and some destroyed.

Damn these people.

Gunwalker and DHS lying about their rules

First, from Uncle,
There were rumors that the border agent that was killed had a bean bag gun. The government denied those rumors. Except that they’re true. Also, who really thought it was a good idea to send someone to the violent sections of the border armed with a glorified paintball gun?
There you have both the initial idiocy of the rules given these Border Patrol agents, and that Napolitano & Co. flat lied publicly about it. Just like they've flat lied about some things in the Gunwalker mess, both in public generally and directly to legislators investigating this.

Second, CBS has covered the "We need to put out good stories to cover up the bad" memo at BATFE:
We've had ongoing requests for information and on camera interviews with both ATF and the Department of Justice since prior to our first report which aired Feb. 22.

A similar lack of response has been reported by Senator Charles Grassley, who has asked for documents and briefings from ATF.

Now, we learn that after our Feb. 22 report, ATF's Chief Public Affairs officer sent an all-call internal memo to ATF Public Information Officers in an effort to "lessen the coverage of such stories in the news cycle by replacing them with good stories about ATF."
One of the lines of that memo that kind of jumps out when you think about it:
At the time, the memo noted "Fortunately, the CBS story has not sparked any follow up coverage by mainstream media and seems to have fizzled."
Makes you think the BATFE and DOJ people involved are really hoping the rest of the major media will keep ignoring this. Our major media being, for the most part, the partisan little hack excuses for reporters they are, they're trying, but the word is out. And we've got to do our part in spreading all this around.

How the Brady group actually sees you

In any event, it's nice to know that the antis view us as not only terrorists, but WORSE than terrorists.

Ref the 'public right to know' bullcrap on firearms permits

in IL, a new thought from DouT:
It's very convenient that the AG office released this decision just as Concealed Carry is gaining serious momentum in the capitol. Then the bill to prevent the release gets stalled 5-5 in committee w/ no updates on the votes on the web site even though they have been updating the increasing numbers of cosponsors. I'm sure her daddy had nothing to do w/ it.

This is classic Chicago politics in action. Madigan et al are not working for the people. They are working to keep their own power base.
Wouldn't surprise me at all.

From the first link, something that really pisses me off:
“Therefore, even if disclosure of the names and expiration of the (Firearm Owner’s Identification Card) card owners did constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy, this fact is outweighed by the public interest that exists in ensuring the integrity of the (police) database,” he wrote.
First, you can't just paper over the 'unwarranted invasion' problem by saying "But I think we should anyway."
Second, how the HELL is releasing this supposed to help 'ensure the integrity of the database'? Absolute effing bullshit, and Assistant Public Access Counselor Matthew Rogina is a friggin' dirtbag and tool to try to excuse this with that nonsense.

But it is Illinois, after all, and it appears none of the corrupt bastards like the peasants doing things the bastards don't like.

I will admit I was surprised the IL State Police are fighting this; whether they're scared of the consequences or someone up top has the balls to stand up for the right, I don't know, but glad they're fighting this.

It should be noted- loudly- that Dennis Henigan is a damned liar

who tries to cover up his lies when people notice them.

I am going to descend into bad language again

because even if half the stuff in this report isn't accurate, the other half calls for it:
Southampton Town Police Lieutenant Iberger
Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office(numerous members) and
Officials from the airport, as well as other local and federal law enforcement agencies also responded, including, without limitation, the Southampton Police Department, the Westhampton Police Department, the FBI, and the Department of Homeland Security.
I'm too pissed, and pressed for time, to go into the particulars; read, and be advised that a breakables alert is in effect.

As I said, if only half of the stuff in this report is true, then every one of these miserable, lying, corrupt, worthless fucking excuses for lawmen should be fired. And personally have to pay their part of the damages. And be banned for life from ever being allowed to wear a badge again because their shit-brained selves would tarnish it forever. As they already have the ones they wear.

I'm specifically speaking of you, Iberger, in particular; you have no excuse whatever for your actions. Assuming your brain was actually working and you actually thought you had reason to question her, you could have asked "Could you show me the pictures you took?", seen that they were shots of a gods-damned public display and let her go; but oh, no, you did what you did.

And please note the names of a of the agencies: municipal LE agencies. She could not have been inside ALL their jurisdictions now could she? And when they leave their jurisdiction, unless their state says otherwise, THEY HAVE NO MORE POLICE POWERS THAN YOU OR I. And if this was outside their jurisdiction what the HELL were they doing there? Besides it being none of their Deity-cursed business they were leaving the place they were supposed to be uncovered while they were fucking off at the side of the road harassing these people. Which is dereliction of duty at the least.

If even half of what is in this report is true and correct, I hope she wins the whole amount. And the assholes who behaved as they did are fired, if nothing else for being such a sorry God-damned disgrace to their badges.

Gunwalker is pretty much blowing up now

Didn't see the news segment on Gunwalker this evening, did see this linked at Drudge(finally!). A lot of this boils down to these paragraphs:
Newell, the special agent in charge in Phoenix, was asked at a news conference after the Avila indictment whether his agency would ever let guns knowingly cross the border. Newell answered, “Hell, no.” But, he said, suspects under surveillance sometimes elude agents, which could result in guns winding up in Mexico.

Grassley got a similar answer.

In a Feb. 4 letter to the senator, the Justice Department said ATF never “knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser who then transported them into Mexico.” ATF, the letter added, makes “every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation into Mexico.”
Newell flat lied at the conference; the Justice Department flat lied to Grassley in their letter; and BATFE and the JD are spinning this as hard as they can to try and make this look less nasty. Speaking of spin,
Gentlemen and Ladies, This just hit minutes ago. Panic and chaos are taking place at ATF headquarters in advance of the anticipated media releases today and tomorrow. Below is a message just sent from the subordinate of Jim McDermond from the ATF Office of Public and Governmental Affairs. An emergency request is being issued to all ATF Public Information Officers to find ATF stories with a positive spin to counter-influence was is expected today. Very insulting and very much the character of ATF management. Please respond to me that you received this. I think it will be critical to your stories and for Senator Grassley to further see demonstrated ATF’s continued desire to spin and cover up.

Sipsey Street has this link to the letter and documents in Sen. Grassley's latest letter to Holder; transcript of the letter at Sipsey if you want to read it there. I'm going to borrow these paragraphs; imagine yourself a clown at JD or BATFE who reads this:
In light of this evidence, the Justice Department‟s denials simply don‟t hold water. On February 4, 2011, the Department claimed that the ATF did not “knowingly” allow the sale of assault weapons to straw purchasers and that “ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation into Mexico.”13 Clearly those statements are not accurate. These documents establish that ATF allowed illegal firearm purchases by suspected traffickers in hopes of making a larger case against the cartels. ATF was not alone. The U.S. Attorney‟s office appears to have been fully aware and engaged in endorsing the same strategy.

