Background is here.  This has been bugging me for several months now.  Maybe grumbling about it here will relieve the frustration some.

And before you start laughing at me please realize that I know it's a minor thing and "it really doesn't matter" but it still bugs me.  Its that I want the world to be perfect and expect people would want to work toward that goal.  I know it's not possible but why can't people make the changes that they can instead of being so random?  It makes me look down on people in general.  Give me a reason to believe that the Neurotypicals are worthy of my respect.  But no.  That's not the way it works.  I'm looked down upon when it is they who are inaccurate and random.

The thing that has been bugging me?  The one of the pizza types in the cafeteria is labeled "grilled vegetable pizza".  It has red peppers, yellow peppers, black olives, yellow squash, and mushrooms along with the usual cheese and tomato sauce on it.  I'll bet 99+% of you won't see anything wrong with this "picture".  I do.  And it bugs me.  There's only one vegetable there--the mushrooms.  All the other plants parts are fruits.

This sort of irritation is perversive in our society.  Why can't people get it right?  And they tend to get irritated when you politely inform them they made a mistake (no, I didn't inform the cafeteria staff about their mislabeling of the pizza) and they almost never correct their errors.

There's a reason I'm into computers, guns, and explosives--they are understandable, rational, and predictable.

Reports from the media are almost always filled with errors.  The reporters, at best, are expert writers and are seldom experts on the topic.  They have limited time and rely on others for the "facts" which filter through biases and various error prone communication channels before they ever reach the public. And in the case of what happened behind a bar shortly after closing time on a Friday night (actually early Saturday morning) even the people who participated are probably not going to be worthy of being called knowledgeable.  The changes in the story of what happened that night reflect the difficulty in knowing exactly what happened.

What is known for certain is that 32 year old Michael Charles Williams, in possession of an Idaho concealed weapons license, fired three shots from a "large caliber" semi-auto pistol into the chest of 25 year old Christopher Rick Adams who died at the hospital a short time later.

My references, all from the same paper, are:

• February 27, 2005 Man shot and killed near Blackfoot bar
• February 28, 2005 Waitress: 'This sort of stuff just doesn't happen': Blackfoot shooting shocks lounge workers
• March 01, 2005 Verbal dispute sparked killing: Victim hit by three gunshots to chest
• March 11, 2005 Hearing put off for accused murderer: Williams charged with shooting man
• April 08, 2005 Judge sets Williams' trial date: Man faces second-degree murder charges
• May 11, 2005 Accused murderer pleads not guilty
• May 18, 2005 Judge reduces bail in Blackfoot murder case
• June 02, 2005 Man posts bail in murder case
• August 30, 2005 Blackfoot man free unless murder charges are refiled
• September 2, 2005 Man faces highest charge of murder

Read the April 8th story for the most detailed version of what is believed to have happened.

In addition to getting an email from Williams sister asking for help what makes this interesting to me are some of the biases in the story as it appears in the paper.  Some of those biases are probably unintentional.  Others, almost for certain, were intentional.  All of them are against Williams yet who, according to my understanding of the law, is to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.

The February 28th story says:

A press conference on the murder is scheduled for 10 a.m. today at the Blackfoot Police Department, 501 N. Maple St.

It's not murder until someone is convicted.  The paper should have said something along the lines of "...conference on the death...".  If the circumstances had been much more clear I would let them get away with it.  But in this case there is at least some reasonable doubt as to what actually happened.

The following, from the March 1st story, doesn't adversely affect Williams in this case but it does affect you and me.  It's an implication of what someone, probably the reporter, thinks the law is or should be.  The police captain, Kurt Asmus, almost for certain knew the question presumed things that were not true but figured it didn't really matter and answered the question in such a way the reporter could continue believing their view of reality was correct:

The weapon was legally registered to Williams, Asmus said.

There are no registration requirements for semi-auto pistols in Idaho.  My guess is the police captain said something like, "The pistol was legally owned." in response to a question about the gun being registered.  This allowed the naive public to believe firearms are registered and desensitizes the public to the hazards of firearms registration.  When it comes up that firearm aren't registered after for years believing they were it will be easier to get such a law passed.

