Good way of putting it: we're just another variety

of geek.


By the way, 'indigo kids'? Really?


And yeah, if Holder & Co. had any integrity, and actually believed in that Constitution thing they swore an oath to uphold*, they'd be investigating those clowns. But they'd also have dealt with that voter intimidation crap, and not started smuggling guns to Mexico for political reasons, and...


Whoops; the approves storyline is fraying, badly:
Lastly, note that the Police Report from the night of the shooting - which took its info from his two-year-old ID - listed him as 6-0, but the Trayvon who was shot was was in fact a six-foot-two and 180+ pounds football player - not the innocent little boy being plastered all over!
among other things.


Translation: "The tech is easy; it's making the peasants, er, commoners, ah, serfspeople do what we've decided is necessary that's hard."
If I had it to do over, I’d approach the issue planning differently, my fellow editors permitting. I would scale back on the nuclear fusion and clean coal, instead devoting at least half of the available space for feature articles on psychology, sociology, economics and political science. Since doing that issue, I’ve come to the conclusion that the technical details are the easy part. It’s the social engineering that’s the killer. Moon shots and Manhattan Projects are child’s play compared to needed changes in the way we behave.

A policy article authored by several dozen scientists appeared online March 15 in Science to acknowledge this point: “Human societies must now change course and steer away from critical tipping points in the Earth system that might lead to rapid and irreversible change. This requires fundamental reorientation and restructuring of national and international institutions toward more effective Earth system governance and planetary stewardship.”
...
Unfortunately, far more is needed. To be effective, a new set of institutions would have to be imbued with heavy-handed, transnational enforcement powers. There would have to be consideration of some way of embracing head-in-the-cloud answers to social problems that are usually dismissed by policymakers as academic naivete. In principle, species-wide alteration in basic human behaviors would be a sine qua non, but that kind of pronouncement also profoundly strains credibility in the chaos of the political sphere. Some of the things that would need to be contemplated: How do we overcome our hard-wired tendency to “discount” the future: valuing what we have today more than what we might receive tomorrow? Would any institution be capable of instilling a permanent crisis mentality lasting decades, if not centuries? How do we create new institutions with enforcement powers way beyond the current mandate of the U.N.? Could we ensure against a malevolent dictator who might abuse the power of such organizations?
He means 'abuse the power in ways I would not approve of', I think. And crap like this is why the trust in people who want the UN running us is, ah, 'low' shall we say? And why so many have such distrust of a lot of people in the sciences.

I'm going to go out in the sun for a while; both for the vitamin D and because I need some fresh air.

I sound like I've been gargling gravel;

not a good way to start things.

So, the NYEffingTimes was lying about things a long time ago, to get the story they wanted as opposed to the real one.(found over at Ace)


Anyone else get the feeling that he means "If I win, I'll do whatever I want; and if I lose, I'll do whatever I want until they throw me out in January."?


Interesting to have a AG who thinks a subpoena is something to be obeyed only if you feel like it.
Therefore, Weich is denying Issa‘s and Grassley’s subpoena because of the “sensitivity” of the ongoing operation.

Issa spokeswoman Becca Watkins responded Friday night, saying, “It is troubling that the attorney general continues to express the outlandish view that his compliance with lawful and binding subpoenas is merely optional.”
Of course, we also have a Treasury Secretary who cheated on his taxes and got a special deal from the IRS, and a Rep. who was writing the tax laws he cheated on and then his defenders claimed 'those laws were too complicated for him to understand', and...


Haven't said anything about the shooting in Florida; reason being that information is still coming out. I will say that if this Justice Department had any integrity at all, they'd be investigating the NBP clowns calling for kidnapping and murder. Of course, this JD doesn't give a rats ass about voter intimidation if blacks are doing it, so they're not going to do anything about this. Or other death threats.


Bleah. I need a large glass of tea. More later, assuming I feel like it.

May be a good thing I couldn't make the shoot today,

as I seem to have broken with some bug; better to miss the Schutenfest than maybe spread this around. Or it may be something in the air with everything blooming/leafing out, since there's not fever(as yet, anyway).

Ah well.

By the way, know anybody who owns gold bars? Send them this and see if they break out in hives.

Heard of this, first time I've seen this map

Oh, I want to go

Thought might be able to make the last day of the Gunblogger Schutenfest,

but the world called, and just got all that done. So by the time could get up there...

Ah well, next time I'll make sure have at least one day free for it.

And while Obama is helping stir things up, and he odious

Sharpton & Co. are trying to start violence, and the NBP dirtbags that Holder has such a tender spot for are planning on kidnapping and murder, this stuff isn't getting much press for some reason:
A 13-year-old Kansas City [MO] boy is back home after two teenagers poured gasoline on him and lit him on fire.

It happened Tuesday [Feb 28] at the teen’s home on Quincy Avenue, just down the street from Kansas City’s East High School. The boy lives less than two blocks away from the school and was walking home when the attack happened.

…the teens followed [him] home and attacked him outside his front door … rushed him on the porch as he tried to get the door open… [one] poured the gasoline, then flicked the Bic, and said, ‘This is what you deserve. You get what you deserve, white boy’.
Here's the description of the attackers:
Police said the two suspects, believed to be around 16 years old, are male and have facial hair.

One was wearing a blue hat, blue jacket, and shoes with the number 23 on the side.

The other wore a blue hat, a black jacket, and wore glasses.
Notice anything missing?

Followup:
Moreover, after conducting an investigation that included extensive interviews with parents and students, I’ve learned that Coon’s son is not alone. Other white students also report a pattern of racial harassment at the high school at the hands of their peers — and, shockingly, their teachers.

…Two of these victims were the twin 14-year-old daughters (first names withheld upon request) of Karin Wildeisen. Ever since their family relocated from Texas, they had endured racial animosity in the Kansas City school system and inappropriate behavior by staff, which included teachers laughing while boys humiliatingly manhandled the girls and a teacher slapping one of them on the backside….

Then, further down, in Boston,
The arguments between my daughter and these boys started with a couple of the boys asking Morgan to be their girlfriend. When Morgan turned them down, they retaliated by calling her names like “fat ho, lesbian b**ch, c**t, etc…” this goes on for about a month before the first assault on the bus occurs. The boys are refugees brought over from Kenya and Ethiopia. Morgan was brutally attacked. First elbowed in the face, followed by 6 to 7 punches knocking her front teeth out and leaving her with a concussion. It took four teachers to get one of the boys off her…”
Where's our major media on these stories? Guarandamntee you, if this had been white kids abusing blacks or hispanics there'd be screaming on all fronts; instead
I am not exaggerating when I say that there was not a word about this story in the national press. I searched, and the only stories I could find were the write up in the Daily News mentioned above and, oddly, a story in the Daily Mail, a British paper.

Nothing from the New York Times, AP, Reuters, UPI, etc. If any reader can produce a story about this sadistic attack that was actually published or mentioned in a national outlet, let me know. I’m only human; I may have missed it. I welcome being proved wrong about this, because I’m about ready to fold up my tent, quit civilization, and go find myself a comfy cave in Borneo to live in. This country is, like a bad calculus problem, rapidly approaching zero.

Yeah, that does make sense, doesn't it...

