INT – Day – Space liner hallway.
Continue reading
Fade in.
INT – night – sparse and spare starship lounge, dimly lit in red-ish light Continue reading
INT- DAY – Spaceport near check in
Port is starkly lit and utilitarian, clean-ish but run-down, not a lot of people, mostly queued up and looking resigned to fate. Focus and pan on Helton as he walks hurriedly toward the check-in area.
EXT – day – outside a diner with “Kwon’s Kosher Cajun Curry” on the flashing neon sign.
Camera slowly zooms in toward the door.
Today I’m starting to publish a story here. It will be a (hopefully daily) series of posts that are a screenplay of sorts, though in the interest of screen-space it will not be in proper screenplay format. This is a sort-of movie script. It is somewhere between a proper movie and a movie-of-the-week or a series, or maybe a novel. Read it like you are seeing it on the big screen. It’s a space-western, in the Firefly genre. The story proper takes place circa 2655. FTL travel was discovered in the late 21st C, but not FLT communication, so star systems are still connected similarly to the 18th century days of sail, with message-drones and ships carrying data and people between stars, often taking days, weeks, or even months for flights.Explorers might be out of touch for months. Many star systems and planets have been explored, and some have been partially terraformed. A “local” supernova disrupted subspace so much, though, that FTL was shut down for several centuries, and each terraformed planet (and planets that were still very much “in process”) and colony had to survive (or not) on its own. This was known as “the long dark” or “the big blackout”, as well as by several other names. This takes place after things have quieted down a bit, and “the stars are coming back,” meaning FTL travel is once again possible in some places. But, FTL sub-space is like a stormy ocean, and “swirls” in it can make FTL flights faster, or slower, than normal, or even shut them down altogether.
Cultural note: the dominate cultures out among the stars are the descendants from former British Colonies, but there are scattered colonies from various other places as well.
If anyone in the movie industry sees its potential and wants to turn it into something “real”, I’d be more than happy to talk to them. Feedback from readers welcome, be it positive or negative.
OK, here we go:
The Stars Came Back, Part 001, Intro
I was thinking it would be nice to have some shoulder-patches made for Boomershoot. Size would most likely a 3″ or 3.5″ round patch. I figure the basic style would be, of course, a red/yellow/black fireball, dark green and blue background (field and sky) with a couple of different options for surrounding text.
I thought that “Boomershoot Target Maker” across the top, with “Henchmen” below for those licensed to handle explosives, Just “Boomershoot Experience” with “Minion” below for those that help with things but never had the explosives license. A possible 3rd type, with “Boomershoot Long Distance” across the top, and “Crony” across the bottom, for the shooters / spotters / attendees / dudes who went there once.
I figure an evil hidden conspiracy mastermind MUST have henchmen, minions, and cronies, right? I mean “STAFF” and an org chart just seem so, so, so… official.
Anyway, what do people think? Any interest? Thoughts? Early orders? Preferred titles like “flunkey” or “accomplice” or something? Spitwads? Job offers?
Obviously, the price would depend on the level of interest.
Sound good. The left are always going on and on about “sustainable
agriculture,” and “sustainable lifestyles,” and “sustainable energy,” and
so-forth, and they make some reasonable arguments. The viability of their
solutions is another matter, but the problems are, at their core, real enough.
Yet they absolutely refuse to address the things that are obviously and destructively
NOT sustainable, and will make the above problems even worse, such as all aspects
of the welfare state.
The Welfare State is totally a creature of government creation,
subject to any rule change they want to make. People respond to their perceived incentives. Every trend line you can draw
show that all forms of public assistance, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security
(normal and disability) etc., are utterly NOT sustainable, and are in the
process of destroying the vary system that supports it (the rule of law, free enterprise,
property rights, etc), and it does so because it is NOT aligning incentives with
goals; indeed, it is filled with perverse incentives. Until people can see
that, the leviathan will continue to grow. We need a balanced budget amendment,
NOW. If people saw the real cost of
government because they were seeing it in real-time, not just putting it on the
credit card for someone else to worry about later, they would understand, and demand
less. Debt is too abstract, and not scary enough, as the colossal level of
private debt clearly illustrates. Balance the budget, via taxes or cuts or both,
and the cuts will follow as the real and immediate pain sets in.
I just got a letter from our health insurance provider. We buy our own, as it’s not provided by any employer. Right now we have what is pretty much the least-expensive high-deductible coverage we can get. It’s around $550 per month for the family. As of 01Jan2013, it’s going up about $200, to about $750, a more than 30% increase. Coverage will not significantly change.
To paraphrase the Princess Bride’s Inigo Montoya if he were to talk about the Affordable Care Act, “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”
Whenever I think things are going badly, and I’m bummed about
the prospects on the political scene, I think the barbarians are
winning, and it’s all going to hell in a hand-basket, I take solace in history.
Rome was the most powerful empire the world had ever seen, had built amazing feats
of engineering, and been sustained by astonishing feats of logistics, and had
many stories of unimaginable bravery and personal strength. It has existed
nearly forever, it seemed. Rome Was Eternal.
