Dust in the Dustbin

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Today, March for Our Lives is in disarray. Funding shortfalls and a rift between its board and younger staffers… have strained the organization. And a recently filed federal lawsuit accuses the board of racism and retaliation.

On March 20 of this year, just before the seven-year anniversary of its celebrated rallies, MFOL terminated 13 of its 16 full-time employees.

Firearms Policy Coalition @gunpolicy
Posted on X, August 20, 2025

See also: Inside the Chaos at March for Our Lives.

As I said the other day, our recent progress has to be putting pressure on donations.

At this point MFOLs has to be rendered powerless to cause us any damage. I think it is extremely unlikely they will recover. They are just dust in the dustbin of history.

Trusting the Science

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Before I started researching gun deaths, gun-control policy used to frustrate me. I wished the National Rifle Association would stop blocking common-sense gun-control reforms such as banning assault weapons, restricting silencers, shrinking magazine sizes and all the other measures that could make guns less deadly.

Then, my colleagues and I at FiveThirtyEight spent three months analyzing all 33,000 lives ended by guns each year in the United States, and I wound up frustrated in a whole new way. We looked at what interventions might have saved those people, and the case for the policies I’d lobbied for crumbled when I examined the evidence. The best ideas left standing were narrowly tailored interventions to protect subtypes of potential victims, not broad attempts to limit the lethality of guns.

Leah Libresco
October 3, 2017
Opinion | I used to think gun control was the answer. My research told me otherwise. – The Washington Post

Reality is tough. And when reality contradicts what you firmly believe, it is even harder to see and accept. I have to give Libresco a lot of credit for this.

Peace For Our Time?

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My personal belief is that history shows that this war of aggression, which is part of a wider Putin aspiration to restore the old Russian Empire and achieve dominance in Europe, can only be resolved by a Russian defeat that would lead to real deterrence. But that is not what is on offer.

The next few days and hours will write the future for our children and grandchildren. The future defeat of the West, which is what is coming down the line as the result of a bad peace deal, would not see a repeat of the Holocaust. It would see a new Russian dominated Europe. The people with most to fear would be the blue-haired protesters on our campuses and in our streets, as well as the LGBTQ+ community who would certainly cease to exist. A newly dominant Russia would and could not tolerate such diversity and certainly not any form of dissent.

Tim Collins
Former British Army officer who served with the SAS and as commander of the Royal Irish
August 19, 2025
Putin could never afford to take the Ukrainian land he wants. He must not get it for free

I don’t see Putin accepting any deal that gives him anything less or equal to what he expects to be able to take in the next year.

And if the response of countries like Finland and Sweden (who joined NATA in response to the war) are an accurate assessment of Putin’s intentions, making such a deal will go down in history like Chamberlain’s “Peace for our time” deal did.

Prepare appropriately.

I’m aggressively pushing for the completion of my underground bunker in Idaho.

A Good Shoot

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If there is such a thing as a good shoot, it is really just one of the least bad outcomes, this is one of them:

An Illinois mother shot and killed a man accused of breaking into her home at night, police say.

The break-in happened at about 10:30 p.m. Friday, Aug. 15, the Joliet Police Department said in a news release.

According to police, the woman heard what sounded like someone forcing their way into her home, so she hid in an upstairs bedroom closet with her baby, and armed herself with a gun.

When the man went into the bedroom, she opened fire, hitting him in the head, police said.

Officers arrived to find the man “unresponsive,” and he was confirmed dead at the scene, according to the department.

The man was wearing gloves and had a screwdriver, police said, adding that there were “signs of forced entry.” The woman told police she didn’t know the man.

Even with the early retirement, someone made a very poor career choice that night.

Another Brick in the Wall

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Cooling-off periods do not fit into any historically grounded exceptions to the right to keep and bear arms, and burden conduct within the Second Amendment’s scope. We conclude that New Mexico’s Waiting Period Act is likely an unconstitutional burden on the Second Amendment rights of its citizens.

