No Excuse

There is absolutely no excuse for this:

Virginia Tech officials could have saved lives if they had quickly warned the campus that two students had been shot to death and a killer was on the loose, a panel that investigated the attacks said Thursday.
Instead, it took administrators more than two hours to get out an e-mail warning students and staff to be cautious. The shooter had time to leave the dormitory where the first two victims were killed, mail a letter, and then enter a classroom building, chain the doors shut and kill 31 more people, including himself.

Two hours. For two blasted hours those students were sitting ducks for that madman. If it was one of my kids that had been on that campus that day, dead or not, I'd have been trembling with rage right about the time I read that. This goes way the hell beyond bad planning if you ask me; this, folks, clearly rises to the level of flat-out criminal malfeasance. If Virginia Tech administrators were not going to allow students the means of defending themselves, then damn it, they should have come up with a better plan than the one they had in place. Seems this one takes the old saying to an entirely new level: "When seconds count, the cops are only two hours away."
And as if that wasn't bad enough, consider the response of the Virginia governor to one parent's demand that university officials be held accountable for their complete and utter failure:

Mr. Kaine, however, told the Associated Press that school officials have suffered enough, and that firing them wouldn't help prevent future incidents.

Call me crazy, but I would think "future incidents" damn well could be prevented if the fired officials' replacements came up with a better plan than the one that was in place before. And call me insensitive too, but considering said criminal malfeasance of these officials, I for one couldn't give a tinker's damn about their "suffering." It was their dropping the ball several times along the way that facilitated that massacre. Heads should roll, and sniveling bureaucrats like Larry Hincker should be called out and loudly ridiculed to boot; after all, we see how his "parents, students, faculty and visitors feel(ing) safe" remark turned out to be the verbalization of such an outrageous delusion. But it's looking as if none of this will happen, and students at Virginia Tech will remain easy targets.

Judgmental Much?

Wow, and to think some people accuse us gun people of frothing-at-the-mouth hatred...

For the people working in the various branches of the gun industry, moral considerations are apparently not a major concern. If you make the guns or sell the guns or rent the guns, and somebody kills him/herself with the gun, or kills someone else, well, you distance yourself and say 'I just made/sold/rented a tool, they chose to use it that way.'

Yeah. Sure. Whatever.

You made/sold/rented a tool that is designed to KILL PEOPLE. And somebody used it for that purpose. So, good work, eh? Feel good about yourself tonight as you're thinking about what you contribute to the human project.

I really should have taken the address of this character's blog as enough of an indication that it's a veritable eternal fount of hideously stereotypical self-righteous horseshit. But no, being the masochist I am, I had to go reading through it. Nothing really new here, just the same old Brady Campaign/Violence Policy Center trash about, for example, a lady's gun being taken from her and used against her -- and this Culturologist character claims it happens "often," but, as is the gun-haters' wont, dares not back that up with any kind of statistic, not even a biased one. Not that anyone with the sense to come in out of the rain would actually believe said statistic, but one would think they'd be trying harder than that. Maybe you could call it another indication that we on the pro-rights are actually winning -- after all, if we weren't, would people like this Culturologist be spouting such vile rhetoric?
And I'd guess he got that degree in Culturology through the mail -- because, if you'll pardon the expression, he obviously doesn't know jack shit about the culture of the American gun-owning community at large; he'll just sit on that high horse and judge us all based on what a few do with guns, as if the problem didn't go any deeper than the supposed "easy availability" of weapons.
Really now. If you wonder why people get to saying things like "they can have my gun when they pry it from my cold dead fingers," then you need look no further than people like this -- people who will not be swayed by any arguments about the natural rights of humans -- people who, due to their blind hatred combined with misguided idealism about gun-free societies, would strip us of our most fundamental right -- the right to effective self-defense. There really is absolutely only one thing we can tell these people, when one gets right down to it:

The short answer to your demands is "No." The longer answer is two words and starts with "F." You can't have our guns...We're not going to give them up. There aren't enough of you to take them from us, and if you try we will resist. Now go away.

Call it frightening, call it dangerous, but is it really anything but cold, hard reality? This may, if you wish, be distilled even more into two simple Greek words that have lived on through the ages...
Molon Labe.

My Rights Day Purchase...

...will be a box of Berry's plated 180-grain 10mm flat-nosed bullets to reload for my Kimber. Tomorrow, I'll load some more in addition to the remainder of the last box I loaded this weekend, and go out and shoot them if it doesn't rain. They make for a great little plinking load behind 12.1 grains of Accurate No. 9. I'd go hotter, but for three things: they're plated bullets, which means you can't drive them too fast lest you strip the plating off and lead the barrel; I'll be using Remington primers instead of CCI, which basically means the prudent thing to do is start again with the minimum load; and this will be firing No. 3 for my current batch of brass. Still, though, with a hollow-point it'd make a pretty decent defensive load if it has the same ballistics as the last batch of Berry's that I drove downrange, at ~1150 fps and ~528 ft-lb. of energy. We'll see how it works -- with luck it'll be tomorrow...

Not-So-Pro-2A Democrats?

Have I mentioned lately how I despise Party apparatchiks?
Via JR and David, with Fits also commenting, we have this little group, the supposedly pro-RKBA Amendment II Democrats. Seems they talk a great game on their home page -- and the rally they're holding in Dallas is a great thing indeed -- but once you get past that and dig deeper, they're not nearly as good as they sound:

Do you actively oppose Democrats who support sensible gun measures if they run for public office?
We are Democrats, and as such we will support our party's nominees for local, state, and federal office. During the primaries, however, if any Democratic candidate supports gun control measures that Amendment II Democrats oppose (such as reauthorizing the national ban on semi-automatics), that primary candidate is fair game, and we will encourage voters to support Democratic candidates who are in greater harmony with our outlook on Second Amendment rights. But once the primaries are over and the candidates for the general election have been chosen, it is important that all Democrats pull together and support our party's candidates as best as we are able. Under no circumstances will Amendment II Democrats support Republican candidates who run against anti-RKBA Democrats. We are, after all, Democrats.

So it would seem here that when we get right down to the brass tacks, party's going to trump principle. That being the case, what the hell's the point of this organization? Maybe they meant they'd stay home if anti-RKBA Dems eventually got the nomination for their respective offices, but until I hear otherwise I'm gonna guess they meant to say that if it came down to a pro-gun Republican versus an anti-gun Democrat, they would go in there and punch the ballot for the candidate who would strip them of their most vital civil liberty, for no other reason than the fact that he has a "D" behind his name. Or hers, as the case may be. And then how about the whole "sensible gun measures" bit? Who the hell gets to define "sensible"? We all know exactly how the Democratic leadership defines it. They're just too chicken to take it to the people because they know the party as a whole would be thrown out on their ear for it. And these so-called
Amendment II Democrats will sit there and vote for these gun-grabbers so long as they have the D behind their names. It would seem to me the RKBA isn't nearly as important a bedrock principle as it is an attempt to woo pro-gun voters who are moderate on other issues besides gun control -- mere bait, if you will. Call me a cynic, but if they're not willing to go against their party when it really counts, then just what good are they? I want these people on our side, really, I do. But until they stand up and withhold their votes from anti-gun Dems, then all the talk about supporting the RKBA really is just that -- talk -- and you know what they say about THAT.