Until it was sacked. And repeatedly taken over by a
succession of military despots, kings, generals, armies, Senators, and foreigners,
and was sunken into the darkness of barbarism and illiteracy, even as each new replacement
empire claimed the mantel of “Rome’s successor.” Some people fled the invaders,
and hid in the nastiest and most inaccessible of the local swamps and fens,
amidst the islands and channels where cavalry and armies couldn’t go after them.
They fled the easy (but crime- and corruption- and invader-infested) life of the
hills and fertile soil of northern Italy. It was a hard life, with no powerful
protector, difficult farming, lots of places to wreck your boat, fetid water and disease, and no time
for anything as non-essential as high culture or art. They clung to life, remembered the best of Rome, and
did the best they could.
Nearly a thousand years later, the city-state of Venice was
one of the most powerful in the world, and its fleet (with help from Spain and
the Papal States) crushed and halted the fleet of the powerful Imperial Ottoman Turks at Lepanto. Ideas are powerful things, and humans are resilient. We may
not fight our way out of the darkness before we die, nor may our children, but
we pass on the good ideas and knowledge to them, and instill in them a sense of
history, and, one day, it WILL happen. Property rights, individual freedom, limited
government, and free markets work.
They will, eventually, take over, because they are more powerful than the
forces trying to limit them… but it may be a long, long slog, and will most assuredly
NOT be a straight line.
(History geeks, take note: this is the simplified version of
things, where the essence is correct, in the interest of telling a good story
with a powerful idea to put current events in perspective.)
My dad asked me what my thoughts on the Israel / Palestine
issue were, and why it could never seem to get a lasting negotiated peace
agreement of some sort. My answer was:
As long as there were people at the top who had a personal
vested interest in keeping it going, it would never stop, and pretty much all
the leaders (both secular and religious) in the surrounding Islamic nations
find having a Jewish state nearby to blame everything on very useful. So, IMHO,
it will never have a negotiated peace
for any significant period of time.
Historically, negotiated peace treaties are worth
less than the paper they are printed on; they are merely used to play for time.
War (on some scale) seems the normal state of most people of the world, and the
only time there was peace was when someone big and strong came through, crushed
all rebellion or dissent utterly, and made it clear that fighting was NOT going
to end well (i.e., heads on pikes, razed cities, leaders hunted down like dogs,
etc). The Mongols, the Huns, Alexander to Great, the Romans, the Persians, the Egyptians,
the Ottoman Turks, the British Empire, Germany and Japan post-WW II. The list
is seemingly endless. Peace of a generation or longer comes not from negotiation
and good will. It never has. Peace comes from having strength and will enough
to make the cost of NOT-PEACE prohibitively high to the leaders that would ask for war. I say let Israel do what it needs
to do to expand and secure its borders, and if that means we can’t count the
dead in the radioactive wastelands of its newly established border-land DMZ
& Nature Preserve, well, so be it.
Assumption: People change their behavior when the perceived incentives (cost and/or benefits) change.
Assumption: The world is not a zero-sum game.
Any arguments or dispute? No? Ok, then, a thought experiment.
A typical grading curve in school is 90% A, 80% B, 70% C, 60% D, less than 60% fails, where there are many standard point-earning opportunities, and occasional “extra-point” opportunities, where each person earns their own scores. Maybe everyone aces an easy class with all 90%+, maybe a herd of sluggards all fail. Any number of points might be earned in total.
Tell a classroom full of kids that the grading curve is to be changed. In order to help out the GPA of struggling students, points will be redistributed. After each test, project, or paper, any points above a grade cut-off will be shaved off as “extra” and re-distributed to the lowest scoring student. When the lowest scoring student has been brought to the level of the next-lowest student, then the points are shared between them, because they are both the neediest at the bottom. No “extra” points can be “banked” against future mistakes. If not everyone is brought up to passing by this method when just extracting “extra A” points, then more points will be extracted from the scores at the top, and the 80%-90% scores will get cut to 80%, and all the extra points re-distributed to those in need of points to pass. If some are still failing, then all the now-B students will get knocked down to C’s, and those points re-distributed. Etc.
Question: with the changes in incentives, how will students change their behaviors?
Some will keep doing what they are doing, because that is just who they are, and they want to learn regardless of grade. Likely it will not be many. Many near the top will see all their extra points being sucked away, and they will stop trying to earn more than 90%; indeed, I’d expect a competition to see who can come closest to 90% most often without going under. Those at the bottom will work even less, knowing they will be given some extra help, so they will need more points than ever. Those in the middle will get frustrated, because they are not doing well, but they are not getting any help, because it’s all going to those at the bottom, who are not helped in the end because there are not enough points to bring a dozen zeros up to 60% and passing. The total number of student points, reflecting the growing knowledge of the students in the class (at least in theory), will shrink. The number of people passing will shrink. The attitude toward the subject and teacher will deteriorate. In the end, a few will still be trying because they know it’s the right thing to do, but it will not be anywhere near enough to help out the grade situation, so learning halts, because no new teaching can start until a passing grade on existing material in achieved.Classroom average GPA will head to zero.
