More cool stuff

M:I:3

Rented Mission Impossible 3 this morning, watched it all the way through already. Great movie. Alternately like and not like J. J. Abrams's style on Lost. I think he even canabalized some Lost music. The pace just does not let up in MI3. It goes from one action scene to a few seconds interlude of peace to another action scene.

The part where Ethan breaks out of prison with a Kershaw Chive was my favorite. Not nearly bloody (realistic) enough, but it couldn't be and still be PG13.

Range Day

Took my carbine and my Sig 220 out to the range today. Ran 50 rounds through the Sig, and an equal amount through the carbine. Actually, it was my brother doing the rifle work, I never fired it. He did quite well.

The Sig has a moderate kick. Well, let me rephrase that. It's powerful. It likes to jump around. But fortunately, it's easy to hang onto. I'd estimate the kick being at or just a tid more than my dad's 1911.

I had 2 misfires, but I believe those are because I didn't let the trigger reset all the way. I'm used to being able to judge the reset distance on my Beretta and keep squeezing, letting it only move forward as much as it needs. Haven't learned how to do that with Mr. Nelson yet. It liked all the ammo I put through it - 7 rounds of Blazer Brass and 43 rounds of Wolf steel case. Next up, some hollowpoints.

I had acceptable accuracy at pistol distances. Roughly 12x12 inches at 15 yards. There were times when I was punching one big hole, there were times when I opened up my pattern high and right. It's perfectly accurate for house or room distances, as long as I don't have to target specific parts of, say, insect anatomy.

All in all, Mr. Nelson performed admirably. Which is more than I can say for his animate counterpart.

Cool stuff

The Monkey's Corner

Blogger's messed up, and has put all my links at the bottom of the page. This is unfortunate, as I've added my first link, The Monkey's Corner. Belongs to a friend of mine, as cool a monkey as I've ever met. We stand together on some issues, apart on others, but I'm honored to call him my friend and link to his blog.

I LOVE THIS GUN!!!

Mr. Nelson was a police trade-in about a year ago. Seems every year around Halloween, a local constabulary farms about 5 P220s and 3 P226s out to Gander Mtn (this year they dropped a P2009 on the store, which is odd, considering it was NIB and still had the original 10rd mag). Like I said, Mr. Nelson came in a year ago. This year, they dropped a few more used 220s and 226s (including a NIB 2006 220, and a P220T, which looks like it's about 20 years old but has a Titanium slide), all of which were in better condition than Mr. Nelson. I got the pistol I'd been handling for a year, instead of the newer, less-beat-up guns that were priced the same. Yes, I'm a sentimental fool - Mr. Nelson has character and I felt sorry for him.

Ye Gods, this Mr. Nelson thing is getting creepy. I'm going to stop now.

Ok. So Mr. Nel...So the 220 I bought was a beat up police trade in that had been sitting in the case for a year. I bring it home, clean it up, load it, etc. What I failed to pay attention to were the sights. Standard Sig sights are three little dots of white paint in dimples on each of the three posts. Lots of used Sigs (especially the multiplicity of 225s (great guns BTW) that I've handled) have some or all of this paint scratched/scuffed off, or the paint is faded. This looked to be the case on Mr. Ne... my gun. The dimples are filled with this grayish scuffed metal looking stuff. On impulse, I cover the sights with my hand, and peak under my fingers.

They glow.

(Note:I've unloaded the gun at this point) I shut my bedroom door, turn off the lights, and push the gun forward and up, sighting in (on nothing - it's dark in my room). Three glowing green dots hover in the pitch black. Night sights. Not the best or brightest, but DEFINITELY visible in the dark.

I just checked online. To have Sig put nights on your gun costs around $150-$200. The sights themselves cost $100, and if I'd bought them seperately, Gander Mtn. would probably charge me another $100 to install them and sight them in, and they'd keep my gun for 2 months while they were doing it.

Like me, I bet the Gander Mtn. people never thought to check to see if the nights worked. They just assumed they didn't. That's at least $100 value that I got for free.

I am SO pumped right now.

Overheard at 10pm

While watching the news after CSI:Miami:

Dad:John Gard is a wimp.
Vincent:I wish John Gard and Steve Kagen would both take it upon themselves to drop their drawers in front of the state and show everyone that they do indeed possess the defining anatomy of the male gender.
Mom:*snort*

...And it's home!!!

Picked up the Paul Nelson Commemerative .45 at about 5:30 this evening. Brought it home, cleaned all the green shipping gunk SIGARMS filled it with, oiled it, loaded it, and it's now slumbering peacefully next to my carbine under my bed.

When cleaning it (CopperCleenz, or whatever it's called is the most destructive substance I've ever had the misfortune to be around. It literally chaps my hands whenever I clean a gun. Nasty stuff.) I noticed several things.

~First, a lot of the wear on the inside of the slide is just dirt and that green gunk.
~Second, the rifling looks much stronger when clean. Not as strong as, say, my 9mm, or my battle-rifle, but better than I thought it was.
~Third, the lockup on this gun is TIGHT. It fits together like clockwork. When chambering a round, the slide demands some muscle, but moves like glass on oiled glass. Smooth, that's how we do it...as they'd say in Miami Vice.
~Fourth, this thing has some miles on it. A smile on the barrel, a heckuva ding on the trigger guard that went straight through the finish...those are just the imperfections I remember.
~Fifth, this is not an elegant gun. It's heavy, it requires some muscle to operate, and unlike my 92FS, it's just plain ugly. Absolutely no frills, no unnecessary curves or metal at all. It is utilitarian in the extreme - it is designed for one task only and it is designed to accomplish that task with no flash or pizzazz, just extreme dedication and hard work. It's like a my Spyderco in that regard. I'm not sure I could destroy it, even with a week off work, a pickaxe, and a mission statement. It is THAT tough.

I look forward to taking it out to the range on Monday.

Post-script:I'm buying another battlerifle on Nov. 7th. It's sort of a family tradition - vote, then go buy an assault weapon.
Post, post-script:Two nickel Novak mags and 2 boxes of either Hydrashoks or Silvertips will be entering the house in the next few days. Then that's it, I'm done with buying guns until my 21st birthday, when I pick up a USP45. Or until the godless communists this country's about to offer it's throat to start passing more victim-disarmament.

McCain-Feingold Violation Post 2!

I wasn't planning on posting up anything more tonight, but the muse hit.

The Democrats are negative whiners.

I see probably +12 political adds on TV everyday, and without fail ALL Democrat ads are attack ads. Probably 60% of Republican ads are attack ads, but most of the time they actually TALK about what they'll do in office. The Democrats just *edited* about Republicans voting against the minimum wage. Seems to me that's goofed up, because voting against the minimum wage is a good thing.

Even back after the primary, the Democrats were *edited* about the opposing party. John Gard accepted his party's nomination gracefully, humbly, and with dignity. Not one negative word passed his lips.

Steve Kagen on the other hand, used the news coverage of HIS nomination to absolutely BASH John Gard.

Most recently, when Steve Kagen was recorded joking about "Injun time," he apologized, then went on a 1-minute rant about how the morally bankrupt Republican party was trying to divert attention from their failed national policy by focusing on his one trip-of-the-lip.

John Gard, when asked to comment on it, COULD'VE given Kagen a royal smackdown. Instead, his comment was a slightly more elaborate "I was surprised that he said it."

Jim Doyle meanwhile, the man solely responsible for preventing Tereasa Halbach from taking a gun to Steven Avery's car lot, is mugging for the camera on the streets of Madison while wearing a leather jacket and talking about how many child molesters he's sent to prison.

In any just world, he'd get locked in a room with all of them.

Paul Nelson Commemerative .45 And Gun Statistics

Because the ever intelligent authorities are concerned about us shooting someone right now and not in 49 hours, the two day "cooling off" period for my Sig Sauer Paul Nelson Commemerative P220 .45 is counting down. As I type, we've got about 47.45 hours to go.

Anyway, I figured it'd be a good time to review some gun statistics, just in case anyone hostile to the 2nd article of the Bill Of Rights is in the house (so to speak).

~120,000,000 people in the United States believe having a gun in the house is better than having no gun in the house
~There are 300,000,000 privately owned guns in the United States
~The lowest number of defensive gun uses recorded is 800,000 per year
~The highest number is between 2,5000,000 and 4,000,000
~That means that on the low side, there's a 1 in 375 chance you'll defend yourself with a gun in the next year
~On the high side, that's a 1 in 75 chance
~There are 13,000,000 crimes committed every year
~There are 1,300,000 crimes committed every year with a gun
~That means there's a 1 in 23 chance you'll have a run in with crime in the next year
~That also means there's a 1 in 230 chance you'll have a run in with gun crime in the next year
~There are 1,500,000 violent crimes committed every year
~There's a 1 in 200 chance you'll be the victim of violent crime in the next year
~There are roughly 17,000 homicides each year.
~There are roughly 10,000 gun homicides each year
~That means you have a 1 in 17,500 chance of being murdered in the next year
~You have a 1 in 30,000 chance of being murdered with a gun in the next year
~66% of all homicide involves criminals killing criminals
~There are roughly 30 child firearms deaths each year
~The 1 child gun death per hour statistic comes from increasing the age of childhood to 24
~Most homicide is committed by males aged 16-24, and is related to the drug trade

And the most concerning of all statistics, and the main reason the Founders listed the human right to keep and own weapons of military significance in the Bill Of Rights:

~There were 120,000,000 civilians murdered by their own government in the 20th century.

Liberalize Me

So there's this guy on public radio this morning who wrote a book called Conservatize Me.

Capitalizing on the success of that moron Morgan Spurlock's movie Supersize Me (supposedly the magnum opus of anti-fast-food thinking, all it does is show the predictable result of being stupid), John Moe writes Conservatize Me to try and get inside the minds of right-wingers (anyone being right of Marx being a NeoCon to him) by taking in nothing but right-wing politics and media for an entire month.

Why is it rank-and-file Republicans and Libertarians are always stereotyped as rednecks?

Anyhoo, I tried to duplicate the experiment within the confines of my own mind. I tried to get inside the head of a liberal for about 45 minutes.

