Author Archives: Lyle

A Letter From Israel

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This is from a friend who lives there.  He’s been a long-time marksmanship and sniper instructor for the IDF, and he does seminars in Israel and the U.S. on counterterrorism.

You just can’t make up this stuff:

Friends:

 

Over 20 Kassam rockets rained down on the northern Negev.  We get only partial information.  If we received all the facts and figures, like Kassams landing around Askelon almost every single day, the government would be forced to defend the country or resign.

 

Have a good weekend.

The response from the U.S. has been to supply arms, ammunition, and training to the Palestinian government in Gaza, which ostensibly are for keeping the terrorists in check, but in fact are being promptly used against Israelis.

 

In summary; the situation in Israel is normal.

In Search of the Second Amendment

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Anyone with a cursory interest in the Second Amendment can find a lot about the Original Intent of the Framers with just a few quick internet searches and a few minutes of reading.  Why then would we need an exhaustive documentary on it?  Because so many people, knowing what it means and hating it, attempt to deny it using all manner of silly rationalizations.

Now we can drive those people crazy (or bring their already existing craziness into the full light of day) while educating those who are willing.  I just ordered four copies– one to keep, two to give to friends, and one to donate to our local public school library (heh).  (The “heh” is there because, as we all know, most people in our public school system will go bananas over anything that shows even a hint of tolerance or acceptance of gun rights.  60 years ago however, there were still quite a few gun ranges on public school property, so the statement that one would donate literature regarding the original intent of the Framers of our Constitution would have been seen in the appropriate light– as a nice gesture, rather than an attack on their politics.)

Joe and I watched the documentary at his discrete, undisclosed, hardened & secured, intimidating underground bunker facility last month, and I guarantee that you will not be disappointed in this work of scholarly excellence.

Indignation Education verses Real Situation

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Thomas Sowell is one of my heroes, but I’ve never known him to comment on guns or shooting until now.

Even within a range of 6 feet or less, the police miss more often than they hit — 57 percent of the shots at that distance miss and 43 percent hit.

As you might expect, there are even fewer hits at longer distances. At 75 feet — which is less than the distance from first base to second base — only 7 percent of the shots hit.

Moreover, just because a shot has hit does not mean that it is now safe to stop shooting.

Sowell wastes not a single word while offering more perspective than an entire flock of regular journalists.

Word Games

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If it hasn’t been said that complexity is the tool of the corrupt politician, I’ll say it here for the record.  This post is a rewrite of a comment I made here.  I thought it deserved its own post.

“…the ATF sent out it’s ATF State Laws and Published Ordinances. Ride Fast notes some numbers:

California, 67 pages, about 120,600 words of regulation.
Massachusetts, 18.5 pages, about 32,400 words.
Nevada, 6.5 pages, about 11,700 words.
Vermont, 1.05 pages, about 1890 words.”

(To those who have so far never cared about the issue enough to look into it; Vermont has historically had a right-to-arms policy close the original intent of the Second Amendment. For example, one may legally carry a concealed pistol without getting government permission.  It is also worth noting that their violent crime rate is lower than those of surrounding states.)

Here are some contrasting numbers:

The Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States: One sentence, 27 words.

The Congressional Oath of Office: One paragraph, 73 words.

I assume you’ve all looked it up and saved it, being concerned citizens and all, but to save you the trouble of going to your desktop and clicking on it, here it is again:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”

Human rights, honesty and reason are relatively simple.  Obfuscation is complex.

Woopie Goldberg – A Voice Made For Television

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We hear it said of an ugly guy, “He has a face made for radio”.

Woopie Goldberg has performed brilliantly as an actor in television and in movies.  Her personal commentary however, has been nothing you couldn’t hear at the espresso and chi tea bar in any local natural foods store any day of the week.  Hence it is no surprise that her radio show is being axed.  I believe she still has a future in acting.  Therein she has talent.

There remains a significant part of society that can’t seem to understand how radio is a business (the business of selling advertising) and that in business you must have something to offer that people, you know, want.

Malkin covers it too.

Hint:  If you have no respect for those who made it big in the business, you just might be on the wrong path.  “I’m gonna be just the opposite of that really, ultra successful guy” might not be the best business plan.  Success, one would think, is the best teacher.

And here’s a hint just especially for those on the Left:  We’ve all heard your message every day for our whole lives, as long as we can remember.  You’ve gotten your message out, and that is your problem.  A lot of people are sick of hearing it because most of it has something to do with how wrong, greedy, stupid, evil, and endangered we are– the air we breathe is killing us, the food we eat is killing us, oil is killing us, a shortage of oil is killing us, farming is killing us, starvation is killing us, fat is killing us, dieting is killing us, carbs are killing us, disease is killing us, antibiotics, vaccines, and the drug companies are killing us, freedom and prosperity are especially killing us, poverty is killing us, the good economy is killing us but really the economy sucks, terrorists are killing us (but it’s our fault) and the war against terrorists is killing us, and everything, absolutely everything, is killing women and children, the elderly and the minorities the hardest– and how some form of socialism (government-enforced coercion) is the answer to absolutely every problem, real or imagined.