Compare that to progressive taxation, welfare, the economy, and government.
For those on the left that don’t get it, allow me to spell it out. The formerly high-scoring students grow too actively resent the low-scoring ones because they are dragging the high scores down. The failing students actively dislike the strong students because they COULD be working harder to earn more points to pass around, but aren’t. Those in the middle can’t help those at the top OR bottom, but get caught in the middle and accused of being “other” by both sides. It’s a toxic brew that sows discord, hatred, envy, and sloth. It destroys the incentives to succeed, shrinks the point-and-learning pie, and hurts everyone, regardless of the stated intention to help those in most need of a GPA boost, because it fails to recognize that GPA isn’t the GOAL, it’s a BYPRODUCT of the goal, learning. The goal of the government should not be to get everyone to a particular level of income & benefits, it is to provide place, laws, and opportunities for a person to be able to do that on their own.
On the other hand, change the grading system so that failure to earn a passing grade means you cannot get a free lunch, and continuing failure jeopardizes your families’ voting rights or welfare checks or eligibility for other government assistance or jobs. Failing has real, painful, consequences. Helping a struggling student to pass earns you extra opportunities, or classes, or money. Getting high grades in difficult or high-demand classes can earn college / trade-school tuition money or even a cash graduation bonus. Doing well for yourself has solid, immediate benefits. People can take as many classes as they want, and earn unlimited points or cash, and it’s not being taken from the low-performing students.
Which would return better long-term results?
Yes, I know this isn’t a new concept. It seemed like a good way to give a concrete example of how my basic assumptions and principles about people and how the world works, and perhaps shed light on the folly of current programs, and suggest a more sensible approach.
It is easy to argue with others and say that they must be
stupid or insane or whatever to vote a certain way. But, when you lose, you
have to confront the fact that you were out-voted, and therefore, in a
minority. Introspection to see whether you
made a mistake, or if they were
mistaken, or if there are other forces at work, must be done or you will keep
losing. We all have our assumptions and principles, and these form our basic
world-view, and it may be time to check out or investigate theirs, as well as
my own. Assumptions and principles are different, and should be evaluated for
clarity and reasonableness.
All of Euclidian Geometry follows from a very small handful
of postulates, common notions, and definitions. People are more complex, but
that doesn’t mean that our assumptions HAVE to be far more complicated or
vastly more numerous.
Some people have a very simplistic “if it feels good do it”
sort of worldview, because that sums up their principles, and their sole
assumption / value is “feeling good right now is what matters most.” If you don’t
agree with that basic assertion, then you see them as shallow, hedonistic, short-sighted,
etc. But you can’t get them to change their view, or see YOUR view, until you get them to formally recognize
and question those underlying ideas, and acknowledge yours. Similarly,
you can’t understand why they do what
they do until you recognize and understand what their fundamental principles and values are. Same facts, utterly divergent
views.
Simplistic example: Men generally value freedom more than
security, and women vice-versa. Men generally earn more than women. A
politician offering much freedom and low taxes, at the cost of limited
safety-net and therefore personal uncertainty, will attract more men than
women. Another politician offering an image of dependability and security (such
as free healthcare) at a cost of high taxes and regulation, will attract a lot more
women than men. Men see the cost in taxes and on their freedom, women see
benefits of not having to worry about it. Same fact, different values, different
votes. Looked at short-term, before the cost of the free health-care bankrupts the
nation, the female vote is perfectly
rational, and if she votes against it she’ll be accused of voting against her
own self-interests. OTOH, a man voting against it will be accused of being
selfish or uncaring. Looked at long-term, as the burden of it destroys many
other things and increases uncertainty, it’s
very self-destructive to vote for
the health-care pol. But one just calling the other stupid or callous doesn’t
help find common ground or resolve the dispute and decide the best course for
both short AND long term concerns.
My basic assumptions about the people of the world are:
A) People tend to change their behavior when their perceived incentives change (see “O” below).
B) People will work much harder for themselves (to make more money or improve
their situation) than for anyone else, i.e., they will work in their own best
interests (as they see them).
C) Most people are basically good, and want to do good, BUT
D) people tend to be lazy, and can be envious, spiteful, cowardly, have other
anti-virtues, AND
E) some folks just are not wired right (psychopaths, narcissists, psychotics, sociopaths,
OCD, idiots, etc)
F) People are people – any assumptions you make about the “common man” or
business leaders, you must ALSO make about people with a badge, or in elected
office, or any other government employee. (Corollary: If you don’t trust folks
to take care of themselves or run business, you can’t expect them give them a
monopoly on government force and expect them to act like angels.)
G) Risk can never be eliminated, and trying to do so creates other, much more
subtle and dangerous, risks (Corollary: you CAN’T save everyone. NON-corollary:
it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to save anyone).
