Hearing loss reversal

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Restoring Hearing: New Tool To Create Ear Hair Cells Lost Due to Aging or Noise

Hearing loss caused by aging, noise, and some cancer therapy medications and antibiotics has been irreversible because scientists have not been able to reprogram existing cells to develop into the outer and inner ear sensory cells — essential for hearing — once they die.

But Northwestern Medicine scientists have discovered a single master gene that programs ear hair cells into either outer or inner ones, overcoming a major hurdle that had previously prevented the development of these cells to restore hearing, according to new research published today (May 4, 2022) in the journal Nature.

This is great news! I grew up driving extremely noisy tractors without hearing protection. And even with hearing protection after shooting some guns under certain conditions I can tell I had too much exposure.

I like living in the future.

Quote of the day—Elon Musk

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Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated. I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential—I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it.

Elon Musk
May 8, 2022
Elon Musk Puts Twitter Employees on Alert
[Nice words.

I look forward to seeing those words backed up by action.—Joe]

We live in interesting times

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Enough Fraudulent Votes Identified to Change 2020 Election Outcome: Dinesh D’Souza

An analysis of cellphone records performed by an election intelligence group shows that thousands of fraudulent ballots were deposited in mail-in drop boxes during the 2020 election, an amount sufficient to change the outcome of the election, according to Dinesh D’Souza, director and writer of the documentary “2000 Mules.”

Will the fraudulent election be set aside? I think the odds are 1000:1 against that.

Will anyone of significance be prosecuted? I give it odds of 100:1 that they will not.

Will voter fraud rule the next election Federal election? I find it difficult to believe we should expect anything different next time.

We live in interesting times. Prepare appropriately.

Quote of the day—Tiffany Troia @TiffanyTroia

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We should just take away all guns. It works for other countries. Cuts down senseless deaths by a huge margin. Guns are an offensive weapon, not a defensive one. That’s just basic logic and it’s sad that you lack it.

Tiffany Troia @TiffanyTroia
Tweeted on April 3, 2022
[I wonder what color the sky is in her world.

If it were true here we would have an answer to Just One Question.

Oh! She is an artist. That explains why she isn’t in touch with the real world.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Connor Bible @bibliomania94

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It’s a classic form of compensation for… y’know.

Connor Bible @bibliomania94
Tweeted on April 2, 2002
[It’s not only another Markley’s Law Monday, it is another science denier!

It is a classic case of Markley’s law. A form of compensation for not having a meaningful thought and insults are the best they can come up with.

Via a tweet from In Chains @InChainsInJail.—Joe]

News you can use

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Vitamin D, Omega-3s, and Exercise May Reduce Cancer Risk in Older Adults

Engaging in exercise and taking nutritional supplements may reduce the risk of invasive cancer in healthy individuals aged 70 years or older, a new study suggests.

Researchers observed a 61% reduction in the risk of invasive cancer among patients who completed a home exercise program and took vitamin D3 and omega-3 fatty acids daily.

Hmm… that seems like a worthwhile thing to do for the reduced risk.

Just one question bit.ly link

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For easy referral I have created a bit.ly link to my Just One Question post. The link is: http://bit.ly/Justonequestion. This should be easy enough to remember and quickly type into a comment thread or reply to someone on social media.

I realize this takes people down a path where rights are debatable based on practical concerns. But, it also is a quick and easy response to point out the opposition is lying when they claim the solution to “gun violence” is gun restrictions. The general population is not accepting of liars. This is about winning hearts and minds; not being philosophically pure. If you want the philosophical purity aspect add another link or sound bite.

Meet them on what they believe to be their own turf and point out their delusions and/or evil intent to others. Here are some other links all in an easy to use copy and paste paragraph:

Don’t be a science denier.

https://www.concealedcarry.com/news/armed-citizens-are-successful-95-of-the-time-at-active-shooter-events-fbi/

https://fee.org/articles/california-s-background-check-law-had-no-impact-on-gun-deaths-johns-hopkins-study-finds/

http://bit.ly/Justonequestion/

Quote of the day—Cheryl Nash

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The Republican road to heaven is paved with a hell on earth they are co-creating.

