@linoge_wotc @rickygervais Exactly. It’s a fetish. @NRA members love fondling those shiny surrogates for actual manhood. #Pathetic
Jeff Fyke
Tweeted on May 6, 2013
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday! Via still another Tweet from Linoge.—Joe]
Quote of the day—Thomas Sowell
There are people who have never fired a shot in their life who do not hesitate to declare how many bullets should be the limit to put into a firearm’s clip or magazine. Some say ten bullets but New York state’s recent gun control law specifies seven.
Virtually all gun control advocates say that 30 bullets in a magazine is far too many for self-defense or hunting — even if they have never gone hunting and never had to defend themselves with a gun. This uninformed and self-righteous dogmatism is what makes the gun control debate so futile and so polarizing.
Thomas Sowell
January 22, 2013
Do Gun Control Laws Control Guns?
[While this is true a case can be made that the ignorance of gun control advocates does not matter. Their ignorance is irrelevant both to them and to us. The only important fact to them is that control is lacking. Independence and freedom, no matter the form, are what they are fighting.
Their single minded goal makes our mission all the more clear. Efforts on our part to remedy their ignorance are wasted. Our only goal is to defeat them.—Joe]
Quote of the day—Sarah Brady
The House passage of our bill is a victory for this country! Common sense wins out. I’m just so thrilled and excited. The sale of guns must stop. Halfway measures are not enough.
Sarah Brady
July 1, 1988
[The Brady Campaign has been using the phrase “common sense” for a long time. It’s good of her to confirm what we all suspected they meant by that.—Joe]
Gun Song – God and Guns by Lynyrd Skynyrd
Lynyrd Skynyrd is a country rock band that has been around a while, originally forming in 1964, and having their strongest popularity in the 70s. They lost three member in a plane crash in ’77, but still had enough to reform for a while later.
This particular song is pretty basic country-boy southern rock with clear vocals.
Quote of the day—Molly Ivins
I used to enjoy taunting my gun-nut friends about their psycho-sexual hang-ups – always in a spirit of good cheer, you understand. But letting the noisy minority in the National Rifle Association force us to allow this carnage to continue is just plain insane.
I do think gun nuts have a power hang-up. I don’t know what is missing in their psyches that they need to feel they have to have the power to kill. But no sane society would allow this to continue.
Ban the damn things. Ban them all.
You want protection? Get a dog.
Molly Ivins
Columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram
March 15, 1993
Taking A Stab At Our Infatuation With Guns
[She also says, “As a civil libertarian, I of course support the Second Amendment.”
Note that this is someone who lives in Fort Worth Texas in 1993. Those were very, very dark days for gun owners.
I could spend several paragraphs picking apart the quote above but I really don’t have the time or interest. I just want to address one point.
If you “get a dog” for your protection keep in mind that it has a mind of it’s own. It isn’t under your full control. A gun does not have a mind of it’s own. You can lock up the gun in a safe and leave it there when you are at work without worrying it will get cranky and bite the neighbor kid that is poking a stick at it if you left it in your yard. When you decide your life is in immediate danger of termination or permanent injury you can pull the trigger and be nearly certain your persuasive forces have been significantly increased when the dog could be thinking of begging for a treat.
If your dog is a weapon big and determined enough to pull down a large attacker do you really want that weapon to have a brain with that much independence, and that much less judgment controlling it’s actions?
If Ivins has evaluated the judgment of dogs versus her own and decided in favor of the dog I’m certainly not going to dispute her conclusion on the basis of the evidence I have seen so far. But she has no business making a similar decision for me or anyone else.—Joe]
Quote of the day—Alan Gottlieb
You simply have to love Piers Morgan. Trying to have a rational conversation with him about guns is like filming a recruiting commercial for the gun rights movement.