In the May 18th story the prosecutor, arguably doing his job, shows a bias and the newspaper lets it stand:

He said Williams has shown no remorse for his crime and has admitted he could have avoided the shooting.

"Mr. Williams was perfectly willing to kill Mr. Adams," Andrew said.

Williams has only been charged with a crime.  It has not been proved there was actually a crime committed.  No remorse could mean he believes he behaved morally and legally correct.  Admitting he could have avoided the shooting doesn't mean that would have been the proper course of action.  You could avoid shooting someone and let a dozen innocent people be killed.  And willingness to kill someone is not evidence of a crime or even evil intent.  For example I'll bet we could have found 100's of thousands of people willing to flip the switch that turned Ted Bundy into burnt toast.  I suspect the prosecutor exaggerated on the willingness angle.  Carrying a firearm for self defense shows willingness to use deadly force under extreme circumstances.  We don't really know if the prosecutor has evidence Williams was "perfectly willing" to kill.

In the August 30th story we have this from the prosecutor:

Andrew said witnesses would now testify that Williams told them he would kill someone if the right scenario presented itself.

If you reword that just slightly you get the essence of what nearly every firearm self-defense instructor teaches.  That is you are legally justified in using deadly force if innocent life is immediate danger of death or permanent injury.  And guess who one of the witnesses is?

...one of the prosecution's new witnesses is Williams' ex-wife and the couple is currently involved in a child custody action.

I'll bet the child custody battle will go a lot smoother for the ex-wife with Williams doing time for murder.  I'm sure she will be totally unbiased in her testimony.

From the September 2nd story we find the line from Deputy prosecutor Scott Andrew that got Williams sister all wound up in her email to me:

Williams is accused of shooting Adams outside the Blackfoot bar after Adams allegedly walked towards his car during an argument.

"He waited for him to get closer, just like when you're hunting ... He hunted Mr. Adams," Andrew said.

Interesting hunt when the prey knows about the hunter, has been warned about a possible weapon, and still advances on the hunter.  This is really over the top--even for a prosecutor.

I don't know which way this is going to go or should go.  I don't have a strong opinion on it because I know the facts as represented in the newspaper story are tenuous at best.  The jury will have much better, if still limited, view of the facts and usually will do a pretty good job of coming to the correct conclusion.  But there are some lessons to be learned here.  Nothing new, but this guy either didn't know or forgot them.  As we teach in the NRA Personal Protection class:

1. After a shooting let your lawyer do all the talking.
2. Don't talk about killing people to defend yourself.  What you can say is that if innocent life is in immediate danger of death or permanent injury you would be willing to use deadly force to stop the attack.

I suggested to his sister that the defense attorney call CCRKBA and/or SAF.  Depending on the type of case the prosecutor tries to make, like saying the concealed weapons license was evidence Williams was looking for someone to kill, they may be able to help in some way.

No matter how the trial goes there is plenty of tragedy to go around.  I just hope our legal system can come up with a reasonable approximation to justice--whatever that is in this case.

No longer is the issue merely that of belittling an immigrant group.  Just as there are heroes of free speech in Denmark, there are also heroes - from the Arabian Peninsula to North Africa to Indonesia - who are ready to take to the barricades to defend their prophet's dignity.

Jürgen Gottschlich
A German journalist based in Istanbul
Quoted on February 7, 2006 in A 'dangerous moment' for Europe and Islam

I get the most interesting email.

There have been the room temperature I.Q. cases wanting help building a bomb which I talk about frequently.  There are also cases where I don't talk much, if any, but are just as interesting. 

There was a case where a public defender wanted help defending against federal bomb making charge.  I thought Ry and I were going to be doing some testing for them.  But the case was dropped after the public defender told the court they had an expert who didn't think it would explode but wanted to test a duplicate of the device to make sure. My guess is the the prosecutor knew it wouldn't/couldn't/shouldn't explode but figured putting a 15 year old girl in the slammer was just another way to get a few laughs and get more points toward their next promotion.  Don't ever forget we have a legal system, not a justice system.

