Category Archives: Politics

Who is the idiot here?

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Does this guy Kane think we are idiots?  Rhetorical question alert–Or is he an idiot?  From the Washington Post:

“I’m committed to not violating the Second Amendment or infringing upon the gun rights of law-abiding citizens,” Kaine, the lieutenant governor, said to a handful of supporters and local reporters who were on hand to watch him shoot. “I’m committed to protecting that constitutional right to hunt and fish. . . . I value the traditions that Virginians value.”

Who, in their right mind, believes that while guaranteeing our rights to free speech, freedom of religion, due process, a speedy trial by a jury of our peers, etc. etc. the writers of the Bill of Rights were guaranteeing the people the right to “hunt and fish” with the Second Amendment?  (I think it was Rolf that pointed out that particular argument to me.)  As if they were anticipating a similar absurd claim the founding fathers wrote, “A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State…” as part of that guaranteed right.  As someone else once said, “It ain’t about duck hunting.”  If you still don’t get it, here is a clue.

Quote of the day–George Washington

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Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.

George Washington
Speech of January 7, 1790

Airport security editorial in the Seattle PI

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This editorial in the Seattle PI is surprisingly good.  I would have expected something in the PI to be more of the nature of “Give the government more money and power so it can protect us better.”  It’s not that way at all.  In fact he points out a change in passenger attitudes is a major deterrent to future hijackings:

A repetition of 9/11-style attacks became less likely, not because of increased airport security, but because of a change in passengers’ responses to airline hijackings.

And he correctly points out how we ended up with 100% loss of our 4th Amendment when we travel on commercial airlines:

How did we get to this abysmal state of affairs? Because even in times of crises — in fact, especially in times of crises — politics plagues government security efforts. Congress and the bureaucracy have to show the nervous public that they are doing something, even if those efforts make little sense. Sixty-five percent of the funds spent on domestic homeland security goes toward aviation security alone, leaving many fewer resources for measures at ports, borders and on mass transit.

The public should demand that the TSA be abolished and airport security be reprivatized. Perhaps it would be a first step toward ending the paranoia that has resulted in excessive emphasis on airport security to the exclusion of everything else.

I only partially agree with his conclusions.  Before we reprivatized airport security we should research the alternatives.

No surprise here

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From World Net Daily:

TEL AVIV – Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei and members of various Palestinian terror groups this week decided at a meeting “resistance” against Israel would continue and would be coordinated at the national level until the Jewish state evacuates “all territories,” WND has learned.

Earlier this week, it was reported Qurei held a private conference in Damascus with leaders of Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. According to media reports, the parties reached an agreement under which the PA would not attempt to disarm the terror groups in spite of recent U.S. and Israeli calls for the groups to be dismantled after the Gaza evacuation.

…

But security sources close to the meeting told WND agreements reached at the conference went one step further – it was concluded the Palestinians would continue to use “resistance” against Israel until the Jewish state leaves “all occupied territories” – code for the destruction of Israel. The resistance, the sources said, is to be coordinated between the Palestinian groups and based on the foundations of Palestinian unity.

…

Afterward, the Battalions held a press conference in which a spokesman stressed his group’s determination to “do whatever it took” to liberate the “rest of our land,” including kidnapping Israelis and committing “resistance attacks.”

How many times do we need to learn this lesson?  Their extremist culture must be destroyed.  They give us no alternatives but our own destruction.

Update: That didn’t take long:

Driving home fears Palestinian terror groups will use land gained by Israel’s Gaza evacuation to launch rockets deeper inside the Jewish state, two Qassams today were fired at western Negev towns as Israeli troops prepared the Gaza Strip for handover in the next few weeks.

Quote of the day–Charles A. Beard

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You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go around repeating the very phrases which our founding fathers used in their struggle for independence.

Charles A. Beard
American historian

We dodged a bullet

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We temporarily dodged another attack on our civil liberties in California.  From Sacramento:

Attorney General Bill Lockyer has shelved a novel gun-control measure that would have required manufacturers to stamp microscopic serial numbers on all handgun ammunition sold in California.

Sen. Joe Dunn, a Garden Grove Democrat carrying the legislation for the attorney general, said he needed more time to resolve a heated debate over how much the potentially landmark tracking system would cost and who would pay for it. 

The bill, SB 357, has passed the Senate and is pending in an Assembly fiscal committee as the Legislature pushes through its final three weeks of this year’s session. The measure may be taken up where it sits next year, the second in the two-year session.

The legislation would require manufacturers to imprint or etch a serial number on the end of each slug or bullet starting in 2009. Boxes of cartridges bearing the same number could then be linked to purchasers with the swipe of a driver’s license at the time of sale.