Cheryl Nash
May 6, 2022
LETTER: Road to heaven?
[Nash should read some history and correct her ignorance.

If it were not such serious business the letter would be laughable. She doesn’t use the word but the policies she advocates for are lure of Marxists. There has never been a clearer proven path to hell on earth than the one she advocates for.

I am not a Republican and can point out numerous faults in their political policies. But, I have not seen any Republican claim to be capable of guiding us down a path to a heaven on earth. But they do seem aware that a path exists to relative individual prosperity and the avoidance of a Marxist hell. This is something Nash would do well to investigate.—Joe]

Some lawmakers are on the right track

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FORMER JUSTICE OFFICIALS ASK SENATE TO CONFIRM BIDEN’S ATF DIRECTOR TO FIGHT GUN VIOLENCE

The momentum for the nomination came at the same time as elected Republicans attacked the very existence of the ATF.

Republican House Representatives Marjorie Taylor Greene (GA), Matt Gaetz (FL), Paul Gosar (AZ), and Ralph Norman (SC) have proposed legislation to “eliminate the ATF”.

The view is shared by Republicans currently in the running, including Senate candidate JD Vance, who recently won his party’s nomination in Ohio.

It’s not enough to accomplish much more than making some noise, but they are making the correct kind of noise.

Quote of the day—Jeff Carlson and Hans Mahncke

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Musk’s proposed takeover of Twitter represents a seismic shift in the battle over the flow and control of information. The impact of shifting back to the unfettered exchange of ideas online would be enormous. But that impact also didn’t go unnoticed.

For two days last week, Twitter relaxed its censorship site-wide and the effects were immediately noticed, especially among conservatives. But the return to free speech did not last long and within days, Twitter’s oversight was suddenly back.

Establishment forces moved quickly to fight back against what they feared most: a return to free speech.

Only days after Musk announced his purchase of Twitter, the Department of Homeland Security announced the creation of a new, Orwellian “Disinformation Governance Board” supposedly to combat so-called misinformation ahead of the 2022 midterms. This new body is being led by the very same people that have spent years spreading disinformation.

The current fight over free speech isn’t over just yet. Not by a long shot.

Jeff Carlson and Hans Mahncke
May 5, 2022
Don’t Expect the Establishment to Give Up Its Control of Twitter Without a Fight | Truth Over News
[Liberty is always unfinished business.—Joe]

Pointless Red Flag Laws

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Via Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership:

“Red flag Laws”, which allow police to seize the firearms of people accused of being at risk to misuse them, have been passed in 19 states. Do they do what proponents say they do? A recent study by Veronica Pear, PhD and Garen Wintemute, MD, and co-authors says the answer is clearly, “No”

DRGO says the laws are pointless, but that assumes you believe the point was public safety. It’s not.

There has never been a valid “Yes” to my Just One Question:

Can you demonstrate one time or place, throughout all history, where the average person was made safer by restricting access to handheld weapons?

It has been over 17 years since I posed the question above and no exceptions to the premise have been found.

The point of such laws is clearly not public safety. The point is to enable the harassments and imprisonment of innocent people who wish to defend themselves from criminals (including those on the government payroll).

Quote of the day—Ethel Mertz @IloveEthal

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I’ve been sitting here safely in a Blue state not understanding why my elected officials are still playing nice. I want to see the most strictest gun laws ever; insurance, lockboxes, home visits, 98% tax on ammo, limit on magazines.
If red states can go nuts so can blue

Ethel Mertz @IloveEthal
Tweeted May 3, 2022
[It is nice of her to admit the motivation for restrictive gun laws is to abuse people rather than to improve public safety. It is too bad for her that won’t play well with the courts.—Joe]

Confirmation

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We have another study confirming John Lott:

findings were pretty conclusive: “We find that burglaries increased in ZIP codes with fewer gun permits, and decreased in those with more gun permits, after the database was publicized.” Specifically, in ZIP codes with the largest number of residents who had permits to carry firearms, the number of burglaries fell by 18 percent. That decrease took place even as burglaries were going up throughout the entire region covered by the database.