Congress needs to get to the bottom of this.

After close of business last night, I received a one-page response to my letters of February 9 and 16.14 The response asks that I direct to the Inspector General any individuals who believe they have knowledge of misconduct by Department employees. You should know that just after Agent Terry died in December, at least one whistleblower contacted the Office of Inspector General before contacting my office. Despite reporting the allegations multiple times by phone, Internet, and fax, no one contacted the whistleblower until after my staff contacted the Acting Inspector General directly on February 1.

I have received no documents in response to my February 16, 2011, request. Last night‟s DOJ reply cites the Justice Department‟s “longstanding policy regarding pending matters” as a reason for withholding documents “relating to any ongoing investigation.”15 However, as you know, that policy is merely a policy. It is not mandated by any binding legal authority.
and
In addition to providing the documents I previously requested, please explain how the denials in the Justice Department‟s February 4, 2011 letter to me can be squared with the evidence.
Very polite way of saying
You lied to us.
You tried to blow us off.
You ignored the whistleblowers, and have lied about that.
Knock off the "We couldn't tell you" bullshit, and
We're waiting to see how you try to spin having lied to us. Again.

From Codrea's latest,
There was one moment of unintended hilarity, though, in the statement from Acting Director Kenneth Melson:

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) will ask a multi-disciplinary panel of law enforcement professionals to review the bureau's current firearms trafficking strategies employed by field division managers and special agents.

Oh, your strategies are going to be reviewed, alright, Mr. Melson.

Count on it.
Yeah. And not by people you can count on to scratch your back.

Is Geithner serious in thinking

we can just go out and 'tap oil reserves'? Does he not have any idea what it takes to find the spot and then drill, etc? Or is he just throwing bullshit around and hoping people will believe it?

Hey, if he couldn't use Turbo-Tax properly, he may actually be stupid enough to believe this.

And he does work for this clown, who can't be troubled to annoy Calderon for an exemption to allow our agents to be armed when in Mexico(but don't worry, Calderon said Mexican officials are "deeply analyzing alternatives." Probably involving payoffs).

AND the crap the cartels have generally tried to keep south of the border is spilling over:
Authorities have determined a man who was stabbed and beheaded in a suburban Phoenix apartment was killed for stealing drugs from a Mexican cartel, in a gruesome example of drug cartel violence spilling over the border.
But not to worry, as Incompetano still insists the border is more secure than ever before.

Gunwalker stuff to cover, that's going in A Post of Its Own

Insty asks 'Is the Navy trying

to start the Robot Apocalypse?' Which reminded me, you ever see a David Drake collection of shorts called All the Way to the Gallows, get it. And read Mom and the Kids first.

In weather, they're currently saying

it'll turn 'very cold!' tomorrow night: 32-33F; three weeks or so ago that would've been a wonderful number for a low.

Hell, for a while there it would've been a nice number for a high.

CBS will have another piece on Gunwalker tonight

CBS News Investigative Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson will follow up on her February 23 report about a major scandal within the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF). In an exclusive interview with Attkisson, a Phoenix-based ATF agent risks his job to describe the practice of letting guns "walk," and gives an insider's perspective about how the ATF knowingly contributed to the escalating violence in Mexico and American border states to that country.

Following are advance excerpts from tonight's broadcast.

On his bosses' denial of the gunrunning practice and going public:

ATF Agent: "I'm here boots on the ground in Phoenix, telling you we've been doing it every day since I've been here. Here I am. Tell me I didn't do the things that I did. Tell me you didn't order me to do the things I did. Tell me it didn't happen. Now you have a name on it, you have a face to put with it. Here I am. Someone now – tell me it didn't happen."

Codrea also notes that Sen. Grassley has written to AG Holder(Head Bigot-JD). Basically, "You're hiding information from us and your excuses suck; we want the facts."

You know, when Holder got pissy the other day and made his 'my people' comment, I wonder if the stress of what's coming out about Gunwalker is one of the things causing him to say what he did; which makes me wonder just how involved he is in the mess?

I would like to know what clown came up with

"Use beanbags against the smugglers" as a way to deal with armed intruders crossing the border.
The documents say the group of illegal border entrants refused commands to drop their weapons after agents confronted them at about 11:15 p.m. Two agents fired beanbags at the migrants, who responded with gunfire. Two agents returned fire, one with a long gun and one with a pistol, but Terry was mortally wounded in the gunfight.

Border Patrol officials declined to answer questions about protocol for use of force, citing the ongoing investigation.

But Terry’s brother, Kent Terry, said the other agents who were there that night told him that they were instructed to use the non-lethal beanbags first.

A: That's definitely a threat

B: Piotroski is a dirtbag. The kind of lawyer who's one of that 97% that gives the other 3% a bad name.

And any of the po-po who go along with this threat should be fired.

I predict that if Sen. LaRose starts catching any crap from LE, they won't like what happens next. Fact is, the kind of crap some of them pull on private citizens won't fly from someone in a real position to kick back.

So THAT'S what all the fuss is about!

Since the Mexican government doesn't seem to care

how many peasants have been murdered with ATF assistance, how about "How many US citizens are dead because of it?"
The gun that was used by a smuggler to kill ICE Agent Jaime Zapata last month in Mexico has been traced to a Texas gun shop, where it was purchased by suspected gun traffickers who had reportedly been under ATF surveillance for over a year.” An email blast from firearmscoalition.org provides more details . . .

I come back to a question I've asked before: there are some good LE agents working for this agency, and I do have to wonder, now more than ever, why?

What level of stupid Updated

was required to do this in the first place? And even more, how effing stupid do they have to be TO NOT FIX THE DAMN PROBLEM?
As often as three times a week, Rose and Walter Martin are greeted at their front door by cops brandishing guns. Far from criminal masterminds, the innocent 80-something couple are upstanding citizens who are the victims of a mistake in the NYPD’s computer system. Apparently when the department put in a new system in 2002, they entered the Martin’s Brooklyn address as the default address for warrants. Since then, their house number appears in warrants for rapists, murderers, and drug kingpins, all because of some bad lines of code.
So some idiots picked a real address, and no moron ever involved in this has bothered to fix it.

I realize it's New York, but still. SOMEONE there should have at least three working brain cells to rub together.