Sunday Morning Musical Musings: Maybe It's A Familiar Complaint, But Still...

I was driving around taking care of some business yesterday morning, and on the radio in the truck I heard an old favorite of mine from the early '90s. You might remember 1993, when a bunch of the country hitmakers of the day decided to get together and record Common Thread: The Songs of the Eagles. Travis Tritt's "Take It Easy" was the big hit from that record and seems to be a mainstay of country radio even now, but to my mind the best cut from that recording was Alan Jackson's rendition of "Tequila Sunrise," the song I heard as I was tooling around in the truck. Maybe it's just the way Alan sings -- he could probably make Slayer sound country -- but to my ear, that particular recording seems to be more country than a lot of what's getting spun these days. I'll freely admit to being a bit of a curmudgeon, musically speaking. I love Haggard and Jones and Charley Pride and John Conlee and all the other folks from the days gone by; we're quite lucky, I think, to have a station here in Southeast Texas that plays all that, even if they could stand to put more variety in the playlist. But I'll put my varied popular musical tastes up against anyone's. I was listening to Seether yesterday afternoon, and
Kelly Clarkson's Breakaway cd often finds its way into the player during the post-range gun-cleaning ritual, just to name a couple of examples. And I just can't help but think it's a sad commentary on what passes for mainstream "country" music now that a cover of a "rock" song from 30 years ago has so much more of that down-home country sound to it than too much of what's getting played now. I know the Eagles have often been branded as a "country-rock" band and no doubt more than a few rock fans back then had as much of a gripe with them as I do with acts like Keith Urban and Sugarland, but I'll still say it...if I wanted to listen to what's more or less middle-of-the-road pop music, I'd tune to the adult-contemporary station. (As far as non-country goes, I usually tune to contemporary hit radio.) I remember reading an article a few years back from Peter Cooper, who I think was working for the Nashville Tennessean at the time, lamenting the state of modern country music after that year's American Music Awards. He had this to say:

In Nashville, we have a Country Music Association and a country music industry. Yet we seem to blindly accept that Shania Twain's Def Leppardish drums or Billy Gilman's Star Search-y One Voice are country, merely because the songs are played on country radio and a portion of the retail proceeds end up in Tennessee wallets.
"But isn't this really just a matter of innovation, like the symphonic pop string arrangements that sounded awfully pretty on Patsy Cline's records? Wasn't the fuzz-toned rock guitar a good thing on Marty Robbins' Don't Worry? Doesn't it sound good when contemporary artist Clay Davidson lets his Southern Rock roots show?"
The difference is that Cline, Robbins, Davidson and scores of others have successfully tweaked the genre's commonly accepted norms. Innovation in country music sometimes means helping the tree to grow new branches.
At the AMAs, though, the tree was chopped and chipped and the roots were removed. Then someone put an aluminum pole where the tree once was and called it ... a tree.

Shania Twain and Billy Gilman have long disappeared from the scene, but I think Cooper's laments are every bit as valid today as they were six years ago. Incidentally, it should be noted that the "fuzz-toned rock guitar" in the 1962 Marty Robbins hit was an accident; it was supposed to be a straight-ahead bass guitar solo, but the taping mechanism they were using malfunctioned as the song was being recorded, resulting in that famous fuzz-tone.
Cooper's closing words were quite apt as well:

...if country means "whatever," it really means nothing at all. It's nothing more than an asparagus steak, or Bogart's mythical desert seaside, and the fan base is likely to further recede. No one goes to an Italian restaurant hoping for tacos.

There are those of us to whom the term "country music"still does mean something. And too much of what "country radio" and the Nashville establishment calls "country" isn't.

More East Coast Mainstream Media Idiocy

Via this morning's Chron, from Courtland Milloy of the Washington Post, the latest example of why so many of us in "fly-over country" hold the big-city mainstream media in such low regard...

Too bad Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick that people like me love dogs more than cows. Or, to put it another way, I prefer the taste of Angus and Hereford to Rottweiler and pit bull. Otherwise, the federal agents who recently charged Vick with dogfighting would have to arrest nearly all of us for participating in far worse acts of animal cruelty.
Ex-Beatle Paul McCartney is credited with having said: "If slaughterhouses had glass walls, everyone would be a vegetarian." Well, they don't -- and most of us are carnivores. We'll kill a duck, deer, turkey -- name any meat -- for the sheer entertainment of our palates or for the fun of the hunt.

*snip*

Vick's farm was raided by agents from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the same USDA that permits the wholesale slaughter of cows, chickens, pigs and lambs.
Vick's case ought to be handled by a state's attorney, but it isn't. He is being prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Virginia. You'd think the guy had been caught smuggling a ton of heroin in the carcasses of dead poodles. U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson is presiding. His previous experience includes hearing cases that involve people suspected of being al-Qaeda sympathizers or "enemy combatants."
Perpetrators of gun violence ought to be taken so seriously.
According to data recently released by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, nearly half of more than 10,000 guns recovered by law enforcement authorities in the Washington area came from Virginia. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people -- human beings, not dogs -- have been killed by these guns. But you won't find any gun manufacturers -- or even many killers, for that matter -- being hauled into court on conspiracy charges.
Apparently you have to be a dogfight promoter for that.

First off...I haven't been hunting in ages, I'll admit it. So I could be wrong with what I am about to say -- but if I remember correctly, most states specify a minimum energy level that a bullet must generate to be legal for hunting. I remember Bob at Near the Salty City said something about my 10mm handloads being strong enough to take deer with in his home state of Utah, with its lower limit of 500 ft-lbs for that animal. But here's what I am getting at -- don't they have those lower energy limits to make the kill as painless and quick as possible for the animal? I can't think of any other reason, really, and it makes sense to me. But beyond that, I would argue that killing animals for food is perfectly natural. And since we as humans were born with the ability to fashion the tools to fight our way to the top of the food chain -- and they don't call it that because of the way it rolls off the tongue -- would it not follow that it was perfectly natural that we would do that, too? Mr. Milloy might not think me so enlightened, as I don't think his comparison of hunting and dogfighting makes any sense at all, but with his status as a member of the coastal media, so insulated from the realities of life outside the newsroom, that much is to be expected from him and his faux-intellectual ilk.
As for the gun manufacturers being hauled into court on what I guess would be conspiracy to flood the inner cities with guns...I can't help but think of what the great Larry Elder wrote in his book "Ten Things You Can't Say In America":

A black friend said that manufacturers conspire to "put" guns in the black community. "Larry, guns, like drugs are brought in from the outside. There's no gun manufacturer in Compton in Watts."
"Yes," I said. "And there are no pig farms or egg hatcheries there either. But I had ham and eggs this morning. Grow up."