…

Dunn said he will work during the coming months to resolve fears that his bill could pose a financial burden on some law enforcement personnel who are required to purchase ammunition for training.

“It’s a legitimate question that we will respond to,” Dunn said.

He was less optimistic about bringing manufacturers together with companies that have developed methods to code ammunition. Regardless, he predicted the measure will be delivered to the governor next year.

However, opponents say Lockyer and Dunn have yet to sell the proposal to much of the state’s law enforcement community.

Prominent organizations, such as those representing the state’s district attorneys and police chiefs, have declined to endorse the bill, noted Lawrence Keane, general counsel of the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers’ Institute, an industry trade group better known as SAAMI.

“I think it’s pretty clear that law enforcement by and large is not supporting this effort,” Keane said.

Manufacturers say the proposal would force expensive changes on a high-volume, low-margin business. Keane and others have warned the required manufacturing modifications would either drive companies out of business or result in steep price increases.

It doesn’t bother them it how much it would cost private citizens or how a black market of out of state or stolen ammo would fill the “market niche”.  It only bothers them that it would be a burden to law enforcement.  I guess that means they serve the state and not the people.  Does the phrase “Police State” ring a bell with anyone?

Something on the light side

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If your stomach hurts and you feel like crying (as I do right now) after reading my quote of the day below here is a little something on the light side.  Of course if you read Kim du Toit or Neaderpundit this is a repeat for you: Best? Movie. Clip. Ever.

Quote of the day–United Nations

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On 24 September 1999, the Security Council convened its first meeting at ministerial level devoted to the issue of small arms. A report (S/2000/1092) was prepared with the assistance of internationally recognized experts following the ministerial meetings request that the Secretary-General “develop a reference manual for use in the field on ecologically safe (amended in report S/2000/1092 to read ‘environmentally sound’) methods of weapons destruction in order better to enable Member States to ensure the disposal of weapons voluntarily surrendered by civilians or retrieved from former combatants”. The report has been used as a guide in the preparation of this aide mémoire.

…

…

 

A DESTRUCTION HANDBOOK
Small arms, light weapons, ammunition and explosives
UNITED NATIONS
http://disarmament2.un.org/DDAPublications/desthbk.pdf

A story title I can support

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Give the TSA one-way ticket to oblivion.  A pretty good article too.  It’s only a half-way measure, but it’s a step in the right direction.

Quote of the day–Thomas Jefferson

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Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God.

Motto found among the papers of Thomas Jefferson.

Quote of the day–Lao Tse

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Leaders are best when people scarcely know they exist, not so good when people obey and acclaim them, worst when people despise them. Fail to honor people, they fail to honor you. But of good leaders who talk little, when their work is done, their aim fulfilled, the people will say: “We did this ourselves”.

Lao Tse
[I would argue most of our current political ‘leaders’ fail this test. — Joe]

Quote of the day–Will Rogers/Anonymous

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Diplomacy:  The art of saying “nice doggie” until you can find a rock.

Will Rogers

Diplomacy is the art of saying “nice doggy” until you get a sight picture.

Anonymous adaptation
[“Sight picture” refers to having the sights on your firearm aligned on the target correctly. — Joe]

Canada inches away from socialism

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Or should that be “millimeters away”?  It’s not a lot of progress but it’s encouraging:

EDMONTON — All Canadians should have the right to buy private health insurance to complement their care in the medicare system, the country’s leading doctors’ group says.

The Canadian Medical Association said, in essence, that a recent Supreme Court of Canada judgment, which struck down a ban on private health insurance in Quebec because patients were not ensured timely access to care, should apply to all Canadians.

In doing so, the CMA, which represents the country’s 62,000 doctors, also clearly rejected the notion yesterday that there should be a medicare monopoly. It did so just one day after doctors gave their backing to the existence of a parallel, private for-profit health system.

…

Barry Erlick, a physician from Toronto, told his colleagues that buying private insurance would be a wise investment because the medicare system cannot keep pace with demand for services.

“Governments are failing my patients today,” he said during the debate. “We are saying, ‘Give our patients options to alleviate their suffering.’ “

Quote of the day–Jeff Cooper

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The Republic is in very bad shape – probably the worst since 1776 – but it does us all well to remember that the principles of the Founding Fathers stand as sound and irrefutable today as yesterday. We must bear in mind that “they” cannot disarm us. They do not have the legal power, of course, but neither do they have the physical power. An army may be defeated by another army, but the people of a nation cannot be, as long as they are aware of their principles and maintain their determination to observe them. We hope, of course, that “they” never presume to try, because “they” simply cannot do it. What the American people need is the viscera to tell “them” No! God grant that we still have the courage!