Update: in comments Sendarius points something out that hadn't hit me: ... the police officers involved are REPEATEDLY swearing false affidavits TO A JUDGE about the warrants in question.

If the address is wrong - and according to the story it has been wrong over 80 times - then what else that the police officer states in supporting affidavits is a lie?

Thoughts on the day

In the aftermath of the Tonsils & Adenoids Relocation, spent some time thinking about some things. Partly on the idiocy and bigotry of the people who call parents 'breeders'. Leaving everything else aside, barring a real change of mind they've completely blocked themselves from ever knowing how simultaneously wonderful and scary it can be having kids.

Father of goddaughter is my age and until marriage(wife had some from previous marriage) and birth of daughter had no real experience with small kids, let alone kids of his own. While she was in surgery we went to pick up some drink and calories for him & wife* and while doing so, at one point he said "Now I know why parents get old; kids can be the most terrifying thing in the world." Yeah. That's one side; the other is the look on his face when he held that baby for the first time. He's having the usual problems with a stepchild; I've seen him mad as hell when the kid deliberately does something to screw things up, and I've seen the desperation he has, that desire to be a good father, to help raise the kid. And the delight when they can get things to work. It's all rolled together into one big, messy stew. The kind the jerks who sneer at 'breeders' will never taste.

Way back when the kids were little, I got a call at work; wife had walked by sons crib and he didn't seem to be, well, doing anything. She touched him and he jerked and took a big breath. She called the doctor who said "Bring him in. Now." Which led to the call, as she was currently at the hospital; the doc had done a quick exam and admitted him for tests, and he'd had another episode not long after they got there. So I spent the rest of the shift burning calories like gas in a muscle car, and at the end blew out the door. He spent the night there with his mother, I at home with daughter. He had several episodes during the night, and SIDS was the diagnosis. So we got to spend the next few months with him hooked to a monitor every time he went to sleep. Fortunate compared to some kids: if he stopped breathing for more that 'x' seconds the alarm sounded, it'd startle him and he'd start breathing and the alarm would stop. Kind of amazing how fast you can adjust to something like that: in the night it would sound, you'd sort-of wake up(after the first couple of nights) and drift back down when the alarm stopped. And that went on for about six-eight months, can't remember exactly, and he grew through the danger age/phase/whateverthehellitis. Do I wish he hadn't had to damn near die with this? Oh, HELL yes; but it was part of the package. Just like learning to shoot was happy, so was puppies and cats and "How the hell did you get up there?" was a bit of a mix.

Daughter didn't have that particular problem as a baby, but she's had some health problems, not quite the same stress-inducing level as SIDS but not fun. The balance to that was watching her first shot(.54-caliber muzzleloader with a light load when she was three, story for another time), and the pet mouse that would sit on her shoulder and groom, and finally getting the hang of a bicycle, and quenching oil up to her shoulder(dropped a piece of coal in the bucket and of course she had to get it...)

I've been scared to death when one was sick or hurt, and worn to death pulling a makeshift sled through snow with two kids on it. Some was delightful, some most definitely not, but all part of the package.

You know what's one of the hard things? When you look back and see the times you were not the man/father/husband you could have been. Can't change those times, can try to teach the kids so they don't make the same mistakes. Another part of the package.

Remember the line about "Old age is not for sissies"? Neither is parenting.




*When I got to the hospital I looked at him and said "I cannot tell a lie; you look like hell." Wife was somewhat better, but not a whole lot.

Just got a message from the dad: before the surgery goddaughter had said one of the things she'd like to eat was chicken noodle soup; says he "I thought I'd get some chicken and stars too. Then the thought occured to me: chicken soup is referred to as 'Jewish penicillin' so, if it was Jewish chicken and stars, would the stars have SIX points?"

Let's see, people who really demonstrate

prosecutorial and judicial misconduct and being vindictive assholes:
By speaking out in defense of a Kansas doctor and nurse accused of running a “pill mill,” pain treatment activist Siobhan Reynolds annoyed the federal prosecutor assigned to the case. Assistant U.S. Attorney Tanya Treadway was so angry that in April 2008 she sought a court order telling Reynolds to shut up. Concluding that such an order would be an unconstitutional prior restraint of speech, U.S. District Judge Monti Belot said no.

But by the time Belot sentenced the defendants, Stephen and Linda Schneider, last October, he was so irritated by Reynolds’ advocacy that he could not contain himself. He said he hoped the harsh sentences—three decades each—would “curtail or stop the activities of the Bozo the Clown outfit known as the Pain [Relief] Network, a ship of fools if there ever was one.”
...
After Treadway failed to obtain a gag order silencing Reynolds, she instigated a grand jury investigation of her for obstruction of justice, obtaining subpoenas that demanded material related to PRN’s activism. Reynolds unsuccessfully challenged Treadway’s fishing expedition on First Amendment grounds, and last November the Supreme Court declined to hear her appeal. Perhaps the Court was impressed by the reasoning of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit. We can’t judge for ourselves, because the appeals court’s decision is sealed, like almost every other document related to Reynolds’ case.


I've mentioned the preacher asshold Jim Wallis before; he's currently pushing "Jesus would increase funding for the needy, no matter how badly it would/things are screwed up." Mind you, this is from a shithead who, if someone of a more conservative bent pushed their viewpoint, would be screaming "SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE!" a loud as he could.


Among the excuses for AG Holder not prosecuting the Black Panthers:
Rep. Chaka Fattah, a Democrat from Philadelphia, said the Black Panthers "should not have been there." But he said the GOP was making too much out of a fleeting incident involving a couple of people.

"The most unethical thing a person can do is make allegations based on absolutely nothing," Fattah said. "The only issue of race is singling out this particular decision...That this rises to national significance is bogus on its face."
Got that? Honest-to-God voter intimidation by a couple of racists is a fleeting incident; these bastards ON VIDEO doing this is allegations based on absolutely nothing; demanding the Justice Department deal with this the exact same way it would if whites had done it is bogus on its face.
Bull-Fucking-Shit. Fattah, at best you're an ass-kissing excuse maker; at worst you're a racist yourself. And Holder is a racist bastard who wants very much for this to just go away.
But it won't.



"Do not surrender to the ICANN!" Nabil Kisrawi yelled during one of the conference's sessions, according to a story in the Register, an online publication on Internet governance. "There is even a representative of the ICANN in this room!" Kisrawi said. (Kisrawi recently died.)

Translation: "We want to be able to shut up anyone on the internet who offends us!" And, not surprisingly, this administration seems to sympathize with the assholes.