Timothy Tymkovich
US federal appellate judge for the 10th Circuit
August 19, 2025
Federal Appeals Court blocks New Mexico’s 7-Day gun purchase waiting period

It is a small step. But the steps add up.

The anti-gun people have to be getting very depressed. Not just because of the lost ground but because this is going to reduce donations. Why donate money when progress toward a full gun ban is completely blocked?

On the other hand, our side should be donating money to the groups most effective in the courts. The momentum is on our side. Let’s push this as fast as we practically can.

Number 30 to Help Bury the Racist Roots

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Permitting laws are nothing less than a burdensome tax on law-abiding citizens who wish to self-defend. Having North Carolina become the 30th permitless carry state is something these lawmakers should be proud of. We appreciate Representative Penny’s leadership in committing to an override, and we salute all the other legislators who are resolved to end a policy that’s deeply rooted in a racist past.

Alan Gottlieb
CCRKBA Chairman
August 18, 2025
CCRKBA CELEBRATES PROGRESS IN NORTH CAROLINA ON PERMITLESS CARRY | Citizens Committee For The Right To Keep And Bear Arms

Never forget the racist history of gun control:

STI Benefits to Monogamous Relationships

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While I wanted to respond with this information to a comment it is much better as a post.

Via Copilot:

StudySample SizeRelationship Type% Reporting STI DiagnosisNotable Insights
Lehmiller et al., 2015 – Journal of Sexual Medicine556CNM18.3%CNM participants reported more condom use and STI testing than monogamous ones.
Monogamous17.6%Nearly 25% of monogamous participants reported infidelity, often without protection.
2012 National Survey of Sexual Health and Behavior (CDC)2,270CNM (Open Relationships)14.0%Higher condom use for anal sex and more frequent testing.
Non-consensual Non-monogamy22.0%Highest STI risk due to secrecy and lack of protection.
Monogamous13.0%Lower reported STI rates, but testing frequency was also lower.

:

CNM means “consensual non-monogamy”

Copilot sums the studies up with:

  • CNM relationships show comparable or slightly higher STI diagnosis rates, but this is offset by greater testing and safer sex practices.
  • The highest STI risk is found in relationships with non-consensual infidelity, not CNM.
  • Monogamous individuals may be lulled into a false sense of security, especially when testing is infrequent or infidelity is hidden.

It isn’t as clearly stated as it could be, but it because of the lower testing rates in the monogamous relationships the actual STI rates may be higher than reported in the studies. Hence, if anything, the STI benefits, already near zero, to monogamous relationship may be overstated by the studies.

Ironically, if someone insists STI avoidance is the reason of monogamous relationships if they really wanted to decrease the risk they should be in a CNM relationship or, best of all, give up sex.

This reminds me of the Robert Heinlein quote:

If “everybody knows” such-and-such, then it ain’t so, by at least ten thousand to one.

And, of course, there is the stubborn belief that gun control makes people safer when the facts indicate More Guns, Less Crime.

Alternate Reality

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A lot of people have opinions like:

  • no man would ever seriously date a whore
  • promiscuous people have relationships that fall apart
  • this is setting everybody else for so much drama
  • slutty people are secretly suppressing their actual hatred of the lifestyle etc.

This all feels so bizarre to me. I live in a culture where none of the ‘slutty people are unhappy and failing at relationships” thing is true – or rather, not moreso than it is in non-slutty cultures. It seems like it’s hard for people to envision how a life might work where there’s a high contingent of happy, slutty people.

…

So to help visualize, here’s some instances from the lives of myself and people I know. Names are changed, and some details are slightly altered to preserve anonymity.

