They say there have been many double barreled guns in the past, which of course is true, but the purpose has always been to have multiple shots available, either in leiu of a repeater (before there was any such thing as a repeater) or to have a second shot on hand without working an action, usually in a large African caliber or a shotgun. In this case both barrels fire together. It’s an interesting novelty. Maybe you could fiber/epoxy a couple of 1911s together and have a similar experience. The variations on the jam, or other stoppage, should be interesting as well. The two barrels are serviced by a common slide.
Sustainability
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.
Evidence of inflation
I recently purchased some Potassium Chlorate for Boomershoot 2013. The delivered price per pound increased 47% from March of this year. Both the price for the chemical and the cost of shipping increased by nearly the same percentage.
It won’t really affect the next Boomershoot but if the inflation rate were to continue at 47% every nine months (approximately 65%/year) it would cause me considerable concern and change the planning for Boomershoot 2014.
Quote of the day—David Hardy
Not all the media is in the tank for Obama. It’s a heck of a situation, though, when Pravda is the one hold out.
David Hardy
November 26, 2012
Not all the media is in the tank for Obama
[Even excluding Pravda it’s a slight exaggeration to say that all the media is in the tank for Obama. But it’s close enough to be funny.
The most interesting part of the article is that Pravda is touting the free market and criticizes Obama and the U.S. for repeating the USSR mistake of going down the Marxist path.—Joe]
O-care strikes
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.”
Interesting shift
From Guns Aren’t the Problem, The NRA is the Problem
A fight against the right of Americans to own guns is one that almost certainly can never be won. But a concerted effort to make gun ownership safer by enacting and strengthening common sense efforts to protect public safety through, for example, closing the gun show loophole and banning bullet clips that hold 100 shells, can and must be won if we want to reduce gun violence in the US. And the way to win that fight is to paint the NRA, which takes advantage of its own members in order to promote a reactionary and dangerous agenda of turning the US into a version of the old Wild West, as the out-of-control villain that it is.
Emphasis added.
It might be all from the same source but I have seen several instances where the anti-gun people are advocating restrictions on 100 round magazines with no mention of a 10 round limit as is the usual threshold for demonic possession.
While that is certain to ease the political resistance to capacity restrictions on firearms the statistics where such magazines played a definitive role in the execution of a crime are going to be exceedingly poor. I would be willing to bet that you will find a much higher correlation to crimes committed by people wearing gray hoodies greater than size XL simultaneously with size 12 or greater Nike shoes than you would to 100 round magazines being correlated to crime.
But don’t expect the facts and logic to be important to these people. It’s about the implicitly admitted long term fight “against the right of Americans to own guns.” The 100 round threshold is the camel’s nose.
Quote of the day—danceronice
In Boston, we had a name for the city’s laws about self-defence weapons, from pepper spray on up: “Call 911 and Die.”
danceronice
September 2, 2012
Comment in a forum with the topic of Gun control: you for or against?
[Yup. There is also a book by that name.—Joe]
Imagine the implications
Last week Ry came into my office and told me of an article he had read.
This is the “money quote”:
When the four molecules key to the smell of rose were combined with an olfactory white mixture, the rose smell was effectively obscured — showing that olfactory white could be used to mask odours, from the smell of public toilets to that of cocaine or explosives.
If that works on dogs as well as human the implications are very interesting.
Oh deer!
After Thanksgiving dinner brothers Doug, Gary, Dad, and Uncle Darrell and I went for a drive and looked at various things at the place where Dad and Uncle Darrell had grown up. We then went for a drive “around the loop” to see other old landmarks Doug wanted some historical discussion on. I took video of most of the discussion about the place my grandfather and great uncle used to own.
When we were driving around we saw a herd of about a dozen whitetail deer. I had enough time to put on my telephoto lens and take some pictures. It’s interesting to see the deer in motion stopped by the camera:
New equipment for Boomershoot 2013
I’m always searching for new ways to improve Boomershoot. I recently ordered a OXO Good Grips Food Mill from Amazon in the hopes it could speed up the processing of the potassium chlorate we use for making Boomerite.
Saturday I tried it out. I first used the smallest screen which is similar in size to the current strainers we use to remove the lump (and sometimes “rocks”) from the potassium chlorate.
A strainer used in preparing potassium chlorate.
Food mill used in preparing potassium chlorate.