Does that about sum it up?  Who needs to tune into a radio show to hear that when we hear it everywhere else every day?

More-of-the-same day in and day out nagging and finger pointing and blaming America and our Liberty for the world’s problems isn’t something a lot of people are going to pay money to have broadcast in their name.  But you don’t, and won’t, get it anyway.

School Wars – Public Education and Bitter partisan politics

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Once again, Walter E. Williams finds a way to articulate an idea with roughly ten thousand times the clarity I or most anyone else could muster.  I’m sure most of you read Walter’s column regularly (what red-blooded, thinking American doesn’t?) but this one deserves special attention.

Government allocation of resources enhances the potential for human conflict, while market allocation reduces it.

True of course, but he explains the how and why of it.  It should be a primer course in every elementary school, but then, it’s a piece favoring a free market in education:

For a public school system, teaching free market principles would be suicide, wouldn’t it?

Situation Normal – Muslims Burning France

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Since things are “stable” (no change in the situation) this is not news (but the second year of on-going coverage of the Aruba rape case got tons of play last night and this morning, and the History Channel has been busy talking about Sasquatch and the Bermuda Triangle).  Why report that Muslims are burning and looting in response to an accident?

Malkin has some details.

Le Parisien reports that they burned down a Peugeot dealership, sacked a train station and shops, tore up a McDonald’s, stole the day’s receipts and attacked customers, smashed and burned cars, and are still going strong.

Don’t they have a protection of gun rights in France? (I’m trying to imagine something like this happening in Idaho, going on for over a year, and I just can’t do it)

Yup.  Things are normal in France, so we can concentrate on important stuff like space-alien abductions, haunted houses, Princess Diana, and the Loch Ness monster.

Politically Incorrect and Making Money

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We just had to do it.  There was no choice, really.  This had been building for a long time and finally, we made the trip (I say pilgrimage) north to the new Cabela’s store in Post Falls, Idaho.  Calling the new store a mere “store” would be like, well, like calling Cabela’s a mere store.  It’s much more than that.  It’s bigger and nicer than some whole shopping malls.  There is a space as large as our warehouse dedicated to displaying stuffed big game animals, including a moose standing in water (with live fish).  There is another fish tank as large as our two offices here combined, and the list goes on.

The parking lot is bigger than any of the several county fairgrounds lots I’ve seen, and they actually are building a freeway to the place (OK, it’s really just a four lane road with a center lane).

While most gun dealers keep all the guns behind the counter, cabled together, this place had racks of the less expensive ones out in the isles where we could handle them.  They all have trigger locks, but are otherwise treated no different than hammers or screwdriver sets (except for the form 4473 requirement, et al).  Yes, this is Idaho, where we’re not all afraid of our shadows, so this sort of thing works nicely.  The ammo section alone is much like a small market in its own right– Row upon row of boxed ammo, out where you can open a box and actually see what you’re buying.  They have several types of loading presses represented, assembled, where you can test the feel of them, and a whole isle of loading data books.

They were busy, but they had just the right amount of salespeople (available when you needed them, but they didn’t get in your face, though I have to tell you guys– you COULD have sold me the Blue Ridge flintlock I was fondling if you’d pushed it just a tad– I was teetering).  There were signs posted in the covered entrance: Something like, “If you brought guns in for trade, check them in with a salesman.  No loaded guns, but loaded concealed carry is OK.”  These are my people.

What struck me over and over was that here is a business catering to what some might call “guy stuff” (guns, hunting, fishing, camo clothing and outdoor gear of every description) and they are not relegated to a shamed, forsaken corner of society.  They are big and beautiful, they have their brand name on much of the merchandise, and they are doing very well.  That sort of puts the lie to the whole “politically correct” set of policies adopted by lesser retailers, which really only amount to surrender of principle.

Cabela’s hasn’t surrendered.  The camo clothing section alone (remember the anti camo clothing movement of the Clinton years?) was larger than most whole stores.  There was the regular gun section, including hunting rifles, shotguns, eeeeevil black rifles, and the nicest selection of black powder firearms I’ve yet seen in one place.  Then there was the “Firearms Museum”– a store within a store where you can purchase fine handmade shotguns, double rifles, rare and antique firearms.  I witnessed some haggling over a nice double, going for well into the five figures range.  There is an indoor audio-animatronics shooting gallery and a big-screen video shooting gallery.  I wasn’t terribly impressed, but they were there, damn it, and that is good.  The in-store restaurant served us ostrich and bison club sandwiches.  Mine was good, not spectacular, but good, and it was ostrich!

There was for sure a disproportionately high percentage of beautiful women in the place.  I don’t mean the help, though that could be said of some of them too, I mean the customers.  You fellas who are being “chickified” by the NAGS out there (National Association of Gals); are you taking heed?  You know who you are; you’re the pale, low-talking, fervently average, obstinately moderate men who smell like women and avoid controversy– the ones who clam up and won’t talk to me directly for fear or revealing yourselves as angry, irrational leftists.  Most “Real Men” (even some of the gay ones I know) are attracted to “guy stuff” and so are most “Real Women”.  That makes perfect sense, don’t you know.