Sounds to me like that'd pretty good advice for Milloy to take, intellectually speaking. No doubt many media professionals think ending up at the Washington Post, New York Times or San Francisco Chronicle would be the pinnacle of their career. Reading crap like this I really can't understand why. Is those people's self-esteem really THAT low?!

Gun Troubles

Remind me never again to boast out loud about my guns' reliability...
So far that Springfield Loaded has run like a top, but over the past couple of weeks trouble's started creeping up with it. About once every hundred rounds or so, the spent casing's been getting caught in the action as it cycles; when that happens, I have to drop the mag and work the action back and forth to get it out. Last Sunday was the worst, and to be honest I was in a bit of a funk by the time I left. The gun jammed on me yet again, with the 230-grain Blazer Brass ball, and I thought I'd never get that blasted spent casing out. I had a rod with me just for the possibility I'd need it, but the case looked like it was caught in the mag and I spent a good ten minutes with that thing trying to get it out, putting a scratch on the slide in the process. Not so fun, no...between that and wondering if the girl I'd gone out on a date with the night before would go out with me again, I was more than a little bit stressed this week. I've been communicating with the good folks at Springfield the last few days, and the gun as I sit here is on its way back to Illinois to be looked at by their 1911 wizards. I'll admit this is the second 1911 from them that I've had troubles with, but they fixed the last one and I don't have any reason to doubt they'll do me right this time too. They're doing inventory this coming week, and it won't be till the week after that they'll be able to look at it. She left Beaumont just after 8 tonight. In the meantime, I have other guns to shoot -- more homemade 10mm fun awaits me later this week -- and another date on the horizon, so I am feelin' better tonight...

Fred Thompson Takes Another Swing...

...and slams another one out of the park:

When I was working in television, I spent quite a bit of time in New York City. There are lots of things about the place I like, but New York gun laws don’t fall in that category.

Anybody who knows me knows I’ve always cared deeply about the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. So I’ve always felt sort of relieved when I flew back home to where that particular civil liberty gets as much respect as the rest of the Bill of Rights.

Unfortunately, New York is trying, again, to force its ways on the rest of us, this time through the courts. First, they went after U.S. gun manufacturers, seeking through a lawsuit not only money but injunctive control over the entire industry. An act of congress in 2005 blocked, but did not end, that effort.

Now, the same activist federal judge from Brooklyn who provided Mayor Giuliani’s administration with the legal ruling it sought to sue gun makers, has done it again. Last week, he created a bizarre justification to allow New York City to sue out-of-state gun stores that sold guns that somehow ended up in criminal hands in the Big Apple.

I must say, that was a brilliant move on Thompson's part. Rudolph Giuliani is every bit as weak as either of the Clintons are on this issue, and that much more so when his party affilliation is taken into account. And I fully believe it can be his undoing if someone's smart enough to actually take advantage of it. I know the RKBA ideally shouldn't be a partisan issue, but the fact is that in the world we live in today, it more or less is just that. Mr. Giuliani may well call himself a Republican, but for his record on guns he might as well be Chuck Schumer, or Dianne Feinstein in drag. And his camp might as well face the fact that his record is going to be a deal-breaker for more than a few people. Of course, reading the official response -- or, should I say, non-response -- from Giuliani's camp, one can't help but get the idea he and his spokespeople are scared, very scared:

Says communications director Katie Levinson in an email the campaign blasted out tonight:

"Those who live in New York in the real world - not on TV - know that Rudy Giuliani's record of making the city safe for families speaks for itself. No amount of political theater will change that."

Why are they scared? Because they have nothing, absolutely nothing, of substance to counter Thompson calling Giuliani out on this. If they did they'd have used it instead of pulling out the same tired old rhetoric used by the Brady Bunch and every other professional gungrabber out there about "making families safe" -- or making a not-so-veiled slam at Thompson's acting career. Rudolph Giuliani's record on a deal-making-or-breaking issue for millions of Americans is woefully anti-liberty -- and no amount of weasel rhetoric about "making families safer" is going to make those millions of Americans think otherwise. As one commenter said, "This round goes to Fred Thompson and the Constitution."

(h/t Instapundit)

UPDATE: Looks like the Fred has some pretty good spokespeople working for him, too (emphasis mine - ed), and as we also see here, the verbal diarrhea is rocketing out of the mouth of at least another of Mr. Giuliani's people:

Run or keep your mouth shut!" snarled Guy Molinari, New York co-chairman for the Giuliani presidential campaign.

"If you want to bash people, jump into the pool. We're waiting for you," Molinari added.

Giuliani's adviser called Thompson out of bounds for penning a column on his blog blasting New York City's gun-control laws under Giuliani and his successor, Mayor Bloomberg.

"He's not just attacking Rudy. He's attacking every resident of New York City," Molinari charged.

Even before the column controversy, a liberal blogger had filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission accusing Thompson of violating campaign-finance laws for electioneering before filing papers for his candidacy.

"I have a serious problem with this guy. Is he running? Is he not running? Now he's going into attack mode even though he's not an announced candidate," said Molinari, a former congressman and Staten Island borough president.

Thompson - who had criticized Giuliani, Bloomberg and Brooklyn federal Judge Jack Weinstein for going after out-of-state gun dealers - laughed off Molinari's tirade.

"I am tempted to say that was a good 'shot across our bow,' " a Thompson spokesman said yesterday, "but I'm afraid that same federal judge might go after those of us who manufacture out-of-state gun metaphors."

Priceless. Absolutely priceless. And don't you worry, Mr. Molinari. Once the Fred declares, he's gonna blow Giuliani's authoritarian arse right out of your pool.

15,000

Came a little sooner than I thought it might...From Chandler, Minnesota, my 15,000th visitor came at 10:52 am today. I dunno how you got here, but I'm glad you did.
Thanks once again to all of you who make Live From the (upper) Texas Gulf Coast a part of your day. I hope you continue to find my commentary worthwhile.

I Want It Too

Shamelessly filched from Josh...

What kinds of fun can be had with it? See below.


Fun, fun, fun, till daddy takes the t-bird away...

Buy Some Ammo or Gun Stuff on Aug. 28, And Tell Your Friends To Do The Same...