It was hard. I generally don't think the world owes me anything, and I obviously had to adjust THAT. Then there was that whole "hatred of the successful and wealthy" attitude to get used to. I knew I was getting somewhere when the words "proletariat" and "bourgeois" and "wage slave" started coming more naturally to me. I also started developing a fondness for Cindy Sheehan, Ted Kennedy, the Dixie Chicks, and Al-Jazeera.

Thus suitably prepared in the liberal mindset, I tried to envision utopia. It needed the following criteria:

~All basic needs are provided. Food, shelter, basic furniture.
~Work is not necessary.
~Healthcare is absolutely free for all.
~Dentalcare is absolutely free for all.
~Education is free.
~College is free.
~Entertainment is provided.
~No one can have access to weapons of any kind.
~Only the police can protect you.
~The police are everywhere.
~Authority makes all the decisions for you.
~A few of your rights are protected.
~There are strict rules, designed to keep everyone safe.
~Any attempts to change the system outside of political means are punished.
~Anyone can join the society.
~Societal benefits last from the time you come in until the time you leave or die

Ye Old Lightbulb went on at this point. Not a dawning flicker, mind you. Someone, somewhere, just threw another 6 rods on the nuclear reactor and the lightbulb lit up like a Christmas tree covered in strings of 1,000,000 candlepower bulbs. The illusion ended, and I was left with the realization that...

Such a place exists on earth! The liberal utopia is here!

Wait for it...

The liberal utopia, the state the Democrats and other assorted socialists want to create, the state the embodies all the virtues listed above is...

You knew this was coming, didn't you? I mean, is this IT or is this it?

It's prison.

Random Reflections Pt13

51. If a mountain were to slide down and annihilate a town, that would not be evil. Evil requires consciousness, the willful act to violate the rights or life of another who has not harmed you.

If that mountainslide were to be willfully caused by a person, that would be evil. For society to continue, evil must be punished in proportion to the damage it has inflicted upon society. I say in proportion because too weak a punishment would be the exact same as no punishment at all, and two harsh a punishment would establish tyranny.

This is not law. Laws change, year to year, regime to regime. This is justice.

Law is not written for the good. The good carry the Law in their hearts. Law is written for the bad, so that society may, as a whole, bear the responsibility of enacting justice. Written law is meant to mirror the Law that good men carry in their hearts. But law is written by men, who can be evil, venal, and corrupt. Thus law, like any tool, can be used for good or ill. Laws change, year to year, regime to regime. Simply because a law IS, doesn’t mean it embodies justice. It may be an unjust law. Similarly, actions which enact justice may not be enshrined in the law.Laws change, but justice is justice.

52. I know life is short, whatever time you get is luck. – Neil McCauly, “Heat”

It’s going to sound trite, but don’t wait until you’re dying to start living like it. Within reason, do what you want to do NOW. Or work towards it. The sooner you realize that, the happier your life will be. But I can't MAKE you realize it - you have to want it, you have to have that "aha moment" all by your lonesome.

53. Heroes are not people who save lives. Otherwise, doctors giving flu shots at grocery stores would be heroes.

Heroes are people who RISK their own lives to save others. Who show uncommon valor or bravery to help their fellow men. We talk so much of heroes today, and few other people we apply the heroic adjective to actually deserve it.If, as I have said before, that choice is the only thing worthy of respect, then risking your life with no obligation to do so, knowing that your death, possibly, will have absolutely no merit is worthy of the descriptor “nobility.” There aren’t too many heroes like that these days.

54. Free people will never be equal. People forced to be equal will never be free.

In a condition of freedom, people will never be equal. There will be people who are better than others at certain things. There will be people who get ahead in life when others don’t. Lest we all forget, we are still animals, beholden to the same animal impulses, and we’re still living in a civilized jungle, where the laws of nature still hold some sway. This is FREEDOM. It’s a dangerous, scary thing.We can do our darnedest to equalize housing conditions, income, diet, healthcare, whatever. But in doing so we MUST take from those who are successful, and make beholden to us those who we would raise up.

We can have freedom, or an attempt at absolute equality, but we can’t have both.

(Notice I’m not talking about equality of rights. Everyone’s inalienable human rights should be protected, with no one’s rights greater or lesser than another’s.)

55. There’s been some grumbling in my state’s government recently about how all our college graduates are drifting out of state. There’s also been some grumbling by our college graduates about how tuition rates are unreasonable. Leaving aside the fact that no one in the state should have to pay for the education of a child that is not their own (and would likely have plenty of money to pay for their child’s education if they weren’t paying for everyone else’s), how about this for a plan: Each student can only receive tuition aid if they agree maintain a 3.0 grade point average and will remain in the state for 4 years after graduating.

We all get what we want then, except for the elderly and single people who are putting their neighbor’s kids through college.

McCain-Feingold Violation Post!

The only race I'm really passionate about this year is Mark Green vs. Jim Doyle for WI governer. I hope Green wins and Doyle loses. I hope Doyle has a very painful run in with crime, regardless, since he is ultimately responsible for disarming everyone in this state outside their home. Note, for anyone official who finds their way here:I WILL NOT be the cause of any crime directed at our evil governer. I would simply do a Snoopy-style happy-dance.

I hope John Gard wins and Steve Kagen loses, simply because Gard is a Republican and Kagen is a Democrat. They're both *a swearword first introduced to me by my aunt, years ago, one that starts with "a" and rhymes with "brass poles"* but at least Gard's party isn't actively opposed to the Second Amendment.

I'm voting strictly on who gives me the most time to prepare for war (want peace?). The Democrats will go off the cliff at 90mph. The Republicans will take a little less time to get there, only travelling at a leisurely 60mph, but they'll still go over eventually.

Meanwhile, Herb "The Fa****" Kohl is running pretty much uncontested for Senator. I don't call him that because I disrespect gay people - their life choices are none of my dang business, and I simply don't care. I call him that for the same reason I call John Kerry "Hanoi John." Can't figure out a better nickname for someone I have less than no respect for.

Bush wasted all his "credit" on the occupation of Iraq (and no, we should not be there) instead of actually making the American people even freer at home, and has screwed things up bad enough that the whole country is polarized against the Republican party. This year they ain't gonna be voting based on issues, they'll be voting based on who's NOT a Republican. I hope I'm wrong.

No matter who wins, it's gonna be an ugly 2 years until the Presidential election. Then, there's a good chance it'll get even uglier. Ugly on a scale like we have not yet seen ugly.

There's the chance...

...actually a good chance, that I'll be laying some money down on that Sig Sauer P220 .45ACP pistol this afternoon. It's not the nicest looking pistol ever, it's definitely got some miles on it, but it's in good condition and I've been handling it for nearly a year (possibly more). When I pick it up, I'll have bought 2 more magazines and a few boxes of Winchester Silvertips to go with it.

It will be the first gun I've ever named. I plan on calling it the "Paul Nelson Commemerative 45." Paul Nelson is an anti-freedom Republican running to unseat a Democrat Rep. in my state, who says he'd support a draft if we went to war with North Korea. We can only hope he loses, though the alternative is almost as nauseating.

Paul, I'm gonna have a .45 with your name on it!

See you in another life

Lot's of updates goin' on here recently. I wish this one was going to be a fun one.

A guy I know died two days ago. He was one of our friends at Gander Mtn. He knew us by name, watched out for cool stuff he thought we'd like, would shoot the breeze for an hour if we stopped in. He was the one who sold me my carbine and was absolutely honest in all his dealings.

Sunday, October 15th 2006 he died of pneumonia, a complication of spreading pancreatic cancer, which he'd had for 3 years. He wasn't expected to live 6 months past the diagnosis, but beat the odds to the point where when he finally gave up the ghost, his doctors now want to know every single detail of his lifestyle.

Besides once experimenting with Navaho (Navajo?) Indian medicine, the one lifestyle point that everyone contributes his longevity to was his enduring good spirit. To my knowledge he never once anticipated dying. He just kept fighting, kept his cheer up, kept living. He was planning on going varmint hunting in Montana in Summer 2007. That he'd outlived his expected "expiration date" by 2.5 years didn't factor into the equation, he planned ahead and expected to be there.

We'll miss you Don, and we hope you're still as happy as you always were.

Media

Since I managed to escape from Hardware 2 early this evening, I got to watch CSI: Miami. For once it was a treat. A real pro-freedom message tonight.

The gist was thus:A councilman is found dead, a developer is stealing people's homes with eminent domain, and a corrupt judge is looking on.

Lots of good stuff. Eminent domain (the kind detailed by the fascists on the Supreme Court recently), received a brutally thorough smackdown. Kinda nice to hear the good guys talking about law in a bad light. The POLICE carrying it out got roughed up by a main character (so much for just-following-orders!) The corrupt judge was sent to prison, and it turns out the equally corrupt eminent-domain-swing-vote councilman was greased by a kid who's house was going to be stolen. The kid did it with a folding pocketknife no less, in a blitz ambush that probably would've had Marc MacYoung wincing, nodding, and saying "Well, yes, that IS how that's done."

They were VERY careful to show the various violent and confrontational actions taken by the outraged and displaced victims (the homeowners, not the ones who got what they deserved) as wrong, preferring instead to advocate a legal means of vengence. Specifically:Let Horatio Caine dig up dirt on them.

The real world more than likely does not contain Horatio Caines, so I preferred to read the message tonight as "How NOT to get caught."

I probably won't get so much enjoyment out of television again until I go see The 300 in theaters. Watch the good (but fuzzy) trailer here:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6124436450423739706&q=300+%2B+trailer&hl=en

Well, that's not entirely true. Lost, House, and Prison Break will be on between now and then, and Miami Vice will be coming out, so I will enjoy myself to a great degree before THe 300 is released.

Saga of the BAG Day Gun Pt3

At last posting, my BAG day junker rifle was FTFing, FTEing, and despite a wiggly handguard (which I pointed out to him THREE times, along with descriptions of the necessary replacement part), the gunsmith at Gander Mtn said the only problem was my Wolf ammunition.

Having decided in the affirmative upon his incompetence after he suggested the remedy to be $1/rd Federal ammunition, I set about correcting the problem myself. A replacement gas valve was located and ordered.