Jeff Cooper
Jeff Cooper’s Commentaries
Vol. 2, No. 2
31 January 1994
[Those were very dark days in the mid-90’s.  Most people forget how serious things were and how much they have improved. — Joe]

If you believe in compromising on gun control

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Gun owners compromised in England and now look at things.  The anti-gun owner bigots in England can’t be happy with a total ban on handguns!  Now they are going after imitation guns:

Steve Walker of GCN said “…our position is clear. If it looks like a gun it should not be allowed.”

Gill Marshall-Andrews, GCN’s chair, said: “No one needs a realistic imitation gun – except perhaps a re-enactment society.”

GCN is Gun Control Network.  Check out their objectives.  This is what you can expect if you attempt to compromise with them.  Who could imagine that two or more people outside of a mental hospital would insist there be a “Ban on the sale, manufacture and import of imitation guns and their possession in a public place.”?  Why does the newpaper consider the rantings of lunatics newsworthy?

Quote of the day–Henry David Thoreau

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Any fool can make a rule
And every fool will mind it.

Henry David Thoreau
(1817-62), U.S. philosopher, author, naturalist.
Journals (1906), entry for 3 Feb. 1860.

It makes as much sense as what we are doing now

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Bruce Schneier reports on a new method of airport security:

Photograph from What-the-Hack.

My thoughts on airport security.

We already got the hole dug

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People and companies in Idaho do a lot of logging and mining.  That means we probably have more than our share of ecoterrorists.  I always questioned the sanity of these people operating in the forests of Idaho.  True, your chances of getting caught out in the woods a hundred miles from the nearest police station and dozens of miles from the nearest house are pretty slim.  But that also means a vigilante has little chance of getting caught.  Particularly since they have heavy earthmoving equipment on-site.  This viewpoint was reinforced recently when I heard a rumor.  Law enforcement had been spending thousands of man hours trying to catch someone.  The ecoterrorist claims he wants to kill some cops–specifically naming a couple of them that had been assigned to his case.  The ecoterrorist uses a rifle in some of his activities against the business interest. Hence the ecoterrorist has the means and intent to kill cops.  The cops are not happy with this.  If they find him and he shows even the slightest amount of aggression they will be justified in using deadly force against him.  But he is living in the woods and it’s quite likely the ecoterrorist will see them coming and be able to get off the first shot or two before being seen–if he is seen at all.  Most body armor won’t stop a rifle bullet.  This far from the nearest hospital a solid hunting rifle hit to an arm or leg will probably result in death.  And it would certainly cause permanent loss of function.  The cops are not at all happy about this.  The local law enforcement officer (LEO) is rumored to have had a conversation with the target of the ecoterrorist that went something like this:

LEO: If that guy disappears and there’s no evidence I have to investigate it wouldn’t bother me any.
TARGET: That’s what we figured.  We already got the hole dug.

Note to ecoterrorists planning to operate in Idaho forests:  Get your sanity checked.

Quote of the day–Albert Einstein

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The strength of the Constitution lies entirely in the Determination of each citizen to defend it.  Only if every single citizen feels duty bound to do his share in this defense are constitutional rights secure.

Albert Einstein

Reality is knocking at their door

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I just ran across this headline as I was scanning the news:  Leading doctor says free NHS is unsustainable.

LONDON (Reuters) – The National Health Service is unsustainable and needs to be reformed, one of the country’s most senior doctors said on Saturday.

In an interview with the Daily Telegraph, Bernie Ribeiro, the new president of the Royal College of Surgeons, said healthcare should be paid for through a social insurance system.

“If we’re going to have a health care system suited to the future, we’ve got to be prepared to invest in it,” he said. “I don’t personally believe that can be done out of pure taxation.”

Ribeiro suggested a means-tested system where the poorest would pay nothing at all and other patients would take out insurance to cover a proportion of their costs.

“We’re not a poor country, the working population is reasonably well paid, we could afford our workers to make an identifiable contribution towards health care — not one hidden in national insurance and taxation.

“We seriously need to look at this again.”

The Labour party vowed during the May election to continue free care for all through the NHS, which it created in 1948.

Britons tend to be very protective and proud of the health service which employs 1.3 million workers and spends over 76 billion pounds a year.

But an independent report in June 2005 said the service faced serious financial problems through poor management and doctors and patients have repeatedly complained of long waiting lists and over crowding on many hospital wards.

Socialism–The Road to Serfdom (which was written in 1944 and intended for the British audience).  And socialized medicine is just one of the steps down that path.  At least a few people are getting a clue after nearly 50 years.  The question is, is it too late to reverse the slide into the abyss?