...even better, buy a gun if you can...
In response to the item mentioned here:

On August 28, activists in cities across America will hold a national day of protest to focus attention on the scourge of illegal gun trafficking. August 28th is the anniversary of Martin Luther King's historic March on Washington in 1963."

"The Brady Campaign and its network of Million Mom March Chapters is supporting the efforts of Reverend Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow PUSH Coalition to draw attention to gun violence by organizing local events to be held in cities across America. So far, Brady Campaign activists have confirmed more than a dozen events, and more are expected." ...

..the peerless David Codrea over at The War On Guns came up with an excellent idea: Buy a box of ammunition or anything else gun-related on that day, and a few days before, tell the local gun shops about the protest and our little way of counter-protesting. I don't know if the local gun shops would give a discount on a gun, but I don't know why they wouldn't give a discount on things like bullets, powder, primers, targets or anything else gun-related just for a day.
Like the title says, a week from Tuesday, go buy something gun-related, and tell your friends to do the same, and tell the gun stores about it beforehand. We should take every opportunity to
step up to the plate and defend our rights, and this is one great way to do it.

Yet Another RCOB Moment: 60 Minutes, and Stop Snitchin'

Warning -- Profanity alert!
So I made the mistake of watching 60 Minutes tonight, and apparently it was a rerun of an older episode about the whole Stop Snitchin' phenomenon. And this rapper who calls himself Cam'ron actually admitted he wouldn't turn in a serial killer living next door because "it would be bad for business." And all I can say to that is what I told my folks when I heard him say that -- "Anybody who wouldn't turn in a serial killer is a piece of shit." This sentiment was further confirmed when I heard him later say, in what seemed to be a defense of the thug culture, "I just think that rap takes way more slack than the video games and the movies. We don't make guns. Smith and Wesson makes guns...Like, white people make guns and bullets and all we're doing is rhyming and putting words together." And then all I could do was yell out, "Smith and Wesson didn't pull that goddamned trigger, you motherfucker!"
Even my folks were surprised at that...I don't usually get so animated, but my, did that ever piss me off. That was just downright brazen of him to come right out with such bigotry. Rarely are bigots so honest! And it's amazing how Jesse Jackson and his fellow race hustlers never point the finger at those who have attitudes like that and call them out for what they're doing to hip-hop and black culture. Sure it's easier to blame the guns, but Jesse ought to be asking what kind of mentality is bred from the thought that turning in a serial killer is "bad for business."
At least one person sees this mentality for the danger it is, though, and the double standards that those who subscribe to it adhere to. Educator Geoffrey Canada had this to say:
"You don't need someone destroying you when your own people are the worst messengers possibly...And this is what black people in America have not come to grips with. If we had a bunch a people in robes saying this stuff, there would be a movement all over America to shut this thing down. That it's young black millionaires, we are doing nothing."
I really couldn't have said it any better than that...

teh Saturday morning funnay....

...as Tam said, "must stop laughing...hurts...can't...breathe...."
And with a little exploration, I found this. Some absolutely priceless stories. You're absolutely cheating yourself if you don't read them! No snippets, just click!
Oh, and before you do, put down your drink...

A Bad Answer To A Stupid Question

Via just about everyone, comes this, on the campaign trail with Mitt Romney:

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney on Wednesday defended his five sons' decision not to enlist in the military, saying they're showing their support for the country by "helping me get elected."

Call that whatever you want, but if it's not the definition of asinine, I don't know what is. The woman who asked the question, the name of the organization she was identified with raises a huge red flag, but still I can't help but agree with what she said later:

The woman who asked the question, Rachel Griffiths, 41, of Milan, Ill., identified herself as a member of Quad City Progressive Action for the Common Good, as well as the sister of an Army major who had served in Iraq.

"Of course not," Griffiths said when asked if she was satisfied with Romney's answer. "He told me the way his son shows support for our military and our nation is to buy a Winnebago and ride across Iowa and help him get elected."

Progressive Action for the Common Good...I think that pretty much says it all. But as for Romney's sons thinking he'd make a great president, well, there are more of a few of us in the Republican base who beg to differ and think that his sons are indeed NOT doing the country any kind of good -- on the contrary. It would seem that in addition to being a panderer, who will do or say just about anything to get elected (click here), Romney's a bit of a narcissist. I read a comment somewhere that that particular remark from Romney sounded like something John Kerry would say, and that sounds about right to me. He's just one more RINO that needs to just mosey on back to his lefty refuge.

Yet More Contemptible GFW Inadequacy

Welcome, visitors from Blogonomicon! Main page is here, come on back now, y'hear?

Via Ahab, we have this, from, well...good grief, just read it (emphasis mine -- ed.)...

"Guns are great to have around," he continues. "Just like seat belts and fire extinguishers - you don't know when you're going to need one, but when there's an intruder in my house I'll be glad to have it." I look around and watch a dozen or so gun-toting, plaid-wearing bearded guys nod in agreement. I decide now's not the time to mention that children can't accidentally kill themselves by playing with seat belts and a fire can't steal your fire extinguisher and use it against you.

My, aren't WE witty today...but for the fact that a kid can get hurt or, yes, even killed by playing with the seat belt. If kid takes off seatbelt while Mom's blasting down the highway at 75 mph and they get in a wreck, chances are kid will be hurt, or, yes, killed. As for the fire stealing the fire extinguisher, well, that's what training and practice are for, so the bad guy doesn't get the drop on you...It's been said before, but it deserves to be said again: Being in possession of a gun doesn't make you armed any more than possession of a guitar makes you a virtuoso musician. Something that was quite obviously lost on this, this...person. *spit*

Having completed my eight-second firearm tutorial, I don my safety goggles and large red earmuffs and head for the shooting range. Carefully cradling my pistol and a box of 50 .38 Specials to my chest, I ease my way down to lane number six. Every few seconds I violently twitch as another gun is fired; even with ear protection the noise is deafening. I'll be glad to get out of here without soiling my undergarments.

There is much I could say to that, but the fact that a grown man would admit -- in print -- that handling a firearm makes him want to crap on himself, well, that says volumes more than I could, even at my most eloquent. (As an aside, I personally think the .38 Special is a pussycat, relatively speaking. I guess it's a good thing this cretin didn't try .357 Magnum. He'd probably have suffered a massive heart attack right there on the spot.)

I take my target - a large off-white sheet featuring a potential intruder's head and torso - and clip it to the metal pole above me. A flick of a switch sends it flying backward into space. I load my pistol and take aim, briefly wondering how much it hurts to accidentally shoot oneself in the foot.

I squeeze off shot after shot, jumping at the sound of each one. Some people feel powerful with a pistol in their hand; I feel terror. I reload rapidly, hoping I run out of rounds before I run out of luck and end up with nine fingers.