  • We know a lot of each other’s fetishes. “I’ve been horny lately,” says a girlfriend of mine. “Oh,” says the girl groupchat, “I’d recommend trying to bang Mike. He’s really into this thing you’re into.” But another girl chimes in – “Actually I’m not sure, Mike is definitely into x but I think you’re actually more into y, and it might not work out. Worth trying, though!
  • I’m hanging out with a group of friends, which includes Bob and Alice, who are married. Bob and Alice are getting ready to try to conceive a baby; they’ve moved into a group house with other soon-to-be parents for communal support, we’ve discussed birth control methods with Alice and how her sexual behavior is going to change once she enters the ‘active conception attempts’ phase.At one point someone mentions how big Bob’s dick is. I’ve had sex with Bob, and I agree that it’s big – I say that whenever Bob approaches at orgies, the other guys tell me ‘oh you’re in for it now’. Most of the other women there have also had sex with Bob. Alice says something about how her husband’s dick is big but she didn’t realize it was that big, and then we tease her about having high standards for dick sizes. We discuss the one other person at an orgy who had an even bigger dick – what’s his name – someone remembers. We agree that it was probably girthier but not necessarily longer.
  • A friend of mine is a mega slut, with bodycount in the multiple hundreds. She married a very successful guy, spent the marriage helping her husband get laid and having threesomes, and now has a few young kids.
  • I’m hanging out in a group of friends and their friends and I overhear someone saying “well you guys might find this weird but I’m actually monogamous”
  • My boyfriend is having a girl he’s dating over. He’s mentioned he’d be interested in banging her casually in the open, and I say sure. She’s sitting on the couch with us, and he starts having sex with her in front of me (with her consent). It looks nice so I ask the girl if she’d like me to take photos of them. She says no. About ten minutes later (still in the middle of getting railed on the couch) she says “actually I changed my mind, photos would be nice”. I’m like daw ok, and I get a lot of photos of them having kinky sex. I text them to her afterwards.
  • “I was at Susan’s garden party, sheepishly admitting to just having had sneaky sex with someone in the closet. Susan overheard and said “wait you should fuck my husband!” and went over to get him.”

Aella
June 25, 2025
Anecdotes From The Slutcloud – by Aella – Knowingless

I did not post the entire set of examples. This is just a sample.

Some people live in an alternate reality. And it could be someone in the same room with you without you knowing. In some ways, this is totally bizarre to me.

Is there some psychological dysfunction involved? If so, which reality is dysfunctional? Is it possible to even test for dysfunction? How would you create a test that was not biased in favor of the test creator?

Perhaps it is “simply” a culture difference with a different set of tradeoffs being made. But again, how do you determine which culture is best for society? Or is it something that just doesn’t matter, like people having different hobbies? It maybe it does not have any significant social impact, and it would be inappropriate to apply social pressure to conform to one cultural norm over the other.

It is so mind twisting for me that I find it to be a fascinating puzzle.

Taking Blood from the Young

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The idea of taking blood from the young to rejuvenate the elderly is getting an increasing amount of attention from scientists, and a new study has shown how some of the youthful properties of our skin can be restored with this kind of blood swap.

A special 3D human skin model was set up in the lab by researchers, who then tested the effects of young blood serum on the skin cells. By itself, the serum had no effect, but when bone marrow cells were added to the experiment, anti-aging signals were detected in the skin.

It appears that the young blood serum interacts with the bone marrow cells in specific ways to roll back time in skin cells.

David Nield
August 14, 2025
Scientists Identify How Young Blood Reverses Aging in Human Skin Cells : ScienceAlert

Faster please.

Hmmm… This is interesting. Maybe someday I won’t have to harvest blood from the young to maintain my youthful appearance.

A First by the Ninth Circuit

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Today’s mandate issued by the Ninth Circuit marks the first time the court has issued a final decision striking down a law for infringing on the Second Amendment. Between Heller and Bruen, every case heard by a panel which concluded the law was contrary to the Second Amendment was reheard en banc by the court and ultimately upheld. This is a historic victory for Second Amendment rights in the Ninth Circuit and marks a measurable defeat for Governor Newsom and the legislature’s attempts to curtail the exercise of the right to keep and bear arms in California.

Adam Kraut
SAF Executive Director
August 14, 2025
SAF, PARTNERS SECURE HISTORIC VICTORY IN NINTH CIRCUIT – Second Amendment Foundation

The defendants chose not to request an en banc hearing, so we don’t need to worry about that anymore. This is the final decision.