I became confused when I heard the word "Service" used with these agencies:

Internal Revenue 'Service'
U.S. Postal 'Service'
Telephone 'Service'
Cable TV 'Service'
Civil 'Service'
State, City, County & Public 'Service'
Customer 'Service'

This is not what I thought 'Service' meant.

But today, I overheard two farmers talking, and one of them said he had hired a bull to 'Service' a few cows.

BAM!!! It all came into focus. Now I understand what all those agencies are doing to us.

I would hope that you are now just as enlightened as I am.

By the way, the Brady Campaign and CSGV

are fucking dirtbag hypocrites. Who don't care about a bunch of dead Mexicans and some dead American cops, so long as they think the bodies will help their political cause.

First evening of the First Annual Central Oklahoma Gunblogger Schutenfest

is over for me; unfortunately, need to get some sleep. Nice gathering, met Jennifer & hubby, met Daniel, met- well, a bunch of folks. Lots of shiny toys shown off, including that Barrett Daniel recently adopted.

Some fine smoked lamb and chicken and such to help things along. Very nice evening, it was.

Seems to cover it

Found at Ace

Remember the "You have no right to resist an illegal entry by cops" judge?

People got pissed, and this is the outcome.



The attorneys of Bill Newell, embattled former ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix Field Division, and David Voth, Supervisor of Phoenix Group VII (the group that carried out Operation Fast and Furious), are accusing Senator Charles Grassley and Chairman of the House Oversight Committee Darrell Issa of making “many inaccurate and harmful statements” and “factual distortions against” their clients.
And they do this by lying their faces off.
Shouldn't people like attorney and former Department of Justice Prosecutor Paul E. Pelletier have some kind of a problem about lying in print like this?


Well, how about the Houston PD stops being a collective dick? That would take care of the problem.


So the NYEffingTimes doesn't like castle-doctrine laws. And some prosecutors don't like them because it makes them harder to charge people in honest self-defense cases(my wording). Well, tough shit; one of the reasons for the push for these laws was prosecutors charging people just because they figured it was an easy way to get another 'I took a criminal off the street' conviction in their record for when they ran for office later on.
Other thoughts here.


A: Idiot cops shooting dogs.
B: Idiot journalist makes excuses.


Oh my....

Somebody's gonna get a talking to...(thanks, Feral)


A bit of history on Gen. Grant and Jews.
One thing I'd argue:
”the [P]rotestant, the Catholic, and the Jew appointed days for universal prayer in my behalf,” he boasted to his eldest son on his deathbed)
When I read something like this, I'm wondering if there was any indication of 'boasting' in the actual record, or is that the writers' interpretation?

What? Obama & Co. are supporting islamists?

Why, isn't that a surprise...

'Course, after Egypt and Libya and such, isn't a surprise to a lot of us...

They're baaaack

Honeybees in the holly trees while it was sunny yesterday. Saw maybe two last year, but there were a bunch enjoying the blooms; nice to see them back.

Ace notes that "I want to speed up THIS pipeline" Obama is full of crap. On multiple levels. As he says, when The Oklahoman says things like
Is it just us or would Obama's green energy evangelism be more convincing if he either kept Air Force One parked more often or used electric vehicles for surface transit?
it tells you something about how this crap is going over.

Sen. Constance Johnson(D: big surprise, huh?) is one of the idiots and gun bigots

we have to deal with in this state. When the Senate passed Senate Bill 1733, this is what she came out with:
Sen. Constance Johnson, D-Oklahoma City, said there are too many potential adverse outcomes that could happen as a result of the bill.

"I know boys and toys are a big deal," she said.
...
"I hope that girl in the Governor's Office if it gets that far will say, 'That is enough, boys,' " Johnson said.
Yes, because we're obviously a bunch of children who need people like Johnson to supervise us and decide what we can be allowed to do. And note the 'girl in the office' bit; interesting coming from a Democrat and aimed at a Republican Gov.

And, of course, we had the Wild West crap come out:
In the Old West, the fastest survived — not the good. Wisdom required guns to be parked at the jail before walking to the saloon. Will a gun stay holstered after a few beers? Will our children see us as peaceful or violent citizens? We have the right to bear arms. Do we need the right to display them?
Let's see,
Illegal to drink while carrying.
Bullcrap about the West(again).
One of her other questions was Will criminals intimidate with visible guns? Well, criminals don't seem to be too shy to flash them now to intimidate, so I don't think this really counts. The rest of the letter is standard "Think of the CHILDREN!" stuff, with 'think of them' meaning "Make the scared of guns and people who own them." combined with "How can the police ever deal with this?"

You still have to have a concealed-carry permit to open carry under this law, but it is a step forward.

What? This murderer of Jews and French troops is muslim

and a jihadi asshole? Who could have suspected such a thing?[/sarcasm]
And I propose a new label: anytime someone like the NYEffingTimes or Guardian refers to some dirtbag as 'far right', it should automatically be translated as 'socialist'. After all, despite all the efforts on the left to deny it, the nazis were very much socialists. And the Palisimians & Co. have always been quite fond of the nazis.


"It's not a ban, we just won't let you make or sell them."


Well, you keep apologizing to dirtbags who insult and murder our troops, there's going to be a reaction.


Obama still lying about insurance and his moms' death.


Obamas' Energy Secretary is either a arrogant fool, or doesn't care how much he lies about what a great job he's done. And he really wishes he had more 'tools' to work on gas prices. Yeah, I'd imagine he loves the idea of being able to close refineries and such at will.


Veep Joe Biden: Effing Incredible Moron, or just full of crap?
Personally, I vote for both.


"Yeah, we let the illegal-alien child rapist out on bail; how were we supposed to know he wouldn't hang around?"

Alien reminds me, in one city in Arizona saw a billboard: "Fresh Alien jerky!" Which automatically had me running through
You're turning aliens into jerky?
You know who they are and make jerky just for them?
Is this why you call some of the locals 'Soylent'?


Some thoughts on the President letting his daughter go to Mexico for spring break, and some of the mess thereof. Bypassing, for the moment, the media putting their own stories down the memory hole at the request of the White House.


The U.S. Supreme Court ruled unanimously Wednesday that homeowners may sue when they think the Environmental Protection Agency has treated them unfairly.
It's a start.


DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton also made similar pleas, predicated on gun violence committed with U.S. guns in Mexico.

We know for a fact that Operation Fast and Furious was designed by the Obama administration to put American weapons in the hands of Mexican cartels to kill Mexican citizens, and that the guns recovered in those deaths would be used to call for more gun control.

Hundreds died in a plot that appears to have been designed to impose gun control. It’s past time for the appointment of an independent prosecutor, and to press for criminal charges against those responsible for the carnage that has resulted from the deadliest scandal in U.S. government history.


And now, since it's threatening to rain some more, I think I'll hit the store while it's still a bit sunny outside.

I effing HATE some commenting crap

Like over at Feral Irishman, if I choose 'Google account' it does nothing; and my comment just disappears. If I choose 'Name/URL' it seems to work; except the effing comment disappears AGAIN.

Happens at a lot of sites anymore; and it sucks.

