Putting guns back on the street after they've seen the police station is just asking for more trouble.  Every single gun seized by the police should find its end in a furnace.  Anything less is nothing more than a contribution to the gun violence our nation is currently suffering from.

The Gun Guys
Your Gun Guys Daily Update (daily email)
June 1, 2006
[I understand now. He is in favor of the death penality on the first offense--for the gun instead of the criminal. The "Gun Guys" have mental problems.--Joe]

From Alan Korwin--tactics that work in the fight to defend the right to keep and bear arms.  As he says, "Easy, fun, and it helps save the planet by golly!"

I kept forgetting to post this.  A couple weeks ago Ry told us about a some changes announced at a company meeting at Microsoft.  One of the things he didn't mention that struck me the most was the reason Bill Gates didn't attend the meeting.  Bill had just finished up a CEO summit meeting he had hosted and he and his good friend Warren Buffet were going to play poker that afternoon. 

OMG. 

I wonder what the ante for one of those games is. Would it be $100K, $1M, or a penny?  What would it mean to the future of the world if both of them pushed all their chips into the center of the table?

Canada is resisting the identity card system required by U.S. law to enter our country:

Canada will not embark on an untested identity card system to meet U.S. border concerns, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said yesterday.

His government has told the Americans it prefers not to create such a card and wouldn't do so until the American government has convinced itself it is effective, Harper told reporters.

ID cards are not effective in solving the problems they are claimed to address.  Mandatory ID cards are a bad idea.

New Orleans is sinking.  Anyone who looked at the problem and had more than two brain cells to rub together knew that.  What wasn't known was that parts of the city are sinking at a rate of over one inch per year.

Add in the inability to get pumps installed in a timely matter (it's a tough problem, the Corp of Engineer's has my sympathy) and my advice is they should spend their money on abandoning the city.

Dr. Joe's cure for everything is more sex.  It also works as preventative medicine.  Jamie Fox uses it to prevent obesity:

Jamie Foxx has sex every day for 30 minutes to keep in shape.

The 'Ray' star revealed that daily love making is the best way to stay slim.

He said: "We should all do something for 30 minutes every day to get the heart pumping. I make love to stay in shape."

The discovery of sugar powder was a landmark event in the history of the Benson family.  In total significance, it ranked right up there with Pearl Harbor and catching our first mink.  For my brother and I, it certainly was the moral equivalent of our first piece of ass.

Ragnar Benson
Chapter 7, page 85
Ragnar's Guide to Home and Recreational Use of High Explosives
[Sugar powder is a substitute for black powder made from household sugar and potassium chlorate.--Joe]

I was almost asleep a few minutes ago and the phone rang.  Xenia was calling.  It must be one of three dire emergencies I thought.  Those were, not necessarily in the matter of importance to her: 1) Someone is hurt or is very sick or dead; 2) Her Internet connection is down; 3) Her website is down.

I was wrong.  She wanted to know if I had read her Live Journal recently.  "How recently?"  I had read the posting from yesterday sometime.  Nope that wasn't it.  She wanted to know if I had read it in the last 10 minutes.  "No, why?"  I couldn't imagine what was so important.  She told me she posted the email she got from her English teacher on her anthology that I quoted from the other day.

I was wide awake now.  Did I need to immediately drive home and be ready to dance on the English teachers desk with muddy boots when he showed up tomorrow morning?  I couldn't quite tell from Xenia's tone of voice.  It could be she was very happy with what he said and it could be she was smug with the knowledge that someone was going to get what they deserved for trashing the hard work of Daddy's little girl.

The important part is as follows (emphasis in the original email):

Xenia:

This just may be the most beautiful anthology I've ever read.

It is the boldest.

That's my girl he's talking about!

Update: This is the teachers blog posting on the topic.

Maybe the TV news people left something out that would make things a little more clear but the way it's spelled out now Mayor Kiss doesn't make a lick of sense:

"From the perspective of being mayor," he said, "I haven't looked at public safety in terms of whether there are initiatives we would like to take. At least an element of that is that we've had two recent shootings in which handguns were involved."