Due my Modern Ballistics program I have received lots of requests for ballistics help.  In one case (IIRC, it's been several years now) someone was investigating the possibility of a wrongful death case against a police officer.  It wasn't a problem my program was designed for and I couldn't help.  One request was the defense in a murder case.  Using all the data I had at my disposal I still had a couple unknown variables that could push the answer either way.  And even if those numbers were tied down the answer depended on the skill and knowledge of the shooter as much as the physics involved.

This week I received my first request for help in defending against a first degree murder charge (three shots to the center of mass from a large caliber semi-auto pistol) where the defendant had a concealed weapons permit.  I'll blog the details tomorrow.  The guy goes on trial Monday.

From ABC News online:

The tourist town of Broome, in northern Western Australia, is considering going to unusual lengths to promote safe sex.

Figures show the Kimberley region has the highest rate of sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in the country and health workers are advising authorities in Broome that something has to be done.

They are pushing for condoms to be made available in parks and public areas where young people gather.

They would be hung in PVC containers from trees - a method that has already proved successful in other Kimberley towns with high Indigenous populations.

I've update several of the pages on Boomershoot.org.  The most changes were on the general information page.

The news release for Boomershoot 2006 is available now.  See it here.  Send copies to whoever, media or not, you think might be interested.

There are still 26 positions available.  The last week of February is typically when the biggest surge of entries comes in.

There is going to be a similar event in Missouri on April 23rd.  I've been giving the organizer a little bit of help via email but other than that I won't have any involvement.

Update: I've been forgetting to mention that the portable toliets have been ordered, the caterer has us on his schedule, and the last of the chemicals have been ordered.  The only remaining items to be purchased are the boxes used for target containers and possibly a few more stakes to put the targets on.  On the portable toilets... I forgot to look at them at the end of the on Sunday.  Did we fill them up?  Were there long lines?  Do I need to get a third toilet this year?

The damage that the rioters did - both to Lebanese property and to the image of Islam - was far worse than that done by the cartoons which desecrated the Prophet Mohammed.

Editorial
The Star
An English-language Lebanese newspaper
February 6, 2006

A leader in the religion of peace has a solution to the riots and protests over the cartoons that upset the extremist Muslims--execute the cartoonists:

Speaking from Beirut, Omar Bakri Mohammad, leader of the Islamist group al Muhajiroon which is banned in Britain, called for the execution of those involved with the cartoons.

"In Islam, God said, and the messenger Mohammad said, whoever insults a prophet, he must be punished and executed," he told BBC radio by telephone.

But there are some voices of restraint and I hope they get their share of attention as well:

Moderate Moslem groups as well as Western leaders condemned the weekend violence and calls to arms and called for calm.

"With growing concern, we are witnessing the escalation in disturbing tensions...," the prime ministers of Turkey and Spain said in the International Herald Tribune.

"We shall all be the losers if we fail to immediately defuse this situation, which can only leave a trail of mistrust and misunderstanding between both sides in its wake," Tayyip Erdogan and Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said in the joint article.

H/T Michelle Malkin for the pointer to the Reuters article.

I can imagine no greater misfortune for a cultured people than to see in the hands of the rulers not only the civil, but also the religious power.

Caius Valerius Catullus
[Theocracies have been known to be a bad thing for a long, long time.  I wish the Muslim extremists could drag themselves into at least the 19th century.--Joe]

Karen and I grew up on farms just 3/4 of a mile apart.  She is a few years older than me and I fondly remember her reading books to me before I could read.  My family would visit her family and after a while our parents were too boring to listen to anymore she would be tasked with keeping me entertained.  I've always been very proud of her.  She was valedictorian of her high school class and later became a lawyer.  After several years of mostly corporate law she became a judge--an Idaho State Appeals court judge.  I don't get to see her very often anymore.  She lives in Boise now which is 300 miles from my home in Moscow.  Sometimes at Christmas and a few other family gatherings we get a chance to chat some.  When I got a mention in Newsweek for Boomershoot she told me that I had topped her single sentence mention in USA Today when she was appointed.  Today she got a mention in the Seattle PI:

"The state's interest in apprehending re-offending sex offenders was not rationally advanced by a classification that differentiated between offenders based solely upon their date of entry into the state," Judge Karen Lansing wrote for the court. "Because the statutory provision under which he was convicted was unconstitutional, however, Dickerson's conviction for failure to register must be reversed."