My assumptions about economics are:
H) The world is not a zero-sum game.
I) TANSTAAFL- ALL choices are trade-offs, and better choices can be made if
consequences are clear, direct, and known to the chooser at the time of the
choice being made. (Related: Costs should align with benefits, preferably in an
obvious-to-the-beneficiary way at the
time of benefit)
J) People tend to change their behavior
when the incentives change (yup, same as above – it’s important)
K) Things not earned are not valued properly or understood well. (Corollary:
giving people stuff, either “free stuff” or power, corrupts the spirit and
distorts values and other incentives).
L) Because people have different values, aiming for equality of outcomes is unwise.
M) There will always be relative winners and losers in ANY system, and changing
the rules simply changes who wins or loses most. (Related: the more rules there
are, the more people will attempt to game the system to personal advantage, and
the worse the side-effects)
N) When incentives of self-interest are
aligned with desirable outcomes, there is little resistance to “good” action (corollary:
when they conflict, coercion will be required).
O) Failure is not a bug, it’s a necessary
feature, a feed-back mechanism. It’s not only an option, it MUST be a VISIBLE and
PAINFUL option, if people are to evaluate risk and reward to choose wisely.
P) What works best is usually what aligns self-interest with desired outcomes.
Q) Marginal costs can tell you a LOT about how well thought-out a plan is.
R) That which cannot be sustained, won’t be.
My principles and values are: more freedom is better than
less; private property is private, and that includes your body, your time, and
the product of your labor; I really don’t care that much about what you say about
the intended result of your actions –
I care much more about the actual
real-world results, effects, and side-effects; dependency is bad; coercion is
bad; coercion and charity are incompatible; clarity and accuracy are more important
than hurt feelings; things of value are best earned or given freely; a person
should do all that they promise to do; a person should not harm another, or
their property, without just cause (such as self defense); all people should be
treated equally under the law, BUT not all people are of equal worth; honesty
is good, even if it is uncomfortable.
Questions, challenges, any missing / contradictory /
redundant items? If I can get it concise – simple, clear, short, and complete
enough – whenever I get in an argument that I think can be broken down to
fundamentals, I can ask which ones they disagree with. If they DON’T disagree
with any of them, and don’t have any others, I could build up, like a Euclidian
proof, why my position makes more sense than theirs (or at least, why their
position doesn’t make sense to me), and if they DO disagree or have other
additional items, I can get a much better handle on why/how/if I can approach
the disagreement to find common ground.
Advertising is expensive, and people are good at tuning it
out. Memes catch on because the are pithy and may be hitting at a core truth.
Music can carry a message, tell a story, or just get into someone ear and buzz
there for a while. To get a message across, to teach, you can use massive repetition, or strike an emotional chord
in someone’s brain to trigger a this is
important signal, or massive repetition. Political advertising goes for the
massive repetition, from both sides. But protest songs are almost almost exclusively
a tool of the left. I think it’s because artists tend to be on that side of the
spectrum. What we (the conservative / right) need are some good protest songs to reach the young and the undecided’s in the middle.
The thought came to me that
“Four dead in Benghazi” sounds an awful lot like “Four dead
in Ohio”
A person could either make the song to Neil Young’s tune,
and change the words appropriately, something like:
Two soldiers and no-one’s coming
We’re abandon, on our own
This winter I’ll hear the piper
Four dead in Benghazi
Gotta get to the annex
Terrorists cut ambassador down
We warned higher ups long ago
If you knew him
And found him dead on the ground
How could you tell us to stand down?
SEALS and marines are ready to go
Jets are fueled on the strip
Targets are all lit up
AC130 overhead being called
On for help
Need some rounds on the ground
Two soldiers and no-one’s coming
We’re abandon, on our own
The winter I hear the piper
Four dead in Benghazi
Or they could make a mocking, sarcastic, satire, something
sung to the tune of “Hero of Canton” from firefly, which was (in the show) a
serious folk song, but to us (the audience) is was hysterical because it
misrepresented the facts and Jayne so badly. For that, something that mocks and ridicules
the entire Obama presidency would be best. Something like:
O, the man they call O! / He robbed from the children / and
he gave to the old! / Stood up to the kings / Then he bowed to the floor!
It could reference many of the different doings, from
fund-raising scandals, “green energy, deficits, no budget, Benghazi, etc.
Know any bored song-smiths?
There is an election coming up, so I thought I’d update my
last prediction.
You can create your own scenario here: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/obama_vs_romney_create_your_own_electoral_college_map.html
As I write this, at RealClear FL, NC, VA, CO, NV, IA, WI,
MI, OH, PA, and NH are considered “Toss-up”, and Obama has a solid 201 Electoral
College votes, Romney a solid 191.
