Jun 242016
 

Who would the USA exit from? I suggest from the federal government. Behold:

There Are Now More Bureaucrats With Guns Than U.S. Marines

The “Militarization of America” report found civilian agencies spent $1.48 billion on guns, ammunition, and military-style equipment between 2006 and 2014. Examples include IRS agents with AR-15s, and EPA bureaucrats wearing camouflage. … Open the Books found there are now over 200,000 non-military federal officers with arrest and firearm authority, surpassing the 182,100 personnel who are actively serving in the U.S. Marines Corps.

I’m sorry (no I’m not), but the government doesn’t get to have temper tantrums and demand that the people should be disarmed while at the same time loading up on the very same arms they say we can’t have.

Whenever there’s a gun control debate, you almost always see the one guy pop up with “Yeah, ok, so what about nukes? Should regular folks be allowed to own nukes? Huh? Should they? Gotcha!” I’ve suggested before that a simple rule of thumb on what arms the civilian populace should not be barred from having is this: I get to buy whatever the internal policing system in the US gets to buy. If the EPA gets to have assault weapons, so do I. If the IRS wants main battle tanks, I should be allowed to buy ’em too. If the Food and Drug Administration gets theater ballistic missiles, so do I. If the Small Business Administration gets weaponized smallpox, then I get the selection of plagues and poxes of my choice.

Don’t want me to have a particular class of weapon, Representative Trigglypants? Then why do *you* get them?

 Posted by at 8:35 am
Jun 232016
 

Since the AR-15 is in the news again, people – and reporters and politicians – have been referring to it as, among other things, a “high power rifle.” Yeah, about that…

That’s not how they teach you to fire that thing. Accuracy has got to suffer.  But that’s about the *only* thing that suffers.

 Posted by at 7:17 pm
Jun 232016
 

So pretty much all day today I’ve been dealing with getting a book assembled. It’s of unusual format (11 inch-high pages about 40 inches long) and of only 27 pages length, but it cost enough to have printed that I only got ten. And so today I ran my butt 40 miles down the road to the print shop to get it (and a few other things that were printed), and once I got home I’ve spent the rest of the day dealing with these project. After many hours futzing around, I have a grand total of one copy of the book all assembled.

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Anyway, I was busy all day today. While driving home I heard something on the radio that made me think someone was playing a little joke, and then forgot all about it. So when I finally finished that first book, I turned on CNN to find that the House Democrats have lost their tiny little minds and have been having a childish temper tantrum all day. If you’ve somehow failed to hear, they’ve been having a “sit in” in the House preventing work from going forward because they lost votes on their initial ideas about restricting the civil liberties of American citizens without due process. Take, for example, Senator Diane Feinstein explaining that it is up to Americans to prove their innocence, a complete reversal of more than 200 years of American jurisprudence. She then goes on to say that that’s just the first step; next comes banning the average civilian firearm.

And the floor of the House looks like it has been invaded by an army of Trigglypuffs, shouting their inane slogans: “Why do you want to let terrorists buy a gun?” “No bill, no breaks!” And other such nonsense, like a bunch of idiot campus causehead protestors. At the same time they’re yapping about wanting a Real Debate, they’re shouting down anyone with an opposing view, like Louis Gohmert pointing out that the Orlando terrorist attack was, in fact, a terrorist attack:

Bah.

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At left, Rep. John Lewis. He made his name in the 1960’s working for civil rights; now he’s working to curtail civil rights.

The reason I turned on CNN in the first place was to see the Libertarian town hall in hopes that maybe, just maybe, the Libertarians might give me hope this time around. But it was pre-empted by coverage of the Democrats House whine-in. It’s very unlikely, but just barely possible enough that maybe there was some thought in advance to scheduling this childish display in order to wipe out one of the few opportunities the Libertarians have of reaching the public.

And apparently Nancy Pelosi is sending out fundraising emails. Even the talking heads on CNN generally agreed that this was “gauche;” the Dems claim they’re doing this to protect families and children and puppies and baby unicorns, but it’s really just a craven and monumentally cynical publicity and fundraising stunt.

Even Raedthinn can’t stand these idjits, and he doesn’t even watch CNN.

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 Posted by at 12:06 am
Jun 152016
 

The most pathetic thing you’ll read today:

What is it like to fire an AR-15? It’s horrifying, menacing and very very loud 

And what was learned? Primarily that the author of the piece is a man not to be respected (bolding mine):

It felt to me like a bazooka — and sounded like a cannon.

One day after 49 people were killed in the Orlando shooting, I traveled to Philadelphia to better understand the firepower of military-style weapons and, hopefully, explain their appeal to gun lovers.

But mostly, I was just terrified.

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The man-child continues:

The recoil bruised my shoulder, which can happen if you don’t know what you’re doing. The brass shell casings disoriented me as they flew past my face. The smell of sulfur and destruction made me sick. The explosions — loud like a bomb — gave me a temporary form of PTSD. For at least an hour after firing the gun just a few times, I was anxious and irritable.

Oh FFS. As someone on Fark correctly posted:

Ye gods. Compared to most “military style” weapons – the M-1 Garand, the M-14, the M-16, the AK-47, a good shotgun – the AR-15 is a BB gun. The standard AR-15 platform is *small,* the bullet is small, the cartridge is small.  I shudder to imagine what this guy would have done had he been confronted with a Barret. Or Odin forbid, a Ma Deuce.