The result was that I could process the chemical about 20% faster. I could get about 160 grams per minute through the mill. That was good but not great.
I next tried the medium screen. I got 310 grams/minute! That is a significant improvement and the quality of the result appeared to be just as good as what we have been using. This is probably close to the rate at which a single mixer can consume it in the production of Boomerite. We have two mixers that we sometimes put to use when have enough people.
I was running short of time but I will try the large screen the next time I get a chance.
Boomerite from cold packs
Last April Rolf gave me three instant cold packs you buy at the drug or sporting goods store. Yesterday I opened them up:
I poured the prills of ammonium nitrate into a bowl:
The three packs combined gave me 370 grams of AN. I scaled the other components for Boomerite appropriately and mixed as usual:
It made enough to almost fill a 4″ target box:
I put it near the base of a tree and as usual it created a small “smoking” (it’s actually water vapor not smoke) crater when detonated by a .223 bullet:
Update: I did a little poking around online and found that cold packs are not all made equal:
Depending upon which warehouse we fulfill your order from the Ingredients may be: Ammonium Nitrate, Water or Urea, Water. Express orders will be fulfilled with Urea, Water to avoid Hazardous Materials shipping fees. Both products work well for an exceptional quality cold therapy product.
Urea requires processing with some hazardous chemicals (strong acid IIRC) to be made into something that will go boom.
Did you vote?
An infographic on the low voter turnout in the election. The verbal summary:
Voter turnout for 2012 fell to 118 million from 2008’s impressive turnout of 131 million, with only 60% of eligible voters actually exercising their right to choose their government. In an election where the difference in the popular vote was less than 5 million, the 78 million people who chose not to vote might have made a huge difference. So how did President Obama get out the vote? Tweets, likes and status updates.
Via an email from Chloe (sent two weeks ago and I am just now getting around to responding to).
Super moss!
On November 11th Barb L. and I went on a hike to Wallace Falls. As usual it was an interesting hike. The falls are very pretty. The elevation gain is 1200 feet which is noticeable but not extreme. The trail starts out very wide and easy but gradually gets more difficult. Plan on spending about a half day to get in, enjoy the view, and back out. It takes about two hours each direction. A little than that getting in and a little less getting out if you don’t spend too much time resting and admiring the view. Take water (we didn’t and were sorry) and perhaps a snack.
On the way out my left knee started aching (from old tennis injuries) and it required some ibuprofen for a few days afterward.
This is in the Cascades and the area gets a lot of rainfall. I took some pictures of the moss to which Barb exclaimed, “Super Moss!” Yeah, I guess you could say that:
The trail goes beyond the upper falls but hikers are strongly cautioned to be prepared if you continue:
There were of course other interesting things to take pictures of:
Middle Falls
Upper Falls
Random thought of the day
Quote of the day—Kit Carson
The Left insists the Nazis are a great evil. It is misdirection. They are the same –Totalitarians. We must resist them both, communists and fascists. They will always be with us. We must never relent.
Kit Carson
November 22, 2012
Comment to The “Hollywood Holocaust” and Other Cold War Myths
[H/T to Glenn Reynolds who was going to get QOTD with his post but a lot of other people already quoted him.
Reynolds claim brings up an interesting thought:
Refusing to hire Communists is on the same moral plane as refusing to hire Nazis. Which is to say: It’s a good and admirable thing.
To the best of my knowledge it is not against the law in the U.S. to discriminate in hiring based on the politics of the job candidate. The communists and Nazis both used party membership in hiring to great effect. I wonder how much it is being used by the left now in jobs and if it can be openly used. I know one rabid Obama supporter who changed her name on Facebook because she believed it was making it difficult to get work.
If employers openly hired and purged existing employees based on their politics what would be the result? Could that turn our collapse into socialism around? Or would it inspire laws such that employers could not discriminate or even required discrimination based on loyalty to the socialists in this country?—Joe]
Quote of the day—Jeffrey Singer
Health insurance will soon be extinct. Unlike other members of the species – property and casualty insurance, life insurance, liability insurance, auto insurance – political predators have been steadily killing off health insurance over the years. Soon it will cease to exist, allowing for more intrusive regulation of behavior.
Jeffrey Singer
November 16, 2012
Jeffrey Singer: Health insurance an endangered species
[H/T to Barb L. via email.