After a sufficiently bad dad at work on Friday, I return home to find that my gas valve has arrived. I happily discard the packaging, do some minor stripping to the front of my rifle, and replace the old gas valve with the new. Reassembling the rifle, I determine that the handguard STILL wiggles. This does not bode well. I start investigating replacement handguards online.

Saturday my dad and I decide to take my rifle out to a public range not far from where we buy our wonderful and wonderfully illegal fireworks. (Actually, it's legal to buy them, not legal to set them off, which of course, we would never do. Nope, not us, not once, not never.) After an hour of driving, we return home, not having found the range.

Today my brother and I took the rifle out to our regular range. I load up the magazine, snap the bolt shut, and hold the rifle at waist level (one can never be too sure with repaired junker guns, and I'd rather take an exploding receiver in the kidney than in the eye - I KNOW how powerful these things are). My first shot bucks the gun up in my hands, I pull the trigger again...and...click. No dice. This is good actually. Seems whereas before it was short-stroking, now it's stroking far enough to re-cock the gun, but not far enough (or too fast) to eject. My brother hammers the bolt back and chambers another round. I pull the trigger.

*BOOM*

*Tinkle tinkle tinkle*

The sound of a steel case skittering off concrete has never sounded so good. I ran through the rest of the magazine while trying to determine if I was too much of a gentleman to go back and laugh at the Gander Mtn gunsmith. I think I am. Not sure yet though.

I Smell Bacon

Or: The Pig Fell In The Mud

When last we interacted with the thin blue line, a city bus driver had, with no proof or witness or investigation, gotten our family charged with a $185 dollar fine which the police lowered to $85 for cooperating.

So:My dad calls back, asks the pig at the desk to go through it all once more. Turns out, the bus driver incorrectly recorded the streetnames. Whether he saw correctly or not, he definitely did NOT see it at those coordinates (one intersection over). So dad asks if the bus driver could've shut his lights off before the illegal manuever (my mom freezes around buses and red lights) and forgotten about it (having so many better things to concentrate on OTHER than writing down a license plate, make and model of a car, etc.). He then adds that to be informed about only the fine a week later means its the word of a citizen against a city official. The cops gives a variation of the didn't-work-for-the-SS routine of "We're only following orders." Says they can't have a squad car follow every bus and that bus drivers can, legally, accuse you of anything without proof and have you fined without an investigation. Not in so many words for that last part though.

My dad says we want to contest it. The cop says that given the bus driver screwed up the location, and the city just does NOT have the resources to go to court over an $85 traffic violation, they'll just drop the whole thing.

No fine.

Never underestimate the stupidity, incompetence, or maliciousness of anyone working in city government. Yes, they didn't fine us. No, it wasn't because they saw the error of their ways and have decided to become born-again good public servants. It was because they didn't have a dang thing and knew it.

Scary Morning

I'm yanked from a deep sleep by the sound of something shattering.

It's 0-Dark-Hundred in my room. It's dark outside, I can't see a thing. Something in the rest of the house woke me up.

The first thought through my head is "How can this be happening AGAIN?!" The second is "They are NOT getting away with it this time!" Well, there were a few more cusswords in those thoughts, but this is a website for everyone, so...

I'm out of bed in a heartbeat, discard the idea of taking my carbine (even high as a kite on adrenaline at God-Knows-What-Time in the morning, I still allow for the possibility of another explanation), and hold my open knife down by my leg. There's light coming under my door and I think "That's bloody bold of them." I open my door, see my dad a few feet ahead of me, hurrying down the hallway - now I know something's up.

I follow him out into the dining room, see my mom in the kitchen, see the time on the clock (6:07) , and everybody turns to look at me. I said "I heard something shatter."

My mom had dropped something - that was the noise I heard. I return to my room (I get up at 6:30) and go back to bed. Won't be going to sleep though: My hands are shaking.

I absolutely hate the idea of being party to violence.

Random Reflections Pt12

46. I’ve never heard of anyone being robbed at the shooting range.

Just think about it - Multiple instances of usually expensive items, which beyond resale value have great occupational use for an aspiring thief, often tended by just one or two people, who are far more interested in viewing holes in paper hundreds of yards away than keeping track of their $500-$1500 investments laying on the table next to them.

And despite all that lax security, despite the major incentives, I’ve never heard of one instance of anyone’s guns being stolen at the range. And doesn’t more guns equal more crime? You’d think the gun range would be a MAGNET for the criminal class. Why isn’t it?

Nah, the obvious answer can’t be the right one.

47. Riffing on school shootings a little more, why is it that whenever some little wacko flies off the handle and kills someone the predictable response is always “He was bullied. Where were the social workers?”

Bullying is a bad thing. I’ve dealt with it some in my life. And it seems to me that as long as we allow their unconstitutional, completely useless existence, schools should be safe places for kids.

But: Would these kids find it necessary or desirable to shoot up a school IF they were allowed to respond in an appropriate fashion to their tormentors? But no: Jack a bully in the face a couple of times and you’re getting booked for assault and battery and expelled from school.

But instead, we turn a blind eye to the bullying, dang near criminalize the resulting fisticuffs, and then we can’t imagine how things could’ve gone so wrong when these tormented youths, forced against their will to spend 8 hours inside a concrete box running around to the Prussian equivalent of Pavlov’s bell finally explode in an unjustifiable and evil surge of repressed rage.

48. I hate the way most TV portrays men. For the most part, men are portrayed as arrogant, ignorant, lustful, socially insensitive clods.

Look at the classic sitcom Home Improvement. The basic plot goes thusly: Family breadwinner Tim Taylor does a whole host of stupid, dangerous things at work. He comes home and causes a major disturbance by getting in an argument with his wife – which is ALWAYS caused by him being wrong and unable to admit it, or completely ignoring his wife’s feelings. After fumbling around a bit in the dark (so to speak) he’s enlightened by his genius neighbor, usually to the tune that he needs to listen to his wife more and quit obsessing over himself or his tools and (though I hate to say this) ignore his some of his male instincts and behavior. He goes into his house, misapplies his neighbor’s sayings, and begs his wife’s forgiveness, understanding, and tells her to go ahead with whatever it was he was too blind and stupid to take a shine to in the first place.

Or watch any episode of According To Jim. Much the same situations, same portrayal of men. Heck, most any sitcom you can think of shows husbands and fathers as completely out of touch with their family, and usually obsessed with projecting a stereotype of maleness.

Now, reverse the gender roles, and tell me it would be as well received. Tell me there wouldn’t be a public outcry to the tune that it’s stereotyping women in a negative way. Tell me there wouldn’t be hate mail, demonstrations, boycotts, and finally an apology or cancellation.

Most men strive and sacrifice for their families, usually with very little thanks or recognition. This is not the norm on TV. And yes, it is television – so what, right? What lessons do people take away when they constantly see MEN being held up as objects of ridicule, the wonderful and defining differences between them and women being scorned as old-fashioned or out-of-fashion or stupid? Yes, there are traditional roles for men and women in society. That doesn’t mean that women should be kept barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen, it means that MEN are usually the ones to run the household, and that’s the way things have been for thousands of years, in any society worth noting (find me one instance of a matriarchal society worthy of the label "Civilization"). It’s almost human-bloody-nature. When MEN as heads of households are held in scorn and contempt, and their NECESSARY roles in their childrens’ and significant others’ lives negated by social assistance and scorn, it’s no wonder we have a skyrocketing problem with out-of-wedlock births and broken homes. The simple presence of a male role model, teaching them traditional values of honor, loyalty, hard work, and respect (especially for women) is invaluable for boys – I would propose that it is as damaging to have a large percentage of our young male youth raised solely by their mother as it would be to have a large percentage of our young female youth raised solely by their father. Each gender needs close role-models for its gender, and you chip away at some of the validity of that by ridiculing one or the other.

Best sitcom ever was Malcom In The Middle. At least there both parents were portrayed as equally insane.

49. Like Christians never being able to outrun the Crusades, I’ve come to the conclusion that constitutional government will never outrun slavery.

Speak of the wonderful freedom guaranteed (not granted) by the Bill Of Rights – the other side brings up slavery. Speak of the wisdom and courage of a handful of men in creating, out of thin air, a style of limited government never before seen on earth – the other side brings up slavery. Speak of following the Constitution as the only way to achieve legal, righteous government – the other side brings up slavery.

Yes, slavery was bad. Yes, it was antithetical to hold people in servitude while espousing the cause of freedom.

HOWEVER: In the eyes of the majority of the people back then, blacks were not viewed as anything more than property. To speak of giving them freedom was like speaking of giving one’s carriage freedom. This is not an excuse, it’s an explanation. Furthermore, in order to create and continue a union that guaranteed freedom to the MAJORITY of its citizens, the founders had to pander to certain…special interests. Despite a good number of them believing black should be free, we would not have the freest country on earth if the founders had’ve stood on pure principle and demanded equality for everyone RIGHT NOW. They realized that the union had to be preserved, else NO ONE be free.

Yes, that was a terrible decision to have to make. But frankly, I’m glad they made the decision they did – that decision guaranteed that we’d have the freedom some day to sit back and call them dead white men and bigots and racists.

To conclude: The prevailing attitude towards blacks, mixed with the necessity of preserving the union led to the perpetuation of slavery. It was a fault of the day, not of the men of the day. Their failings in no way taint the beauty of the gift they gave us.

50.Yet again, it is time to be insensitive. *sigh* You’ve been warned.

If I were presented with a lineup of the Halloween decorations of fifty domiciles, I could, with a reasonable degree of accuracy, pick out which belonged to duplexes, and which belonged to houses.

For some reasons, duplex dwellers buy really expensive, massive, and totally ugly lawn decorations, mostly the inflatable variety. One would think, if you live in a duplex, it’s generally because you can’t afford a house. So why decorate with dozens of expensive (and horrendous) blow up dolls and tinfoil headstones and fog machines.

Not that I’m saying every duplex yard contains ugly Halloween decorations, or that houses don’t occasionally go overboard (there’s one in my neighborhood that is an absolute eyesore any time there’s a holiday), but in my experience, people living in duplexes have a monopoly on the ugly lawn ornament trade.