Kiss said it was possible that Burlington might seek a charter change related to guns or a member of the Legislature from the city might propose a bill.

...

Despite the likelihood of opposition, Kiss said it was timely to talk about handguns, given the recent shootings. "We could see where that went, without prejudging the process," Kiss said. I don't want to be afraid of bringing up issues that are sensitive."

He doesn't want to be afraid of bring up issues that are sensitive?  Okay then Mister Mayor, why don't you bring up reinstating slavery?  Never mind that should he start pushing for such a thing I would probably be among those looking for a clear shot to put a .30 caliber hole in his cranial vault.  That is if he wasn't almost immediately impeached and unable to get any job with a higher status than shoveling pig manure.  It would make about as much sense.  Vermont has one of the lowest crime rates in the country and among the most relaxed gun laws.  Why would he want to change what is working well?

I have Just One Question for you Mayor Kiss.

The felons at PNNL didn't allow me to see the evidence against me, confront my accusers, or present a defense of any sort but I didn't know such things existed in criminal courts of law of modern countries.  So this, from Ireland, really surprised me:

His lawyers had sought to have his conviction quashed after the Supreme Court last week overturned a 1935 law that made it an indefensible crime for any man to have sex with a girl under the age of 15.

I can see the point but one should always be allowed to defend themselves.  They could have been framed for example.  Their DNA could have been planted by someone else, the pictures could have been edited, whatever evidence is used should be subject to question.

Something like this even happens in the U.S. under certain circumstances.  The freedoms we take for granted are not as secure as you might think.

No greater wrong can ever be done than to put a good man at the mercy of a bad, while telling him not to defend himself or his fellows; in no way can the success of evil be made surer or quicker.

Theodore Roosevelt
[England, Chicago, Washington D.C., New Jersey, San Francisco, etc. please take note.--Joe]

The "armed populace at large" becomes the libertarian fantasy of some people, arrested in political adolescence, who have an extreme difficulty accommodating to public authority and giving the "consent of the governed". The fantasy is that this is a viable concept. The right to be armed outside of the law is a right and a fantasy that has to be maintained by defeating legislation. It succeeds because everyone else fails.

The Potowmack Institute
As revised on November 11, 2005
[They completely neglect to consider the concept of inalienable rights such as freedom of speech and other rights guaranteed by our Bill of Rights so it's no wonder they arrive at the wrong conclusion in regards to firearms.  Thanks to Lyle for pointing these guys out.--Joe]

We walked from our motel to the Ponderosa and had breakfast.  Then walked up the street to the church where we got married:

From our motel room balcony we watch the VFW do a 21-gun salute on the bridege for Memorial Day.  Then we drove to my parents place and said hi before driving back to Moscow.

It has been a wonderful weekend.

We got up a little earlier on Sunday and drove up the Lochsa river:

We stopped to watch the rafters going through the white water:

Even though it was raining we hiked up the trail to Jerry Johnson Hotsprings:

We expected that because of the rain we would be the only ones there.  There were six people in the first pool and eight in the second.  We sat in the first pool for several hours and talked and talked to a couple from Montanna that come to the springs several times a year.  People came and went but mostly came and about 17:30 there must have been 15 people in the pool and standing around.  The other couple, Marty and Cheryl, invited us back to their camper for dinner.  We hiked back down the trail with them:

We ate with them and talked and talked and finally about 22:00 we left on our two hour drive back to Orofino and our motel room.

The 30th day of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet church-yard in the land. In this observance no form of ceremony is prescribed, but posts and comrades will in their own way arrange such fitting services and testimonials of respect as circumstances may permit.

John A. Logan
Commander-in-Chief
N.P. CHIPMAN
Adjutant General General Orders No.11
WASHINGTON, D.C.
May 5, 1868

I quietly declare war with the State, after my fashion, though I will still make use and get advantage of her as I can, as is usual in such cases.