Business people and politicians; take note also.  Quality sells, and the experience sells.  Where people stick to their principles (assuming they ever had any to which they might stick) they often succeed wonderfully, flying in the faces of the nay-sayers.  Cabela’s isn’t going to be winning friends among PETA, or among the pants shitting anti gun movement, but those people never really mattered anyway.

And yes, we bought some stuff there, and I think I know where I’m getting my first, early-American style, flintlock rifle.

Now if only Cabela’s would put in a “Tires and Lingerie” section…

Some Students Understand – Administration Still in the Dark

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In spite of a lifetime of indoctrination to the contrary at public schools, some students are figuring out that being in a “gun free zone” can put you at risk.  Here in Moscow, pro rights students at the University of Idaho are making themselves heard.  This comes shortly after our socialist mayor, Nancy Cheney, tried to ban guns in “public places” and was told by the state attorney general to back off.  “Preemption” laws state that a local government may not enact gun laws that are more strict than state law.  Yet hear we have a state-funded institution with a gun free zone policy.  Go figure.

Virginia Tech is also a “no firearms” campus, but that didn’t stop Seung-Hui Cho from killing 32 people there April 16. Baker [one of the student protestors] said he doesn’t believe being able to carry concealed weapons would have prevented the tragedy, but that it would have minimized the number of innocent people killed. He said Cho didn’t obey the “no firearms” signs, and that can happen anywhere when lawful citizens are denied their right to self-defense.

How do you spell, “Duh!”?

“We’re not saying we need a mass arming of students,” … People are not going through these [permit approval] procedures so they can go out and commit robberies and rape.”

Does anyone else understand that a criminal isn’t going to bother getting a carry permit?

Lt. Paul Kwiatkowski, campus division commander for the Moscow Police Department, said while concealed weapons are legal with a permit, the university’s code of conduct is very clear about carrying them on campus and that this policy, if changed, would complicate issues of violence.

Yeah, it would complicate things very much indeed – for the criminal.  Nothing will spoil your day of fun, murdering people, worse than having someone shoot back at you.

“If an individual is carrying a concealed weapon, you shouldn’t see it,” he said. “They like to flash their guns and show everyone they’re carrying a gun.”

Really?  Carry permit holders like to “flash” their guns and “show everyone”?  Got any proof of that, Lieutenant?  I know a bunch of permit holders, and I’ve never once seen it happen that way.  If I’m not mistaken, Lieutenant, “flashing” you gun around, can even get your permit revoked.  One thing left out of this article is the fact that Idaho requires three hours of training before a carry permit is issued.  My experience is that most people get a lot more training than that, all on their own.  Anyone who cares enough to have done even rudimentary study of this issue will already know that concealed carry permit holders are THE most law-abiding segment of society – more so than police.  Furthermore, (and are you listening, Nancy Cheney?) the rates of innocent bystander injuries, and of improper shootings, are far lower when a concealed permit holder is involved in a confrontation, compared to when a policeman is involved.  Look it up.

If concealed weapons were allowed, Kwiatkowski said, and a shooter came on campus, while concealed weapons carriers could fire back, when police arrived they wouldn’t know who the shooter was.

This is one point that has some shred of legitimacy.  However, we were trained in my “pre-permit” classes to be very aware of this potential problem.  If you’re the citizen defender, and you’re the one calling the cops, make sure they have your description and that of the perp.  When police arrive, put your gun down if possible, and identify yourself, etc..  Cops:  You people need to have thought of these things, and know what to do ahead of time to protect the innocent.  Our right to protect ourselves does not depend on what you consider to be convenient.  For that matter, should we automatically assume that anyone in a cop uniform is actually a cop?  Mr. murderer can get a cop outfit at the local rental store.  Now he’s Deputy Freakin’ Dog.  Unfortunately for all of us, criminals don’t wear bright orange arm bands or some such, identifying themselves as criminals, either.

A letter From Son

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My son, a freshman in high school, occasionally sends me e-mail from school, but due to a busy study schedule and extremely slow computers (it’s a public school) they are rare.  Today’s letter was notable.  Our complete exchange follows:

In the last period of the day, we had a study hall, and I had no homework. So, I decided to go on the boomershoot website and look at explosives. I also had the ultimak webpage open at the same time. I actually had a teacher come and tell me to find another subject!

To which I replied:

Sorry to hear that (actually, I read it but “sorry to read that” just doesn’t have the same effect) but I’m certainly not surprised. Our popular culture has been effectively trained, like Pavlov’s Dogs, to recoil (like the metaphor?) from anything that shows guns in a favorable light.

http://nobelprize.org/educational_games/medicine/pavlov/readmore.html

Racist bigots once behaved in exactly the same way toward blacks or other minorities– back then you might have been looking at Martin Luther King Jr.’s writings while in a study hall in Alabama, and been told to read something else! We don’t hear much from the racist bigots any more, because they tend to keep their mouths shut in polite company. Now we have anti-gun bigots instead, who feel no compunction and mouth off regularly.