Have you noticed the 'Happy Volt Owner' commercials

that came out shortly after the news of suicide by fire and right after they idled the production line?

It occurs to me that maybe they need to start ATF training

with Brer Rabbit and the Briar Patch, updated to "Please don't make me go back across that border!"


The UN and the warmist fascists really don't like there being sovereign nations that can say 'Screw you', do they?

So the "I wasn't given communion at my mothers' funeral because I'm LESBIAN!" story is crap; whoda thunk such a thing?
“So in my interview with the principal we talked openly about my being a lesbian and a Buddhist.”
But then, "I wasn't given communion because I'm a Buddhist" just doesn't fit the narrative she wanted to create.


In our current "Ma Nature is catching up from last year", it's rained a lot the last couple of days, a few tornadoes, some flooding south and east of here. By the time things dry out I'm going to have a half-bale worth of grass to cut.


The Collinsville PD and Officer Michael Reichert: a fine demonstration of why people don't like or trust the police anymore. And, in far too many cases, SHOULD not trust them.


Back when I was forging a lot, and doing some shows regularly, I'd get some interesting reactions to some of the knives: some people would look at a big dirk or bowie and say things like "That's too big, nobody needs a knife that size" or "These are too sharp", or "Too fancy." Mind you, they were outnumbered by the "I like it!" people, but there were enough of them to stir thought. They remind me of this guy: "It's one thing to have a small knife to use, but THESE are too much/too nasty-looking" and such. You also get the "That motorcycle doesn't need that much horsepower/can go too fast/etc."

Personal experience on bikes- lots of cars for that matter- has given me the viewpoint that I'd far rather have more horsepower and torque 'than I might actually need' than find out I REALLY need to move and I can't. If I'm out in the woods a big knife might not usually be needed, but if you do need it... For that matter I'm with Tam: I like finely-made tools for their own sake, as well as their utility; I like knowing that if I crank the throttle that VFR is going to take off like a raped ape; I like knowing that dirk I kept will go through a lot of things and hardly slow down, and still be sharp after. To those who can't understand that, well, that's your problem.

"He was cooperating and talking a lot

and giving up a lot," he said. "From an investigative standpoint, that's pretty good information you're getting. Maybe he can hook you into even bigger fish."
Yeah, he 'talked and gave up a lot' just long enough for ATF to give him a phone number and turn him loose. After which, surprise! SURPRISE!!, he disappeared.

This Gunwalker mess combines such levels of idiocy and/or corruption, I'm sick to death of finding out more about it.

So Chicago cops have the same respect for that Constution thing

that Obama does...
The two were covering the fatal shooting of a six-year old girl and, though they were already across the street, the officer demanded they go another street over.

“F*** news affairs, I don’t care about news affairs. Forget news affairs,” he said.

When the journalists spoke to their rights, the officer replied, “Your first amendment rights can be terminated, if you’re creating a scene, or whatever. Your first amendment rights have limitations.”

After the journalists responded, “how have we created a scene? This is what we do for a living,” the officer replied, “Your presence is creating a scene.”
'Terminated', that's a real interesting word choice, isn't it?

Mr. Pistole, that you can defend crap like this makes you

the biggest effing dirtbag in the TSA. You ought to be fired, since you don't have the honor or integrity to either resign or make this shit stop.
The three-year-old, confined to a wheelchair due to a recently broken leg, was with his family at O'Hare Airport in Chicago, on their way to board a flight to Disney World in Orlando, Florida.

Despite constant assurances from his father that 'everything is OK', he physically trembles with fear and asks his parents to hold his hand.
Because it's apparently better for these fast-food rejects now wearing badges they haven't earned* to screw with children and steal your stuff, and molest people and humiliate people with medical problems than actually worry about terrorists, because that would be A: intelligent and B: someone would scream "PROFILING!", like that moron Minetta who used to be in charge of this idiocy.


*There was a piece recently listing how TSA snuck this "We want uniforms like cops, with badges" crap through, but I can't find it.

Let's start the day with global warmening idiots who want to genetically modify

the human race to end globular warmering.
In this article, Atlantic correspondent Ross Andersen ably interviews S. Matthew Liao, a professor of philosophy and bioethics at New York University. Liao and his philosopher co-authors have a forthcoming paper in the journal Ethics, Policy & Environment that proposes genetic engineering and other “biomedical modifications” of body function for the purpose of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
It's hard to pick a single bit to excerpt from this, there's so much WTF?!? here. I'll use this one:
“Andersen: Taking a look at this from the perspective of deep ecology — is there something to be said for the idea that because climate change is human caused, that humans ought to be the ones that change to mitigate it — that somehow we ought to be bear the cost to fix this? Liao: That was actually one of the ideas that motivated us to write this paper, the idea that we cause anthropogenic climate change, and so perhaps we ought to be bear some of the costs required to address it.” In short, just when you thought hair shirts and self-flagellation were so 1270 A.D., Liao and company are proposing genetic modification as sin expiation — a kind of self-mortification of the bodies of current and future generations.


While back someone I know posted something along the lines of "Republicans are worried, because studies show women don't want to vote for idiots who hate women." I replied that "Well, they had no problem voting for a drunken abuser named Kennedy and his equally abusive friend time after time, so that shouldn't actually be a problem." No response.


An opinion on the 'war on women 'cause you don't want to pay for our rubbers and pills' bullcrap; let's say she's not a fan.


"It's ok for leftists to be violent, because We're Right!"

Global warming is the new home of the closet totalitarian.

Only now they’re not in the closet any longer.

An early step to Gunwalker, it appears

Breitbart.com has uncovered video from 1995 of then-U.S. Attorney Eric Holder announcing a public campaign to "really brainwash people into thinking about guns in a vastly different way."
...
Holder added that he had asked advertising agencies in the nation's capital to assist by making anti-gun ads rather than commercials "that make me buy things that I don't really need." He had also approached local newspapers and television stations, he said, asking them to devote prime space and time, respectively, to his anti-gun campaign.
And now he's stonewalling about his part in gun smuggling to Mexico and hundreds of deaths.

Ah, if only

on her last deployment...

Congratulations, Chrysler, you've just made sure I'll never

buy one of your cars.

Friend is a mechanic. Earlier today told me that, beginning in 2013, Chrysler automatic transmissions will have the software that operates them embedded in a module in the transmission itself. And if you disconnect the battery, or it dies on you, you can reconnect it or put in a new one and the engine will start; but until you get it to a Chrysler dealer to have the module reprogrammed, you're not going anywhere.

Just think of all the levels of 'Fail' involved in this.

A little piece of history

about our time in the Philippines.
Captain Cloman tracked down the killers and arrested them.

All night Cloman interviewed the suspects in order to answer the most important question: Why? He obtained no satisfactory answer. The Moros’ explanation [he wrote in his diary] “always came down to the fact that the soldiers were in their power and could be killed, so therefore they were.”

...
The American military did not want to enter into a full scale war with the Moro and exercised military restraint, however:

The Moros saw American restraint as weakness. The Moro understanding of Mohammed’s life story taught that a party engaged in diplomacy merely to buy time to recover from setback. Thus… return to diplomacy reinforced the Moro perception of American weakness.

Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

Project Gutpile: Potemkin village?