What? People who want the peasants disarmed lying about the facts?
Are you surprised?


Hmmm. Democrat nailed for sexual misconduct whines 'the charges are a distraction; then yells "You are fucking dead!" to a female Republican. Some polite discourse, huh?


Code Pink demonstrates once more that they don't care about peace, they're just on the enemy side.


To Connecticut: fuck you. You defining a standard magazine as 'high-capacity' demonstrates once more that 'Gun control is what politicians do instead of something'.


Why yes, I am using a lot of bad words tonight.


Attention S&W and Kahr: Oklahoma would love to have you move here. Tell the PROM to screw itself and get out.


This is what happens when assholes with badges get to spend other peoples money with the 'oversight' people not bothering:
School Police wouldn't show us any of those guns, but confirm that over the last few years they bought 14 AR-15s for training.

Add in the weapons maintenance kits and the grand total comes to nearly $13,000, plus another $23,000 for bullets--just in the last two years.

Even though they train on the assault rifles, if patrol officers want to carry them, they have to buy their own.
So they spent all this damned money for rifles used ONLY FOR TRAINING?
AND the $450 blouses AND $130 belt buckles... and the people supposed to oversee the spending?
Darcy Spears: "Of course, it's an expense that's approved by the Board."

Carolyn Edwards: "Yes."

Darcy Spears: "So...?"

Carolyn Edwards: "Many expenses are approved by the Board. We don't go through every expense with a fine-toothed comb."

Darcy Spears: "But don't you think the taxpayers expect that?"

Carolyn Edwards: "Well... they may expect that, but the purchase orders that we see every month, every Board meeting, is hundreds and hundreds of pages."
God-damn you, Edwards, and every other shithead on the Board; one of the things THEY PAY YOU BASTARDS FOR is to go through the damn orders to make sure money isn't being wasted and/or wrongly spent, but you apparently think that's too much trouble. You should be fired, immediately.


Richard The Turd Daley & Co. in meltdown. A beautiful sight. He lies, too.


Japete provides more entertainment. Or demonstrates a need for new meds. Or something.


That's about enough for now; I need to think about some far more pleasant things.

Tonsils are no longer attached to goddaughter,

she's doing well. Parents may recover in a day or two.

Goddaughter is losing her tonsils today

and I'm away to provide moral support. Or something. Possibly whiskey to the father.

See you later

Apparently TSA figures it has everything so under control

that it can spend people and money on monitoring Twitter. And responding to tweets they don't like.

Indicates one of two things: whoever is doing this instead of what they're actually supposed to do needs to be fired, or TSA- which obviously has more money than it actually needs- needs a budget cut.


True, every agent- or whatever they call them- doing this isn't physically molesting or irradiating people, but still.

By the way, have you noticed

that the talk from the White House on both the rebellions and the pirates sounds like something from Temporary Acting Deputy Undersecretary Crodfoller in a Retief novel?

And just as useful?

How the administration wants to deal with pirates:

President Obama did not issue a statement on the tragedy. White House spokesman Jay Carney said that the administration was "obviously outraged by the actions of the pirates."

"And the president, as you know, I believe, has expressed his sincere condolences to the families of the victims," Carney said at a press briefing. "But beyond that, I don't want to get into details."

"This deplorable act firmly underscores the need for continued international progress toward confronting the shared security challenge posed by piracy in the waters off the Horn of Africa," Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in a statement Tuesday.
...
"Well, one of the challenges -- I'm not sure we can do something about it, but one of the challenges with pirates is if you capture them, what do you do with them?" Clapper said. "The international legal mechanisms for prosecuting, trying and convicting pirates turns out to be rather problematic. That's not obviously something we, the U.S., can do something, but that is a problem for the international community."
'International progress' and the 'international community' means "We sit around playing games, and when we capture some of the pirates they get a nice trial. Somewhere. Sometimes."

There is a simple solution to this: kill them. They take hostages, make it a simple "Release them and you live; harm them and you die" and then carry it out. Every time. You catch them in the process of an attack you don't try to capture them, you sink the damn boat; you find their mother ship, you sink it. They say "We will kill hostages if you trouble us!", you say "If you do this, we will find our home port and destroy it." And then do it.

But that would require a President and cabinet who care more about stopping this than about playing games with 'world opinion' and 'social justice'. And have the balls to carry out the actions.

A new .22 round

designed for autoloaders; 40 grain bullet at 1255fps. Be interesting to see how it works out. Note that this says it'll be sold only in 1k value packs, an interesting choice.


No, I never heard anyone teach this, either.


Preparing battlespace?
Nation of Islam leader Minister Louis Farrakhan predicted on Sunday that America faces imminent uprisings that mirror those in the Middle East.

“What you are looking at in Tunisia, in Egypt … Libya, in Bahrain … what you see happening there … you’d better prepare because it will be coming to your door,” Farrakhan said in a booming voice, thousands of followers cheering in his wake.

Farrakhan also called on President Barack Obama to allow protesters to march, urging the president not to attack innocent people when they do.
A: Peaceful marches are not a problem.
B: Some of the stuff he's pointing to are anything but peaceful.
C: Considering Farrakhan, he probably wants a really nasty situation here; among other things it'll be something else he can blame on the JOOOOOS!

Speaking of Farrakhan, the other day (on Facebook) I put up a link to this post at Classical Values; no comments, just the link because I thought it interesting. Response from socialist: "... the difference with the left is that racists and homophobes never become national spokespeople."
Really?
Al Sharpton? Farrakhan? Robert Byrd? Jesse Jackson(remember 'Hymietown'?) None of them ring a bell?
Response: "How about names from the 21st century?"
Think about that. Byrd died last year, the others I named are currently running around spreading their crap. And they're just the first ones that popped to mind, but the answer to them was 'they aren't current'. Just freaking unbelievable. I'd throw in Malik Shabazz, and the MEChA and La Raza clowns, but it wouldn't matter.


It's heading into spring in Oklahoma; yesterday it was 70's, last evening there were tornado watches up north and it's currently in the 30's. Ah well, 30's beats the teens we had a couple of weeks ago.

It seems there are some Madison LE officers

who need to be fired for not carrying out their orders.

Lest we forget

If you're not familiar, background here

Damn, the commies want to control EVERYTHING!

In one of history’s more absurd acts of totalitarianism, China has banned Buddhist monks in Tibet from reincarnating without government permission. According to a statement issued by the State Administration for Religious Affairs, the law, which goes into effect next month and strictly stipulates the procedures by which one is to reincarnate, is “an important move to institutionalize management of reincarnation.”