On a side note; many have never learned (because this story doesn’t fit the popular, leftist anti-gun action line) that during the civil rights struggle, many black leaders and religious figures joined the NRA and encouraged their black neighbors to arm themselves. As one would expect, violence against blacks tended to fall precipitously in those areas where such advice was taken.

Many would also be shocked (shocked, I tell you!) to learn that the KKK not only supported gun control (see above paragraph) but their political party of choice was the Democratic Party. No self-respecting KKK thug would ever vote for a Republican.

Give that to your social studies classes, et al, and let them chew on it for a while. They may hate it, but unlike much of what they say, they can look this up and verify it. Then you can explain that you were looking at your father’s web site and the site for an event that you attend annually.

Now, keep up on your homework, be nice, and have fun! That’s an order.

I’ve always had the policy of not “talking down” to my kids.  I use the same language I’d use in a conversation with an English professor.  If they don’t understand something, they’ll either ask me or they’ll look it up.

Gun Skool

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Some weeks ago, I had mentioned to Joe that I would like to get my NRA Trainer’s certification.  There were classes offered over in Western Washington, and Joe offered to let me stay at his hardened, underground bunker, located beneath a non-descript building in an ordinary part of an obscure town in a crowded part of the state.  In the middle of getting some new gun products photographed, spec.ed, instructions written, and put on-line, I drove to Western Washington for some courses, created by the NRA, in Instructor Training, Basic Pistol instruction and Home Firearm Safety instruction.  That was three days of intense (for me) study, from 8:00 AM to after 6:00PM Friday and Saturday, and 8:00 to about 5:30 on Sunday.

The first exercise of the weekend involved demonstrating that we could show another person how to safely load and unload five different long-gun actions and three handgun actions (aced that–for me it was akin to asking a chef to demonstrate his ability to prepair scrambled eggs and dry toast, but enough bragging).  We then had to score at least 90% on four separate written exams and shoot at least 50% on a pistol qualification course—shooting from a distance of 25 yards at a nine-inch target, from three specific standing positions including one-handed.  Apparently, most pistol shooters don’t shoot much beyond 10 or 15 yards, but I was unaware of this, having tried my hand at 100 yards. 100 yards is a bit of a “hail Mary” exercise with a common handgun. At 25 yards you have to take your time and concentrate, but it is very much doable.  I’d have scored higher than my 63% if I’d either used my own guns or if I’d known in advance that their pistols were regulated for a “bull’s-eye” zero at 25 (sights held on the bottom of the round bull’s-eye to hit in the center of the bull’s-eye– ask me if you want to know why that’s a great idea, which it is) because I was holding the sights on the center of the bull. Most of my misses therefore went high. Most of us in the class were “combat” shooters (they’d make fun of that by saying we were from the “Billy-Bob School of Running and Gunning”) and so we were a little bit unprepared for the slower, more relaxed, more skeletal-supported bull’s-eye style they use in the NRA basic pistol classes.

I passed everything with flying colors, except for the second written exam—I was completely unprepared to “study for the tests”.  I hadn’t been in college for almost 30 years.  I was listening intently to the instructor, and was confident of knowing everything he was talking about, plus I had already scored 96% (I think it was) on the first written exam.  Trouble was, I didn’t have the precise verbiage they wanted as answers on the second test—the Three Principles of this, and the Eight Steps of that, etc..  One instructor was impressed enough that he let me take the test over, which I passed with 100%.  The trouble with that, however, was it took time away from my studying the material for the other classes, so in spite of taking no time for anything but studying, eating and sleeping a little bit, I was behind the curve so to speak, for the whole weekend.  I was a hair trigger from bugging out on more than one occasion, but I am very glad I stuck it through.  As soon as I receive my official certification I’ll be qualified to teach NRA basic courses in Pistol and Home Firearm Safety.

Aside from being impressed by the quality of both the teachers and the students at Kenmore Range, there was a lot I never knew about the NRA, in spite of having been a member for years, and I gained a new respect for the organization.  It turns out they started for very much the same reasons Joe started the Boomershoot— to increase the number of competent shooters for the times they may be required to defend life and Liberty.  The whole political persona we all know, came much later, and to this day is only a very small part of the NRA.  They are mostly a marksmanship advancement, training, and competitive shooting facilitator, having founded Camp Perry and a number of other excellent ranges, and developed a comprehensive and effective training program.

 

To you NRA phone solicitors and mailing program developers out there:  You really should spend more time talking to your perspective members about all the things, in addition to the political wing, the NRA does to promote American marksmanship.

 

The weekend was rough, but I highly recommend NRA Trainer education to anyone interested in teaching gun handling or shooting skills.  Thank you, Joe, for the use of the hardened bunker.  I could not have done so well without it, and the broadband pipe you provided also.