Alan Gottlieb
Founder and executive vice president of the Second Amendment Foundation
October 16, 2013
PIERS MORGAN ‘DOESN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT THE SECOND AMENDMENT IS,’ SAYS GOTTLIEB
[This was in response to what happened here:
In this video Piers calls Alan “stupid”. Alan has a degree in nuclear engineering. Piers “studied journalism”. I have spent hours talking to Alan and he’s very smart. I haven’t talked with Piers but my bet is that Alan is a lot smarter than Piers.
Further evidence of this is that this is the first time I have known someone to find a use for Piers. Piers makes a good recruiting tool.—Joe]
Why Republicans are not cowards
You must have principles before you can fail to stand up for them.
Quote of the day—Anshel Sag
Having the ability replicate the human nervous system and some of their thought processes is a good thing to have, but I just hope that there are some very strict checks and balances within these systems. You know, to prevent a Skynet-like event where the robots become self aware and start to realize that the world is a better place without us. It’s a crazy thought, sure, but giving computers the ability to think and feel like humans is also a bit crazy too.
Anshel Sag
October 11, 2013
Qualcomm Takes Us One Step Closer to Skynet with Zeroth Neural Processing Chip*
[The propagation time of human nerves and synapses are many orders of magnitude slower than the electronic analogs because, contrary to the common misunderstanding, biological signals are transmitted via a chemical chain reaction not electrical signals. Electrical signals propagate at nearly the speed of light. IIRC it’s roughly 1 mSec per foot versus 1 nSec per foot. That’s one million times faster.
Imagine being engaged in physical combat with someone that has a OODA loop that is a million times faster than yours. The Terminator/Skynet universe of Hollywood may give you hope that wouldn’t be the reality of it. In that universe the machines were slow to observe and make decisions. In reality their actions would be, for all intents and purposes, instantaneous. If they were to use projectile weapons the compensation for all the environmental conditions, target direction and velocity, and all possible target responses would be calculated and if needed multiple projectiles would be launched to cover the responses.
At work, today, I’m working on something that writes computer code. Given a simple description in a few dozen lines it writes thousands of lines of code that compile and run without error. It completes the task almost before you can lift your finger from the “Enter” key. This same code would take a human many hours, if not days, to write.
Imagine a world with the industrial capacity of machines that not only build machines but can design them as well. There would be automated tools that build better tools and machines without human interaction. And those tools and machines could build better tools and machines than themselves.
It could be utopia. Or it could be a Terminator universe where the battle against an individual human is over in milliseconds and the battle for the entire planet is over in hours.
Sleep well.—Joe]
* See also Qualcomm Zeroth Processors official: mimicking human brain computing
The fun part of hunting
I’ve been asked by non-hunters a couple of times variations on “you think it’s fun to kill innocent creatures? Are you mental?” I replied that of course killing isn’t fun. But it got me to thinking… what IS the “fun” part of hunting? Continue reading
Quote of the day—aallison
There is no possible necessity for a private citizen the need a reloadable semi-automatic weapon.
aallison
October 11, 2013
Comment to Brown misfires on gun control legislation.
[Such ignorance is absolutely staggering.—Joe]
Terminal ballistics and truck skinning
Got some pictures, some are kind of graphic – if you don’t like images of meat processing or bullet holes, don’t click. Continue reading
Quote of the day—Roby Egan
He must have an incredibly small penis #GunControl rawstory.com/rs/2013/01/18/…
Roby Egan (@roby44)
Tweeted on January 20, 2013
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday! Via still another Tweet from Linoge.—Joe]
It must be that eclectic thing
The other day Barb was helping me unpack my stuff at the new clock tower. She was out of sight for a while then came back, walked up to me and said, “You have 242 shirts.”
“And your point is?”, I asked. No verbal reply. There was some body language but it was indecipherable to me. Okay. Whatever. Her Match.com profile did say she was eclectic* so maybe this was an example of this. I thought maybe she just liked to keep count of things like that. She has a great head for numbers. So I asked, “Did you include the ones in the dirty clothes? And I think there are some I left at your place.”
She had not included those and a couple of days later she reported, “You have over 250 shirts.” Again I asked, “And your point is?” Again I got silence and that indecipherable body language.