Well, kemosabe, if you keep your hands and feet away from the hole the bullet comes out of, you won't have to wonder how much it hurts to shoot yourself, because you won't do it...but I guess that kind of logic is obviously way out of the league of some people...

It's not until I leave that I relax enough to take a look at my target. Though I aimed at my intruder's heart on every shot, most sailed wide, past his right shoulder. When I find an intruder in my house, I'll just throw a fire extinguisher at him.

You do that. But don't expect a real man to have any sympathy for you when said intruder takes that fire extinguisher and bashes your pathetic little skull in.
Sorry if I come off as harsh, but there is just no excuse for this kind of thinking. I think Eric S. Raymond said it best:

To believe one is incompetent to bear arms is, therefore, to live in corroding and almost always needless fear of the self — in fact, to affirm oneself a moral coward.

Moral coward. Sounds about right to me. They might scream and wail about me being judgmental, but the hell with them. I just call it like I see it. And a man who's so obviously unwilling to defend himself with whatever means he has at his disposal isn't a man at all, but a mere shell of one.

Cheap Sunday Range Fun

...relatively speaking, anyway...
I got a call Friday afternoon from BZ Gun & Repair in Groves. The clerk told me he had gotten some Berry's 180-grain .40S&W/10mm bullets in if I was interested in them. Never heard of 'em before. So I did some research. Come to find out they were copper-plated instead of copper-jacketed. Which means, of course, that you can't drive 'em as fast as a jacketed bullet because the plating could come off and you'd get leading. I'd seen some conflicting reports of how fast one could load them to before getting adverse effects, anywhere from 1100 to 1300 feet per second -- and one brave soul was loading them to about fourteen-and-a-half, with what I am guessing was .357 Magnum, with no leading. 'Least that's what he said. Anyway, I bit the bullet, so to speak, and swung by there yesterday morning to pick some up. Just a box of 100, to experiment with. Later I sat down at my bench and loaded 50 rounds, with the most conservative data I could find for my components. Finished product:

Cartridge: 10mm Auto
Case: Federal twice-fired American Eagle
Bullet: 180-grain plated flat-nose
Powder Charge: 12.1 grains of Accurate Arms No. 9
Primer: CCI large pistol
OAL: 1.260"


I took it to the range this morning, with my Kimber Stainless Target II. Accurate rated that load for 1086 fps, albeit with a different bullet, and I was thinking it would shoot faster than that rating as did the 155-grain Hornady XTPs I've been using so far. I figured right. I took a 20-shot string and was averaging 1153.35 feet per second, with a low of 1112 and high of 1190. Only two of the shots were below 1120, though, and if you take those out it works out to about 1157 fps, with most of the shots running between 1130 and 1170. Very nice, and accurate, little midrange plinking load, runs about even with the Remington UMCs' 1150 fps. Seems like the recoil was a little heavier with these than with the 155-grainers, even though the latter was running about 200 fps faster. But it was still very manageable, with, just as important, no leading. I think I've found a winner here, for about $20 for a box of 100 completed rounds; it could go lower than that, of course, if I order components in bulk. Beats the living hell out of $25 for a box of 50. The more I roll my own, the more I like it!

Friday Morning 1911 Musings: A 1911A1 Like Grandpa's?

An interesting question posed on this thread at THR:

Okay, so I won't bore everyone with my 1911 story. Lets just say that I am a Glock/CZ shooter who bought a Kimber some time ago and got rid of it after it continued to malfunction.

Here's my question: Why doesn't anybody make a REAL 1911-A1 pistol?

I'm talking about a real pre-series 70 1911-A1 like those that were produced in the THOUSANDS by non-firearms companies WITHOUT COMPUTERS and were generally excellent, reliable, COMBAT firearms.

I would buy a REAL 1911-A1 pistol in a heartbeat. No 1970s Colt "toilet" bushing, no 1980s firing pin block safety, no stupid front slide serrations, no dumb backstrap lawyer-lock, no "schwartz" system (I don't even know what that is, but i've heard it's no good)!

I think that's a fair question, but something that irked me on a few subsequent responses was negative commentary on things like front slide serrations and skeletonized hammers and triggers. I can understand gripes about deviations from the original designs like firing pin safeties and such, and I can take or leave front slide serrations. I never use them anyway but don't think they add or detract from the look of the pistol. But I do think that the skeletonized hammer & trigger add a lot to the aesthetics of the 1911. Personally, I think the 1911 is a thing of beauty whether it's a bare-bones military-spec pistol or a Springfield Loaded-type gun. I have both types and like them both just the way they are, and as I said at THR, I don't shoot the Loaded wondering if John Moses Browning would turn his nose up at that particular iteration of his design. He might not like the internal locking safety on it or the deviations from the original tolerances, but I've shot that gun enough to know it's a reliable weapon just as he intended it to be, as is the Springfield GI. But I loved Xavier's response to the original poster:

That's what you wanted,.......and you bought a Kimber? Well golly gee darn. If you want a '57 Chevy like Grandpa used to drive, you don't go buy a 2007 Lexus and then complain about it.

I must say, I thought that was pretty funny. But what I really don't understand is the animosity toward modern manufacturing technology. I'd say that as opposed to taking away from the quality of a modern 1911, they add to it, because I would think such technology would allow those guns to be turned out more rapidly than they used to be, thus keeping the prices lower than they'd otherwise be. As for the Kimbers, I guess I've just been lucky -- either that or the complaints about them on the Internet gun boards are blown way out of proportion. Between the two I have, the only issue I've had is a weak magazine spring with the Tactical Ultra II.
I wouldn't mind having an old gun like they used to make. I'd buy one in a heartbeat. And I know there's a world of difference between that Kimber and an old WWII-era Colt. But I just can't believe the modern-day 1911 is as much of a "big-boy toy" as so many claim it is. More than it used to be, no doubt, but I don't know why my Springfield Loaded would not be deserving of the legacy of the 1911 despite the differences between it and a World War II-era Colt.

Pathetic

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I don't think that, up until last night, I saw something that was just so unbelievably pathetic, until I ran up on this, from THR (http://www.charlotte.com/local/story/218113.html):

"Maybe we should buy a gun," I told my husband.
As I waited for him to answer, I listened to the birds chirping. I looked toward the sky, hoping for rain.
"No, we shouldn't," he said finally.
"Listen to this," I said, picking up Sunday's paper. I read aloud from the front-page story, "Forced to Kill," about four Charlotte people who had each shot someone trying to protect themselves.
The killings were legal. Necessary. The police said so.
I could slip instantly into the shoes of one south Charlotte man, who woke to the sound of the doorbell seven years ago. When he heard loud banging, he grabbed a revolver and ran downstairs.
A young man had thrown an iron patio chair against the window, shattering the glass. The older man fired two safety shots. When the young man swung the chair again, the older man aimed a third time and fired, killing the intruder.
I could imagine us in the exact situation -- without a gun -- defenseless.