 

As an aside, I left my wallet and checkbook, everything, at a rest stop near Dusty, WA on my way to the West Side.  I didn’t know about it until Joe informed me as I was entering the Seattle area.  It turns out that someone from the West Side was driving to Moscow, ID where I work, picked it up, called my place of work, and hand delivered it.  Sort of renews one’s faith in Mankind, that does.  That person could have easily relieved me of many thousands of dollars, to say nothing of depriving me of 100% of my ID and other creds.

North Central Idaho Practical Field Ballistics Terminology: “M.O.C.”

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We spent this weekend out camping in an Idaho mountain meadow, in an “open range” area (where cattle wander free, and are branded for later roundup).  Aside from being stunningly beautiful, with the fall colors coming on and the abundant wildlife resulting from recent logging operations (you did know that logging results in copious new foliage for the grazing of deer and elk, and cover for small game, didn’t you?) there are quite a lot of cow pies.

Grass and water go in one end of the bovine, you see, and cow pies are what come out of the other end.  The name applies whether the bovine in question is male or female.  That saves you the trouble of determining whether a given pie is a cow pie, a bull pie, or a heifer pie, etc..

I’d been doing some shooting out there with several firearms, and asked my 10 year-old daughter to get out her .22 rifle.  She wasn’t much interested until I pointed out that she could try shooting at small pieces of wood floating in a pond.  She quickly discovered that if you place a bullet just under the floating stick it will jump 15 feet into the air.  That got her attention, and she was soon asking for more ammo.  She’s a fairly new shooter, so her hit rate wasn’t very good, and she lost interest until she discovered that a fresh cow pie will explode if hit with a .22 Long Rifle hollowpoint.

In other words, her shooting may not be minute-of-angle accurate (one M.O.A. equals one sixtieth of a degree) but she can shoot “Minute Of Cow pie” (M.O.C.) which allows her to enjoy a 100% hit rate on these impromptu, reactive targets.

She spent the rest of the afternoon shooting cow pies with a big grin on her face (and me laughing to myself, thinking how wonderfully stereotypical, North-Idaho-redneck an activity that was).

For further study, I picked up some beer cans (probably discarded by some pale, leftist San Franciscans who thought getting drunk and littering in Idaho would be a hoot) filled them with water and shot them with various calibers.  It happens that a .223 Remington cartridge, pushing a 55 grain, hard-jacketed spitzer at around 3,000 feet per second will cause the water-filled aluminum can to burst out in all directions, yet still hold together in one piece, whereas a soft lead sphere of .495″ diameter (50 caliber patched round ball – the patched ball is an American innovation that was used with deadly effect against King George’s officers during the Revolution) traveling at about half that velocity will blow the can into several pieces, scattering them up and out about 15 yards, leaving the base of the can still holding water where it stood (I picked up the pieces and took them home if you must know, leaving the meadow cleaner than we found it).

I also discovered that you can hit gallon jug-sized targets at 200 yards (you do travel with a rangefinder, don’t you?) with a little youth model .22 rifle, zeroed at 20 yards, if you aim about 5 1/2 feet high.  You have enough time to bring the rifle down and listen/watch for the impact at that distance.

Ain’t freedom grand?

Just So We’re All On The Same Page…

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…regarding the police chiefs out there (who, we are told, have come out against the Second Amendment): Every law enforcement officer is required to take an Oath, affirming said officer’s commitment to the Constitution of the United States.  Here is one example taken at random.  I’m sure you can find many others:

“I swear (or affirm) that I will support the Constitution of the United States, and that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to the State of Maryland and support the Constitution and laws thereof; and that I will, to the best of my skill and judgment diligently and faithfully, without partiality or prejudice, execute the office of police officer according to the Constitution and laws of this State.”

Notice the first clause– support for the U.S. Constitution.  Taking an Oath not only suggests or recommends, but it requires individual judgment and individual commitment to the U.S. Constitution when deciding to follow a particular order or enforce a particular law.  It requires, in this case, that the sworn individual understand the Constitutionality of an action before taking that action.  Why else take the damned Oath?

The Nuremburg defense doesn’t cut it here.

On the matter of law enforcement officers who have taken the Oath, and who then actively lobby against our Constitutionally protected civil liberties:  Words fail me at the moment, but I’m envisioning a physician who takes the Hippocratic Oath and sets out thereafter to murder his patients.

To you chiefs of police out there who are on the fence:  Be reminded that some of us actually take our civil liberties seriously.  Just sayin’.

Update 09/21/07:  Another reminder for our friends in law enforcement (and to law makers as well).  I use this example only because it is so well known, though there are plenty of other examples: In early 1942 there were a whole lot of German officers and government agents who were as cock-sure of themselves as anyone could be.  Their degree of swagger was quite an impressive sight to behold.  Only a few years later however, many of them were fugitives from justice, while others were swinging from ropes (things can change in short order, and being on the right side of Liberty is good insurance).  As Joe points out in comments, there is this little thingy we call 18 USC 242.  Not that it would be needed as the Constitution already spells out the law in plain English, but here we have teeth, out in front of the brain, as it were.