I thought about it a while and thought maybe she was trying to say I had too many shirts. So I went into my closet and looked. Nope. I still have room for more:
Today she told me she was going to count my gloves.
It must be that eclectic thing again.
Update: Okay. To cut down on the comments and private email telling me to “watch it!” or “run away!” keep in mind that 90% of this post was intended to be a joke. Barb laughed at it as much as I did. I deliberately withheld a lot of context and dialog to make it funny. There are no “lies” in it but there is a great deal of deception in it for dramatic and humor effect.
Thanks for all the concern but I really think people should “chill” just a little.
* Originally it had said, “eccentric” but her daughter suggested “eclectic” instead and so it was changed before I saw it.
When does a .30-06 do a thirty-thirty?
When it has a spectacularly successful bullet failure. Continue reading
Quote of the day—Carl Stevenson
We should have a very long memory of whom in power abuses us and who followed the order to do the abuse.
Perhaps if tyrants’ heads (and also their enablers) were still routinely mounted on sticks alongside the highway, for both a punishment and a reminder of their misdeeds, we wouldn’t have to endure such foolish people as them and the evil they set upon us.
Carl Stevenson
October 11, 2013
Comment to Park Service Milgram Failure.
[It would take a rather long and difficult research project to verify but my hypothesis is that the tyrants have mounted more heads along the roads “for both a punishment and a reminder” than the oppressed have mounted of the tyrants, their underlings, and their enablers.
Regardless of the truth or falsity of my hypothesis I don’t know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. If the tyrants mounted most of the heads then that would remind people of the hazards of letting tyrants gain power. If the victims mounted the most heads then that remind tyrants the hazards of their occupation.
I have been thinking about this sort of thing recently. The outrage of the victims that comes from extended oppression can lead to excessive killing and even genocide. Oppressors everywhere should be aware of this before they chose such a career path.
Think of the French Revolution or the genocide in Rwanda. To a certain extent “they had it coming” but I think society is better served when killing, even of evil tyrants, is done parsimoniously in a deliberate and carefully reasoned manner rather than en masse.—Joe]
Quote of the day—Frederick Douglas
The whole history of the progress of human liberty shows that all concessions yet made to her august claims have been born of earnest struggle. The conflict has been exciting, agitating, all absorbing, and for the time being putting all other tumults to silence. It must do this or it does nothing. If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightening. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters.
This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. In the light of these ideas, Negroes will be hunted at the North, and held and flogged at the South so long as they submit to those devilish outrages, and make no resistance, either moral or physical. Men may not get all they pay for in this world; but they must certainly pay for all they get. If we ever get free from the oppressions and wrongs heaped upon us, we must pay for their removal. We must do this by labor, by suffering, by sacrifice, and if needs be, by our lives and the lives of others.
Frederick Douglas
From here.
[In Great Thoughts by George Seldes a portion of this quote was attributed to a March 30, 1849 letter to Gerrit Smith. But I found that letter in the papers of Douglass and it says nothing even related. I have been unable to find the original date and context of this quote even though portions of it are widely quoted.
I especially like the sentence “Men may not get all they pay for in this world; but they must certainly pay for all they get.” One could make the claim that the entire basis for the Second Amendment is to increase the cost for oppression. It may be that it cannot fully prevent it but it can dramatically increase the cost. And those that would oppress us, even if they may be able to succeed, must be forced to pay a cost. If they do not pay then there is no limit to the oppression they will inflict.
The Colorado Senators who lost their seats in the recall elections because of their oppressive gun control laws and arrogance is a lesson to those who believe oppression is cost free. If they win a battle then make them pay a heavy price.
H/T to Carl Stevenson for his comment which included part of this quote.—Joe]
Hunting with suppressors?
Perusing the WA hunting regs, I see nothing at all about using suppressors. In the part about Prohibited Hunting Methods it talks about caliber, crossbows, shooting across roads, etc. But nary a word can I see about suppressors. Is it legal? Anyone know for sure?