 Posted by at 6:15 pm
Jun 152016
 

Obviously Hillary and Trump are out. I’d been considering Gary Johnson, even though he’s pretty lackluster. But now… all I have are people to vote *against.* Why? Behold:

Gary Johnson Shoots Himself in the Foot: Throws Out Austin Petersen’s Gun

Short form: after clinching the Libertarian nomination, Austin Petersen, another Libertarian candidate, gave Johnson a replica of George Washington’s flintlock pistol. A little odd, but I guess a nice gesture. But hotel guests saw Johnson dumping the pistol into a trash can, fished it out and returned it to Petersen.

Weak. Weeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaak.

 Posted by at 12:05 am
Jun 122016
 

KINDA INTERESTING UPDATE:

Ahem:

Greeson said that Howell harbored no ill will toward gays or lesbians and added that Howell was bisexual.

And from last year…

Two of them referred to an incident earlier in the day in which Howell had pointed his gun at his boyfriend.

So, it seems the overly armed feller from Indiana wasn’t likely going to the LA Gay Pride Parade to blow the place up. He was going there for… well, some other purpose. And he just happened to be hauling his guns and explosives along with him, because he’s apparently none too bright.

—————

After events earlier today in Orlando, police in Santa Monica, CA, arrested *another* guy *apparently* bent on causing havoc at a “Pride Parade” in Los Angeles. This guy, one James Howell,  was from Indiana and had an “arsenal” of guns and a bucket of explosives, and apparently told the police that he wanted to “harm” the event.

You don’t often hear about “buckets” of explosives, but in this case it’s Tannerite. To me this seems a dubious choice for bomb making purposes… it’s a simple mix of aluminum powder and ammonium nitrate, used for exploding targets on a gun range. It’s not a particularly impressive explosive, and setting it off is a chore. Set fire to it? It doesn’t go off. Zap it with electricity? Nada. Whack it with a hammer? Snore. To get it to go off you have to hit it with a relatively powerful supersonic shock, such as you’d get with a rifle round. A pistol round probably won’t do it.

Since it’s a binary explosive, it’s brisance (shattering force) is not particularly good, but it’s heaving force is pretty good. As such it can be used to Blow Stuff Up Good if you use enough of it and shoot it with a high power rifle. Still, to make it really effective as a bomb you’d want to make a pipe bomb of it… which is a problem, since you have to actually shoot it. The pipe *might* play hell with the bullets ability to set off the Tannerite.

This seems like sloppy bomb making. Couple this with the fact that “James Howell” is a perfectly bland euro- American name, this doesn’t seem to indicate that this incident was ISIS inspired. If the bomber-to-be really was intending to set off a bomb  and *isn’t* a Muslim, then things could get politically pretty interesting.

 Posted by at 3:50 pm
Jun 122016
 

Twenty are dead after someone – identity as yet undivulged – opened fire in a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida. The FBI is investigating this as terrorism, which certainly seems reasonable. So, get ready for your new media obsession for the next week or three, at least until Trump opens his yap and says something stupid.

About 20 people dead, more than 40 taken to hospital after shooting at downtown Orlando nightclub

So, since there is as yet no data on the shooter, speculation will of course run rampant. The top four, as it seems to me:

  1. Run of the mill whackjob
  2. Some whackjob with a problem with the club (former employee) or someone there (former boyfriend)
  3. Religious whackjob, tweaked about teh gheys. Note: reports are the terrorist *may* have been wearing a bomb vest, *may* have been strapping bombs to hostages. I leave it to you to decide if that sounds like any religion in particular.
  4. Conspiracy Theory Wildcard: Umm… lessee. Ah, got it. The gunman was brainwashed by Obama to shoot up a Protected Class in order to gin up outrage among the electorate to help ram through new gun control measures and/or divert attention away from Hillarys upcoming indictment

UPDATE: The Daily Fail is already reasonably certain of the motive

UPDATE 2: And we have a winner. Multiple news outlets including CNN are ID’ing the terrorist as one “Omar Saddiqui Mateen” from Port St. Lucie, Florida, American born to Afghani parents.

UPDATE 3: Latest number I’ve heard is 59 dead, confirmed as 50 or more. Worst mass shooting in the US since at least the 19th century.

UPDATE 4: Omar pledged his loyalty to Islamic State on a call to 911 during the shootout.

 Posted by at 5:52 am
Jun 052016
 

Who said Socialism never aided business growth? If you are a grenade manufacturer or dealer, Venezuela is the place to be!

Deaths From Hand Grenades Rise in Venezuela

47 people killed with grenades in 2015. Still small compared to the overall of 27,875 homicides (90 per 100,000). But hey, the economic conditions are so spectacularly awesome that the military is selling things like AT-4 anti-tank missiles to street criminals.

Feel the Bern!

 Posted by at 5:32 pm
May 202016
 

An article describing a little-known Austro-Hungarian submachinegun from 1915:

The ‘Standschutze Hellriegel’ Submachine Gun Is a Mystery

It’s an odd one… with a water-cooled barrel and the choice of either box or drum magazine. But the drum was pretty bizarre… it didn’t affix directly to the gun, but via a flexible chute. Now, if the chute was *really*  long, like three feet, then the gunner could carry the ammo on his back. But it was only a few inches long, which would seem to make the thing pretty cumbersome and limiting.

 Posted by at 8:18 am