I’ve heard it claimed that Obama Care has to have been specifically designed to destroy the health care industry. Singer explains why the health insurance industry will be destroyed.—Joe]
Quote of the day—Larry Elder
This battle for ‘common-sense’ gun control laws pits emotion and passion against logic and reason. All too often in such a contest, logic loses. So, expect more meaningless, if not harmful, ‘gun control‘ legislation. Good news – if you’re a crook.
Larry Elder
From Thinkexist.com.
[I have been unable to determine when he said this. While true 15 years ago expecting more gun control legislation is less and less a good bet. I’m skeptical it is because logic and reason suddenly are winning contests against emotion and passion. I expect it is because we are accumulating more emotion and passion on our side.—Joe]
Putting setbacks into perspective
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.)
Quote of the day—Erma Bombeck
What we’re really talking about is a wonderful day set aside on the fourth Thursday of November when no one diets. I mean, why else would they call it Thanksgiving?
Erma Bombeck
From Quote DB.
[I hope everyone had a nice turkey day. I spent it with son James, his wife Kelsey, my parents, brothers, Uncle Darrell, Aunt Alice, and brother Doug’s children Amy (and Nate and Jared), Lisa (and Kevin) and Brad.
We had way too much really good food and stuffed ourselves.—Joe]
Quote of the day—tdiinva
Since nanny Bloomberg has chosen to limit his citizens self defense option his failure to call in the Guard is failure to live up to his obligations as their nanny.
tdiinva
November 19, 2012
Comment to Bloomberg F-Bombs Request for National Guard Aid.
[Via a link from Sebastian.
It’s a fundamental problem of being a nanny with a scope larger than a few children. Just because a nanny is an appropriate solution in some situations does not mean is is possible to scale it up and make it work at a much larger scale. If it did work we would see both biological and manmade systems organized much differently than we do. Both evolution and the free marketplace would have created systems with central control to dominate over those systems that pushed the decision making to the lower levels rather than pushing it up. Your brain doesn’t control the details of cell metabolism and your web browser doesn’t control how the mouse determines if it has been moved.
I’m channeling Thomas Sowell as best I can with the following.
The problem is one of information. You, a fully functional adult, know more than anyone else about your situation and what is best for you. You know a lot more about your family than people not in your family. You know more about how to do your job than people that don’t do your job. You know more about your community than people outside your community. And you know a lot more about your situation than does the mayor of your city, the governor of your state, and the president of the country. Central planning fails because the people with the most information about the situation are not making the decisions.
Even if it were possible for all the information needed for making optimal decisions were to be communicated to the central planners they cannot process the information nor come up with innovative alternatives that the individuals and small groups closer to the problem can.
One might be tempted to say that central planning failed in the past because of this fundamental problem but we have much better communication and processing power than we did even a decade or two ago. Central planning can work now that we have computers. Those people are wrong.
Even ignoring the obvious SkyNet dystopian scenarios look at the way engineers solve control problems in complex systems now. Heinlein was a visionary in many ways but “Mike” the computer in The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress will never be implemented as Heinlein envisioned it—handling payroll, air flow, mass launchers, communications, and a thousand other things.
Whether it is a large software program, a cell phone network, or a sewage treatment plant the far cheaper, better performing, and feasible solution is to delegate “authority” to very small subsystems to solve the issues that are local. The video driver in your computer is given a command to set the background to a color and output text at certain coordinates on the display. The video driver “knows” how to control the chips of the graphics board to change the color of the display and what address in memory corresponds to the coordinates of the screen. The local cell tower “knows” signal strength of your phone, the number of other cell phones it is handling, and communicates with nearby cell towers to enable a clean handoff such that you don’t have a service interruption as you move from location to location. The components of the sewage system control air and water flow rates, agitation, and chemical balances without knowledge of the price of electricity or the growth rate of the town it serves.
At each subsystem level the information and the resources are available such that they can do the right thing to operate their area of responsibility in a manner that is a tradeoff of performance, time to implement, initial cost, and operating cost.
Bloomberg and other central planners do not and cannot have the information to even approximate optimal decisions and they deny resources to those that do have the information. The result is a dystopian world that has the potential to be just as catastrophic as one where “SkyNet” has all the information and resources to create Elysium but instead makes the decision to destroy humanity.—Joe]