I can't wait to hear what her brother has to say about this.  One of the cases Karen worked on before she became a judge was a case where someone (I think he was associated with a school) was accused of sexual impropriety with a child.  As part of the investigation the guy took a test where they put fairly tight fitting paper band around his penis then showed him images of young children.  After showing the images for a few minutes they examined the paper band and it was found to be broken--indicating he had been sexually aroused by the sight of the young children.  If I recall the case correctly Karen was defending the school for not taking appropriate action against this accused pedophile.  Karen's brother took great pleasure in asking at every opportunity how her "Peter Meter" case was going.

This case isn't going to make life any easier for Karen.  I just emailed her brother a link to the article.

It is unjustifiable under any kind of personal freedoms to allow a person or a group to insult the beliefs of millions of Muslims.

Al-Thawra
Syrian state-run daily newspaper
Quoted in Ireland Online
February 5, 2006

The Washington Post had an article on shrapnel and a good portion of the article was on Jason.  Katy, Jason's mom, had a few words to say in her blog post about the article.

Mrs. Roosevelt's polemical life was lived right in the heart of liberal mania, with the results that, themselves bereft of their senses, they were incapable of recognizing that Mrs. Roosevelt was bereft of hers.

William F. Buckley, Jr.
Up From Liberalism

I received a call from Xenia's chemistry teacher this morning.  Uh oh...  This has never happened before.  Xenia has almost always been a pleasure for her teachers as well as her parents.

Rather inform me Xenia had lost control of some explosives in her locker (like I did once when I was in high school) she just wanted to tell me that Xenia is doing great in class.  She said she doesn't get to make many of those types of calls and she wanted to let us know.

I'd like to think it had something to do with the chemistry experiments I do and have had Xenia help with.  But while Xenia thinks it's "way cool" she hasn't had the slightest bit of interest in the actual chemistry (and here).

This post on a new blog, face of muhammed, articulates the concept Ry suggested to me the other day quite well:

A new non-political international movement is rising.

4000 terror attacks after 9/11, the world was still slumbering. But 12 innocent satirical drawings in a Danish newspaper, the kind of cartoons printed daily by the thousands in newspapers all over the world, have changed the geopolitical situation.

Suddenly, a new understanding is emerging across political differences.

In recent years, the world crisis between Islam and the non-Muslim world has been discussed in thousands of books, countless television debates and millions of articles across the globe. It did nothing but divide us. Even former western allies were divided, and a wave of anti-Americanism has swept even the free western societies.

Now ridiculous circumstances have changed all that. A sense of humour has changed what all the debating could not.

Read it all.

It isn't the first time I've seen this and it probably won't be the last:

Bloomberg, who was a Democrat before he switched parties for his first run for mayor in 2001, is a political moderate on such issues as abortion and gun control.

Why aren't politicians that want to, and do, violate the constitution considered extremists instead of moderates?

From the AP via the Washington Post comes this list of 12 different deadly postal shootings.  Should we ban postal buildings?  If it only saves one life...

I suspect the text for most of this is in Danish, but the images speak their own language (some may not be safe for work).  The "asshole switch" has definitely been flipped.  Here are a couple of my favorites:

Thanks to Ry for the pointer.

The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie -- deliberate, contrived and dishonest, but the myth, persistent, persuasive, and unrealistic. Belief in myths allows the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.