Not in my house
"Can't you see that happening to us?" I said."Sure, I can," my husband said. "But we have an alarm system. And we're not getting a gun."
"Your reason?"
"Two reasons," he said. "Our granddaughters."
That stopped me cold.
About 200 people in the United States kill someone each year in self-defense.
But how many die each year -- innocently -- from guns?
Let me tell you.
In the 10 years ending in 2006, 486 children under age 18 in North Carolina, alone, died from gun-related injuries.
Amazing the figure is that low, considering that 82,000 kids in this state are exposed each year to unsafely stored firearms.

Actually, I would argue that's a tribute to gun owners' diligence, considering that in my own experience, those who own guns are quite careful with them and would never be so careless as not to teach their kids about the dangers firearms pose when said firearms are not used safely. For that "man" to stand there and cite his granddaughters as an excuse not to get a gun to defend his wife and granddaughters is a borderline criminal cop-out -- not to mention a rather frightening prospect, considering he's probably old enough to come from a generation that still believed without reservation that certain things were worth killing for, among them one's loved ones. But here was the clincher, the last couple of lines:

In our house, we'll remain unarmed.
Defenseless is better than discovering someone we love dead.

I don't think I've ever seen such tortured logic in print anywhere other than a Handgun Control press release. And I hope that poor deluded lady never wakes up to find a goblin standing at her door with a crowbar with nothing to stop him but her manicured fingernails.

Comments From the Brady Blog

It would seem the powers that be at The Organization Formerly Known As Handgun Control have decided their blog needs to be overhauled. I am guessing they'll probably shut down comments entirely, considering how pro-gunners practically run the place. Speaking of that, the following was posted by Kelli, one of the two resident gun-haters:

You want to dominate a blog, go to the pro-gun sites with your other gunnut buddies

My response:

We have those and congregate at them too. I see several familiar names here, actually. I just think it’s deliciously ironic that we pretty much own the comments section on a blog by an organization that’s dedicated to stripping our rights from us. Anyone who’s been paying attention to American politics over the last few years knows the power of the Internet is an awesome thing. And if you don’t believe it, just google “Joe Lieberman, netroots” or “Jim Zumbo, terrorist rifles.” I should note, however, that I am no way comparing the lefty lunatic fringe to the average joe AR-15 owner — but the above are textbook examples of what happens when certain groups congregate via this medium and direct that energy to a goal. With that in mind, it’s quite illuminating that here at the blog of what is arguably the biggest gun-ban organization in this great land, most of those who care to speak up are pro-rights and pro-liberty. The Brady gun-ban supporters are, for all practical intents & purposes, nowhere to be found (Celli and Macca don’t really count). Kinda makes me think the Brady gun-ban agenda isn’t nearly as popular as they’d like to make us think it is. If it is, where are all the people who support it? You’d think they’d all be here — or at least a lot of them. Could the Brady Bunch and their insidious agenda really be so transparent to Mr. and Mrs. America? One can certainly hope.

Should be fun to see what happens. They'll probably shut off comments completely just like the Gun Guys did. Robb mentions possible changes here. Funny stuff.

A Tale of Sheer Brilliance: Making Fools of Antis

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From THR:

I left Champaign-Urbana at 0530 with 27 guns in my trunk and one on my hip. Given that Chicago Police reportedly now receive one vacation day and a $300 bonus on their paychecks for each gun they confiscate, I was very cautious. Visions of a car accident and subsequent police contact and discovery of the guns in my trunk filled the back of my mind. It would surely earn me the label of "gun runner" and incarceration in the disease-ridden bowels of Chicago’s city jail.

I'm sure the eyeballs first officer to find said guns would be wide with glee:

"Hoo YAH! Cha-CHING, BABY! I just got a month and a half off and a free trip to Aruba!"

I had 23 guns to turn in and didn’t want to take them all in at once as I expected that would raise suspicions. So I decided to visit three or more turn-in locations to “spread” things out. You know, take five or so into each location until I ran out of guns or they ran out of credit cards.

Might not sound so good at first, but if you haven't seen it before, trust me, it's quite gratifying. A lot of folks say that participating in those "gun buy-backs" only helps the gun-haters because it ramps up the statistics on how many guns were turned in, but then there are also those who make the point that the buy-back advocates pad their numbers anyway. I'd agree with that. (By the way, how can one "buy back" property one never owned in the first place?!) Getting money for what are essentially piles of scrap metal and funneling that money back into the shooting sports -- money from people who think guns are essentially the root of all evil -- is just great. I was laughing out loud with glee and had a grin on my face the size of a B-52 when I was reading this at work yesterday. It'd be fun to see this happen more often. ;-)

A Few Words On the Honorable (sic) Sen. Joe Biden

Pretty much everything that can be said regarding Senator Biden's slur towards gun owners on national TV the other night has already been said. But I just have to say, I wonder how many of the other candidates are cursing him under their breath for letting the cat out of the bag in relation to how the people running the Democratic Party REALLY feel about gun owners. So far it seems that none of the other candidates have not really come out and said anything about the issue of gun control -- although, of course, even a cursory examination of their records shows they arguably share Biden's opinion. It really was quite telling that not only did Biden get raucous applause for what he said, but he also didn't get publicly upbraided on stage that night -- not even by the allegedly-pro-Second Amendment candidate Bill Richardson. That one's definitely gonna be something to remember should Richardson's candidacy gain any traction. Such a shame he'll probably never get called out on that.

Just One Thing to Say...

I really should be ashamed of myself for not keeping up lately with Frank J.'s hilarious takes on things over at IMAO, but with the raise in the minimum wage that takes effect today, I thought of something he said shortly after the Democrats regained control of Congress. If you'll recall, Michael Moore sent out a really smug message out to conservatives right about that time, and ole Frank, of course, had a dead-on take on every part of it, but this morning I thought of this little snippet (Mike in regular font, Frank J. in bold):

10. When we raise the minimum wage, we will pay you -- and your employees -- that new wage, too. When women are finally paid what men make, we will pay conservative women that wage, too.

I don't want a minimum wage! That's why I went to college!

I really couldn't have said it any better than that. What really burns my tail about this, though, is that I make more than minimum wage, so when the inflation kicks in, as it invariably will to sustain this increase, I won't get a raise to counter that, which basically means that I am going to effectively be taking a pay cut. I've already taken one this year. I damn sure don't need another one. Thanks a lot, you sons of bitches. You better believe I'm gonna remember this next time I go to the polls, no matter how badly the Republicans screwed the pooch in their 12 years in the majority.