Time for a Quorum Amendment

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Listening to the radio on the way to work, I heard that a small town school bond levy in Idaho had passed by an approximately 70:30 vote.

Let that sink in for a moment…70:30 approval.

The next thing I heard was that the voter turnout was 30 percent.

If my math is correct, 70 percent of 30 percent comes to 21 percent of eligible voters who approved the levy.  21 percent of the people wanted the levy, and the other 79 percent either opposed it, figured it was a forgone conclusion, didn’t care enough to vote, or didn’t know about it (the latter leaves me wondering who was in charge of publicizing it).

In a very small town where the school district is possibly the largest single employer, how many of those 21 percent who approved the levy do you suppose were school district employees, the families of school district employees, and contractors to the school district?

Forget how you would vote on something like this– you could be on either side of it, depending on the particular issue.  Looking at it conceptually; how is it that 21 percent of the people, most of whom are the direct recipients of the tax revenue, are able to impose taxes on 100 percent of the people?  Is that outcome consistent with the idea of democracy, or of a free society?  No and no.

Why don’t we have a quorum rule for something like this?

Cultural or Drug Induced Behavior?

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It seems there are a lot of people stopping nearly a full car length behind the broad white line at traffic lights lately.  This was once a rare occurrence (old people who can’t see, stoned kids, etc.) but I’m seeing it every day now as I drive through town.

Is this some new cultural phenomenon, or do we suddenly have more pot smokers in Moscow, Idaho?

Cop Threatens to Fabricate Charges, Then Lies

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I found this at Say Uncle.

The video pretty well speaks for itself (the audio anyway– there’s not much to see).  Full transcripts are provided also.  I  truly did not believe what I heard the first time through: The cop actually threatened to fabricate charges against an innocent man because he dared to ask questions.  The cop then lied to a fellow officer, saying the motorist had been weaving and had failed to signal (he was driving perfectly and the signal indicator is clearly visible in the video).

Cops have to put up with a lot of really insane crap.  Having worked in the late-night music scene for many years, I’ve seen cops put up with the most outrageous behavior from people, and do it with amazing patience.  LEOs need to present a far more calm demeanor than the average person.  This cop on the other hand is a fight picker– a frustrated, undisciplined prick with a chip on his shoulder, and that is a disaster in the making.

The fact that our LEO said what he said, knowing he was being recorded, suggests he had reason not to worry much about being disciplined for it.  On the other hand, it seems the recording taken from his cruiser has turned up missing.  Put those two facts together and what do we have?  Was he contemplating the destruction of his victim’s recording?

Understand that when you’re out in the middle of the night this sort of thing is far more likely.

On a broader point: Our foolish “war on drugs” has led to far more abuse, as cops are looking out for drug deals and the like, with full knowledge of current forfeiture laws.  In this environment, “probable cause” has morphed from that-which-is-required-to-obtain-a-warrant-from-a-judge, into whatever-the-cop-decides-at-the-moment-is-cause-for-a-warrantless-search.  As with much of our Leftist speak, “Probable Cause” has taken a meaning opposite to its original.  It is now used to enable the exact abuse it was intended to prevent.

My experience with city and county law enforcement (north Idaho/Eastern Washington) has been pretty good over the years, and in most cases, very good, even when I was clearly in the wrong.  Lets hope it stays that way.  You get one retarded mayor or one bad sheriff at the next election, and things could go to hell fast.

Happy Labor Day, Socialists

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Now I don’t suppose you’d be ready and willing to honor all the creative people, the inventors, those who put their dreams into action, and the venture capitalists who have put their capital at risk so you could have a chance at a job in the first place, by going to work on a weekend at no charge to your employer.  What; turnabout isn’t fair play?  Its all one way with you?

More Guns and Fewer Defenders

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We’ve heard the story (via Kim).  We’re now told (by people who apparently have nothing productive to do, unless they happen to be working in market research for a gun company) that we in the U.S. have about 90 guns per 100 people, making this the most heavily armed nation in the world.

Not so fast.  They didn’t say 90 out of 100 people in the U.S. own guns.

In fact, something like half, or less than half, of American households are armed.  The 90:100 figure looks only at guns per capita.  Those who own guns tend to own several, and one person can only operate one gun (or in some cases, two, but mostly as a gimmick) at a time.  Are you more heavily armed if you own 10 guns than if you own one or two?  Not really.

I have a pile of guns, but if I really needed to use a gun for protection, I’d be able to use only one of them, leaving the others stowed in their cases and out of action.  At best I’d have a long-arm in my hands and a side arm on my hip.  At the worst I might be overcome by my assailant while trying to decide which gun to use (Let’s see; do I want the Italian auto-loader, the 870, the AK, or the…)

In Switzerland, most households contain at least one assault rifle, or such is the word on the street (I’m using the term “assault rifle” correctly here, which is an anomaly most in the media would not understand, but just so you know).   If you count the percentage of armed households (a dwelling containing at least one serviceable firearm) rather than the total number of guns per capita, which makes far more sense if we’re considering the armed, quick-response potential of a given population, the Swiss have a more heavily armed society than we Americans.  Only in the case of a sustained need (wherein you might find I would skillfully load all my guns and copious ammo supply into my full-sized, American, V-8 powered, four-wheel-drive pickup, transport them to a predetermined and communicated distribution point, and start handing them out to my neighbors) would the number of guns this individual owns ever be an issue, so long as its more than one or two.  So you can take about 20 guns out of Reuters’ figures, just for me alone.  In my home town though, I would estimate that there are more guns than people (its a very polite, peaceful town) so the number of skilled and determined marksmen, plus the ammo supply, would be the important figure.