By the Time You Call the Cops

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By the time you call the cops the crime is already done.

(Vanessa) Gothix @GothixTV
Posted on X, August 11, 2025

The full video:

I have nothing more to add. As the Second Amendment Foundation said she, “Nailed it.”

With Friends Like These… Wait, is it True?

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Video footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol shows a man who now works as an adviser at the Justice Department shouting at rioters to “kill” law enforcement officers responding to the attack and calling them “the Gestapo.”

The footage, from a body camera worn by a Metropolitan Police Department officer, was first published Thursday by NPR. The network joined CBS News and other news organizations in suing to obtain thousands of hours of surveillance footage and court exhibits from the more than 1,000 criminal cases brought by the Justice Department against people who allegedly participated in the Capitol attack.

Among those defendants was Jared Wise, who eventually faced six charges as a result of his alleged actions on Jan. 6. He pleaded not guilty. Wise’s hiring by the Justice Department was reported last month. A Justice Department spokesperson said in a statement that Wise “is a valued member of The Department of Justice and we appreciate his contributions to our team.”

Melissa Quinn, Jacob Rosen
August 7, 2025
Video from Jan. 6 attack shows Justice Department adviser telling rioters attacking police to “kill ’em” – CBS News

Assuming this is a truthful representation of the facts, then one has to wonder how well the current administration is vetting new employees. With friends like these you can make a lot of enemies and lose a lot of friends.

But the truthfulness needs some checking. As pointed out by Grok, selective editing of the facts may have created a biased result:

The CBS News story is likely truthful in reporting that body camera footage shows Jared Wise making inflammatory statements during the January 6 Capitol attack, as supported by court records, the FBI affidavit, and corroborating reports from NPR and other sources. His employment at the Justice Department and receipt of a presidential pardon are also substantiated. However, the story’s presentation may carry a narrative bias by emphasizing his actions without fully exploring context, intent, or the broader implications of his pardon and hiring. Without access to the unedited footage, some uncertainty remains about the exact nature of Wise’s statements.

For a definitive assessment, I recommend reviewing the primary body camera footage, if available, or seeking additional court documents related to Wise’s case. If you’d like, I can search for more recent developments or specific footage related to this story.

Do a Resist Tyranny

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Via email:

The Trump administration has bent rules and pushed interpretations in new directions. But after digging into the source evidence, I haven’t seen anything that qualifies as “tyranny.” That said, people shouldn’t ignore the political shifts or assume everything is perfectly fine.

Government should never be trusted. Always be on guard and prepared to respond appropriately.

If it Isn’t True, it is True to Character

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In the movie Tremors Burt Gummer was originally supposed to have an NRA sticker on his truck however his actor Michael Gross objected not because he refused to play an NRA member but because he said Burt was WAY too pro gun to be in the NRA

Dr Death @DrDeath1776
Posted on X, August 11, 2025

I don’t know about the truth of Gross saying that. My AI sources can’t give explicit reference but they agree the sentiment is correct.

Grok reflects my best take on it:

Yes, the claim appears to be true based on available information. Michael Gross, the actor who played Burt Gummer in Tremors, reportedly objected to an NRA sticker on Burt’s truck during the film’s production. His reasoning was that Burt Gummer’s extreme pro-gun stance and extensive arsenal went beyond what the NRA would typically endorse, especially in the context of the 1990s. Gross believed Burt’s character was too radical in his gun enthusiasm to align with the NRA, which might have been seen as more mainstream or cautious in comparison. This sentiment is reflected in posts found on X discussing the matter.

However, without direct confirmation from Michael Gross or primary production sources, this should be considered plausible but not definitively verified.

Back twenty years ago the quiet conversation at the gun range or late in the evening after the “women folk” had gone to bed it was commonly said, “If the politicians think dealing with the NRA is bad, they really aren’t going to like who they will have to deal with if the NRA fails.”