Via David Hardy.

Quote of the day—Kim du Toit

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I’m getting too old for this foolishness, but maybe a boomer or two will cheer me up.  That’s always worked in the past…

Kim du Toit
April 29, 2022
Journey’s End
[It seems to work for everyone, every time.

For example, on April 23rd, one week before Boomershoot 2022, we had a private boomershoot event. On April 17th I advised we postpone it until the weekend after Boomershoot 2022 instead of the weekend before:

I was on site last Friday and I have been watching the web cams and the weather forecast. I am strongly recommending you postpone your event. The best-case scenario is that your shooters are laying in mud. Most likely it would be an inch or two of icy water. Access to the target production facility also may involve wading through shin deep mud and carrying nearly 900 pounds of targets 100 yards to the nearest gravel road. Our target production manager will be seven months pregnant at that time so we have our own motivations for postponing the event as well.

They decided they wanted to proceed with the 23rd. Okay, if that’s what you want.

We managed to get vehicle access to the target production facility. As predicted there was icy water in the shooting area and mud in the target area. The weather was better than I expected. It was cloudy but no rain … until about two minutes after the shooting stopped. Icy rain drenched the shooters before they could walk back to their vehicles.

The event was for a promotional advertisement. All the shooters, about 100 of them, were wearing the company t-shirt. I saw one petite woman soaking wet in the t-shirt, shivering, and telling us how awesome that was with a huge smile on her face.

When Kim was 16 years old she had broken up with her boyfriend. She hadn’t smiled in a week. I took her to the local gravel pit to test fireball construction. This is a frame grab from the video as she stood up from detonating the fireball target:

image

They can’t always express themselves coherently (Cyndi couldn’t even talk) but when a newbie detonates a boomer and they always have a smile on their face.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Dean Weingarten

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The idea of a person being armed as a provocation to attack appears to flow from a simple premise on the left: A person doing something a leftist does not like, is a provocation to attack them. It is part of the broader philosophical abandonment of the rule of law.

Evidence for this theory exists in the left’s theory of speech from any opponent. Speech from an opponent is considered to be violence, and worthy of attack. Violence, from the left, on the other hand, is considered to be speech.

When leftists surround a car and beat on it; that is not provocation; when leftist shoot at people; that is not provocation; when people the left does not agree with, display weapons; that is considered provocation by the left.

Dean Weingarten
April 25, 2022
Is Carrying a Gun Provocation to be Attacked?
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Boomershoot 2022

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Boomershoot went reasonably well this year.

Dinner was good. I really like this food vendor. This is the second year for them and will probably will continue to be the vendor of choice.

MTHead (frequent commenter here and sometimes quite quotable) showed up and helped with Saturday target production.

Our Saturday night dinner speaker Kim du Toit spoke on how he believes individuals can help Make America Great Again. He says there is a Boomershoot report to follow once he returns to Texas. Also, he has a plan to sponsor a free Boomershoot dinner for all participants. We will discuss the details and give his idea serious consideration.

The weather was mixed with showers on Saturday but Friday and Sunday was dry and a bit cool. The targets had a high detonation rate. We did not find any targets which failed to detonate when they received a solid hit. There were the usual targets which were torn and lost content when hit by projectiles of wood, rock and ammonium nitrate prills from other targets which detonated.

We had a last minute problem with the land owner on the hillside informing us the USDA Conservation Reserved Program had recently informed him the rules were being interpreted much more strictly than in the past. Hence we couldn’t put any targets on the grass. This limited the most distant targets to about 690 yards to 700 yards and about 30 feet in width. We put targets in this area out in two batches.