But what are we talking about?  Maybe we’re talking about confiscation and don’t know it.  Reuters?

If we’re discussing issues of security related to the fighting readiness of a population as can be learned from history (the actual point of the Reuters article is not stated, but why else talk about how many guns the Joneses have?  Jealous?) we could count the number of legally disarmed Jews in Germany in the 1930s for example, compared to the number of armed Nazis.  Closer to home; we could count the number of unarmed students, combined with the number of unarmed faculty and unarmed staff (disarmed by campus rules) at Virginia Tech compared to the total number of armed assailants on campus that day, and by so doing we might come to a heightened level of actual shared wisdom (Reuters: take note).

Cases of mass death among unarmed populations abound, as is currently being demonstrated in parts of Africa and will yet again be demonstrated in another “gun free zone” in America no doubt, we having failed to learn from reality.  Hence it would seem that China, with only three “estimated” guns per 100 civilians, is ripe for yet another purge.  In Nigeria its 1:100.

This last I found bizarre:

Only about 12 percent of civilian weapons [worldwide] are thought to be registered with authorities.

“Thought to be registered”? Thought by whom?  We don’t know what’s registered?

Exactly why would it matter which guns are registered?  Is a registered gun more useful for self defense, or less so?  Is it more accurate, more powerful or less likely to malfunction?  Is a registered gun more likely to be confiscated by tyrants or less likely to be confiscated by tyrants?

Do criminals and tyrants register their guns, or are their victims’ guns the only guns being registered?  No one at Reuters seems to have a clue.

Just between you and me, I think I hit it up above:  Some people are screaming inside with jealousy and envy toward citizen gun owners, and its tearing them apart.

I’d like to see Reuters do a story on how much freedom people have around the world.  Maybe we’d find some wisdom there.

Ecofascist Defined or “Where does the fascism lie exactly?”

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This is in response to a comment by Frish, from this post.

You must start with an understanding of the word.  You can look it up in history, but Fascism is an appropriate description for the process whereby a group of people attempt to wrest control away from other people by force (specifically of other people’s property) and control it centrally.  The eco movement’s focus on legislation and treaties, rather than free choice, is exactly that.

The term came from Benito Mussolini’s Fascisti in Italy in the 1930s (he ruled from the late ’20s to early ’40s).  Mussolini was a devout communist who had his own plan for bringing about a communist regime.  His vision, his method for arriving at pure communism, was called fascism.

There is a common thread running through today’s eco-movement, regardless of what particular group is involved:  They all are striving for less individual rights, particularly less property rights, and more centralized control, i.e. fascism.  Q.E.D.

We can argue over whether a free market economy, based on the principles of liberty, on one hand, verses a centralized, authoritarian system wherein those in control see humanity as a stain on the face of the Earth on the other hand, is most likely to produce a prosperous, clean, healthy, successful, long-lasting society that would be worth living in.  What we must first agree on is that fascism (now that you know what it means) is almost universally favored by the eco movement in this country.  The use of force (laws) is their primary if not their sole focus.  To the extent that they urge voluntary compliance, I submit, they are preparing their followers and priming the rest of us for future laws forcing compliance.  Once the voluntary bit fails, which it will because there is no possibility of “success”, force becomes necessary, as we’ve seen in places like China, where there have been hideous anti-procreation laws.

As soon as you ecofascists start offering only free-market solutions to the problems you say in your wisdom exist, some of us who believe in freedom just might start taking you seriously.  But then a fascist is a fascist, regardless of the particular cause they’ve latched onto for a given day, so asking a fascist to embrace free-market solutions is a bit like asking Ted Bundy to look after a sorority.  The problem is in the basic world-view, and that has to change first.  Stop hating humanity, seeing freedom as loathsome and frightening, and start respecting humanity, seeing freedom as hope.

On that note I will give you a practical example of what I mean:  The Sierra Club spends enormous resources attempting to get legislation passed– land use restrictions, limits on businesses, etc..  The proper, polite, human rights-friendly, American method to achieve their stated goals (large tracts of land void of humanity, more animal habitats, etc.) to an extent far greater than mere legislation (which can be overturned at the next election cycle) would be to purchase those large tracts of land.  I can’ remember that last time I saw then in a TV ad, trying to raise awareness or money.  Instead they waste their money on lobbying efforts which must by necessity continue on without end if the laws they favor are to remain in force.  By buying land, asking for voluntary conributions, or through a multitude of possible free market offerings, and nothing more, they would be favoring the same things that real Americans are favoring– respect for property rights, and low taxes.  We wouldn’t be correctly referring to them as fascists, but would get along nicely with them as fellow Americans instead.