Richardson thinks so, and they're on the other side.

Found something at Huffman's place

His post is here

Amazingly, I actually got off my ass and out of the house

this evening and caught these folks performing; a good show, it was. There'll be more in the future.

Oh, and Harp from a can sucks; Harp on tap is pretty good.


Remember that stuff a few months back about Texas putting together some gunboats for those lakes along the border? They're going to the Rio and Gulf, too.
Texas unveiled the second of six new ‘interceptor’ gunboats on Thursday, similar to Navy swift boats that plied the rivers of Vietnam during the Vietnam War, to patrol the waterways of the Mexico border.

The Texas Department of Public Safety, which oversees the Texas Highway Patrol and the Texas Rangers, said the 34-foot shallow water crafts would be deployed on the Rio Grande and the Intercoastal Waterway, which separates the Texas mainland from Padre Island.
I'd say folks in TX are getting pretty tired of waiting for the feds to do something about the problems.

Another place I never saw before

for some reason: When the balloon goes up

God damn

Info just coming out that a 22-year-old Marine was murdered on 01 Feb, about 6 weeks ago, in another insider attack. The military covered it up as if it were combat operations. Lance Cpl. Edward J. Dycus of Greenville, Mississippi was shot in the back of the head by an Afghan soldier. Our people immediately turned over the murderer to the Afghans.

That's a huge Red Flag on numerous levels. How many other "combat deaths" have been caused by insider attacks, and how often has our military covered it up? How many murderers have been turned over to Afghans? What happens when we turn over a killer to Afghans?

Among other things,

changed the clutch and brake fluid in the bike today. Fairly straightforward process(especially if you change a couple of things from the 'official' method) but I still get hinky working on the 'make it stop' stuff.

And nitrile gloves are one of the greatest things around: until one tore getting at one of the effing bleed valves on the rear caliper they kept all the grease and fluid off my hands. And only got a little bit then.

On a less-successful action, the bloody tiller doesn't want to run. I think one of the fuel lines is leaking and sucking air in, so if the knee I ran into something this afternoon will let me walk tomorrow I'll pick up a set of new ones and see if that does it.

One of the things brought back from Tacoma is sons' carry piece, on which he installed a set of these XS Big Dot sights. Took it to the range a couple of days ago and tried them out; I like them. Very fast and show up very well in dim light, and glow in the dark. I may have to check these out in the future for my piece.

So, if Australia does create their Ministry of Truth

to police what people say, will foreigners be turned back for having said something the politicians don't like?
Finkelstein’s ideological position is not hard to find. It’s in paragraph 4.10 of his report. He thinks a council should control speech in Australia because most people are too dumb or ignorant to decide for themselves about what they see and hear and read in the media.

In response to the claim from News Ltd’s John Hartigan that ultimately readers “were capable of making up their own minds” about bias in the media, Finkelstein writes, “often, however, readers are not in a position to make an appropriately informed judgment”.

This is intellectual arrogance at its most breathtaking. And it’s a great argument against democracy. If, as Finkelstein claims, people aren’t smart enough to decide for themselves the merits of what they see in the media then they’re certainly not smart enough to decide who to vote for.

This is the totalitarian fallacy: don’t let the people decide (because the people are too stupid), let judges and academics decide for them.

Note this from WUWT on similar threats to speech here:
The same totalitarian ambitions are at work in America too. They face greater legal obstacles here, but key actors are powerfully placed. Obama’s “regulatory czar” Cass Sunstein wants to use the system of “notice and takedown” from copyright law to shut down “conspiracy theories.” As an example, he wants to suppress claims that:

the theory of global warming is a deliberate fraud.

If SOPA had passed then all of the necessary machinery would have been in place, ready to expand from copyright infringement to the suppression of conspiracy theories at the drop of a one-line rider on any bill. At that point our freedom to speak our minds would lie in the hands of Sunstein booster Elena Kagan (who brought Sunstein to Harvard, calling him “the preeminent legal scholar of our time”); the racist Sonya Sotomayor (a long-time member of La Raza, or “the race“); and a borderline Court-majority of similar un-worthies.

Firing Boehner does seem like a good idea, doesn't it?

Operation Fast and Furious was a gun-walking plot dependent on guns being “walked” over the border to the Sinaloa drug cartel. In particular, the plot was entirely dependent on these walked guns being used in violent crimes, and then traced. It is predicated on the cartel’s standard operating procedure of treating firearms as disposable commodities, discarding weapons after they have been used in murders at or near the scene of the crime,so that the weapon could not be tied back to any given shooter in a string of killings."

Let’s be very explicit about this, so that no context can be lost: Operation Fast and Furious was conceived, authorized, and executed knowing that Mexican citizens would be violently murdered as a necessary part of the plot. This is beyond dispute, and admitted to in sworn congressional testimony by BATFE agents.
...
As Speaker of the House, it is John Boehner’s duty to protect and defend the Constitution, especially since he is the de facto leader of the “loyal opposition” within the federal government.

He, more than anyone, has the moral responsibility to hold this Administration in compliance with the laws and treaties of this nation. Boehner, more than anyone, has a responsibility to the American people to demand that DOJ IG Schendar release her findings in a timely manner.

Schnedar has had more than enough time to complete her investigation. Boehner has refused to call for the IG’s report. Even worse, insiders with sources inside the DOJ claim Boehner is actively involved in trying to muzzle the House Oversight Committee’s investigation.

I don't think this'll make my list of 'active volcanoes

I'd like to see', as there's a serious shortage of places to run to if it seriously blows

The ethics of going armed

Good read

Oh, Pistole & Co. must be feeling the love right now (updated)

One of America’s busiest airports, Orlando Sanford International, has announced it will opt out of using TSA workers to screen passengers, a move which threatens the highly unpopular federal agency’s role in other airports across the nation.
...
The agency has been slow to reissue the guidelines on the the rule change, prompting Republican Representatives John Mica of Florida, Darrell Issa of California and Jason Chaffetz of Utah to press TSA head John Pistole to implement the mandate.
Gee, I wonder why... OH:
The TSA has been keen to downplay the opportunity for airports to dispense with their screeners, fearing a mass exodus that could undermine the justification for the agency’s continued existence, especially given the fact that its reputation has been repeatedly savaged by a number of scandals.
Add "And some screeners wondering when some molested woman/humiliated med patient/parent was going to beat the crap out of them."

Oh, and as to the "We see you naked" machines,
The most recent controversy involved a viral You Tube video created by engineer Jon Corbett which demonstrated how the TSA’s body scanners were virtually useless because they are unable to detect objects carried on the side of the body carried in a pocket.

The TSA responded by threatening the media not to cover the issue while putting out a blog statement that completely failed to rebut the claims made by Corbett.
I imagine they really didn't like having to deal with that.

Here's a link to the video;

As a side matter, I wonder if their Snake In The GrassVIPR teams have been taking bets as to how long before some pissed-off/molested motorist runs them over when they screw with traffic on a public road?