I think that the polling data showing a MAJOR shift in party
self-identification from D to R (shifting from about a 5 point D advantage in
2008 to about a 2 point R advantage now), a shift in independent support toward
Romney now giving him a double-digit percentage lead (52% to 39%), greater R
enthusiasm / fear-of-consequences, and the persistently underwater job approval
numbers on Obama will all lead to Romney coming out ahead, beyond the
margin-of-fraud, in FL, NC, VA, CO, NH, and IA, for 267 (two shy of a tie). I think he’ll most likely
also take OH, WI, and NV, giving Romney 301 EC votes. That also means Romney could
afford to lose or have contested any one of those, even for FL, or Ohio AND Wisconsin,
and still have 270+.
If the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy suppresses voting in
Philly significantly, or the Benghazi thing blows up further in the DMC
(Democrat-Media-Complex, aka ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, etc), he may get PA and MI,
too, for 337 EC votes. I consider this only about one chance in five.
If Benghazi goes politically nuclear in the popular press,
and the political rights’ worst fears are realized and popularized prior to the
election (slim chance, but theoretically possible), then the O implosion loses
OR, MN, and ME2, because so many Dems stayed home rather than vote for their former
hero, giving Romney 355, almost as many as Obama did – which would also mean
that the Rs get a solid lead in the Senate, and keep the House. Maybe as much as a 5% chance, here.
If a lot of Dems stay home in disgust because of the national scene, then McKenna wins in WA state as Gov, but Cant(vote)Well will still win re-election in the Senate, because the R party can’t put forth any good candidates in WA, and the Libs in WA are still clueless as to the importance of senators and Cantwell’s ineffectiveness. If party “turnout” is normal, then it’s too close to call, but I’m afraid Insley will have enough friends counting votes that he’ll pull it out.
I’m trying to clean out the freezer a bit, so the next thing
on the menu for the next few weeks is whatever seems to be on the bottom, back,
or mysteriously wrapped. Last night I pulled out a long package of freezer
paper, and we had cod for dinner tonight. Now, the kids don’t really like fish
(they keep telling us), but they like fish-sticks,
so any time we have fish, regardless of preparation method or species, it’s cut
into fairly regular sized things that could arguably be called “sticks,” and
voila! “Fish-sticks,” we tell them.
Not being inspired particularly by all the words on the
first few recipes I looked at, I did the classic “throw some stuff that seems right
together, and follows the spirit of how to cook that thing.” Beat up two eggs
with some salt and pepper to dredge them in before breading. Dump roughly equal
parts Panko bread crumbs, Progresso garlic seasoned crumbs (finished off both
packages) and corn meal together in a bowl for breading. Put on a frying pan
with a bunch (I’d guess nearly a cup) of left-over French-fry oil, which was
made of roughly equal parts canola oil, peanut oil, and bacon grease, with some
small amount of butter. (They were not really deep fried, but it was definitely
NOT the “minimal fat” version of frying.) Cut the cod fillets into roughly
equal hunks (er, I mean, “sticks”), egged, breaded, fried in hot mixed oil until brown and crispy in
the breading and not quite an easy flake in the meat, flip, fry until brown
& crispy on side #2, and the flake is more white than clear. VERY good. The
bacon grease in the oil really makes a huge difference, and starting with the
fillets only barely thawed (still a bit stiff) meant the outside got a hot
enough to brown without the inside getting overcooked and dry. Fish-sticks. No
matter what’s actually inside, they just need to look a certain way for the kids. In this case, what was inside was every bit as good as they appeared.
So, cooking for kids is sort of like politics.
For a lot of people, what is going on inside, the details, are not important.
Just the outside impressions and appearance is what the decision is based on. I’m
hoping when the kids grow up they really understand that cod, wild sockeye salmon,
halibut, trout, tilapia, farmed Atlantic salmon, and mackerel are really VERY
different fish. I’m also hoping that when they grow up and vote it’s not what
the politician LOOKS like or SOUNDS like that makes a difference, but what the
effects of their POLICIES are and HOW they will be enacted and enforced that is
important. Details matter. As a kid,
I don’t expect them to really know or care that much about the details of their
fish-sticks. As an adult, I DO. I suppose there are some obvious jokes to make
here WRT political parties, but I’ll refrain.
At this
time of year I normally hunt in Klickitat County, WA, for deer. Lots of big black-tail / mule deer, and perhaps the occasional
hybrid. My luck at finding them is usually pretty good, though my luck in
finding ones with respectable racks is utterly pathetic – I can manage to find
a 200 lb + mule deer with ears that stick out further than his barely legal
three point rack, which is only three points by the grace of God and an eye-guard
that is about 1.1 inches long, or one that looks like what you’d expect of a mule
deer that cross-bred with a white-tail, with huge ears and all its tiny little points
coming off of one narrow beam, and the other broken off to about 1/3 size. Oh,
well, meat’s meat.
Drove down Friday, looked thing over. Several does frisking
about, and no more than the normal noise from the property across the way (it’s
mostly 20-acre lots in that area, and some government land, with about a dozen scattered
hunting camps and a handful of year-round residents within a mile or two). Light
rain that day kept the dust down, and made the brush a LOT quieter. Lots of
acorns on the trees, I noticed – very different from last year, when there were
almost no acorns, and more hunters than deer. Parked the RV (AKA a minivan with
a seat out and an army cot in the back), got to sleep early, listening to the rain fall.