I Smell Bacon

Or: Run-Ins With The Pigs Part 2.1

So, yesterday my dad receives a letter in the mail from the Green Bay police department stating something to the effect that a car registered to him (as the head of the household) violated traffic laws and he owes $185 dollars; if you require information before we shake you down, or you wish to contest this charge, call ***-***-****. (Notice the use of the emotional-charged phrase "shake you down?" That's called fore-shadowing.)

Not having been pulled over for anything recently, every driving member of the household is a mite perplexed.

My dad calls the number and receives a rundown on the charges against one of the family members. Apparently my mom turned in front of a bus. Still no recollection of having been pulled over or charged with any form of crime. Confusion all around.

Now,given the police departments previous public relations debacle with my family (taking 11 minutes to respond to an attempted home invasion 7 years ago, taking 7 minutes to get to our house when a neighbor had a heart attack (despite the standard presense of four black and whites in the area), and sending 3 B&Ws, an unmarked, and 4 armed, vested up pigs to arrest my brother for fireworks ten days before the 4th, when resounding explosions could be heard all night long for 3 weeks prior), you can probably guess that this is about to take a bad turn. It takes a lot to awe me when it comes to government incompetence, disinterest, or downright malicious behavior slash law.

I have been suitably awed.

Seems no cop was ever involved, no traffic citation ever issued, no crime ever recorded, no one ever charged. See, the bus driver wrote down the license plate, submitted it to the police department with a complaint, and without so much as sending one of the boys in blue over to get a statement, the city proceeded to charge our family nearly $200.

Without taking a statement.

Without charging anyone with a crime.

Without informing anyone of the charges against them before levying punishment.

All on one person's say so.

Because we called, were polite, and decided to cooperate, they've generously lowered the fine for the unsubstantiated, undocumented crime by $100.

Let me see if I can lay this all out in plain language, in case there's any miscommunication leading to misunderstanding here: A bus driver can write down the license plate number of any car on the road, submit it to the police with a complaint about the driver's conduct, no investigation is ever performed, no communication is innitiated, and then based on one person's word, an unsuspecting person can be fined nearly $200.

Now, does that seem...I don't know...right? Just? The way a fair and equitable government should conduct its business?

Stay tuned for breaking developments in "I Smell Bacon:Run Ins With The Pigs Pt2!"

Random Reflections Pt11

41. Please, for your own sake, never cough while drinking orange juice. You won’t be able to breathe for about a minute, you’ll cough violently for fifteen minutes, and your throat will taste like vomit for at least twice that long. Please, just don’t.

42. It may sound contrary to already posted Reflections, but I really don’t care if you’re overweight. Like Jefferson said about religion – “It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” Long as you’re happy with your life, so am I. I just get a little torqued when you blame someone or something other than yourself for being overweight. As long as we all accept responsibility for our lives, everything’s cool.

43. I can understand 15 MPH speed limits around elementary schools. You never know which screaming, insensible critter is going to follow their own inner voice and do a nose-dive into the street.Around middle and high schools however…it’s a different story. You should’ve learned that the big, fast things can hurt you. Lowering the speed limit is an insult to both our intelligences, and it’s being unfair to Mr. Darwin.

44. A group in Wisconsin, the benighted state in which I live (but far more intelligent, legislatively, than CA or most of the east coast) is pointing to Cuba’s mandatory HIV testing as the reason for their low HIV/AIDS problem, and proposing that a similar program be adopted here.

These mush-minded despots actually seem to be gaining some Congressional traction in Madison. And according to the call-in show on Wisconsin Public Radio, everyone else in the state thinks it’s a good idea.

NO! Absolutely NO! You do NOT make criminals of people based on their unwillingness to submit to medical testing. You do NOT get to do whatever you please simply because you can hoodwink a majority of the populace into accepting whatever you can justify with the excuse of public safety. You do NOT go door to door rounding people up for bloodtesting for any reason. And by god, you do NOT darken my doorstep. There’s one solution for people who demand part or all of your body, and in this case, my solution is very much like theirs’ – small pieces of metal, inserted into the skin.

45. All year long we tell kids: “Don’t take candy from strangers.” Then Halloween comes along and we tell them: “Go, take candy from strangers.” What’s up with that?

Riffing on school shootings

Or: Smart stuff for students

Some *expletive* walks into a one-room Amish schoolhouse, kicks the teachers and boys out, zipties the girls, and shoots 5 of them in the head before eating his own pistol.

According to his notes, he picked the Amish schoolhouse because he knew he wouldn't face any resistance from the inhabitants (apparently victimhood is Godly to them or something) and because there weren't any police in the community.

As Lawdog http://thelawdogffiles.blogspot.com said, for all the resistance they offered up, he could've walked in with a pliers or a baseball bat and the outcome would've been the same.

Fortunately, the Victim Disarmament gang has kept relatively quiet over all of these murders. The call right now is for better mental health screening at schools. Me personally, I think they're waiting to spring the Victim Disarmament on us as soon as their socialist candidates get voted into office by the Anybody-But-Bush crowd in a little less than 2 months.

As promised a few posts prior, I'm now going to speak on self-defense.

My dad's a highschool chemistry teacher at a public school, and he says the invasion drills they practice are death. Tip the flimsy desks up, cower behind them, turn the lights off, pretend no one's home...never mind the fact that any intruder will KNOW the classroom isn't empty simply because it's the middle of the day. To that end, my dad has decided to turn the "stop or I'll say stop again" drill on it's head. He makes it known to his students that he has access to the chemical closet, and in the unlikely event that there's ever an invasion, anyone coming through the door is getting a beakerful of nitric acid in the face.

THAT, ladies, gentlemen, and assorted transgender beings is taking responsibility.

To return to Lawdog for a moment, he recently had a controversial post to the effect that you and ONLY you can truly be responsible for your safety. You can't be paid off, you're always there, and with the proper mindset, you can never be truly disarmed, only incovenienced.

Principal Klang in southern Wisconsin realized that, and while unarmed, fought an armed intruder to protect himself and his charges, and sacrificed his life so that many more could live.

The Amish in Pennsylvania did not realize that (or if they did, they chose the Godly route of being shot in the head) and so 5 of them died.

The 6 girls held captive in Colorado did not realize that, and they were assaulted, and one of them was killed.

Do NOT depend on anyone else to save you. Only you are responsible for you. To abdicate authority over your life is foolhardy and a burden on everyone else.

Therefore, I propose that if you are a parent, you send your kid to school with a knife. If you are a student, I propose that you buy a knife and carry it with you.

I was going to do a post on my knife eventually, but I might as well do it here.

My fully-serated Spyderco Endura is with me all the time. If I'm alive and awake, it's clipped to the back of my belt, where only the most thorough of patdowns could find it (and even then, probably not, likely only if I was strip-searched). If I'm alive and asleep, it is less than a foot away from my hand. I carry it everywhere I do not expect there to be metal detectors. My employer would fire me if they found out - I carry it anyway. My knife is always with me - I no more consider it a tool than I consider my hand a tool. I can tell you where the discolorations on the handle came from, the mars on the blade. I have beat that knife up and it's still as sharp and reliable as the day I got it.

It is utterly reliable and dependable. I would bet my life on my knife's ability to perform, with as much hesitation as I would (and do, in case of emergency) bet it on my battle-rifle: Specifically, no hesitation at all.

It's not necessary to buy a $400 knife like a Kerambit or a Benchmade butterfly, or a Microtech Halo. It is however necessary to buy a $50-$80 knife. Any full-size knife lower in price, or sold at the mall is probably crap. It should be thin and light enough to carry all day long, and not print in a pocket, and you should be able to forget that it's there. It should have a blade at least 3 inches long, with a handle at least an inch longer than that. Serrations are IMO better than none, but it's a matter of personal preference. It should have a point on the end of it (you laugh, some knives don't have a hardly any point). It should NOT be a switchblade or butterfly knife. You'll have an easier time explaining to Officer Bacon that knife you have in your pocket is a "utility knife" if it's a rather innocent looking folder than if it's a genuine Italian stilleto with "da switch."

(Yes, if you have to, LIE about your knife. To anyone. God/Nature/Other Himself/Herself/Itself gave you the right to carry it. Everyone else's opinion on the topic is secondary, and should only matter to you based on the amount of harm they can inflict on you. Anyone who would prohibit you from defending yourself does not deserve your respect. (Look up L. Neil Smith's excellent Murder By Gun Control for his three adjective diagnosis those who would prevent self defense.))

Similar to what you carry, where you carry it is another concern, and should partially dictate what you carry: If you're a student, like me, there are lots of places to hide a knife on your person. If you're required to maintain a professional appearance (ie shirt tucked in, tie, etc), it'll be a little harder, though behind-the-belt carry like mine would be easy with a suit coat. Think of everywhere BUT the pockets first.

Of equal importance to carrying a knife for defense is knowing how to retreat. Face it, unless you're a captive and can manage to puncture his - the school shooter's (or any shooter's) - anatomy while he's distracted, your knife is of less usefulness than being able to get the heck out of Dodge BEFORE you become a captive. Look at all the exits from whatever building you're in. Try and figure out how to get out through any of them, from anywhere, without attracting attention. Now figure out how to do it in a panic, in the middle of a panic. Back routes are good, and every school has them, especially colleges. Explore. Walk around. Think about it.

Your mind is your only weapon. It is the only tool you can never be deprived of. Use it to keep yourself and others safe. It's the only thing you can depend on.

Saga Of The BAG Day Gun Pt2

To recap, my BAG Day gun thinks its a bolt action. FTEx, FTEj. It thinks it's a bolt-action. The gun-smith at Gander Mtn says it works perfectly well, I just had it set wrong. I set it right and wrong, and it still thinks it's a boltie.

So. I take it back today, with MY ammunition. He fires 4 rds of mine vs 4 rds Federal, and says that my Wolf is sticking in the chamber - I need to buy $20/20rd boxes of Federal to fix the problem. Never mind the fact that the gas tube is dang near falling off, a fact I've informed him of 3 times, once before I brought the rifle in, once when I took it in, and once when I picked it up. Nope, this cheap, junker gun, designed to be used by an illiterate peasant who probably peed in the action to keep it from freezing has developed a highly sophisticated and expensive palate now that it's on American soil.