So Panetta says Congress doesn't really count anymore

and doesn't trust the troops to be armed when around his sorry ass; isn't that interesting?
“In a sign of the nervousness surrounding Mr. Panetta’s trip, the Marines and other troops who were waiting in a tent for the defense secretary to speak were abruptly asked by their commander to get up, place their weapons — M-16 and M-4 automatic rifles and 9-mm pistols — outside the tent and then return unarmed. The commander, Sgt. Maj. Brandon Hall, told reporters he was acting on orders from superiors.

“All I know is, I was told to get the weapons out,” he said. Asked why, he replied, “Somebody got itchy, that’s all I’ve got to say. Somebody got itchy; we just adjust.”

Hey, Chris, I think the line I once heard was 'Farging corksuckers' or something, and

it seems to fit you real well.

I especially like this part:
“Chris Rock shouted, ‘You want to throw down? Let’s throw down right now!’ Of course, he was standing safely behind two bodyguards when he said it.”

In the 'Self-Defenders' category, you need to read this

now, or soon as you can. And this. Good information.

An excerpt which conflicts with a lot of the usual advice:
When to draw

Despite warnings I often see on the Net I have yet to encounter an instance in which a hold up man called the police to report his intended victim threatened to shoot him. Thugs do not want to come into contact with the police. They may already be wanted or realize chances are good they have been identified in a recent robbery. Or what ever. They are not going to call the police if you draw on them.

Supposed two guys are approaching you in a parking lot and do the classic fan out maneuver. You indicate you have a weapon by clearing your gun hand and fanning your jacket at them. They are not discouraged. DRAW!

I am not saying you should pull your gun out, assume a Weaver stance, and scream "That's close enough motherfuckers!" What I am saying is draw your gun and hold it beside your leg as you start to move to cover. I am very fond of telephone poles. Anything will do though. They will see this. They will remember they have to be somewhere else. They will not call the police.

Then you can just put your gun back in the holster and go back to whatever you were doing like nothing happened. Why? Because nothing did happen. A happening is when shots are fired.

Do not hesitate to draw. If you are somewhere you are supposed to be and someone appears who is not supposed to be there like a closed business show him the end of your gun. Could it be Mother Teresa looking for her lost cat behind your closed business? No it is some motherfucker up to no good. He won't call the police to report he was prowling a location when a guy ran him off.

Thanks to Tam for pointing to them.

Travelogue, the Finale

Got an early start from Flagstaff, back onto I40 heading east, and a while later(through lots more beautiful country, enough to make you think of moving) reached New Mexico. Which shortly led to a decision:
The NM Dept of Transportation sucks.
Specifically, a few miles into the state was a big overhead sign: "I40 eastbound lanes closed at Coors, seek alternate route". Ok, pull out the map, Coors, Coor... "There's no Coors on the map?" So with no more information, we continued on. Through more volcanic countryside, including the malpais, which I'd first read of loooong ago in a Louis L'amour book. Lots more places which, with more time, we'd have taken off to see. Past places from Joe Leaphorn books, Shiprock and the Big Rez.

And then just west of Albuquerque is a traffic backup, and when we get up to the block, yeah, I40 is blocked, a big sign repeating the earlier message and two deputies impatiently waving people to an exit. Why am I saying DOT sucks?
No 'detour this way' or anything signs, just 'get off and go some other way'.
NOTHING between the first sign and this one, and- the big one-
Coors is AN EFFING STREET. Not something you find on a state map, which means unless you happen to be getting the right radio station(and our radio wasn't working) or know the area, the effing signs DON'T TELL YOU WHERE THE PROBLEM IS.

Ahem.

Lost some time getting around this, and then the cherry on top appeared: it didn't just cloud up, it started snowing. Light, then heavier, then light, and then damn hard. As in 'Hard to see cars very far in the other lanes' heavy at times. We'd thought of maybe stopping in eastern NM or Amarillo for the night, but not knowing what the weather might do we were concerned that, if we stopped, we might wake up to being stuck for a day; so on we went.

It continued doing this almost to the Texas line, then both stopped snowing and the temperature was rising. But it was only about 200-250 miles left at that point, so we decided to finish the drive. Which we did a few hours later at the parents' home.

I mentioned the dog was travelling very well, but he was, if anything, more sick of driving than we. He'd been here before, when son was on leave, and he walked into the house, took a big sniff and said "This isn't a motel! I know this place!" Mom petted him and sat down, he spotted a ball the cats play with and pounced on it, then flopped on the rug on Moms' feet and stretched ALL the way out.

I will note further that, after a break, we opened the door and set him loose in the yard: not only was he cool with having his personal dog park, but "NOBODY else has peed on these trees! Cool!"

That ended the critter end of the trip. After some sleep, and a big bowl of stew accompanied by a large wedge of fresh cornbread, I headed home the next day. Dog was too busy exploring, peeing, drinking from the bird bath, scattering his toys and so on to care. When I got home my dogs proceeded to tell me how much they missed me by, when I opened the gate, zipping right past me to check the front yard pee-mail they hadn't covered for days("Gee, I missed you too, you little bastards.")

Thus ends the tale. I'm sure I'm skipping over things that ought to be noted, but I really don't care; as I said, not a trip I want to repeat anytime soon.

You will be pleased to know that Sheriff Joe Biden(D-Moronia)

has your back:
Biden made the remarks at the Georgetown home of Senator John Kerry, where some 87 guests paid a minimum of $10,000 per couple to dine on char-grilled grass-fed New York strip steaks and white truffle mashed potatoes beneath a tent basked in soft pink lighting. Biden told attendees that he is confident about Obama's reelection because Republicans are being open about their intent to cut programs important to a large swatch of the electorate -- the middle class.

“These guys don’t have a sense of the average folks out there,” he said. “They don’t know what it means to be middle class.”


Seems one of the things I missed while disconnected from the 'net was that video of Obama's college days involving a black racist pushing a 'evil white people' line that Obama approved of; hilarity ensued, with various journalists and other clowns screaming "That doesn't mean anything!". And one of them in particular doesn't like blowback from being a 'cover for Obama' jerk.


Admitted terrorist(connected to at least one murder he doesn't want to own) and Friend of Obama Bill Ayers accuses someone else of 'calling for violence'.


That's it for now: it's been two weeks and I'm in withdrawal, I'm heading to the range to enlarge my carbon footprint.

By the way, WindyGerry, if you read this: on that Paco .22 tool, do you just whack it with a mallet or drop a weight on it, or what?

Looks good to me

If you wondered if Obama & Co. really want to be dictators,

you don't have to wonder anymore.

And yes, impeachment SHOULD be filed over this shit.

I don't care of it's malicious (link fixed)

or just damned lazy, the ones responsible should be fired.

Few years back a bedroom community called Forest Park on the east edge of Okla. City got in trouble over something similar: they were hell on '2mph over the limit'-type speeding tickets, and a guy not only fought the ticket, his attorney demanded the records on the maintenance and calibration of the speedgun.

Oops.

Turned out they hadn't bothered to check it for more than two years, and when it was checked for the court it was off by 5-7mph(as I recall; it was a significant amount). They wound up refunding the fines from hundreds of tickets, notifying the state so points could be taken off peoples' driving records, and other such fun activities. I can't remember if anyone was held personally responsible for not taking care of the maintenance on the thing.