John F. Kennedy (1917 - 1963)
[Think gun control.--Joe]

The Times (U.K.) calls it Cartoon wars and the clash of civilisations and there are now over 1000 news stories about it.  Channel 4 (London) quotes a Muslim cleric that I particularly liked:

Influential Muslim cleric Youssef al-Qaradawi said: "The least we have to do is boycott those who offended us by not buying their products.

"We thought it was only Denmark and Norway ... but several European countries and newspapers started reprinting these extremely offending pictures."

In the spirit of service to their customers I think all freedom loving media outlets should show the cartoons and continue the desensitization therapy.  Let the Muslims do their least to all of us.

Interesting report from the website owners of a sex toy supplier:

A British couple who launched a website selling sex toys to conservative Christians has revealed that vicars are some of their best clients.

Stella Hagarty and husband Stan revealed that they had decided to launch 'Wholly Love' to show normally reserved church-goers that sex is a gift from God, and that it should not be treated as something sinful.

And the website seems to have gotten its stamp of approval from God himself, as vicars make up some of the couple's best clients.

Of course the website owners are not at all unbiased in this.  But I still find it interesting.

If I could have one wish fulfilled right now, it would be for someone to get fusion electricity production operational. Cheap electricity would, in a decade or two, make oil irrelevant. The Arab nations would go back to being Bedouins--and we could turn that part of the world into a giant nature preserve, as a reminder of what happens when you get stuck in the twelfth century, and refuse to move forward.

Clayton Cramer
Middle Eastern Oil Dependence
February 01, 2006
[Not entirely true but probably close enough for Mideast politics.  Oil is used for lots of things besides energy.  Lubricants, solvents, and plastics are just the start of a very long list.--Joe]

Considering some of the crazy things the Brits have done in relation to firearms it should come as no surprise they are creating the circumstances in which their worst fears are realized:

Muggings and violent attacks up by more than 10%
By Richard Ford, Home Correspondent

MUGGINGS and violent attacks on people soared by more than 10 per cent in the third quarter of last year as the police struggled to contain street crime, according to figures published yesterday.

Street robbery is rising at its fastest since Tony Blair demanded action three years ago by the Home Office and police to tackle the issue.

...

Robberies soared by 11 per cent on top of a 4 per cent increase in the second quarter of last year. The Metropolitan Police has said that one of the main factors behind an increase in mugging in London is the rising number of portable hi-tech goods, such as mobile phones and MP3 players. In the weeks after the July 7 bombings, muggings in London rose 23 per cent after thousands of police were sent to guard the capital’s transport network.

Gun crime rose by 1 per cent in the year to the end of September 2005, to more than 11,000 incidents. Violence against the person rose 4 per cent overall, although more serious cases including homicide, threats to murder and serious woundings fell by 10 per cent.

Offences in lower category crimes such as less serious woundings rose by 10 per cent. Serious injuries from gun crime rose by 18 per cent to 470 in the year to the end of September but the number of deaths from gun incidents fell by more than one third to 50 compared with 80 in the previous year.

I find it engages my sick sense of humor that they blame the increase in muggings on the rising number of portable hi-tech goods.  Do they even hear what they are saying?  Muggers don't attack someone they think has a fair chance being their equal.  They "interview" their potential victim and attack those that look and act like "grass eaters".  Carrying a concealed firearm makes the victim selection process much more difficult and if that process misses something the possibility of catastrophic failure is quite high.  Muggings go way down when the wolves can't distinguish between the sheep and sheep dogs.

Sometimes people do things which cause their greatest fear to be realized.  For example; a man that is extremely afraid their wife will leave them will forbid them to work outside the home, to visit relatives, and in general isolate them from all other people.  This forced isolation may well be the reason their spouse does leave them.  And it could be the Arabs and perhaps Muslims in general are working as similar sort of angle.  Take a look at these cartoons from Arab media.  Their view of the world is that the Jews are out to get them.  This frame of mind would explain why many of them want to "wipe Israel off the map" and kill all Jews.  It appears to me they are at risk of having their greatest fear realized because of their own actions.