Yeah, it's to try and control Tibet; makes me wonder what happens if a few thousand show up and say "Where's my paperwork?"

Blatherings from Yetta Kurland, a Only One and

(surprise, surprise!) politician on how the peasants should not be allowed arms. But important people like her should.

And on the subject of Only Ones, God damn the brainless fucking morons involved in this; they deserve to be fired, and if not fired then placed on probation for near-terminal stupidity.
An 11-year-old Arvada boy was arrested and hauled away in handcuffs for drawing stick figures in school - something his therapist told him to do.
...
"Tim” is being treated for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder and his therapist told him to draw pictures when got upset, rather than disrupt the class. So that’s what he did.

Last October, he drew stick figures of himself with a gun, pointed at four other stick figures with the words “teacher must die.” He felt calmer and was throwing the picture away when the teacher saw it and sent him to the principal’s office.

The school was aware that the boy was in treatment, determined the drawing was not an actual threat, notified his parents and sent him back to class.

His mother, “Jane,” however, was shocked when Arvada Police showed up at their home later that night. She says she told her son to cooperate and tell the truth, but was horrified when they told her they were arresting him and then handcuffed him and hauled him away in a patrol car.
...
According to the police report, “Tim” explained he made the drawing to release anger and would never hurt teachers or anyone. At first, the school did not want to press charges, but changed their mind when police called them later that night.

A juvenile assessment report shows Tim has never been in legal trouble before and is at low risk to reoffend. Regardless, he is charged with a third degree misdemeanor, interfering with staff and students at an educational facility.
Gee, Officer Friendly, decided you needed a splashy "We Protect People" arrest, did you? Or did the ball-less disgrace for a principal decide he wanted to make an example of how he adhered to Rules That Mean I Don't Have To Think Or Take Responsibility For Anythingzero-tolerance policy? And somehow a drawing the kid was throwing away became 'INTERFERING WITH STAFF'?

Congratulations, all of you: God only knows how much damage you've done to this kid FOR NO DAMNED GOOD REASON. Apparently the Arvada Police Department needs a serious upgrade in intelligence. And a really serious push for people with some fucking brains in their ranks.

There is an idiot named Bobby Franklin in Georgia

who needs to be removed from the legislature if this is his level of brainpower.
His bill defines the beginning of life as the moment of conception and any person who ends that life shall be guilty of murder....period. Now...I am a very devout Catholic pro-life gal and I think abortions are wrong but I think this bill goes too far.

For instance....Mr. Franklin wants all miscarriages to be investigated unless they occurred in the presence of a doctor. So in other words, if you miscarry at home, you could be investigated and you would have to prove that you did nothing to cause that miscarriage. If you took a sleeping pill or if you had a glass of wine then you would have to prove that neither of those things caused you to lose your baby...or you could be charged with murder.
Absolutely out of his freakin' mind. Such as it apparently is.

The sun came out!

There is rejoicing! And while it warms a bit, I'm looking around.
Damn.
A third of the buildings in central Christchurch may need to be demolished and rebuilt, authorities in New Zealand have warned, following an earthquake.

Hundreds of suburban homes damaged in Tuesday's 6.3 magnitude tremor may also have to be pulled down, officials said.
Death toll currently 144 and about 200 missing. Bad.


Engineering a bacteria or virus to be harmless doesn't always work:
Casadaban’s illness is important because of the way the plague bacterium had been weakened. Yersinia pestis needs iron to survive. Normally it gets this iron by stealing it from a host’s body with proteins that bind to it and help break it down. To make the bacterium harmless, scientists genetically stripped it of the proteins needed to consume iron.

“It’s like having a lion, where we took out all its teeth and all its claws,” Alexander said. “But in the case of Dr. Casadaban, the lion didn’t even need to have teeth. There was so much iron that it was freely available and easy to get.”


The federal Education Department in Australia has banned Zumba, a fitness program, from its headquarters after a dance class caused the new building to shake violently.
The possible 'whole lotta shakin' goin' on' cracks are almost endless.


The mayor of LA wants a special six-foot security wall around the official house. Apparently he's bothered by those grubby citizens not being prevented from setting foot on the sacred grounds or something.
And originally, he wanted it to be 8.5' tall.


This crap with TSA is beyond the point at which people should start calling the police and charging them with assault. Maybe child molestation.
The only bad thing on our trip was TSA was at the Savannah train station. There were about 14 agents pulling people inside the building and coralling everyone in a roped area AFTER you got OFF THE TRAIN! This made no sense!!! Poor family in front of us! 9 year old getting patted down and wanded. They groped our people too and were very unprofessional. I am all about security, but when have you ever been harassed and felt up getting OFF a plane? Shouldnt they be doing that getting ON??? And they wonder why so many people are mad at them.
One more reason not to put a bunch of money into trains: the DHS and TSA want to molest you even AFTER YOU GET OFF THE DAMN THINGS.

'Security theater' doesn't even begin to cover this idiocy; the only possible reason I can think of for this is that they want to force people into the habit of being sheep at any time, any place. Thought occurs, what do they charge you with if you say "I'm calling the police, you're holding me against my will"? YOU'RE GETTING OFF THE THING.


Some questions from Doc Helen on one of the latest "You men should grow up!" books:
Though she reluctantly admits that the “materials available to young men are meager, and what is available contradicts itself,” she comes up with this ridiculous conclusion: “At bottom, they are too free, a fact epitomized by their undefined, open-ended, and profoundly autonomous pre-adulthood.” She ends the book suggesting that young women will have to get a better understanding of the limitations imposed by their bodies (Huh?) and young men need to man up.

My question to her: Why should they?

What do you have to offer these men you call child-men if they do man up? Are you going to ensure that they have fair access to their children should they divorce? Will you make sure that they aren’t hauled off to jail if the wife makes false accusations of domestic violence? Will you let them keep the earnings and property that they worked for over years rather than have them turned over to their wife, even if she cheated and was abusive? Will you shield the millions of men who live in fear of their significant other but have nowhere to turn for help? Will you make marriage, in other words, as valuable to men as you think it is for women?


Some questions and possible answers as to why the Mexican government doesn't seem bothered by the Gunwalker revelations(long excerpt):

So why the deliberate indifference?

Possibly, it’s because they want to minimize scrutiny of their own corrupt role in arming cartels:

A Mexican army officer assigned to guard President Felipe Calderon leaked military intelligence to drug cartels, trained hit men and supplied military weapons to Los Zetas, according to a U.S. Embassy cable recently released by Wikileaks.