Gun Song – Don’t Shoot Shotgun by Def Leppard
This song is one of the songs that made the band famous, being released on their multi-platinum hit Hysteria album in 1987.
Def Leppard is a classic hard rock band forming in 1977, and is still active. They have sold more than one hundred million records.
Quote of the day—Matthew Willington
@JoeHuffman It is just our daily reminder that Orwells Animal Farm is still relevant today.
Matthew Willington (@MD_Willington)
Tweeted on October 10, 2013 in reference to this post about liberals getting special privileges from the D.C. police.
[Almost for certain Matthew was referring to this line in Animal Farm:
All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
Animal farm is one of the few books I have read more than once. It is a really, really good book and a fairly quick read.
In the past few days I’ve been listening to the book Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto*, thinking about conversations I have had with Marxists, and our current government situation. It appears, and Mikee independently posted the same conclusion, the “liberals” (communists) in our government act as if and work toward the condition of there being no limits on the power of government. The Bill of Rights is considered “loopholes” that citizens “hide behind”. The listening in on our telephone calls, the storing of all our Internet traffic, the tracking of all our vehicles, the tracking of our cell phones, the abuse of the IRS, the search and seizure of property, the requirements of financial disclosure, and much, much more is strong evidence they want there to be nothing to “hide behind”. They are working toward a society where there are no limits to what the state knows about you and what it can do to achieve the ends of those in power.
What many people don’t consciously realize is that the greater the value of some the greater security it much have to protect it. If you leave a penny on the sidewalk there is a good chance that if it is in a puddle of water it will still be there if you come back for it the next day. If you put $1000 in plain view in your locked car near that same sidewalk it is likely to be gone by morning.
The 20 year old beater car needs less security than the new Mercedes. The piggy bank of a child needs less security than an ATM. The ATM needs less security than Fort Knox. The financial information at your accountants office requires less security than the computer system that contains the financial information of an entire nation. The personal information in the medical records of your doctors office needs less security than the computer system that contains the personal information of an entire nation.
Government power is something of great value to those that control it and extraordinary measures must be used to secure against abuse. The enumerated powers, the multiple branches of government, the reservation of powers for the states and the people, and the Bill of Rights, were all intended to secure government power from abuse.
It is extraordinarily clear government power is expanding without the bounds intended and is being abused with the abusers suffering no consequences. The IRS, Fast and Furious, and NSA, scandals are just the tip of the icebergs. We are in a positive feedback loop. The more power government gets the greater the attraction to those that abuse it. Those that abuse it want more power and less controls. The Marxists who want more government power and claim, “We just need the right people in control” either do not understand the issues involved and/or are the very people who should not be in control.
Scary times are here now and far more scary times are ahead. Read Animal Farm and 1984 as they were intended to be read. They are warning of the dangers of government power. They are not instructions manuals.—Joe]
* I’m annoyed by his claim there can be no morality without belief in god(s) but other than the religious parts it’s a good book so far.
Park Service Milgram Failure
The National Park Service is failing a giant national-scale Milgram obedience to authority experiment. They are doing things, blocking off people from open air parks like the WW II memorial, even while individual rangers are saying that it turns their stomachs. Yet they still do it, saying they were told to, and they had no choice. It’s so bad even the Legacy Media is being forced to cover it and acknowledge it’s happening. This is government by spite, pure and simple. And the uniforms carry out their orders, even while complaining about it. And people say “you will never need guns, it can’t happen here.” Sorry to say this, but… it IS happening here, right now.
The rangers, and the rest of the government employees, DO have a choice. A hard choice to be sure, but it’s a choice they MUST make. And they are choosing poorly.
Quick update: Other than massive civil disobedience, and semi-politely getting in their faces and telling them personally they are failing the Milgram test badly, that they have become a cancerous tentacle of political dysfunction that is TRYING to infect and damage the population for spite, and calling / writing your congress-critters, what’s the best response to these toxic leprechauns?