Jon Armstrong was interviewed yesterday.  And in that interview he was asked what he would do if he were president of the US.  His answer caused one of those blank stares (type 1) in me for a few seconds:

I’d disband the military entirely and spend the money on teacher salaries as well as encouraging public innovation.

I'm nearly certain he is serious.  I looked at some of his blog postings and it's entire consistent.  The defense of our nation via the military is one of the few things the U.S. Constitution grants the Federal Government the power to do and he would apparently leave us defenseless.  There is no Constitutional authority for spending money on teachers and he would do that.  I guess when he took the oath of office and said he would uphold the Constitution he would have his fingers crossed or something.  Of course that's not really any different than it is with the bozos we have in government (at all levels) right now.  But when I say the Constitution isn't even considered a strong suggestion it's barking moonbats like this which prove my point.

One way people with abnormal fears or sensitivities can overcome their problem is by gradually being exposed to more and more of whatever it is that causes the adverse reaction.  For example, someone with a fear of water/drowning could put their feet in a children's wading pool and become comfortable with that before moving on to deeper and deeper water.  It appears some European newspapers are doing some desensitizing therapy of their own on the Muslim extremists that have difficulty with images of Muhammad:

Newspapers in France and Germany were accused of throwing oil on the fire on Wednesday after they reprinted controversial Danish caricatures of the prophet Muhammad that have sparked unrest in the Muslim world.

The Dutch are helping too:

Geert Wilders, the rightwing Dutch politician whose campaign against radical Islam led to death threats that forced him into hiding, on Wednesday published the controversial cartoons on his website, Dutch media reported.

The German editor had a particularly insightful question:

Roger Köppel, editor of Die Welt, defended his decision to publish the drawing alongside an editorial asking, “How much humour can Muhammad’s religion take?”

Of course all these contributions to the desensitization therapy could be interpreted as "turning on the asshole switch" (as Ry put it to me at lunch today) but the Muslim extremists shouldn't think of it in that way. Never mind that for the therapy to work the person receiving the therapy has to want to change.  And that they need to stay mostly within their comfort zone as the stimulus is increased.  But as an enlightened people they should realize that all these people are just trying to help them overcome their problems and adapt to the differences from the usual protocol.

I haven't been following the story very closely but my intial inclination, were I at Microsoft in charge of dealing with the socialists in Europe, would be to tell them "We are suspending sales of products to your country.  All future versions, including updates to existing products, will refuse to operate if the IP address of the computer is within your country.  Language support for the dominate languages in your country will be disabled if it doesn't affect other countries who are friendly to us.  We can chose whether to do business in your country or not.  We chose NOT."

Of course, short term, this would be harmful to the stockholders of Microsoft but it would get my (a very, very minor stockholder) approval.  Here's the story that pushed me over the edge:

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union's antitrust chief says Microsoft (MSFT) cannot charge licensing fees for software blueprints that it is offering to share with competitors unless it can prove the computer code is innovative.

Neelie Kroes also told European lawmakers on Tuesday that she has not yet received all information on Microsoft's offer to share software code and comply with a 2004 EU antitrust ruling.

Microsoft has until Feb. 15 to meet European Commission demands from December that it provide complete and accurate information on code that would allow competitors' products to communicate smoothly with servers running Microsoft operating systesms.

EU antitrust regulators have threatened Microsoft with daily fines of 2 million euros ($2.36 million), retroactive to mid-December, if it fails to comply by the deadline.

In December, Microsoft provided EU officials with thousands of documents but an independent monitor said they were "fundamentally flawed" and required a drastic overhaul to make them workable.

Last week, Microsoft offered to let competitors examine some server source code, calling it the "ultimate documentation" which might address regulators' concerns. Kroes said the first she heard of that offer was via a Microsoft press release.

The EU has never asked Microsoft to supply source code. Backers of open source alternatives to Microsoft's proprietary operating systems called last week's offer a "poisoned apple," as the terms of access to the code were unclear.

EU officials and an independent monitor held talks Monday at Microsoft's U.S. headquarters to discuss improvements to the technical documentation that the software company has so far supplied.