Getting My Fix

So I haven't been shooting in the last three weeks or so, which I think is probably the longest pause in my shooting sessions ever since I took it back up a little over two years ago. Money was a bit tight, and of course .45acp isn't exactly cheap. As it turned out, though, this week I had a little extra cash on hand after taking care of my bills, so what did I do? Went and bought myself a box, of course, and the Springer Loaded and I went out yesterday morning. Man, but did it ever feel good to be back out there...like things were back to normal. I was so excited that I didn't even notice -- until the ammo was almost gone --that the rear sight on the pistol was loose, and drifting off to the left. And boy, did I ever feel silly...all I could do was move the sight back and tighten it as best I could with my Gerber multi-tool, because I had left the little allen wrench at the house that I would have used to tighten the screw on them. It worked for the rest of the box, but now comes the fun part, getting them zeroed yet again. I had completely forgotten that the night sights on that pistol were adjustable. One could call it a blond moment, but for the fact that my hair is brown...but yeah, I went shooting, and life is good...

A Comment On An Anniversary

I think LawDog put it best, and I can't add much to what he said, but the event whose anniversary he was noting -- the infamous Chappaquiddick incident -- did make me think of something the great Mark Steyn wrote a few years ago:

In 1999, Dan Rather, choking up over the "irony" of JFK Jr. dying on the anniversary of Chappaquiddick, couldn't even remember Mary Jo Kopechne's name, or, at any rate, deemed it unworthy of mention. But the advanced-model Kennedy flack disdains such squeamishness: Yeah, so he killed someone. This was the line taken by The New York Times' Adam Clymer in his definitive hagiography of "the leading senator of our time." If the name seems vaguely familiar, it may be because you're sitting on it. Two years ago then candidate George W. Bush caused something of a stir by referring to Mr Clymer as a "major-league a--hole" -- or, according to which paper you read, "assh---." My own view of him was formed by this line from his Kennedy book:
Edward Kennedy's "achievements as a senator have towered over his time, changing the lives of far more Americans than remember the name Mary Jo Kopechne."
As I wrote two years ago, "I don't know how many lives the Senator's changed -- he certainly changed Mary Jo's -- but I'm struck less by the precise arithmetic than by the curious equation: How many changed lives justify leaving Miss Kopechne struggling for breath for hours pressed up against the window in a small, shrinking air pocket in Teddy's car? If the Senator had managed to change the lives of even more Americans, would it have been okay to leave a couple more broads down there? Such a comparison doesn't automatically make its writer an a------, but it certainly gives one a commanding lead in the preliminary qualifying round."

Steyn has always had a way with words, and while some might think that over the top, it really does make one wonder if the voters of Massachusetts apply that same moral calculus when they go to the voting booth every six years and vote him back in. I just find it so hard to believe that the Camelot "mystique" is really that strong. But then, I could be wrong, or maybe Mass. voters really do delude themselves into thinking Teddy Kennedy is the last link to his long-dead brother, though all they really share is the name. Perhaps more than that, as of course JFK's escapades are legion once you get below the image that's been made of him since his death, but apart from that, I can't help but think that Teddy and Jack Kennedy really were far apart ideologically, even though they were both Democrats. Maybe that shows how much the Democratic Party has changed in the last 45 years or so, but still, it just boggles the mind...

More Must-See Video

Gun owners in Australia and England speak out on being stripped of their rights. It'll make you fighting mad, and even tear up a time or two, too...

Getting the Wrong Idea

Via SayUncle comes this, from some lefty Tennessee blogger, on ex-New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani:

The right-wingers are willing to forget his views on any number of matters: guns, gays, and abortion, to get someone who will not only go after every bogeyman they see and they can get a law past against, but do so with such delight as no Middle American has ever seen.

Uh..come again? The so-called "right-wingers" this character refers to are but a subset of conservative-leaning people. If you get beyond the big mainstream conservative blogs, past the David Brooks-type people who think the GOP should basically co-opt the Democratic agenda, you'll see there are quite a few of us right-wingers who have some SERIOUS reservations about elevating him to the highest office in the land. I am sure I speak for more than a few right-leaning people when I say I could never vote for Giuliani. Call me a single-issue voter if you want, but I think Suzanne Gratia Hupp said it best:

How a politician stands on the Second Amendment tells you how he or she views you as an individual... as a trustworthy and productive citizen, or as part of an unruly crowd that needs to be lorded, controlled, supervised, and taken care of.

Giuliani's record vis-a-vis the Second Amendment is loud and clear. Just another big-government nanny-stater, no different from anyone vying for the Democratic nomination. I'm sure many Democrats would try to say otherwise, but as far as I'm concerned that's little more than partisan shilling. I don't know about the views on gays, but we'll see how the views on guns at least come into play as the campaigns really crank up. We libertarian conservatives will be getting louder then. Count on it.

Lock-n-Load: Parker v. D.C. Goes to the Supreme Court

Well, friends & neighbors, we're one step closer to finding out if the highest court in the land believes the Second Amendment means what it says:

Local government officials in Washington, D.C., announced Monday they will appeal to the Supreme Court in a major test case on the meaning of the Second Amendment. The key issue in the coming petition will be whether the Amendment protects an individual right to have guns in one's home -- an issue on which there is now a clear conflict among federal Circuit Courts. The city will be defending the constitutionality of a local handgun control law that is regarded as the strictest in the nation.

The petition would have been due Aug. 7, but city officials said Monday that they would ask Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., for a 30-day extension of time to file the case. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and city Attorney General Linda Singer disclosed the appeal plan at a press conference, along with local Police Chief Cathy Lanier. (A news release announcing the action can be found here ) The Mayor said: "We have made the determination that this law can and should be defended and we are willing to take our case to the highest court in the land to protect the city's residents. Our handgun law has saved countless lives -- keeping guns out of the hands of those who would hurt others or themselves.

Personally, I think Mayor Adrian M. Fenty should be tarred, feathered and ridden out of town on a rail, as do all the elected officials who share his viewpoint. I can't even think of proper words to express my utter contempt and disgust for him and his elitist ilk.
That aside, it's gonna be quite interesting to see what happens. Will the conservative bloc on the court be enough to save the individual-rights viewpoint? Lots of people are scared, and I can't say I completely blame them, but it's long past time the record be set straight. And with the way things are going on other fronts in this country, I'd have to say now's probably the best time to go for the gold. I don't know what the chances are of getting any more conservative justices appointed to the court any time soon; it may well be years before we get another one. And it's long past time to stop this pussyfooting around. I don't know if a negative outcome is going to lead to "pressing the reset button," but something has to change. We have to go for it now. Buckle up, it might be a bumpy ride...