I'm currently trying to contact a guy online about a replacement gas valve. Mine is too short, hence the gas tube wiggle, hence the escaping gas, hence the short-stroking, hence the bolt-action mentality.

Oh yeah and: My dad left his 1911 with the gun-smith. Apparently it came out of the factory with a burr on the ramp/in the barrel that is aggravated every time the gun cycles, to the point when it's FTFing nearly every round 2 years after manufacture. This gun was expensive enough that it should be point-and-click every time.

Range Day

With my brother. More on that presently.

When last we saw my BAG day gun, it was being worked over by the gunsmiths at Gander Mtn. because it thought it was a bolt-action (and not a very good one at that) instead of a semi-automatic. Failure to extract or eject. According to everyone I asked, gas was escaping through a wiggly gas tube, and the lack of gas was short-stroking the bolt.

So, I give the gunsmith my gun, explain that yes, this gun can be set to fire cartridges or grenades (w/ blanks) and it's set on cartridge setting and not still not ejecting. (If you know guns, you probably have some idea of the gun of which I am speaking).

Gander Mtn says turnaround is 2 weeks. A week and a half goes by. I stop in on Monday, ask what's up. Apparently their military-surplus guy is on vacation, he'll be back next Tuesday. Next Tuesday comes and goes. I call on Thursday, say I thought I was supposed to get a call on Tuesday. Their response: "No one told you that."

We manage to get things squared away. They'll definitely give a call next Wednesday. Wednesday comes and goes. Thursday I call. "It's the next one up, I just cleared my bench for it. We'll call on Saturday.

Saturday comes and nobody calls. I've been eyeing a Sig 220, so I stop in to fondle it and ask about my BAG day gun. It's finished, you can pick it up on Sunday.

I pick it up on Sunday. $15 and 12rds of maintence later, the smith says I set it on grenade launcher, it's perfectly fine. I tell him one of his employees did that, I watched him fiddle with it when I handed over my rifle. No no, your mistake. Fine.

I take it out today, and dang, if the thing doesn't STILL think it's a bolt-action. On both regular AND grenade launcher setting.

We'll be going back. And I want my $15 back or a free fix.

EDIT:I suppose I should mention, the gun fires fine. It's dead-on at 25 yards, about 5 inches low center at 50, though I think I'm messing up with the aim because there was no discernable difference between rest shooting and standing shooting.

Oh yeah and the shooting shed we fire from got struck by lightning. I was outside about 5 feet away, standing next to a metal light pole at the time. I am SO lucky to be alive right now.

Random Reflections Pt10

36. Argh. I hate to keep going on religion like this, but there’s something I must comment on in the news today.The pope recently did a speech, like he usually does, the theme this time being that violence was incompatible with God, and quoted an old Byzantine guy’s comments that at that time, Islam had been spread by the sword.

Whereupon radical Muslims across the world call Islam a religion of peace and further call for the killing of the pope, the bombing of the Vatican, and the killing of even more Christians. Whereupon Muslim leaders explained that Muslims take their religion very seriously and we have to be sensitive to that.

Is it any wonder that Muslims think there’s a war on against their religion? Like it or not, the vast majority of people who commit terrorist acts are Muslims, and they’re using religious excuses to call for our deaths.

Not that all Muslims do that – but the vast majority of people who do that are Muslims. There’s a fine line there. It’s just as reasonable to say that the majority of people who commit crimes are black, but the majority of black people aren’t criminals.

The Muslim community has been sadly lacking in the spinal area when it comes to the more crazed members of their faith. We hear lots of “Islam is a religion of peace” but very little “Those who pervert our faith for an excuse to kill people are insane dogs.”

What you don’t punish, you subsidize. What you subsidize, you encourage.

Again, it’s no wonder they think we hate their religion – like it or not, their religion only receives airtime whenever a believer picks up a sword or a gun or a block of C4, kills some people who were just minding their own business, and then issues a statement that everyone who’s not Muslim should die. That’s the “brand” we’re seeing advertised right now. You don’t like it – rebrand your product.

37. I’d just like to state, for the record, that I hate Bush. He signed the McCain-Feingold bill into law, which prevents me speaking my mind about a candidate in the paper or on tv or on my own website. I am currently a criminal for doing just that. He banned the importation of FAL and AK47 kits, and has not rolled back ANY of the +25,000 laws illegally restricting my right to keep and carry anything I want for my own protection against thugs of the common or jackbooted variety. He signed into law the Patriot Act, which grievously violates the 4th Amendment among others. He has had American citizens held in prison without cause, without notification of the charges against him, without the notification of their families. And those are just the examples I can come up with at the moment that can affect ME. He’s invaded a country for bad reasons, without a declaration of war. He’s had foreigners tortured by other foreigners for suspected links to terrorism.

There’s one punishment for treason on a scale that grand, and folks, it ain’t a slap on the wrist.

However: I am perfectly willing to acknowledge the good things he has done. He has, in a faltering and somewhat wrongheaded manner prosecuted those who would attack America throughout the world, as he should. He has, in a faltering and somewhat wrongheaded manner attempted to secure the American nation and economy from the wave of invaders (their reasons for invasion mean not a thing) pouring over our southern border.

He’s done a few good things, for which he deserves credit. The majority of the country would just rather focus on the bad things he’s done, of which there are many. Yes, he’s done bad things – we know already! It’s not being a jingo-istic, right-wing chickenhawk to admit the man has done some good things.

This is what’s known as Bush-Derangement syndrome online: Previously rational human beings driven to a fit of frothing anger any time George Bush Jr.’s name is mentioned. He is not the font of all that is evil in the world. His successes deserve proportional airtime with his failures.

I’m absolutely sick of hearing EVERY-BLOODY-WHERE on tv, radio, internet, and carrier pidgeon how Bush personally thanked the 9/11 hijackers and that Michael Moore snuck into his secret mountaintop headquarters to film his meetings with the Zionist cabal of Haliburton and that he cut a few dollars from the massively inflated and ineffectual education budget so minorities won’t get a good education and that he wants to conquer the world with his moon based Laser Of Death. GROW UP!

38. People don’t understand something about war. I have to thank U. S. Grant, evil though he may be, for giving me this understanding. What they don’t understand is this – it’s hell. I mean that, and not in the trite, sound-byte way. War is the sum of all evils in the world. It is the highest sacrament we can pay to the devil.

You see, war isn’t about right and wrong – it’s about winning or dying. It’s about killing the enemy until they can’t fight anymore. And to so completely devastate the enemy that they can’t hurt you, you have to go all out – you have to attack and attack and attack without ANY regard for any life, enemy or civilian. You have to fight a war like an animal, or you will lose, because all the other guy has to do is outlast you (and if you’re not willing to commit to a war, it won’t take long). We can clear Baghdad of jihadists, all we need to do is firebomb it like we did the large cities in Japan. But we’re not willing to do that.

And if you’re not willing to go whole hog, to destroy and kill everything, then you’re doing nothing but encouraging your enemies. They will grow stronger despite your minor victories. It is absolutely fatal to engage in war without the will to do anything to win it.This is why war must be avoided if at all possible. Because it is every horrible thing human beings can do to each others, the sum of all evil. Because to win a war, you have to make good people suffer, you have drive good people to do things they should never have to do, you have to put good people in situations where it is kill others or die themselves, or allow others to die so that others may live.

War IS hell.

39. No matter the good it does, I have come to the realization that the Christian religion will never be able to live down the Crusades. Criticize the violence some might say is inherent to another’s religion (and we all know which religion that is) and point out that most places as practice it are roughly 1000 years behind in the development of civilization – you hear about the Crusades and you’re hypocrites. Stand up against the invasion of Iraq for religious reasons – you hear about the Crusades and you’re hypocrites. Good God, we know about that already, get over it!

The crusaders and their kin have been dead a thousand years, their actions in no way taint what we do today.

40. Wow, I didn’t think I’d get to 40. Just think how big a milestone 50 will be.

There are multiple levels of programming in a computer. There’s the stuff you see and interact with. There’s the operating system that runs behind it. And behind that, there’s the BIOS and all the hard-coded code that keeps all the chips and parts in synch with each other and running without tripping over their feet.

You can change the visible stuff with relative ease. The operating system…a little harder, but it can be done. But the stuff you REALLY don’t want to screw with is the code behind that. Mess with the BIOS and hard-coded instructions at your own risk – like as not you’ll crash the computer, and it’ll be “lights on, nobody home.”

People are just the same. You can force a change in their visible behavior with relative ease. For a little more effort, you can change what they believe. But deep down, we’re still all animals. We’re just animals who can choose. And when you screw with the animal instincts and impulses and behavior, you’re begging for trouble.

You can attempt to change the programming that runs behind our conciousness – but you will affect absolutely no change whatsoever and will do unimaginable worlds of destruction.

Recent Events Pt3

So, some new information on the shooting of the principal in Wisconsin. Turns out the perpetrator had been given in-school detention for smoking. He made the statement to a friend that he doubted the principal would live past homecoming, whether before or after the detention has not been stated.

The shooter was 15.

Now, before we go any further, what makes a 15 year old kid, with their whole life ahead of them, throw it away by murdering the principal over a detention? How does one make that...LEAP...from detention to murder? How do you justify that to yourself, and then choose to commit the crime? He knew he'd be caught, he knew he was torpedoeing the rest of his life over a couple hours sitting in the school office...how...what...

He's an animal. Unless it comes out that the principal was torturing him or threatening to kill his family, he should be tried as an adult, convicted, and at the very least be given life in prison without possibility of parole.

Now we turn to the actions of the not-guilty. The janitor who wrestled the shotgun away...did so BEFORE the kid shot the principal. He took it, the kid started digging in his pockets for the .22 revolver that became the murder weapon (don't bother to look for the Million Mom March or VPC to start calling THOSE assault weapons), and the janitor, now armed with possibly the most devastating close-quarters-combat weapon ever devised does...what exactly?