There’s another piece of the puzzle for that State Department tie-in mentioned the other day that could expand the Grassley Senate investigation.

St. Louis Gun Rights ExaminerKurt Hofmann makes a particularly relevant observation about timing:

As Charlotte Gun Rights Examiner Paul Valone pointed out in private correspondence, that U.S. Embassy cable is dated January, 2009, meaning that when, a couple months later, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton blamed violence in Mexico on "[o]ur inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals," she was well aware that the drug syndicates were not depending on the U.S. commercial gun market for their weapons.

So Hillary knew at the time that Calderon’s own inner circle was neck-deep in profiteering from cartel connections and military arms supplying. As did Calderon, of course, who still continued to demand a ban on semiautomatic firearms be imposed against United States citizens.

Other day, in one of those stupid arguments on Facebook(I know, sometimes just can't seem to help myself) I was faced with a truly amazing thing: a bunch of the progressives and liberals actually believe ALL our current problems stem from Ronald Reagan having been President. Yeah, not good enough to blame Bush, in the end "IT'S BECAUSE OF THAT BASTARD REAGAN!!!" I mean, these people literally do not see that a Democrat or Socialist ever did ANYTHING wrong. Just flat amazing.


Paul Helmke really doesn't want people to pay attention to Gunwalker, does he?


And that's it for now; cleaning and maybe some handloading to do.

Well, this helps a helluva lot,

doesn't it?
Officers seized more than 6 tons of marijuana, about 145 pounds of cocaine, 12 automatic and semi-automatic weapons, thousands of rounds of ammunition, grenades, body armor and camouflage netting during two raids in McAllen on Wednesday, [Police Chief Victor] Rodriguez said . . .

Much of what officials seized was allegedly provided to the group, which claimed to be working with the Gulf Cartel in Reynosa, by Guardsman Jose Francisco Padilla, 30, of San Juan, police said.

“(Padilla) is a source of the flak equipment … .30-caliber weapons and ammunition,” Rodriguez said. “We know he is an active National Guardsman, but I don’t know what his assignment is.”
Apparently "Steal stuff and sell it", from the sound of this.

Found at Sipsey Street, who also notes that Sen. Coburn has taken notice of Project Gunwalker.

A bike I have no personal knowledge of

Something I ran across at the bike show last weekend, a Ural Patrol:
Not just a sidecar, a two-rear-wheel-drive bike; there's a driveshaft that delivers power to the sidecar wheel. The one I saw was a 2003, here's some specs on a later model.

I'll throw in that the one on sale had been fixed up in more military trim: slotted headlight cover, a RPK(semi) on a pivot mount on the sidecar, etc. Be an interesting thing to drive around, and with the off-road tires would probably do quite well in bad terrain.

More reason, if I needed another, not to every again have an American Express card

They help out assholes who want to destroy dams.

From the same post, another rich-as-hell asshole musician who wants death and destruction. Except. of course, for the major company that helps make him rich:
AP reporter Ryan Foley’s update from Madison on Monday night included details about a rock musician causing the crowd to to roar: “At noon, guitarist Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine took to a stage on the Capitol steps to fire up the crowd. He said he flew in from California to lend his voice to the protest.”

While reporters like Adam Nagourney “worry” out loud that the Wisconsin Republicans are going to look too extreme, AP somehow left out Morello’s truly appalling and extremist stands, like speaking fondly of Philadelphia cop killer Mumia Abu-Jamal and the Maoist Shining Path terrorists in Peru. If that didn’t seem pro-violence enough, then there’s Morello praying for the drowning of President Bush in 2007, as reported in the Washington Post:

Onstage, when the Nightwatchman [Morello] sang, “I pray that God himself will come and drown the president if the levees break again,” the Jammin’ Java crowd’s attitude was chilling. People were praying.

...
That’s pretty strong stuff coming from work-for-hire employees of one of the great cogs in the global capitalist machine, the megaconglomerate Sony, which wholly owns and distributes Rage’s music and even is a co-owner of the group’s publishing. Since 1992, Rage has sold nearly 7 million records, and it’s safe to say that nobody has benefitted more from that commerce than the band’s unabashedly capitalist paymaster.

I have to note that on the CBS news page where I found

the Obama quote on 'stability', on the sidebar there's a 'Charlie Sheen is dating -' piece.

Why the hell is this considered news? I mean, if they had a 'Charlie Sheen found dead from heart attack/overdose/protecting herself girlfriend' or whatever, THAT would be of slight news interest, but this crap on what celebritute he's currently boinking?

So Obama made a comment that we can 'hang on

until oil prices stabilize', and we're supposed to be comforted.

May I point out that prices could settle at, oh, $150/bbl and that would be a 'stabilized' price?

This is just freakin' awesome

Starting with iron ore, down to the completed blades.

thanks to Uncle for the pointer

I think it was Steve at what used to be Hog on Ice who said

something like "Lots of lawyers are scum; so why does anyone think putting them in a black robe will change that?"
Ciavarella has told the media he never took bribe from anybody and has never wrongfully sentenced any teenager to juvenile detention. He was accused of receiving kickbacks from Robert K. Mericle, the builder and co-owner of two juvenile detention facilities in return for closing down the county's only juvenile detention center and sending teenage offenders to a private-run, for-profit facilities, sometimes for minor offenses. The former judge of Court of Common Pleas in Luzerne County has been accused of receiving $2.8 million as kickbacks.

The "kids for cash" case prompted the state Supreme Court to throw out thousands of convictions.


Over to WI, this is what you get from a teacher?
“That’s your problem. You’re an entrepreneur, so you don’t work. You don’t know what work is until you get into an educational area. … You’re uneducated, unethical, immoral, and you don’t know what life is. That’s your problem. Why don’t you go behind that fence where you belong? Why don’t you go back with your own kind?” She said this indicating towards the bottom of the Capitol Steps, where a couple of hundred tea partiers were gathered listening to speeches
...
Bystander: “What did you mean when you said does he have any children that he claims?”

Lady in red: “Because he’s such a free spirit and an entrepreneur, I would assume that he’s not supporting children. …

(To Robinson:) You are a big-mouth take-care-of-yourself man. You don’t care about anyone.”
...
When I asked the lady in red why she was so incensed at Robinson, a man she had never spoken to in her life, she said “He comes here dressed to the nines, look at him. He is portraying someone not from this community.” She admitted that her assumption that this black man has children he doesn’t support was racist, but said “What I said is racist, but I am not a racist.”.
'not from this community'. From a clown supported by thousands of bussed-in union clowns. Yeah.