Got up, weather looked good, headed down for a spot I picked
the day before, partway down in and overlooking a clear-ish spot across a saddle
in the ridge. It has decent visibility, lots of deer trails through there. I
kick up a couple of does while sneaking down there in the dark. Wait for enough
light. See nothing. I hear shooting up behind me on the ridge. Several single
shots, widely spaced in time – either people are doing pretty well, or they can’t
shoot for squat. No way to know at the moment. I’m not seeing anything, except
a couple of does that are heading away from the shooting west of me. Eventually
I quit waiting and get moving, and slowly hunt around in a big loop to see what
can be scared up. Nadda but a couple of does. Light wind keeps eddying around,
so hunting “upwind” is impossible.
About 90% of the way around the loop I run into an old
friend of mine – he’s in his 80s now, was a gunner on a troop transport in
WWII, but still getting out (new just this year is a handicap hunter sign for
his rig, so he can shoot sitting in the cab, or have one of us younger “companion
hunters” do things for him. He said his
son, a spry lad of only sixty, had gone on a big loop up and around similar to
the path I’d taken, but farther out, across to the far side of a large draw and
down through it. So I figure I can go find a good stand up on this side of the draw and see if he
spooks anything my way. I wander off into the thickets. Lots of low brush, large
patches of ten-foot high Oregon white oak, and lots of old pines blown down
like pick-up-sticks (the remains from after a fire swept through the area about
a decade ago). Easy to hide in, lots of forage, and a cast-iron bitch to get
things out of.
I creep along thorough the brush, keeping eyes and ears
open, picking the occasional acorn and popping it into my pockets, which are by
now bulging with them. I find a decent spot with a clear view across the draw
– the far side is about 450 yards away. Visibility closer isn’t great because
of all the oak stands. I stand up on a fallen log to get a better view. Lots of
acorns in reach from there, too. I watch across the draw, watch closer in, pick
acorns absently. Listen to the chipmunks, magpies, and woodpeckers. Wind swirls
around. Nothing moving but birds and leaves. Pretty, but no sign of hunter
orange coming down the far side of things yet. I take off my pack and drop it quietly
to the ground, still standing on the log. A few more acorn are in reach, and
they end up in my pocket.
Then I hear a noise – just barely loud enough to hear, and I
still can’t remember what sort of noise it was, but it WASN’T any of the things
I’d been listening to all morning. I jerk my head to the right toward that
marginally registering sound, and there, plain as day because I know the exact direction to look, I see the “Y” shape of a
deer staring straight at me, mule-deer ears and nose. Just the head – from the
neck down it was hidden in the heavy brush. Not fifty yards away. With a rack.
A small rack (of course), but it’s got a least one clear fork. I’m standing,
balancing on a log, body one way, and it’s off directly to my right. Well, that’s
kind of awkward.
I figure he must have been there this whole time, so slow motions
shouldn’t spook him. I turn slowly until I can get the rifle up into a good
scoping / shooting position. I look. Damn! Only 3 power on the scope, and I can’t
see if there is an eye-guard! I crank the scope to 9X, and look again. Can’t
quite be sure… then the light falling on him changes ever so slightly, and I
can see it! ONE eye-guard! Given the brush and stuff, I figure I’ve got about a
2” square target to hit, off-hand, standing straight up balancing on a log, at
fifty yards. Can’t move to a more stable position because lower would hide him
totally in the brush. Aim too high, miss. Too low, take his jaw off and he runs
and dies miles away or it gets deflected by heavy brush. Left or right, running
injured or clean miss. Just gotta stand tall and deliver. Sure, no pressure. Aim
carefully, breathe in, breathe out, double check the eye-guard to make sure it’s
long enough, breathe, squeeze. BLAM!
I work the action keeping my eyes on where he was. I see no
movement. I walk up carefully. Motionless on a grassy patch amidst the brush. Right
antler blown away. Brains and blood leaking out through the large hole just
above his right eye. I do a double-take, and I don’t see the eye-guard! ARRRG!
Oh, wait. False alarm – just didn’t see if from that angle. WHEW! I measure the
eye-guard; one and a quarter inches – legally counts as a point (1” minimum). Now
I just have to get him OUT of the deep weeds. He’s down amidst the log-sized
pick-up sticks, and a live weight in the neighborhood of 200 pounds – small enough
to be tender and tasty, big enough to be a pain in the ass hauling him out. Then
I hear a shot from up across the draw. Looks like the other guy I know is now
going to be busy with his own deer for a while, so I’m on my own. I gut him
out, drag him uphill as best I can about a hundred yards to where I think it
might be possible to get a vehicle sort’a close. I flag a nearby tree with
engineer tape, and boogie back to the “RV” to see how well a Honda Odyssey is
at off-roading. Turns out, pretty good, if you are careful. Nothing that Ry
would have flinched at, but it’s mostly my wife’s, not my car, and there are
lots of logs and large volcanic rocks around, so….