Does he shoulder the shotgun and blow the clearly armed miscreant off his feet? Does he fire a warning shot and yell for the student to drop and kiss the pavement?

No. Now that he's ARMED, he RUNS out the front door.

A quote of the unfortunately late Jeff Cooper's springs to mind: "An unarmed man can only run from evil. And evil is not defeated by fleeing." Or something like that.

So:Our little *expletive* takes his .22 revolver, enters the principal's office, and is immediately engaged in a scuffle for the weapon. During the course of which, the brave principal takes shots to the leg, chest, and head, and STILL manages to remove the weapon from the criminal.

The principal died of his injuries 7 hours later. If it hadn'tve been for the headshot, I think he'd still be with us.

I'll be blogging on school shooting/invasion preparedness drills in the near future, but I recommend you turn your eyes upwards towards Mr. Cooper's quote once more. It bears multiple readings.

Recent Events Pt2

Colorado School Shooting

Seems the hostage taker at the Colorado high school didn't get ventilated by the police.

Pity.

I would've liked it to have NOT been his idea.

What's not being discussed is why the gunman was the only man with a gun in the school. See, us law abiding folks generally, uh, abide by the law. Meaning, when the law says "Don't Carry Guns" we usually leave our pistols at home. Those that do not abide by the law, and choose to place themselves outside of society by causing harm to innocents will do whatever they dang well please. They'll do things like bring guns into schools, shoot people, take hostages, molest hostages, kill hostages...very much like the reprobate in Colorado did. While those that follow the laws do not bring guns to school, and because of their nature, do not engage in the acts that Mr. BadGuy did.

Simplifying that paragraph, if you prohibit people from arming themselves, the good people do so. If you prohibit people from arming themselves, the bad people will not. And then the bad people will have absolutely free reign to do whatever they damn well please. Ask Teresa Halbach about that.

What dismays me even more than the faculty members (or, heavens to Betsy, the students) not putting two rounds in Mr. BadGuy's center mass followed by another to the third eye is that no one used any other weapons to subdue him. Guns are merely the easiest way to dispatch Mr.Badguy - knives, pens shoved into various weakpoints like ears and throats, belts, or even feet all produce the same result in the end. And unless the captives were bound, it sounds like there were, er, several opportunities where he was distracted enough that SOMEONE could've tickled his brain with a Bic.

Give a kid a good knife, it may just save their life.

Another School Shooting

Elsewhere in the world, my state to be specific, several faculty members and students found they had the cajones to STOP a school shooting. Far south of where I live, a torqued off 15yo walks into school with a shotgun, shoots his principal once, and is promptly subdued by a janitor and other students.

A few notes on this:
1. A longgun is what you bring when you mean business. To achieve a guaranteed kill with a handgun, you have to shoot A LOT. Yes, two or three shots usually does it, but to be sure, going to slide-lock is recommended. A shotgun or mid-caliber rifle at room distances should produce the same effect (a kill) in one shot.
2.Contrary to popular opinion, unarmed people (and I'm SURE one person was using something as a weapon) were able to stand up to a villain armed with probably the deadliest close-range weapon ever invented and LIVE. And subdue him. If you comply, you will end up injured. If you resist and are unarmed, you are slightly less likely to be injured. Resist while armed, and your chances go WAY up. Crime statistics bear this out time and time again.
3.If anyone among those heroes was armed, we'll never hear about. You ever hear about the school shooting where the principal went back to his car, got his gun, and stopped the shooter? Or the school shooting where two students with rifles subdued the attacker? Don't worry, most haven't. Of the roughly 800 stories generated about each of those incidents, only around 40 per mentioned any defensive action by anyone other than the police, even while the vast majority noted the make and model of the attacker's weapons. In the "2 students with rifles" story, most articles mentioning the action taken by the students say that they "tackled him." Why do you think that is?

Reflections On Current Events

Health Inspector Video

Courtesy of The Smallest Minority http://smallestminority.blogspot.com, we get this fine video of what happens when people draw their lines in the sand further and further back. Watch, but lock up anything that could damage your monitor 'aforehand. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vVACCaVxYEk&eurl=

At least he had the brains and guts to bring along a video camera. They really don't like it when their work winds up online. Only thing better would be getting the home addresses, work addresses, telephone numbers, car profiles, email addresses, driver's license and social security numbers, and photographs of those involved in the criminal trespass, and then posting them online. Everywhere you can think of. Sports sites. News sites. Adult interest sites. Gun sites. Goth sites. Democratic Underground. Dating sites. Sites for people recently released from prison. Bathroom walls in gas stations with the byline "For a good time."

Let's hope Mr. Cameraman winds up with all the property previously owned by Mrs. Health Inspector, who winds up spending the next ten years in the pen.

Treason In The House: Or, Reasonless, Warrantless Searches Of Children

Look for H. R. 5295 on http://thomas.loc.gov/ if this link doesn't work: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?c109:2:./temp/~c109XZ2ysO::

Basically, it says that since schools are such nasty places, we need to set rules defining how to search children without warrants. The only type of searches not permitted are invasive - the precedent for which is set by the New Jersey Supreme Court which ruled that only cavity searches are invasive. Or so says public radio.

School Shooting In Colorado

Apparently a gunman wanders into a highschool, fires a handful of shots, the students flee, he hides with two teenage girls as hostages. Most recent development: He shoots a hostage, the police put him down. Rehabilitation by reincarnation - works every time.

I say apparently because: It could not have happened. School zones are gun free, totally. The law prevented anyone from bringing a gun onto the premises. Therefore, since law is so effective, no gunman.

Non-sarcastically, this is NO excuse to pass legislation restricting anyone's unalienable right to defend themselves (ie victim disarmament, or "gun control"). It sounds harsh, but I DON'T CARE what happened, I DON'T CARE how anyone feels, my rights are not dependent on others' good behavior.

No Shooting This Week

I've been getting out to the range every week to fire 50 rounds through my battle-rifle. I go with just my brother (we only get one day a week when our days-off coincide), I use my rifle, he takes a .22 of some variety, we spend two hours total, everyone goes home happy. This week
we detoured around construction on the way to the range. And: Spent 1.5 hours cruising the countryside, looking for a way home. Ran through an entire Bon Jovi CD looking for the range and then the highway home, wound up following a dump truck into town.

I've budgeted completely for my 2 new battle-rifles in November. Now I'm looking at that Sig 220 I wrote about last year. It's still there, and I still want it.

Random Reflections Pt9

31. Rosie “My bodyguards can have guns but you can’t” O’Donnell recently claimed there’s no difference between Islamic Fundamentalists and Christian Fundamentalists. An opinion of this nature can only result from a severe case of mental retardation or a severe case of stupidity.

Last time I checked, the most vocal wing of Christian Fundamentalism wanted to teach evolution in public schools, outlaw abortion, and take Christina Aguilera off MTV (and both of those last two points have a smidgen of merit).

Also last time I checked, the most vocal wing of Islamic Fundamentalism wanted to tax unbelievers for the privilege of not being killed, institute Sharia law all over the world, and just generally sally forth and kill anyone not found kneeling in an easterly direction five times a day.

If you can’t tell the difference between the two, you need to have your head examined.

32. Anything and everything is a perversion when taken to extremes. There’s a little tribe in New Guinea that practices institutionalized cannibalism, the men hold raunchy conversations with the spirits that live in the rafters of their huts, and the citizens are occasionally accused of witchcraft and killed if they can’t cook a perfect torte (or the small, strange New Guinea tribal equivalent).

Confined to a small portion of a small island, they’re an anthropological oddity, interesting to study and watch.Now imagine that small, strange New Guinea tribe spread over the entire world. Their laws are our laws. Their religion is our religion. Their customs are our customs.

Yeah.

Ain’t pleasant at all to think about, is it.

You take anything too far, it becomes horrible. Christianity. Islam. Communism. Capitalism. Democracy. Eating. Drinking. Driving. Love. Pets. When ideology or belief becomes obsession, and obsession becomes religion, and that religion becomes the center of the world, something that once was beautiful is destroyed by the hold it has on someone, and the hold someone has on it.

When Christianity becomes the sole object of the mind of everyone on earth, to the exclusion of all else, there WILL be Hell on earth. When capitalism becomes the sole object of the mind of everyone on earth, to the exclusion of all else, we will have the tyranny it keeps in check. When good health becomes…fastforward…life won’t be worth living.

I think it was the Greeks who had a saying about this. “Nothing over much.” Wise words.

33. My dad once told me that ironically, the freest people are those who exercise the most control over themselves. I’ve attempted to live all my life by this credo. Control is all that separates human beings from animals.

34. It is now time to be inflammatory. Not without reason or intelligence however. Avert your eyes if your are easily offended.AOL recently had a feature on how the twin girls making up the white supremacist pop-folk band Prussian Blue have been ostracized by their hometown. They’ve received death threats and “get out by high noon” style missives, have had signs posted on their fences and yard, etc and so forth.

Their message, roughly translated from the propaganda, is that they want white people to recognize how wonderful being white is.

Ahem.

When you’re caught modeling Hitler Smiley-Face shirts, you’re not celebrating your race, you’re celebrating mass murder on the scale of Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, the Armenian genocide…that one defining piece of legislation enabled all +120 million homicides is not something we’ll cover today. Anyhoo, Hitler isn’t a racial pride symbol, he was a murderous nutcase.

And then I got to thinking.

Sometimes that can lead to unpredictable results. I hesitate to say these next words, honestly. But I will.

What would happen to me if I started an organization called the Nation Association for the Advancement of White People? Petitioned Congress for a White History month? Demanded certain acceptance quotas of white students in colleges across the country? Started a television channel called White Entertainment Television?

Do you have any idea how fast I would be excoriated in the media? How fast thousands of people would call me an evil, bigoted racist? How fast my symbolic head would be hoisted upon a symbolic pike? How every acquaintance of mine would be put in the public fishbowl, their association with me examined by pundits and talkshow talking heads? How fast doctors and psychologists would be examining my psyche on national television, saying I had one mental malady after another.

Seems to me we’ve got entrenched racism, or at the very least preferential discrimination in this country, and we don’t even know it. At least the white-colored racists marginalize themselves.