Gee, the cost of oil affects things? Who- outside, apparently, of some of the idiots in this administration- would have thought it?
People actually paying for stuff, that's who.


The Weare Police Department needs to have its collective ass sued off, as that may be the only think that'll get the attention of these clowns. Speaking as someone who tends to have a 'toward the police' lean, when I see things like this
Police also claim dashboard camera videos of her arrest aren't available because the equipment wasn't working that night. Hipple said police don't have maintenance records to prove the cameras weren't working.
my sympathies go out the window.


Between the price of gas around here currently being $3.18, the cost of bloody everything going up/about to due to this and other fun idiocies, and not quite enough sleep, that's about all I can deal with on news today

The clown who was Schools Superintendent for so long, Sandy Garrett,

can't stop screwing with things even when she's out of office, it would seem.
A Department of Education source claims she was privy to a conversation in which Garrett, a Democrat who held the post for 20 years, allegedly indicated in mid-December that she had been in email contact with board member Tim Gilpin, a Tulsa attorney and like Garrett a Democrat, who supported Barresi's Democratic opponent, Senator Susan Paddack. Gilpin is a former Tulsa County Democratic Party chairman and longtime donor to liberal Democrats. Gilpin and former Democratic Senator Herb Rozell, also a board member, touched off a furor a month ago when they attacked Barresi at her first board meeting and refused to approve her employment of three top assistants.
Various denials, 'never happened', etc. Except
Garrett's emails have mysteriously disappeared from department computers. An employee says she was instructed by Garrett to delete them; Garrett says she gave no such order. But emails from her final months in office as yet have not been located.

The missing emails were discovered after The Associated Press asked about them. Two state records custodians told The AP that the deletion violated a state directive and cost researchers access to significant historical records of a longtime office-holder.
But whyEVER would she do something like that...
After The AP asked to see Garrett's recent correspondence, the Department of Education said the records no longer existed and disclosed that Garrett communicated with her staff through her private e-mail accounts in her last month on the job.
Why, that sounds like someone trying to cover things up, doesn't it?

The Koch brothers,

those BASTARDS!
no wonder the socialists and liberals hate them!

It can never be forgotten: Sen. Chuck Schumer(SDP-NY)

is not only the enemy, but a happy violator of of that troublesome oath he swore:

Under the plan endorsed by Schumer and Bloomberg, states and federal authorities would be required to increase the percentage of denied gun permit applicants to the national gun database. The penalty for not reporting would be a loss of federal funding for crime prevention.

Not required to make sure the data in the database is more accurate and up to date, but to just deny more people the right to purchase a gun, with no regard to accuracy? They call the proposal “modest.” If their Thesaurus has the word “stupid” next to “modest,” I might buy that.

First, we have one response to the Touching Special Areas people

She says that whenever a TSA agent attempts to dine at the restaurant, “we turn our backs and completely ignore them, and tell them to leave… Their kind aren’t welcomed in our establishment.”

The restaurant claims that 90% of its patrons are in agreement with their stance and that the local police have actually helped escort TSA workers of the premises.
Followed by the comment from a friend:
"Very wrong response! Of course they have the right to dine - after they've been viewed naked, and the pictures ridiculed by the staff, and they've been groped in full view of the other diners. If they try to leave before this is carried out, they can be thrown to the floor, handcuffed and taken away for interrogation."

Sgt. Son called a few nights back,

and said something I'm still snickering about. Talking about some of the difficulties with some of the people in the squad, there came the disgusted comment(from his hoary age of 26):
"He's 20 years old and he's still acting like a teenager!"

I'm going to be laughing about that for a long time.

Found a couple of bones in the fridge

left from the last time I had ribs. Took them out and gave them to the Security Staff. Senior took hers to a suitable spot to chew on; Junior took his and chomped it up in about twelve seconds.

That little beast has some serious jaws.

"You, too, can be irradiated

by a body scanner that doesn't do the job!"

AND may be dangerous; we don't know for sure since, last I heard, the safety stuff that should be available still isnt.

To borrow from Simon Templar, Whales do too have wings!

CBS actually made a real report on the Gunwalker mess.

Now maybe some others among our professional journalists will get off their fat asses and report on it.

The current count in New Zealand is 75 dead

and about 300 missing. Damn.

Rep. Michael Capuano, you are a hypocritical little bastard,

aren't you?
January 9: "What the hell is going on? There's always some degree of tension in politics; everybody knows the last couple of years there's been an intentional increase in the degree of heat in political discourse. . . . If nothing else good comes out of this, I'm hoping it causes people to reconsider how they deal with things."

The other day:
"I'm proud to be here with people who understand that it's more than just sending an email to get you going. Every once and awhile you need to get out on the streets and get a little bloody when necessary."
And here's one of the results of the bastards words:

If the police in that town are worth a crap, this sorry thug will shortly be in jail.


Update: Capuano now that he's been called out: "Oh, I should have worded it differently."

Gets interesting when a journalist is called on the bullcrap

they pose as 'given':


Found this at Ace

A very nice breakdown of how & why Marx was(and his ideas still are)

full of crap over at Classical Values. One bit:
To Marx value was raw material plus work. The means of producing that work (machinery, etc) were just sort of there. And he made no allowance for invention. (Which is why though Marxist revolutions often recruit intellectuals they're the sort of intellectuals who never had an original idea in their life.) Of course in our day and age, invention and original thought are at least as important as machinery in creating product. Also, the raw material fallacy means all the countries who have nothing else to sell feel "exploited" because we're taking their "value" away. Imbuing raw material itself with value means that it's sort of like stealing national treasure. This has given rise to an entire colonialist-exploitation-theory of history which has held more people in misery in developing countries than the most brazen robber baron could manage. And no one, NOT ONE seems to realize that their raw materials mean absolutely nothing if not used. If someone doesn't have an idea to use it. If the finished product is not good for something. In other words, if you're not producing something that someone else finds useful. (I.e. enough to pay for.) If the relationship isn't MUTUALLY beneficial.

I can't remember who is was, the first time I read of the 'stealing the treasure of the indigenous people' garbage, who called bullshit on it in a very plain way; as he pointed out, if someone had not developed technologies that used oil, the mid-East would still be a bunch of camel & goatherds raiding each other to steal wives and raping the livestock because without someone needing it that oil is worthless. Still true, and why the oil ticks live in dread of someone finding a practical substitute for oil.