Anyway, got the deer whacked up, then double-check the regs just
to make sure I wasn’t missing something – last year there was a Fish-n-Feather
check-point examining all hunters at a choke-point in the road out of the area for
the first few days of the season, so I want to make sure I’m all totally legal.
Hmmm… must transport with proof that it was male, either “naturally attached
penis and testicles” (nope, can’t do that, cut off while gutting) or BOTH
antlers “naturally attached to the head”. AH, shit-meister! I must have spent
two hours looking for that blasted second antler. Finally found it about 45 or
50 feet away in the brush – a small, brown, forking, stick-like-looking antler
hides VERY well in the brush and fallen oak leaves, let me tell you.
Finally, I got everything cleaned up, packed up, and back on
road, and just then the rain started. So it all worked out, in the end, pretty
well.
A few of things of note:
1) There was no
obvious exit wound from the bullet. A 165 gr slug from a 30-06 at 50 yards
still has well north of 2000 ft-lb of energy, and while the skull was
dramatically broken up and brain bits here and there, but the bullet didn’t
seem to have come out the far side, and there no obvious bullet fragments left
in the cranial cavity, which was mostly filled with partially coagulated blood and
bone fragments by the time I examined it more closely. Not clear exactly how all
the energy was expended, or what happened to the bullet; totally exploded and
the fragments fell out with the brain, or ricochet out essentially through the
same hole and all the brain pulping was done by bone fragments, or just what.
File it under “weird terminal ballistics event.” and “bone is STRONG.”
2) It was obvious he was totally dead from the hole and
brains-on-the-ground thing when I got close to him, so I slit his throat to
bleed him out. Squirt, squirt, squirt. His heart was still pumping! Weird.
3) The kids both thought the carcass pieces I brought home
were interesting. The daughter though it was gross, but she couldn’t take her
eyes off it, so it turned into an impromptu biology and physiology lesson, comparing
front and back leg structures, pointing out tendons versus ligaments, ball
joints vs hinge joints, bone vs cartilage, what a whole muscle looks like when
not wrapped in plastic as the market, fat deposits, what a heart and liver REALLY look like, etc.
They also thought the ribs looked awfully fatty, but agreed that they tasted good
broiled with a little salt, pepper, and garlic powder.
3.a) The only things that got left on the scene was a spine,
feet, hunks of fat, guts, and hide. I need to get better at skinning them out
so it’s worth getting tanned.
4) The kids ALSO thought that learning how to prepare the
bag of acorns I brought back sounded like fun, particularly for the 4th
grader, who did a big unit on Native Americans last year in school, many of
whom ate acorns as a significant part of their diet. We’ll also be planting
some of them as a science experiment (Oregon white oak are native to the area).
4.a) Last year, very few acorns, very few deer. Normally,
lots of acorns, lots of deer. File data for future reference; check the acorn
crop in September – no acorns, find another place to hunt.
5) Does seem to spook and run easily. Bucks, especially
older ones, are masters of immobility and camouflage, and don’t want to jump
until you darn near step on them. Means you have to have REALLY good eyes, good
binoculars, or have a couple of guys that are willing to spend a LOT of time
stomping around trying to kick them up.
6) I am amazed, again, at the fact that even though guns are LOUD, especially high-powered rifles, I never remember hearing the shot go off, or the recoil as it applies to my shoulder. I remember watching the target, working the action, basic body position, getting the sight back on target, listening for and hearing sounds immediately after the shot (even quiet sounds), but never the sound of the gunshot itself.
I’m sure you have all heard the old saw “the enemy of my
enemy is my friend.” Well… No. I think a better version is “the enemy of my
enemy is a useful tool.” And I think
that is what we are seeing evidence of unfolding before us right now.
Obama & Co announce a record $ 181 million in donations
in Sept, largely in small amounts from “first time” donors, too small to require tracking. At the same time, a
breaking story is about extremely lax verification of donor credit card legitimacy (i.e., essentially none) ,
and a LOT of hits to Obama’s “contribute” page (something like 2/3) come from
overseas, and there is not much in the way of addressing matching with the card payment. I would be VERY unsurprised if a lot of OverSeas America Haters made
donations, in violation of US law and with complicit looking-the-other-way by
the Obama fundraisers, because they know that while Obama may not be their
friend, he is an easily manipulated fool who isn’t very fond of America and is
working to destroy it. Not because he really wants to per se, but because he is too stupid and narcissistic to realize
what real effect his actions have. The folks surrounding him want to hang on to
power because it’s shiny and what ALL the cool kids want, but they really are NOT
very good at wielding it (or even understanding it), and REALLY don’t
understand dealing with those that only understand the power of tribe, bribe,
and force, for whom our western values are antithetical to their fundamental
values. These people (the power players
in China, Saudi Arabia / MENA, Russia, drug cartels, radical Islam, etc) would REALLY like to
see Obama pull out a win, because America’s weakness is their gain.