Henry David Thoreau
(1817-62), U.S. philosopher, author, naturalist.
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience (1849).

We drove down to Orofino last night (after my five hour drive from the Seattle area) and checked into the Lodge at River's Edge.  It is, literally, on the rivers edge.  This is the view from our balcony:

I looked around at the other balconies, but mine was the only one with a beautiful woman on it.

I didn't look in the other rooms but my bed had a woman it in.  Although I doubt most rooms were furnished as well as this one I was pleased with my good fortune:

It rained today which meant that going for the walk didn't quite work out as we had planned.  We ended up telling housekeeping to go away and not come back and we didn't leave the motel until almost 1:00 PM.

We drove to the Dent campground to eat our picnic lunch.  But the rain hadn't stopped and the wind was picking up.  We ate in the Jeep as the rain came down:

On the way back we stopped at Canyon Creek Campground and walked out to the water's edge.  We saw a trail to go hiking on but it was too wet and we left after taking a few pictures:

We drove back to our motel and then had dinner at the nearby restaurant.  Excellent food, the waitress was the daughter of one of our high school classmates (Danny Reed), and we had a wonderful view from our table:

After dinner we went to Lisa's graduation.

Update: I forgot to add the following picture and explanation.  We stopped at the pullout and took some pictures in the road where we first kissed each other--over 30 years ago:

Our niece, Lisa Huffman, graduated tonight from the same school Barb and I graduated from 33 years ago.  And 30 years ago, to the day, her parents graduated from the same school.  Lisa, being validictorian, gave a very nice speech and mentioned her parents graduating 30 years ago.  She said quite a bit about her parents and I saw her mother wiping tears from her eyes.

Here are a couple pictures taken with my crappy camera phone:

Mom, Lisa's grandmother, is looking at the camera with her dad and mom (red and white) just to the right.

Lisa in the center of the picture.

Clitorises are the best thing in the world! No other piece of the human body has the SOLE PURPOSE of bringing pleasure. If that's not the coolest thing ever, I don't know how you expect to find any sort of sexual happiness in your life.

Xenia Huffman-Scott
Celebration of Ovulation
An anthology Moscow Idaho English period 6.
May 5, 2006

Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States. A military force, at the command of Congress, can execute no laws, but such as the people perceive to be just and constitutional; for they will possess the power.

In one of the most fact free editorials I have seen in a long time the bigot known as William Crane said this at the Spectator, the school newspaper for Seattle University:

Those who are ineligible to buy firearms at a local store will simply go to a gun show and purchase a firearm there.

...

Concealed weapon permits are also available to any eligible gun owner with no further background check or training needed.

...

Overall, firearms killed 11,829 people in the United States in 2002, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. This number far outweighs any potential benefit firearm possession has in Washington State or the United States.

...

The corroboration between firearm regulations and a reduction in firearm violence is clear.

I was not particularily gentle in my online response. It has to go through a moderator and hasn't shown up yet on their site. I repeat it here in case the moderator decides my opinion is not worthy of being published:

Please have Mr. Crane do some research before expressing his bigoted opinions.

There is no gun show loophole. The laws are the same at a gun show as they are at any gun shop. And even if there were such a loophole according to several government studies only a very small portion of guns used in crime are purchased at gun shows. And most Washington state gun shows already voluntarily require a background check before attendees can purchase a firearm.

Concealed Pistol License do require a background check.

Firearms are used to defend innocent life from grave injury and/or death between two and three million times each year in the U.S. This far outweighs the number of murders committed with firearms. Guns in the hands of private citizens save more innocent lives from harm than are injured by guns in the hands of criminals.

Crane states:

The corroboration between firearm regulations and a reduction in firearm violence is clear.

I presume he means correlation, not corroboration, but regardless Crane is wrong. Please see the CDC report on this very topic for more details.

As for the other misleading, bigoted, and inaccurate statements made by Mr. Crane, I have Just One Question for Crane:

Can you demonstrate just one time, one place, throughout all of human history, where restricting the access of handheld weapons to the average person made them safer?