35. A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, the inhabitants of the planet Stupidia lived in nearly perfect freedom. After a long, bloody war they had secured a democratic republic much like our own was intended to be. Peace reigned for a hundred years.

After a hundred years, a small segment of the population caught the disease of radical religion. Now, growing on the planet of Stupidia was a plant called the Amora plant. Since the Stupidians had crawled out of the oceans and discarded their fins, they’d chewed the berries of this plant. When ingested, the berries made the Stupidians very happy, and loosened their inhibitions for a short period of time. The various varieties of the Larom plants had the very same effect, to different degrees. Due to the effects to the different types of plants, a statistically small percentage of the Stupidians chewed the berries to excess, lost their jobs, became addicted, sold their possessions to buy more the plants, etc and so forth. This has been the way of things for thousands of years. Many people enjoy the effects of the Amora and Larom plants to moderation, and a handful use them to excess.

So: A group of Stupidians get the radical religion virus. And they decide that the cause of society’s evils is the Amora plant. With much arm-twisting of the elected representatives, they get the berries of the Amora plant banned from public consumption. The Stupidians can no longer buy, sell, or grow the Amora plant. These actions, which have been legal for thousands of years, are now crimes.

But strangely enough Stupidians go on doing what Stupidians want to do. They form underground organizations to grow and distribute the “A” berries to those who want them. Because those caught with the plant risk jail time, they demand a higher price for their risk. Local police forces have to be bribed and corrupted to overlook the crime going on under their noses. Due to the profitability, the underground organizations go to war with one another to eliminate competitors, secure distribution territory, etc.

After ten years of skyrocketing crime, the Stupidian representatives realize that human behavior can’t be controlled, only guided. They legalize (despite much crying and hand-wringing from the religiously sick) Amora again. Crime does not skyrocket further. Now that “A” sellers and growers can do so openly, and market their products freely, they have no reason to bribe the police, go to war, stay underground… Crime goes down.

However, thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people who’s work it was making sure that Stupidians didn’t use “A” as they had for thousands of years were now out of work. So with the help of the religiously sick, they sold the Stupidians on the notion that Larom was now the cause of all society’s evils.

No one thought to ask…but weren’t you wrong last time? Or, why wasn’t it the cause of society’s evils last year, or the year before, or any year in recorded history…

So now Larom is illegal. The same crime skyrockets, the same people who used Larom before are still using it. But this time something is different. The Stupidians DON’T abandon the prohibition of Larom. As crime grows and grows, and its citizens demand action, the Stupidian government does things it would never have dreamed of doing before. It starts whittling away at the Stupidian’s rights to privacy. And to travel. And to defend themselves. When last checked, the Stupidians were still slowly sinking into tyranny, all while looking at the failure and its evidence around them and shrieking “Something must be done.”

Now, the question for you is: Why hasn’t anyone told us about this planet yet?

Reflections On Conspiracies

Not a far distance from my house, well within the limits of the city I inhabit, 3 teens were recently arrested for conspiring to perpetrate a Columbine style school shooting. According to reports, articles, and interviews on tv, radio and in the paper, they’d been planning this attack for years, had amassed an arsenal to rival that of Frank Castle, and were training to, among other things, commit mass murder on a grand scale and blow up their school.

The newspapers waxed horrific about the dozens of weapons found at the kids home, the bombs, the training sessions, yadda yadda yadda…and I must’ve seen the same footage of the box of guns being carried out of one of the kids’ home a gross of times.

If you will pardon the pun, I’m about to shoot a few holes in this story.

First off, the majority of the “weapons” the kids had were BB and airsoft guns. Easily identifiable in the tv clip by their bright orange muzzles. The remainder of their weapons were single shot .22s, a shotgun, an SKS, and .40SW handgun. If the mayor and the police chief consider that enough of an arsenal that a televised press conference is desperately required, they’d have a heart attack if they looked under my bed most nights, never mind the basement shelves. (By the way, if anyone from the Green Bay Press Gazette is reading this, you can't use AKS rounds in an SKS. But what I'm sure you meant to confuse the issue by confusing the AK47 with the SKS. Leave the paper, grow a brain stem, and THEN go back to journalism.)

Second, target practice for these young reprobates consisted of firing airsoft pellets into Styrofoam heads. This is to target practice what writing a letter to granmaw is to winning a Pulitzer. Their “bombs” were toilet paper tubes filled with bbs and gunpowder, detonated by firecracker – certainly capable of causing injury, but if you’ve ever spent the weeks leading up to the 4th playing with all manner of fireworks conceivable, you know that single firecrackers have about the same fuse time as a sneeze. Yeah. Blown up criminals.

Their much ballyhooed napalm was gasoline and Styrofoam shavings. That ain’t napalm folks, that’s a cheap imitation.

I certainly hope the mayor wasn’t watching that night we buried artillery shells in the lawn and used them to launch bricks and basketballs…they'd probably get the electric chair out of mothballs just for me...

And the “years” of planning…three kids plan an attack on a highschool for years, even before they get there? You know what that means? They were THINKING about it. “Hey, wouldn’t it be cool if…” And they never had the guts to do it. For years. If thinking about something earns you a conspiracy charge, we’re all in deep trouble. Calvin of Calvin And Hobbes fantasized one Sunday about nuking his kindergarten with an F-16. Innumerable fiction writers have written innumerable books describing in graphic detail terrorist and criminal acts. I myself am currently engaged in writing a novel about the start of the third American Revolution.

Obviously, these kids were seriously disturbed individuals. They could’ve done some seriously bad stuff, had “luck” been on their side or if they’d been a hair more competent. We can’t do a catch and release here, they WERE planning on trying to hurt a whole bunch of people. That’s unacceptable. They need to be punished. But the question remains, what is the best punishment for coming up with a half***ed plan to kill your classmates with contrived and unworkable bombs, fewer and lower-quality weapons than the average Texan household, and chickening out on it a dozen times?

How do you punish evil defeated by one's own cowardice?

Random Reflections Pt8

27. There was a recent warning about an obesity “pandemic.” My dictionary defines that (pandemic) as a wide-spreading, near universal disease. When did making the conscious decision to put more food into your mouth than needed become a disease? Seriously here folks, if I choose every day to slam my head in a car door, do I have disease? If I choose to drink water to excess every day, do I have a disease? If I choose to spend 16 hours a day playing Donkey Kong, do I have a disease? NO! I’m choosing to do something that I know is bad for me, and I’m doing it anyway.

Everyone knows, if they eat to excess, they’re going to get fat. It’s a fact of life people, get over it. It is a choice that they make. It’s not a disease. Again, my dictionary defines disease is an ailment afflicting the body, caused by infection, environment, heredity, or diet. Note the diet isn’t the disease, it can help cause the disease.

Calling it a disease is the sunshine-and-bunny-rabbits way of letting those people who eat themselves towards diabetes, strokes, and heart attacks off the hook. It’s not a choice anymore, it’s a disease. You don’t weigh more than a Honda Civic because you ate 6 Big Macs, 5 Fries, 4 Cokes, 3 Pies, 2 Onion Rings, and the partridge in the pear tree AT EVERY MEAL – it’s a sickness you have. It’s not your fault – you can’t choose to get sick with SARS, influenza, or obesity. Go eat another 3rd world country’s GNP in Snicker’s bars, you’ll get fat or you won’t. Don’t worry, be happy!

28. As I write this a major flight somewhere in the United States has been diverted. Not because of explosives found on board, not because a 50 year old “student” from Saudi Arabia with razor-burn tried to set his shoes on fire, not because Grandma realized the wire in her undergarments didn’t set off the metal detectors at the TSA groping checkpoint, but because…wait for it…an unclaimed Blackberry was found on board. Oh the humanity. I expect much rending of clothing and wearing of sackcloth will be seen on the nightly news. A major flight, chock full of people who have to go somewhere, maybe jobs, maybe vacations, maybe to see their ailing cousin twice removed have been detoured and detained for hours because a phone was found without being attached to the side of someone’s head.

If you can’t find the owner, give it to a flight attendant. Bonus. Or just press redial and ask the person on the other end, “Who did you last speak to?”

Note: My reaction would’ve been different if said Blackberry had been found attached to an ominous looking pile of whitish silly putty. There’s a difference between reasonable fear and freaking out – something a lot of people would do well to learn. A little responsibility goes a long way, especially when so few people are in possession of it.

29. Would you, if possible, help a person getting mugged on the street? I think we all would, that’s basic human decency – “help out your fellow humans” is ingrained into our minds. Now, upon dousing said mugger with a RAID sized can of pepper spray and picking muggee’s wallet up off the ground, would you call the robber back if you found that wallet to contain a sizeable stack of hundred dollar bills? I doubt anyone would. Would you choose NOT to help that person if you had prior knowledge that they were rich? Again, probably not? Why?

Shouldn’t that rich person contribute a little bit to that misfortunate youth, driven to a desperate act by a life of poverty and minimum wage jobs? Shouldn’t that rich person have to give more than the rest of us, I mean, they have so much more, they should feel absolutely compelled to give it to that mugger to help him along in life…

Editing out the words involving crime from that last paragraph, you have pretty much verbatim the “hate the rich” position of the majority of this country and the world. This boggles my mind, this hatred of material gain through hard work, or the hard work of one’s ancestors, or intelligence, or simple dumb luck. If I make a lot of money, it is MINE. NO ONE has ANY claim on it whatsoever, for any reason. IF I am feeling charitable, I will do something to help someone else. My possession of MORE does not give anyone else the right or privilege to take my property and redistribute (remember, all laws involve the threat of violence) it to those who have less. The same goes for any money my parents would leave me – they didn’t work hard and save so that some jackboot could come along when they’re dead and gone and take what they wanted me to have.

My money is MY MONEY. YOU may NOT have it simply because I have more. Yes, that is selfish. Anything else is theft. At threat of violence, don’t you forget. You wouldn’t come try and knock me over and take my wallet *snicker* so don’t try and have someone in government do your dirty work for you. You want my money, Molon Labe.

Come and get it.