Impressive

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You have to wonder if the shooter had any clue as to what was happening. It appears to me they may have just kept shooting until the gun failed to chamber another round. Did they just think they were missing every shot? They didn’t pick up the clues of the change in recoil and report? And with 35 124 grain bullets in the barrel that is 10 ounces of extra weight.

Via Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras.

Damage Caused by an AR-15 Chambered in 22 LR

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If there were a gun show loophole and an AR-15 chambered in 22 LR capable of doing this that could be pulled though the loophole into reality, then it would have a high-powered rail gun projectile velocity booster with a nuclear power plant for the power source. And even then, the projectile would be vaporized at anything more than a range of a few yards. Still, a lead oxide cloud at some small fraction of c might make for an interesting variation of a shotgun.

Why No Demands for Knife Control?

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Last weekend, a man walked into a Walmart in Traverse City and stabbed 11 innocent people in a random, brutal act of violence. The scene was horrifying—but thankfully, everyone survived.

The media covered the initial shock. The politicians issued generic statements. But something’s missing — something that always seems to go missing when the narrative doesn’t fit: no one is talking about “knife control.” Why is that?

…

This is an important moment in Michigan and across the United States. It’s time to stop pretending the tool is the problem and start focusing on the truth: dangerous people are the threat. And guns, in the hands of the right people, save lives.

Marcy Jankovich
August 6, 2025
Jankovich: Walmart stabbings show flaw in gun control logic

Via Dave Workman.

They aren’t talking about knife control because at this point in the game they are playing it sounds absurd. But had we continued down the path outlined by the most recent Democrat administrations we would have seen our future in England.

A Modest Proposal

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I’ve had enough of FUDDS on the bench.

Put Colion Noir in the next seat.

I want to see supreme court orders mandating machine gun and RPG ownership for everyone over 8 under penalty of summary execution.

_anoneng @_anoneng
Posted on X, August 9, 2025

I think that is an appropriate initial negotiation position. I could see allowing for a small amount of compromise if there push back to the point of not being able to get a majority vote.

What About Unconstitutionally Vague?

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The most fundamental requirement for a legitimate legal regime is that a person must be able to know what the law requires before being held accountable to it. As a recent case out of New Jersey shows, however, the state’s oppressive laws for gun businesses no longer meet even this minimal threshold.

New Jersey arguably has the nation’s strictest gun control laws; it is difficult even for well-meaning people and businesses to thread their way through them to exercise their Second Amendment rights. On top of those laws, in 2022, the state enacted new requirements for each “gun industry member” to “establish, implement, and enforce reasonable controls regarding its manufacture, sale, distribution, importing, and marketing of gun-related products.” These “reasonable controls” are supposed to be geared toward preventing bad outcomes from the diversion and misuse of the industry member’s products by criminals.

Yet just what is expected, on top of the mountain of explicit requirements these businesses already face, is not explained. Gun industry members are supposed to figure that out for themselves. The price for guessing wrong, moreover, could be ruinous litigation from the state’s anti-gun office of the attorney general (AG).

…

In resolving the case, in fact, the superior court washed its hands of trying to untangle what reasonable controls the law actually required of Butch’s Gun World in making the sales in question. Instead, it simply held that because the shop hadn’t imposed any additional measures (beyond following explicit statutory laws) in making the sales, the reasonable controls statute must have been violated in some fashion.

NRA-ILA
August 4, 2025
NRA-ILA | New Jersey Attorney General Platkin: Making Up Gun Control Laws as He Goes Along

You might ask, “Isn’t this unconstitutionally vague?” From the same article:

The court similarly washed its hands of the shop’s contention that the reasonable controls statute violated due process by not explaining its requirements: “This Court is not positioned to determine whether the statute is unconstitutionally vague and will not do so.”

There are some people that need to be prosecuted. This prosecutor and judge are on that list of people.

As I have said before, I won’t be going to New Jersey until they fix their laws, or I can get hunting tags.

He Almost Said My Name

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Wow! Cool project:

When asking for help, he did everything but say my name.

Via Ry.