The muddy 375 yards berm was handled in a special manner as well. In previous years with extreme mud we found the blast from targets would completely coat remaining targets with mud which was near perfect camouflage. To prevent this we put targets in this area out in three batches. The targets were given greater spacing in depth as well as elevation. This was a huge help. There was virtually no mud coating of nearby targets.

The first two batches at the 375 yard line were the usual mix of small (4″x4″ and some 3”x3”) and a few 7”x7” targets. The last batch was a last minute idea of mine. Instead of putting the remaining 140 7”x7” targets out near 700 yards we put them at 375 yards. This made the end of the event easy, fast, and exciting. A Boomershoot Grand Finale! It seemed to be a great hit.

I had one shooter tell me, “I had my bench and everything packed up and then I saw there were a whole bunch of big targets at 375. That’s like a bank setting a bunch of cash out in the open for everyone. I had to unpack my gun and shoot from the ground. I got another 10 targets and one probable.

20220501_105719
Some of the more elaborate setups.

20220501_124828
One of my co-workers and his wife with heads down.

The remainder of this post is high in image intensity and so I have split it to save people bandwidth.

Continue reading →

John Ross died

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Via email from Stephen P.:

If you had not known already:

(Quote from Rawles’ Survivalblog)

“I was saddened to hear that pro-gun novelist John Ross passed away. He is of course remembered as the author of the very influential novel Unintended Consequences. Please say a prayer for his family members.”

I remember when the book came out in 1996… I was working at Microsoft and some members of The Microsoft Gun Club (as it was called at the time, I think it is now called Gun Club at Microsoft) referred to it as “The Bible” for gun owners. It is an extremely influential book. While it could have used a good editor to reduce it by at least a third I still recommend reading it.

In 2004 I sent Ross an email inviting him to Boomershoot 2005 and he called me to discuss it. There are a few QOTDs by him and other references to him on this blog as well.

Update: Michael Bane also has some things to say about John Ross.

Quote of the day—Angela Belcamino @AngelaBelcamino

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Can we ban all accounts who tweet “free speech?”

Angela Belcamino @AngelaBelcamino
Tweeted on April 27, 2022
[At first I thought it might be sarcasm. But upon close inspection I don’t think it is.

After reading many of her tweets, I’m still not sure how to classifier her. Is she merely ignorant of history or is she evil? Perhaps the correct answer is “Both!”—Joe]

Quote of the day—Rogue Skillet an Robasdanach @ButtholeOutlaw

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I don’t know who needs to hear this but your gun collection is not a substitute for your lack of assertiveness in the bedroom.

Rogue Skillet an Robasdanach @ButtholeOutlaw
Tweeted on March 16, 2022
[It’s not only another Markley’s Law Monday, it is another science denier!

Via a tweet from Law Firm of SolitaryPoorNastyBrutish&Short @AubreyLaVentana.

I suppose insults are better than nothing. But, it makes it obvious he has nothing of substance.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Anonymous

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And a dozen years after McDonald v. Chicago, the Second Amendment still doesn’t really exist in the 2nd, 4th, 9th circuits etc. I am all about fighting in the courts, but that’s hardly sufficient to secure liberty. You need to fight in the political arena.

Anonymous
April 24, 2022
[The author prefers some privacy. The link will only give you the source if you are one of those allowed access.

It’s not just the political arena, which is absolutely critical in some jurisdictions for court appointments, it’s the culture of the population. Gun owners need to “come out of the closet”, take non-shooters to the range, show them gun owners are safe, friendly, and good neighbors and friends.

Today is the long range event of Boomershoot. It features hundreds of highly reactive targets, a massive opening fireball that draws cheers and applause, and spectators from nearly 300 (and occasionally over 1000) miles away. Boomershoot is an mind blowing awakening for people who only know of guns through the lens of legacy media. Attend, share your Boomershoot stories with friends, neighbors, and family to help change the cultural view of gun ownership.—Joe]