30. Why do companies call yellow cake mixes “Moist yellow” cake mixes? Do some companies sell “Incredibly dry yellow” cake mixes? Are there moist WHITE cake mixes? If all yellow cake mixes are moist as they are advertised, doesn’t that mean that none of them are special by virtue of being moist?

The Happy Dance

I'm a laid back kinda guy. Takes quite a bit to ruffle my feathers, good or bad. But right now I feel like doing a Snoopy-style happy dance. Calvin and Hobbes in their pajamas, listening to classical at 700RPM, that sort of thing.

Thursday afternoon I picked up Max Payne 1. Fantastic game. Not as good as Far Cry, but beautifully gritty, with a film noir feel straight out of a Dennis Lehane novel. I'm 2/3 done with it, which is good - it's sucking up all the time I should be spending doing productive stuff, like schoolwork or writing.

Thursday evening sucked. I've felt lower, I know I have. I just can't remember when.

Friday afternoon rocked. I'll share more when I feel it's appropriate, but I still can't help but smile.

Friday evening we had a bonfire. Great fun, throwing old financial documents and ammunition receipts into a huge blaze.

Saturday afternoon, on the way to the range, I picked up another magazine for my battle-rifle and 60 more rounds of ammunition. Ran into 2 ex-soldiers out at the range, got an eye-witness account of what Iraq is like. Kinda busts your world view when the soldiers you believe are the bad guys are just like you.

Anyway, they were great company on the range. I shot my battle-rifle off a rest (I need time to develop my muscles, that's why I'm shooting 50 rounds a week with my brother, in addition to range time with my dad), at 25, 50, and 100 yards. Even with the added pressure of 2 soldiers and my dad hanging over my shoulder I put a 25 yard, 20 round group together that you could cover with a measuring cup. Taking it out to fifty, I fired an around-10-round string, 8 of which grouped together on the paper plate in such a way that you could cover them with a vertical tongue depressor.

I've never used my battle-rifle at 100 yards before. A 16 inch barrel and a target you can't see the bullseye for isn't a good combination. After working my flinch out, I line up the sights and discover that the front post is the same size as the plate. Dang. I managed to make paper by lining up the top of the front sight with the top edge of the plate. Out of about 20, between 5 and 10 made the plate.

Now, that's not good shooting. But given the fact that I fired my battle-rifle for the first time in nearly a year LAST WEEK, that's pretty dang good. I'd rather be shooting my CX4, truth be told, but I'm going to get proficient with this gun. And come November, I'm going to buy 2 more as insurance.

Oh yeah, and Gander Mtn. is working over my malfunctioning BAG Day gun, to get that working again.

I am so pumped right now.

Sent In My Taxes Today, Reposted from elsewhere

Sent off my taxes a few days ago, and my anger over the evil of it has been percolating in my bloodstream like Folgers coffee.

For those not familiar with the standard US employee pay setup, here's how it works. Your earnings are taxed at a certain rate by the federal and state governments, and a certain amount is assessed for the cost of Medicare, Social Security, whatever communistic Ponzi scheme they're using. I don't even care to know. All of this is deducted from your paycheck before you ever even see it. And lest one think they only hit the employees, your employer has to match your Medicare/SS/whatever deduction with their own money, money they could A)Be paying you or B)Be using to benefit their store. Every spring your employer sends you a statement, called a W-2, showing how much each parasite has sucked from your paycheck. It is then your obligation to fill out paperwork showing how much money you made, and how much of it is "taxable." Taxable means if you were a productive member of your company and were paid in an equal proportion to your productivity, you may owe the government more simply because you worked harder and got paid for it. (W-2 forms should be considered null and void under the 5th Amendment "nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself" protection, however comparing Constitutional behavior to 99.6% of any level of government is like comparing apples to...bobsleds) Now, if you got paid less than a certain amount, you still have to go through this whole dog and pony show, and they'll send you back everything except the SS money, that stuff you'll NEVER see. I was lucky. I'm getting all the money that was stolen from me back.

Why am I torqued off about this?

It's my ******* money. And it was stolen from me in the first place.

I worked for that money. That money is a measurement of the life and energy I gave to my employer. I TRADED valuable time out of my finite lifespan for that money. Anyone can tell you, I worked HARD. That money represents my life, and it was taken from me without my permission. Whether I receive it all back or not is irrelevant. It was stolen from me.

For society not to have a serious breakdown of the social order, thieves should still be punished for their theft even after they returned their misgotten goods. They shouldn't get a time with a duncecap on merely because they weren't good enough to avoid getting caught. Nor should theft be ignored as long as the thief assures us that he'll drop a few bucks from our stolen wallets in the Salvation Army bucket - charity is meaningless when you perform it with money other than yours. The argument that all the nice and wonderful (and by the way unconstitutional) services the government performs or offers would cease to exist without the IRS coercing us into funding them with the threat of death or jailtime is moot.

I guess that would explain, why, while filling out my tax forms, I kept seeing Nazis lined up against a wall, justice being delivered to them in excess of 2000 feet per second.

And the absolute most hilarious thing about this is: It's all illegal! By the rules of their own agency, the IRS has absolutely no claim on your money. If you can find a copy of the IRS rulebook and are willing to wade through the morass (emphasis on those last three letters please) of sickening legal-ese, you'll find this little gem: "The tax system is based on voluntary compliance"

Thus spake the Federal Tax Regulations, Section 601.602.

Is it voluntary? Of course not. But by filing your taxes to avoid all that unpleasantness involving courtdates, judges, and trolls with guns, you give the IRS permission to continue looting your paycheck. Don't see it that way? Go talk to our court system. They've repeatedly held that by requesting permission to exercise a right, you thereby give the government permission to deny that permission to you, turning a right into a privilege. Basically, they can make your life an unbearable hell in order to force you to give them the ability to loot your paycheck, after which you have no legal leg to stand on. And your employer is prohibited by law from hiring you until you've filled out a REQUEST for withholding, otherwise known as the W-4 form.

Further wading through the tax code turns up a few more beautiful nuggets of rage-inducing regulation. Check out form Paragraph A of form 668W (the one authorizing the IRS to seize your paycheck, home, bank account, and property for lack of tax payments)...oh wait...it starts at Paragraph B. Guess what? That's because Paragraph A authorizes the IRS sieze money NOT as taxes from...only government employees. Which completely defangs the IRS.

Yet another interesting piece of information is the fact that the tax regulations to enforce the aforementioned paycheck seizure statute, come under the heading 27 CFR in the Code of Federal Regulations, not 26 CFR (Internal Revenue Code). 27 CFR is otherwise known as *drumroll please* Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearm. Which again completely defangs the IRS since this means they can only levy penalties on government employees who've made income relating to those three areas. (That taxation is a form of infringment, and it is therefore illegal under the 2nd Amendment to apply it to firearms is another story)

And another funny little tidbit about withholding. Remember that other onerous deduction, taken from your paycheck and flushed down the soiled Porta-john of Social Security? Check out Title 26, Chapter 21, Subtitle C, Section 3121 of the United States Code. Social Security deductions can only be made from the paychecks of employees within the United States. Which sounds legal enough, until they define the United States - as being the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, and American Samoa. Pretty much anywhere under US jurisdiction except the 50 states.

Real nice.

There's really no point in my posting this except to get it off my chest. The most infuriating thing about all of this is not the Constitutional and legal abuses, but the principle behind it. My money was taken from me, I want it back and the thieves punished. At the same time however, I don't really want to be a martyr for the tax movement, so I'll shuffle along and fill out all those self-incriminating forms like a good little serf. The pains of making a principled stand far outnumber the benefits. I can only hope, one day, every Na...I mean IRS agent gets their day in court. A real court, not the tax courts that they haul us off to for tax violations, the ones where the above facts are inadmissable as evidence. After which, hopefully, everyone who's been coerced into turning over their money (and especially those RUINED by the IRS) will have a chance to decide their fate.

Wow. That started off as what LawDog and Kim du Toit (google those names) would call a proper rant, and veered sharply off course for nearly 40 minutes into legal waters. Thanks to Vin Supryowicz for writing the most EXCELLENT book "The Ballad Of Carl Drega" without which I would know very little of this infuriating information.

Patriots Day 4/19, Reposted from elsewhere

Today is Patriot's Day.

Today, 231 years ago, a few dozen men and boys stood in a town square in Virginia, stared down the barrels of their own government's rifles, and told the soldiers (who were just doing their appointed duty) that they'd rather die than allow them to take their military arms. A handful of them did die, and after the British had destroyed their arms depot, the militia extracted a terrible price from the British on their march out of town, killing well over a hundred them.

Today is the anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's illegal blockade of Southern ports, marking the beginning of the War Of Northern Aggression.

Today marks the anniversary of the final defense of the Warsaw ghetto in Poland. A handful of poorly armed men, women, and children- many barely older than the patrons of this message board - stared down the barrels of the rifles of the Nazi army and told the soldiers (who were just doing their appointed duty) they would rather die fighting than be treated as a subhuman race. Most did die, but during their several-week defense of the ghetto, they killed dozens if not hundreds if not thousands of Nazi Germany's finest.

Today marks the anniversary of the final defense of the Branch Davidian Church in Waco, Texas. +80 men, women, and children stared down the barrels of their own government's rifles and told the soldiers (who were just doing their appointed duty) that yes, they did have the right to possess military arms and use them in defense of their lives, property, and families, and that they were innocent of all charges against them. They were then burned to death in their own church/living quarters, the culmination of a siege starting with perjured warrant stating that the Branch Davidians were making methamphetamines in the church basement, and an illegal and intentionally lethal attack on the Branch Davidian homestead.

Today marks the anniversary of the detonation of the Murray Building in Oklahoma, City. Whoever is responsible for it (and we'll never know), it was a terrible tragedy, and it marked the beginning of the American government's crackdown on the legal groups it believes to be a threat to its power - civilian militias. Militias are defined as civilian soldiers, or all able-bodied civilians capable of bearing weapons in defense of their nation, state, city, or family.

The Virginians standing before the guns of the British military were a militia.
The Southerners standing before the guns of the Northern military were a militia.
The Jews standing before the guns of the Nazi military were a militia.
The Branch Davidians standing before the guns of the American military were a militia.

They were Patriots.