This is just a letter to the editor and in general these are extremely unreliable sources of information.  But if true it explains something that has bugged me for a while, "Why are there so many accesses to the Canadian gun registry?"

Every time a car's licence plate is checked to see if it is a stolen car, or a driver's licence is checked to see if it is suspended, a "hit" on the gun registry gets recorded. We see thousands of those each day, so what? None of them have anything to do with keeping guns away from criminals, which should be the primary role of any gun-control initiative. Not even its most adamant supporters claim that the gun registry does that.

The writer goes on to nail the real reason for the registry--it makes some people feel good:

It was an interesting idea which didn't pan out; it's now an extremely expensive pink elephant that people cling to because it gives them a warm fuzzy feeling. One thousand more police officers with state-of-the-art equipment will do a lot more to combat gang violence in Toronto than some inaccurate and error-filled list of who owns which duck hunting guns.

Elena Markina, Thornhill

Interesting... using google.cn I get very similar results to google.com for the searches "Boomershoot", "Joe Huffman", "Freedom", and "want some help building a bomb".

I suppose the "Great Firewall of China" probably will block access for some of that but still it highlights the difficulty government types have in restricting information.

Also of interest is that by setting up a proxy on the outside of the firewall and encrypting the traffic between the browser on the inside of the firewall and the proxy on the outside it is trival to bypass the firewall and get access to all the internet.  The firewall would have to block all proxies or all forms of encryption and stegonography (very tough problem) to be effective.

As with illegal recreation drugs in the U.S., illegal handguns in the U.K., and all other goods if there is a market it will be supplied by someone making a profit.  Information in China will be the same.

The new Conservative government has the federal long gun registry in its crosshairs, which has prompted some defenders of the program to plead with the Tories not to pull the trigger on the much-maligned registry.

But the cries of clemency coming from crime victims and now police chiefs, as compelling as they may be, must not be heeded and the registry must be put out of its misery.

The Brandon Sun
Say goodbye to the gun registry
January 31, 2006
[If this actually comes about it will give freedom lovers everywhere hope.--Joe]

Jason was on CBS Evening News tonight.  He was a major portion of the three minute video clip (nearly 12 MBytes).  That may be a bit slow so if you want a faster link (while it's available) you can view Returning From A War Zone on the CBS site.

Update: Ry has put the video on a high bandwidth site for us.

Will this be the defining moment for people to realize just what we are up against?  For the people of the Netherlands it probably was the Van Gogh murder.  But this might "do it" for a lot more people.  I'm glad to see what the Danes are standing their ground:

THE Danish editor who brought the fury of the Muslim world on his country by printing pictures of the Prophet Muhammad defiantly declared yesterday: “We do not apologise for printing the cartoons. It was our right to do so.”

As protests continued for a second day in Gaza with shouts of “Death to Denmark”, Flemming Rose, the culture editor of the centre-right daily newspaper Jyllands-Posten, sat in his book-lined office declaring his surprise at the reaction.

He said that he had to stand his ground because, as in the Salman Rushdie affair, freedom of speech was being threatened. “There is a lot at stake. It would be very naive to think this is only about Jyllands-Posten and 12 cartoons and apologising or not apologising.

“This is about standing for fundamental values that have been the (foundation) for the development of Western democracies over several hundred years, and we are now in a situation where those values are being challenged,” he said.

“I think some of the Muslims who have reacted very strongly to these cartoons are being driven by totalitarian and authoritarian impulses, and the nature of these impulses is that if you give in once they will just put forward new requirements.”

...

A poll over the weekend showed that 80 per cent of Danes thought that the Government should not apologise and 62 per cent thought that the newspaper should not apologise. Jyllands-Posten tried to calm tempers on Monday by apologising for any offence caused, but stood firm on its decision to print the pictures.

Here is a collection of Muhammad pictures including the one of him with a bomb as a turban which was so offensive to the extremist Muslims.  I'm particular fond of the "What would Muhammad drive?" cartoon.  The more in your face types will appreciate the camel one.

Thanks to Ry for the link to the collection and for the basis of this post.