Travelogue, Part III

On south from Medford, more mountains. And signs along the lines of "If this light is blinking, chains are required", which is just so encouraging as you head into the Siskiyou Mountains, and one serious mountain pass; even with clear roads I'd hate to try driving that with strong winds. And you'd better be damn sure your brakes are good.

Same goes for some of this range in northern Californicated.

Can't remember too much of this, too busy concentrating on the road and trying to get my ears to clear. Then down out of the mountains and you run by Mount Shasta; one seriously impressive pile of rock. Nearby you have Black Butte; both are something to see as you approach, I promise. Between the others and these two, half of one of my wishes has been fulfilled: I've seen volcanoes, but none had the manners to burp or roll over in bed while we were in the vicinity, so an erupting/active one is still on the list.

After that, just lots and lots of driving on I5. Gas was now in the upper $4 range. And further south... remember some of those 'Congress created dust bowl' signs? Kind of jarring: fields of grown or new-planted trees, then stretches where every tree was dead. Not an encouraging sight.

Somewhere in there we spent the night in a motel, but right now I can't remember the city it was in; kind of depressing to lose a detail like that.

Shortly after that, take a state highway 58 to go from I5 to I40.

Last real thing to note on that stretch: near Tehachapi were two hillsides bloody covered with windmills: bleeploads of small ones, a smaller number of medium, and a few huge ones. Renewable power, right? Except I couldn't help noticing that a good half of them were not running. I'd heard of this, seeing it really brings it home.

One last note about Californicated: they don't recognize OK carry permits. We had sons' carry piece with us, and since Dad has the retired LE nationwide permit he wore it through the state. I was still a bit worried, as CA authorities have a reputation for being assholes on such matters. But neither of us wanted to go through without having something handy, just in case.

On into Arizona, where the gas was upper $4 range, with a few places at $4.99. We managed to miss the worst of those. Lots more signs of past volcanic activity, more pretty country. Dry country; crossing it on horseback or foot would be interesting.

Spent the night in Flagstaff, and being sick of food on buns tried Sizzler; beat hell out of burgers. Then an early start the next morning.

Travelogue, Part II

After seeing the troll, and getting badly needed food and drink, the next, oh, 1.4 days was spent helping son get his place cleaned out and stuff in storage, all the usual. Not much time to sightsee, some things he wanted to take us to we just couldn't do this trip. The sky actually cleared for a short time Monday, and we got a lovely view of Mt. Ranier; and it had a beautiful lenticular cloud surrounding it a little below the summit. We were on our way to our motel room, and I thought "Maybe five minutes, and if I get on the second floor of the motel I can get a pretty good picture of this." Which means that three minutes later the clouds moved back in and covered the whole top of the volcano.

I won't go through details of "Now they're saying 'X' days, maybe"; let us draw a curtain over that not-exactly entertaining drama. Tuesday morning I woke up and Dad said "Look outside" in a disgusted voice. Yeah, it snowed. Happily it warmed enough that the roads went to wet only in a few hours. Between that and the Army stuff, we got a later start than planned(Surprise!).

South on I5, out of Washington and through Oregon. Pretty country, what we could see of it; mountain roads like I've only driven once before, and these went on a lot further. And, just to add to the joy, it sprinkled rain. Then it snowed. Then it snowed and sleeted. Lather, rinse, repeat, with short breaks between, and a grand total of maybe a half-hour of actual sunlight all day. Again, beautiful country, but I think I'd mildew if I lived there.

A ways south of Tacoma, before we reached the mountains, saw a railroad siding with flatcars for hauling freight containers. Miles of them, and they'd been there for weeks at the least, probably months; there were branches and blowdowns from winter draped over them in a number of places. I have to wonder if that many idle that long is because of lack of shipping.

By the way, gas in WA ranged in the $3.79-4 range.

Somewhere along here saw a couple of extinct volcanoes, the remnants at least: the basalt cores where magma had cooled in the throats and the softer outside rock had worn way, so you had slopes with a flat-topped column sticking up from the center. Lots of other signs of such activity, these were the first "Wow!" type sighting. There were others, but I admit not remembering exactly where along that route: I did most of the driving through that area, and those roads plus weather meant I was paying more attention to that than the scenery. I want to get back up to that area when I can have a few days to just look around; Ranier, St. Helens at least. To give you an idea of what there is to see on this subject, look here; you can click on the individual peaks for more data.


Stopped in Medford for the night; be it noted that Motel 6 has no problem with dogs, and the critter was very glad to get out of the truck for the night. One blessing, he travels very well.

I'll take up California tomorrow.

A Travelogue

of sorts. Or, Where I've Been The Last Week.

This starts with sons' unit going to A'stan. Which wouldn't really have meant all this, except
They only got four months official "You are going" notice.
Then the Army changed the date. Moved up about two weeks.
Then they were advised "Well, there's some training on new equipment we were supposed to have done, but since we didn't do it when we should have, you guys don't get any pre-deployment leave because we're short on time." You can imagine how that went over.
His plan had been to use his leave to drive home, leave his truck and some personal stuff here when the leave was done and fly back. So now the plan became I would fly up there, visit a couple of days, then drive back. Dad decided to go along(a good thing) so we could trade off driving.

Except the unit wouldn't give an actual "You are leaving this date"; which makes travel plans kind of difficult. FINALLY he was told "Between this date and this date, you're going", so I bought tickets.

Oh yeah, you did guess what happens next!

A week later he calls, "You're going to love this." They moved the date up. So change things around for new tickets, change dates, etc. And spend the next ten days worried the morons in charge are going to change things again. Which added one more concern: sons' dog.
As in "If they change this again and we can't get there before, where can we put the truck and dog till we get there?" Which is where I say "Thank you, again" to Sondra; she lives up in that area and when contacted, despite a, ah, 'hectic' situation said 'If it happens, we'll figure out a way'. Took a lot of pressure off.

Now we come to the flight. First,
Fuck the TSA.
No, we had no real problems getting through. Fuck 'em first, for causing the "What that I need to take might cause a problem because of them?" worries. Like deciding to leave my usual jacket behind because it's been worn at the range and might freak them out if they test it; that kind of PITA. Oklahoma City now has two of the "We get to see you naked" scanners, but I was spared deciding whether to be irradiated or to tell them "No, I'm not walking through a possible unsafe scanner, you'll have to feel me up", we weren't 'chosen for special treatment'. But I did get a fine demonstration of why 'security theater' is the description for this: they did decide that Dad and I both needed to have our shaving stuff checked for explosive residue. So we had to stand there trying to put our shoes back on and watching("You're supposed to watch while I do this") as they selected a bottle from each and ran a swab around the lid. That's it. That's 'keeping us safe in the air, for which we have badges and can screw your life around if we get annoyed. Or just want to order someone around, 'cause we have badges we don't deserve.' Speaking of which.

So we get through screening and fly out. First leg, no problem. Second leg, well, due to lack of choices at short date we had a total of 30 minutes to change planes, and since they didn't get the door open on the first until almost ten minutes into that, it meant walking fast/trotting all the way; if it'd been any further we wouldn't have made it. Barely did, which had been my real worry after having to change tickets.

But we made it.

Did you know Seattle has a troll under a bridge?

I see the innertubes survived without me

Short version: a trip I do NOT want to repeat under the conditions.