Been reading about the mess in WI,

and in the mid-East and north Africa, and thinking about the reactions of some people here.

Specifically, despite a lot of the groups and people involved(Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, for example) we've got a bunch of people yelling "Democracy! It's about Democracy!! Democracy good!!!" ; how the hell do you see a bunch of islamist clowns talking about imposing sharia and calling for war to wipe out the Jews and keep saying that as if there's no problem?

Some of this is pretty much pushing for base-form democracy, mob rule; and mob rule pushing for a theocracy, at that. But you've got a bunch of people, primarily progressives and socialists, who either see no problem with mob rule(they plan to control the mob, of course) or are too damn stupid to see the problems. Long as they keep yelling "Democracy!" they think it's all good.

Went 'round with someone the other day on the mess in WI; according to her it's purely the downtrodden workers fighting for their rights against the evil right-wingers who want another bit of value on their stock accounts. Think about this: the state is broke, the people elected are acting to do exactly what they said they would, get the costs under control and stop the unions from controlling the process, and somehow this is seen as Evil Right-Wing Fascists robbing the poor workers, etc.(yeah, she is a socialist) She even sees a connection to those epitome-of-evil Koch brothers. She also defended the crooked doctors handing out fake sick excuses for teachers to skip work because "I'd be stressed too if I knew I might be fired for no reason!" Let's see, skipping work on falsified grounds, abusing sick leave... that's grounds to be fired in just about any company, and I think most states have similar rules on that, but that would be getting fired 'for no reason'. Yeah. Right. (she also basically said that one piece of information I brought up didn't count for squat because I found it on a blog while she quoted something from a local paper; I just said "Information is where you find it." This is also the one who claimed a Media Matters list of calling Glenn Beck names and disagreeing with him proved he 'lied' about a bunch of things)

And let's completely ignore that the Governor pointed out that if these concessions aren't made there'll be thousands of state and local public employees laid off; that doesn't count or something.

Back when, I worked for a state agency. In Oklahoma the union is called the OK State Employees Association, and I became really sick of them. If they'd been honest they'd have registered as a lobbying arm of the Democrat Party, which actions rather ticked me off; add to that their apparent complete disregard of the financial condition of the state when demanding more. More money, more benefits more whatever. And if the point was made too loudly that "THERE IS NO MONEY FOR THIS, YOU MORONS!" their answer was "Then raise taxes so you can give 'us' a raise!" I'd be sitting there thinking "Hey, if you raise taxes to give us a raise we'll be paying those increased taxes too, dammit!"

Their answer to that seemed to be "We'll only raise taxes on the rich!", etc. Yeah. That NEVER soaks down to everyone else, does it? Right now look at how that's worked in Californicated and the PROM; raise taxes on the wealthy and at least some of them move, and then you lose ALL the taxes you were getting from them. Isn't that a wonderful idea?(it is for the lower-tax states those people move to, of course) We're seeing the same attitude in WI; there's no money, but Progressivism Forbid that be acknowledged if it means the unions lose some power. I think one of the things that demonstrates this is about power is the outrage the unions have for two things in particular:
ALL union members would have to vote annually about keeping the union, and
The state would no longer collect dues for the unions, they'd have to get them directly from members.
The unions are apparently terrified of both ideas, which tells me the unions don't trust the bulk of their members to want to stay in and don't trust that they'll be happy to pay dues; they want the power of the state to take the dues for them, and don't want to have to deal with a vote of all members. Says bad things about the union, doesn't it?


I'll add to the personal history that there were a couple of people in my area who were OPEA members; the one time we had a problem that they went to the union with, the response was "Oh, we don't get involved in things like that! And please remember to renew for next year."

Rep. Allen West does not put up with bullshit

"I've been on the battlefield, my friend, ok? Don't try to blow sunshine up my butt"

When the bad guys think they have no reason to fear you,

you get hostages. Then you get dead hostages.
The four Americans aboard a yacht hijacked by pirates off the coast of Somalia are dead.

Hijacked last Friday off Oman, the Quest was being piloted toward the Somali coast – and was being shadowed by a U.S. Navy warship.

CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports that gunshots aboard the yacht were heard, and the warship took action.

All 4 Americans were dead, killed apparently by their captors.
Yeah, how's that God-damned Hope and Change working?

We've got a Navy that could take care of this, and deal with the pirates. Except the politicians won't let them. And here's part of the result. And the captured pirates will get a nice, comfortable cell and plenty of food and a 'international court' that won't accomplish squat.

New Zealand got pasted

with another quake. Second in only a few months.

Wonder if any of the hobbit burrows are left? I know it's a dumb question, but it did pop to mind

How do I despise the New York Times,

#372:
Oh, wait:

The New York Times had agreed to temporarily withhold information about Mr. Davis’s ties to the agency at the request of the Obama administration, which argued that disclosure of his specific job would put his life at risk.

How brave of you to wait five days before outing an undercover CIA agent.
You couldn't f*cking wait until he was at least out of prison and of harms way?

You are patriots who truly love this country.
You love America the way an abusive husband loves his wife. You love the idealized version of her, but are ready at any moment to beat the shit out of her should she do something you disapprove of. You know, like spying on the enemies of the United States.

Wow, a lot of pictures from WWII in the Pacific

here.

Found at Theo's place

Robert Mugabe's health 'hurting Zimbabwe'

Yeah, as long as the bastard is still breathing.

Two things for now: First, Columbia University

should be given two choices: ROTC or lose the federal funding, as I think the law calls for. And every one of the miserable little liberal shits who gave this man crap can FOAD; they're not worthy to kiss his ass.
Columbia University students heckled a war hero during a town-hall meeting on whether ROTC should be allowed back on campus.

"Racist!" some students yelled at Anthony Maschek, a Columbia freshman and former Army staff sergeant awarded the Purple Heart after being shot 11 times in a firefight in northern Iraq in February 2008. Others hissed and booed the veteran.


Second, RNS found this: 10kT Nuke Scenario in Port of Los Angeles. Scary stuff. And the little shits mentioned above ought to consider that
A: There are people out there who would flat LOVE to smuggle that nuke onto their university and trigger it, and
B: Troops like Anthony Maschek put their lives on the line- and often pay a price- to try and keep it from happening.
But that would require them stepping out of their nice, comfortable little liberal bubble. And I doubt they have the balls or brains to do that.

I have an idea for Gov. Walker:

Find every one of the union clowns getting one of these 'take a day off' notes and fire them for false sick-time claims.

Then go after the doctors for knowingly handing out these falsified forms.

That'd be a good start.