News is also coming out that there was a LOT of warning
about security problems in Benghazi, and a SEAL team was pulled out only a
month before, displaying massive incompetence on behalf of the administration.
His foreign policy in general is now being widely
seen as increasingly ineffective, and his biggest supporters are those that
would gain from our weakness.
It is widely acknowledged that the first debate was a
disaster for Obama. Even the New Yorker magazine cover showed Romney Eastwooding
at the debate. I think there is also
a very real potential that the second debate, on foreign policy, will be as bad
or worse (if for different reasons), in part because of the above facts. I’m
not saying that the fat lady is singing her final notes, but I do get the strong
feeling that she’s starting to warm up for a really rock’n finale.
Then, of course, we’ll have to hear about the election being
stolen, voters being too stupid to know what’s good for them, etc., for the
next half-dozen or more election cycles, but that’s a price I’m willing to
accept.
I realize that predictions can be hard. Well, predictions are easy, but making accurate ones is a bit more difficult.
This week, the Chicago teachers union went on strike, turning down a 16% pay increase (4% per year for four years), even though they are one of the most highly compensated districts in the nation, while simultaneously turning in bottom quintile performance. Teachers unions are one of the most rabid pro-Obama groups out there. On the the other side of the dispute is Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s former chief of staff, infamous for hard-nosed, in-your-face negotiation.
In Lybia, the US embassy was attacked and Ambassador Stevens was killed, and I’m now seeing reports that embassy security was being provided by Libyan nationals, who may have helped in his murder, NOT US Marines (the two that were killed there were last second additions when things got violent).
Obama has told Israel to take a flying leap in so many different ways recently it’s not easy to list them all, and it looks like they are getting itchy to pull the trigger on dealing with the Iranian nuke thing.
Prediction: If Obama doesn’t pull some serious magic out of his hat in the next week or so on at least two of these issues, he’s toast. Not just lightly toasted, but burned-to-a-crisp toast. Utterly humiliated. A defeat that will be compared to Carter for the rest of US history. Something that most American’s can’t stand is weakness in a leader, and pretty much all the options he might take on these three issues to appeal to his base will repel the undecided middle. On the other hand, any sort of strong action that might sway the persuadable middle his direction will infuriate much of his base, and do nothing to change minds among the conservative base. The optics are horrible for him no matter which way he goes, and the campaign spots nearly write themselves. Of course, he’s got the Mainstream Media flying air-cover for him, but even they can only do so much, and when it looks like he’s on a failing course they will turn on him to save the liberal ideology (by saying it was the messenger, not the message).
So, barring some actions he has so far shown absolutely no ability to perform, I think we are seeing a major turning point in the election.
No one can honestly say Clint Eastwood isn’t a great actor.
Nor can they say he’s a bad director. He has acted in, directed, produced, produced
music for, or even three all four of those, in seven movies in just the last four
years. His most recent interviews have shown him to be sharp, eloquent, and
engaged. If you saw Gran Torino in
the theater, you could watch a movie he wrote, directed, produced, and made
music for, and watch a trailer for an upcoming movie he directed and produced. His
brain is fully functioning.
So, why and how did his speech at the RNC seem so… rambling, unfocused, edgy, and odd? If we KNOW he’s mentally all there, what
was he doing? If we assume he was doing exactly
what he intended to do, what was he intending?
I think that the republican base is going to vote for Mitt,
some enthusiastically, some holding their nose, but they’ll vote for him
none-the-less. The Dem base will likewise vote for O. No-one on a national
stage will convince that 90% of the electorate of anything different, only
personal experience or epiphany will change anything for them. I think he’s
smart enough to know that, so he wasn’t talking to any of them. He’s an actor and director – focusing on reaching the target audience is what he does.
But, if the R convention attendees and typical convention watchers and committed D or R voters are not his audience, then who was he speaking
to? Perhaps it was the very-low-information voter, the apolitical working-stiff,
the disengaged voter, who recognizes a movie star but has nary a clue who their rep
or senator is, who ANY of the SCOTUS are, and don’t normally watch conventions.
Perhaps he chose to speak in a way that makes all the well-scripted speakers and high-information voters cringe, but in a way that
was different, weird, and odd, but also put humor and the strange right next to the
hard-hitting stuff, so when it got played and replayed and discussed by various
folks in all sorts of outlets, both by those who agree AND those who disagree,
it will get those fundamental facts, like highlighting there are 23,000,000
unemployed, out to many of those low-info voters, and will sway them. It got
the movie-going-but-not-political voter to tune in, and stay and watch Rubio. It
created an instant icon for the politically-absent president, the empty chair. He used unexpected and oblique off-color humor that perfectly captured the essence of the trash-talking Chicago bully in the White House. It
is possible, when we look back on that moment three months from now, that it
will be seen as an absolutely brilliant piece of seeming scatter-brained-improve
that shifted that all-important indecisive, low-information, non-ideological
middle, the folks that vote with their hearts but not their brains. Either that, or it’s one of the fasted pieces of rapid-onset dementia
ever.