Long version: over the next couple of days; just in a couple of hours ago, and I'm tired.

There are so many dots connected already

that a spider could get lost in all the lines.


And yeah, an awful lot of people have been at that "You don't disagree with me, you're EVILLLEEE!" level for a while now.

The anthropologists have something to argue about

Or are back to this argument. Which will again involve name-calling and hair-pulling and various people being told "I don't want you in my club anymore!"

I don't know if you remember a lot of the screaming over Kennewick Man being found to have some caucasoid features; it was loud and nasty. This ought to add to it nicely.

Two quick things:

First, you've probably heard Breitbart died; the 'progressives' are behaving about like you'd expect. 'Respectful dialogue' my ass.


Second,
“Many officers are also uncomfortable that their activities might be displayed on the Internet and otherwise widely distributed,” says Portland, Ore., lawyer Bert P. Krages, who specializes in the area. “Some also have the impression that photography presents a security risk and are acting according to a post-9/11 mentality.”

Adds Krages: “Law enforcement personnel are still grappling with the idea that ordinary citizens have the right to take images, whereas previously such photographs and videos were taken by professionals employed by traditional media companies.”
Well, some more "No, you DON"T have qualified immunity for this" rulings and the subsequent lawsuits would probably help get the idea across.

It would also help if they started reminding cops, from the academy on, of that Constitution thingy that has a place in their oath; and a good course on Peel's Principles would probably help, too.

Oh, and Eric Holder is still a liar

and it sounds like the pressure is getting to him.

Having some time, I want to start this morning with Dax Shepard,

a actor who thought he had a great observation. Till people told him what they think of his observation and his brainpower in general.
McQ says Shepard couldn't hold a SEALs jockstrap; I'd put it 'Couldn't carry a troops' jockstrap', period.


Various Democrats are saying "Take oil from the strategic reserve and release it to quiet the peasants!" Except when they're called on it, then they say it's not a good idea. You'll notice that not one of these clowns says "Let companies start drilling." Oh no, because
A: It would actually work, and
B: It would actually work.
And they don't want that.


The plot is not Hitchcockian: Some bad guys are going to try and do bad things to America. A bunch of SEALs are attempting to stop them, mostly by shooting them in the face. They don't sit around and anguish over the deep meaning of shooting terrorists in the face, either; they make like a Nike commercial and Just Do It.
Time allows, if it's still in theaters, I'm going to have to see this.


"Some of us are having so much sex we can't afford it, so YOU should pay for our birth control!" No, I'm not kidding.


Obama's Energy Secretary says "Screw you people, I WANT gas prices higher."


And from Keith, another gun bigot who's also a liar:
It was among the most emotional speeches at last year’s Labour Party Conference.

A young anti-crime campaigner, Narraser Gordon, was given a standing ovation from MPs including Tessa Jowell and Yvette Cooper when she movingly told how eight members of her family had been murdered.

But now it has emerged that most of the ‘victims’ the campaigner claimed had died are in fact alive and well.

So the Afghans want to put our troops on trial,

and they claim NATO officials have agreed to it:
3. NATO officials promised to meet Afghan nation’s demand of bringing to justice, through an open trial, those responsible for the incident and it was agreed that the perpetrators of the crime be brought to justice as soon as possible.

I really don't have time for this, but heard of this and looked it up, and this crap has to be yelled about. Bad enough son's about to go to that craphole; finding out that NATO- and the US officials involved- may be willing to screw our troops this way... let's say that 'calm reflection' does not describe my mood right now.

Over the next couple of weeks Life will intrude,

so may or may not be much/any blogging. Do have a couple of things:
I've mentioned Catmatyx before: if you'd tried putting this stuff on him, you'd be lucky not to bleed out from the attempt.


This is just freakin' cool: a camp stove that produces the power needed to run the fan. And can charge things that have a USB plug.


I'm at the point of 'Screw the Afghans; let them stew in the pot they choose.' I'm sick of them demanding we serve them, pay them, grovel to them, and murdering our troops. Fuck the place
They've got him: Afghan officer.



Unlike Tam, my thought was "We have lots of clean electric delivery trucks(but let's not talk about making the batteries or the power plants to charge the things)!"
Of course, the truth may be why they have no problem whacking the singing frogs and the pixies.

Bye

It seems some bozos running a place called 'Smoke and Thunder'

are doing it wrong. And badly.

I doubt I'm famous/annoying/whatever enough to be targeted by these people, but just in case, I'll borrow from Lawdog:
1) I will not be joining this site "Smoke and Thunder", so if you see my name there, it isn't me.

2) Nor do I give the site "Smoke and Thunder" any permission what-so-ever to use anything written by me on this site, or by me on any Internet forum or medium, beyond the minimum amount permissible under the "Fair Use Doctrine".

3) Furthermore, I deny the site "Smoke and Thunder" permission to use any of my intellectual property, wholly or in part, for financial gain.

More and more, I think she's right:

them Crazy Years, they be here. Though some things are so fitting of the theme, you'd swear someone made them up:
Verizon will drop the Muslim cable channel Bridges TV on March 14, almost a year to the day after the channel's owner was sentenced to life in prison for beheading his wife, who was also the station's general manager

Attention gunsmiths:

Sound familiar?

Oh Canada,

some of your cops and teachers are freaking morons.

What? They're worried about the WMDs the Syrians have?

Gee, I wonder why...
Third, the State Department wanted Syria's neighbors to know that should the Assad regime fall, the security of its WMD stockpile -- as well as its control over conventional weapons like MANPADS (shoulder-fired rocket launchers) -- could come into question and could pose a serious threat to regional security.
Ya think MAYBE?
And part of the problem is a lot of people over there would consider that a feature, not a bug

Both not feeling it and bloody frayed

at the edges. So no bloggage tonight

My own small experience with earthquakes indicates

that this really sucks.

Detailed analyses of the way the Earth warped along the Japanese coast suggest that shaking from a Cascadia megaquake could be stronger than expected along the coasts of Washington, Oregon and British Columbia, researchers reported Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

"The Cascadia subduction zone can be seen as a mirror image of the Tohoku area," said John Anderson, of the University of Nevada.

Makes you think someone doesn't want this being heard of,

doesn't it?
Prosecutors recently sentenced a Texas man, Manuel Barba, for trafficking a weapon connected to the murder of Immigration and Customs (ICE) Agent Jaime Zapata. Nobody was more astonished to learn of the case than Zapata's parents, who didn't know that Barba had been arrested or linked to their son's murder.

"The family was obviously surprised to learn that there was a case involving a weapon linked to the Zapata incident," attorney Trey Martinez told CBS News. Martinez represents Zapata's parents and the surviving ICE agent in the assault, Victor Avila. "They were surprised they had never been contacted in the capacity as victims so they could give a response or some kind of reaction at the time of sentencing."
If the Zapata family thinks the clowns in charge of all this want them to know ANYTHING, they're far more trusting of these people than I am.

Oh, and as to the "We never let guns walk!" lie,
In a related development, CBS News has obtained documents showing that Barba was under ATF surveillance for at least six months before a rifle he trafficked was used in Zapata's murder. Zapata's government vehicle was ambushed by suspected cartel thugs in Mexico Feb. 15, 2011.