Bottom line:  You either respect humanity, respect human rights, and want to further a system of liberty, of which capitalism is an inseparable component (and are therefore an American) or you see humanity as a threat, a stain, a bunch of unworthy sinners, etc., and want to keep people from pursuing their dreams by using government as a means of initiating force to bend them to your will (and are therefore a fascist).

 

Its Happening Here, Too

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When our first child was born, and again after the second, a state case worker was assigned to visit us, inspect our new house, ask us a list of questions and determine whether we were deemed by the state to be fit to keep our own child.  We were allowed, but only after installing fire extinguishers and making a few minor changes around the house, which I had planned anyway.  I had almost forgotten about that small, (to me then) but at the same time insidious, outrage.

Fast forward 14 years, to a post I’d already been working on:

***

Your Doctor as a Politician, Politicians as Doctors

My wife took our son in for a sports-physical the other day.  The kid’s as healthy as any.  I can almost be persuaded to go along and agree with the school’s requirement, but only in empathy with the administrators, in light of what the trial lawyers have done to our society.   Football is strenuous, sure, but so are a lot of things.  We don’t get a checkup every time we plan a bicycle trip, or for doing farm work, which he did this summer, or shoveling the snow…

The typical string of health related questions was asked, then this question, tagged on at the end:

“Are there any guns in your house?”
“Yes, several”
“Are any of them loaded?”
“Uh, I don’t think so.”
“Well…….stay safe!”

Aside from being completely irrelevant to a sports exam, it’s a bit of a trick question, isn’t it– are any of them loaded?  We teach our kids to treat every gun as if its loaded, never to assume it is unloaded, but I digress.

I wish I’d been there, so I could have explained my point of view to the good doctor, preferably while holding a baseball bat, you know, just to demonstrate that although we keep baseball bats in our house, we keep them for sporting purposes only.

We all need a medical doctor once in a while.  Sometimes our lives may depend on it.  This of course is why people who desire control over other people are trying so desperately to get hold of the medical industry.  Our doctor had ceased being a doctor with those gun questions, and had become a schlep/tool for anti-gun activists, fishing for potential leverage against gun owners.  Remember during the 1990s when they were defining “gun crime” as a “public health” issue?  That was about the same time our co-president was pushing for full nationalization of health care (I say “full” because we’re already halfway there).

Our doctor asked no questions about any of several more common and statistically far greaterd dangers found in a typical home.  “Do you have any insect poisons? for  instance, was not asked.  Nor was anyone in the medical field interested in how much time our kids are spending on bicycles, around a swimming pool, around matches and gasoline, in the sun without sunscreen, or whether there are stairs in the house, or unlocked liquors (which there are, by the way).  They didn’t ask about access to sharp knives, time spent on the highways, running with scissors, unprotected sex, or the condition of our house wiring.  Therefore the gun questions can without hesitation be said to have been motivated exclusively by politics.

***

After writing that, I came across the following, courtesy of K. Dutoit.  The Britts are taking kids away from parents by the thousands, it seems:

He tells Mrs Brookes: “I would like you and your baby to stay in hospital until the courts have made a decision.”

As though they were being given a choice.  That’s cute.  Its also dishonest and sickening.

The social worker says the two or three days the mother has with her baby in hospital will allow her to begin breast-feeding and that once the infant is taken away, social services will pick up expressed breast milk from her home and deliver it to the foster carers (sic) for bottle-feeding.

I can imagine the Social Services (SS) worker speaking in a German accent:  Vee haff come for zee breast milk.  If you haff not met zee quota, schnell! (Those of you with children will understand.  The rest of you will think I’m trying to be funny.)

The social worker admits to the couple that a back-up plan is being drawn up in case the judge refuses the application for a care order. He says: “What we also have to think about is a child protection plan that looks at you, at home, with your baby. There is no immediate risk to your child from yourselves, that’s my understanding from reading documents.”

Throw ’em a bone of hope in an insane situation, like you’re on their side.  F*<%ers!  Those of you with children will understand.  Those without children:  You can never understand the extent of the pure evil of this.  Its how they get you.  You cannot fight them.  You cannot do anything but hope you can have your child back.  Its all that matters to you, and you won’t do anything to risk upsetting those in charge of your baby’s fate.  It is a hell like you cannot imagine.  Nothing alleged to have happened at Abu Ghraib under U.S. control comes anywhere close. I am not kidding.

Juxtapose the UK story with our doctor’s incongrous gun questions for my son here in the U.S., and I submit that unless we stop this sort of thing, smack it down wherever it pops up, we’ll end up with our very own police state, with the medical profession, social services, and lets not forget education, as integral parts of the enforcement system.  All acting very polite of course, saying, “Please do this” and, “Please do that” while they have absolute power over you.

Hillary-Care anyone?

No.  I’ll opt for Liberty, thank you very much.