Documents indicate ATF opened its case against Barba, entitled "Baytown Crew," in June of 2010. During the investigation, court records state Barba recruited straw purchasers and "facilitated the purchase and exportation of at least 44 firearms" including assault rifles. On August 20, 2010 Barba took delivery of the WASR-10 semi-automatic rifle later used in Zapata's murder, obliterated its serial number, and sent it to Mexico with nine others just like it. Nearly two months later, on Oct. 8, 2010, ATF agents recorded a phone call in which Barba "spoke about the final disposition of ... firearms to Mexico and also about the obliterating of the serial numbers before they were trafficked." Barba told straw purchasers the guns were destined for the Zeta drug cartel.

A warrant wasn't issued for Barba's arrest until four months later; coincidentally, the day before a rifle he trafficked was used against Zapata.
Once again: they deliberately planned and carried out an operation that DEPENDED on people being killed. Including Americans.

So, if you think Santorum counts as a conservative,

This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don’t think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues.

That is not how traditional conservatives view the world. There is no such society that I’m aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.”

"To protect you from meth, we're going to screw with your life

even more than we already have."
Yes, in order to save us from meth, they want you to have to go to the doctor and get a prescription before you can buy a bloody DECONGESTANT.

Let's see...
Take time off from work.
Pay your copay or whatever for the appointment.
Take up the docs' time for seeing people with injuries/illness.
And it's just the next step in "It didn't work before, so we'll do it again, only HARDER!"

Of course, it's the evil pharmaceutical lobby that doesn't want this; never mind that
The Oklahoma State Medical Association, the Oklahoma Osteopathic Association and the Oklahoma Academy of Family Physicians all are opposed to requiring prescriptions for pseudoephedrine. In part because they say it will increase the number of doctor visits and keep a safe medicine out of some people's hands.
Which, obviously, cannot be allowed to prevent us being screwed some more in the name of our own safety

I repeat #473: 'zero tolerance' policies are not about safety,

they're about control and preventing school officials from having to use what brain cells they have.

Let's see, when Obama came into office gas was

$1.80-1.90/gallon; and that was proof that BOOOOOSH!! didn't care, etc. Now it's $3.29/gallon here and he says that's 'proof the economy is recovering'. I wish I knew how to say 'Bullshit!' in several languages.

“Ted R. Bromund, Senior Research Fellow at the Heritage Foundation, alerted the public to the very real possibility that ATT proponents are changing the meaning of the term ‘consensus’ and to the political ramifications for the US if ATT proponents prevail,” they warn. “Until now, ‘consensus’ has been understood by the US and others to mean 100-percent agreement with all the provisions of the ATT.”

In other words, through redefinition and procedural manipulation, those bent on global gun control can transmute 100% to two-thirds to game the results:

In plain English, this means that the Treaty will be the all-inclusive version —and wish-list— of everything the weapon-prohibitionists wanted from the start.

...
How unsurprising that the Clintonian "It depends upon what the meaning of the word 'is' is” deception has now been reanimated to apply to the word “consensus.” And how revealing of the character of those behind the move.
He's talking about the UN Arms Trade Treaty, and the games being played to screw us over.


In a followon to Climaquiddick, heard of the Heartland documents? Someone got hold of information from a place called Heartland which has had the temerity to actually argue about the 'settled science' of AGW, and then faked a document to try and damage them.
The present situation is rich with irony. The provenance of the Climategate dossier remains unknown. According to evidence of the Information Commission’s Office to Muir Russell (not included in their report), its exclusion of personal information “could be indicative of a whistleblower”. Nonetheless, it was unambiguously reported by the Guardian and other media as being “hacked” or “stolen”. The provenance of the Heartland documents is relatively clear. Someone pretending to be a director of Heartland tricked a secretary at Heartland into sending documents from a recent board meeting to an email address purporting to be that of a Heartland director but, in fact, belonging to someone else. The document with the most damaging quotes was then fabricated. Nonetheless, the dossier was unambiguously described by the Guardian and other media as being “leaked” by an “insider” at Heartland.

Many other ironies have been observed in respect to both Heartland and Climategate. However, the fact that the most damaging Heartland quotes were fabricated and contained only in the fake memo inevitably limits the parallels and raises a host of legal issues that did not arise in Climategate.
Lots of details and a timeline at Climate Audit, ending with
The ramifications of these events are unfolding.

In legal terms, there are a number of important distinctions from Climategate. First and most importantly, the key document is fake. Over and above that, there is strong reason to believe that Heartland can show that the actual (and much less damaging) documents were obtained by a form of identity theft. We’ll see whether “Heartland Insider” covered his tracks as well as FOIA. Thirdly, whereas FOIA had, for the most part, removed personal information, the actual Heartland documents include a great deal of personal information.

Heartland has sent out legal demands to a number of blogs, which, thus far, have either been ignored or rejected.

As a few commenters wisely observed, it’s time to get out the popcorn.


The CSGV is playing with history again; Miguel whacks them with the full quote, and some other things, and some nice quotes in the comments.


And there are actual things , other than the innertubes, to take care of, so I'm gone.

Open-Carry law being pushed in OK

A proposed law change filed in the House would remove the requirement that Oklahomans with a handgun license keep their weapons concealed at all times.

House Bill 3114, filed by House Speaker Pro Tempore Jeff Hickman, removes the concealed requirement from Oklahoma statutes regarding handgun licenses. The existing system of background checks and training, which is part of Oklahoma’s successful concealed carry law, would remain in effect.
Overall, I'd prefer to carry concealed, but there are times being able to open carry would be very nice. Especially in summer.

Something I might do if I had a pile of free cash

Couple of years back went to a motorcycle swap meet at the fairgrounds, and a guy who did custom paint had some tanks, helmets and such set out to display his work. And he had a tank... the thing was painted in layers in flames, and as you moved it actually looked like the flame was rippling back on the surface. Flat bleeping beautiful.

The tank alone would be expensive, if you tried to do the fairing panels as well it'd be awful. But the tank, something complimentary on the fairings... oh, that'd be lovely

Want to annoy the AG and other gun bigots?

Go here, and hit the poll.

And yes, I know the wording isn't right; for USA Today it's the best you'll get.

I have to wonder, do these econonic geniuses actually think that $3/gallon

gas doesn't affect the economy? What people spend on every-bloody-thing?
Key bit that pissed me off:
The price of unleaded gasoline in the U.S. will likely hit a nationwide average of $4 by this summer, said Dan Dicker, oil trader and author of “Oil’s Endless Bid.” The last time prices topped $4 was 2008 and Dicker said there’s a one in three chance that gas could reach $5 a gallon.

If gas prices do head to those lofty levels, that could put a crimp in the economic recovery as consumers will likely cut down on spending if they have to pay more to fill up their cars.
Bold mine. Because I wanted to emphasize that word.
What the FUCK do you mean COULD? EVERYTHING costs more because of energy costs, people spend less on everything so they can keep the house warm and get to work already! And you say $4 and $5/gallon COULD make it worse? Really? How much hard thought was required to come to that conclusion?

Found over at Ace

Friend just sent me a poster