No Surprise Here

A Democratic presidential candidate wants to ban GUNS and spend our tax dollars on government babysitting programs? Say it isn't so!
Via just about everyone, we have this, from the Associated Press:

CHICAGO (AP) - Standing before a church congregation that has witnessed inner-city violence firsthand, Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said Sunday that more must be done to end a social ill that is "sickening the soul of this nation."
Obama told churchgoers at the Vernon Park Church of God on Chicago's South Side that too many young lives are being claimed by violence and more must be done to combat the problem.
"From South Central L.A. to Newark, New Jersey, there's an epidemic of violence that's sickening the soul of this nation," the Illinois senator told the crowd. "The violence is unacceptable and it's got to stop."
Nearly three dozen Chicago students have been killed this year, according to Chicago Public Schools. Obama said that figure is higher than the number of Illinois serviceman who've died in Iraq in 2007.
"We need to express our collective anger through collective action," Obama said.
He said the government needs to permanently reinstate an assault weapons ban and close regulatory loopholes that protect unscrupulous gun dealers.
He also said government should support and fund more after-school programs to keep kids off the streets. But some of the burden must also be shouldered by residents who need to do more to raise and protect at-risk children, he added.

I really don't understand where the Scary-Looking Weapons Ban comes into play here. As has been pointed out by just about everyone with an interest in the actual facts of the matter (as opposed to overblown, emotion-fueled rhetoric), the vast majority of crime committed with guns in the inner cities of this country is perpetrated with ordinary handguns, more or less just like the one I keep under my pillow for the uninvited 3 A.M. visitors. I'm guessing the ban on the so-called "assault weapons" would most likely apply to said handguns as well.
And one more time, once again with feeling -- why don't more people see these criminals offing each other as a good thing? Call me a heartless bastard, but I can't help but think that once someone gets to the wrong end of a gun in the places Obama talks about, that means someone dropped the ball somewhere along the way. By the time most of these kids are getting cut down by their inner-city brethren, they should have at least some sort of clue that certain actions have certain consequences and that maybe running with the gangs and the drug dealers isn't the best thing for their long-term well-being. And when they don't get the aforementioned clue and they end up eating a bullet because of the aforementioned actions, why are said actions NEVER addressed? Maybe I do sound like a heartless bastard, but I am sick and tired of panderers like Barack Obama telling me that my right to keep and bear arms is causing the violence in this country. And how is it that when I was these kids' age, I managed to find things to do after school, most of which consisted of things like homework, TV or books -- none of which required a dime of taxpayer money?
I've said it before, and I'll say it again -- this guy is nothing but an empty suit, a smiley-faced socialist, and proof positive that Dan Seals was dead-on -- everything that glitters is certainly NOT gold.

Just a small point of contention...

Via Misha at the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler, we have this right good takedown of one Ted Rall, a vile California-based "cartoonist" who seems to get his jollies from insulting everything good about this country. Some good points here about the outrageous double standards vis-a-vis Teddy and someone like say Ann Coulter, but I do have a comment on one thing:

And just because he can think it, and say it, and draw it, and write it, does not mean that he should, or that Universal Press Syndicate has to continue to syndicate him, or that supposedly respectable institutions, such as the New York Times, have to publish his vile cartoons.

I suppose she might actually agree with me here, but I would really like to know just how many people outside of the coastal leftist elite --or arguably a good percentage of the people who run this country's major newspapers -- view the New York Times as as a respectable institution. Everything that's wrong with mainstream media these days, pretty much every complaint applies to that institution -- it's pretty much completely insulated from the realities of the daily lives of its supposed audience, they're incredibly biased, and quite condescending to boot, especially when it comes to things like gun control.
Respectable institution? I'd say the NYT publishing Ted Rall is just another indicator that it's little more than the house organ of the Democratic Party and the extreme left.

Unintentional Comedy Gold...

to be found at http://www.bradycampaign.org/blog/...
as at least two people I read every day, SayUncle and Robb Allen, along with with a trainload of other pro-gunners, has a field day talking about guns and the futility of gun control, and all the anti-gunners there -- who, by the way, are in the very distinct minority of the commenters there -- have to offer is ad hominem attacks (you'll see the term "gun nut" sprinkled quite liberally throughout at least one person's comments) and the same old tired comments about folks like us compensating for something, and they even go so far as to call us racists for the things we say on our blogs. It's quite insulting, but if you can get past that it's pretty funny. Almost makes it worth reading the puke Paul Helmke posts in the main blog!

What Media Bias?

Exhibit No. 90,386,037 that the mainstream media has a near-terminal case of anti-gun bias, so far gone that all I can do is shake my head:

When criminals need guns, they have plenty of options in a country with nearly 100,000 licensed gun stores.

Yes, because everyone knows when a criminal needs a gun, all he needs to do is go see his local federal firearms licensee and he'll be taken care of. Good grief, does the Associated Press have no shame whatsoever? Reading the rest of the article you'll see the statistic that just one percent of the nation's FFLs supply some 40 percent of the guns traced back to crimes in the country, and the AP hack uses that one percent in his lead to make the entire retail end of the American gun industry look like a one-stop shop for criminals. With a New York dateline on that story I guess I shouldn't be surprised. But I shudder to think how many people actually believe that a criminal can just walk into a store and get a gun, considering the lies, half-truths and distortions promulgated by the mainstream media on an almost-daily basis.
Of course, though, something else that was not touched on here is, just how many of those murders were committed by gang members on other gang members? Or by drug dealers on rival drug dealers? And why isn't that touted as a good thing? Maybe it's cruel to think that way, but in the long run I think it'd probably be better for these cretins to snuff each other out than have them crowding our jails and leaving less room for rapists, child molesters and the like. Of course, if we declared an end to the utterly futile "war on drugs" and left it up to society to teach the young about the hazards of drugs, and left them alone to take their chances, and pay the price for whatever bad decisions they make, I just can't help but think society would be strengthened in the long run. And once again, I know it would take a gargantuan paradigm shift for the American public at large to think that way, but it would be more than worth it if such actions got our society back to the old fashioned values of personal responsibility and accountability.

Pot, Meet Kettle

Kim du Toit, in comments to his anti-iPhone screed:

With all Apple products, it’s always been about form, about looking cool, about marketing—because in that way, you can make the gullible too busy going ooh and aah to notice the serious design and operational shortcomings.

It’s about creating a cult, you see...

That's just rich, coming from a man who worships the 1911 so and makes no secret of his preference of the 1911 over the Glock. That's a preference I share, by the way, but the fact remains that there are those who point to the devotees of the 1911 and label us a cult, too. And I suppose there are those in both camps -- Mac and 1911 -- who do have a near-cultish devotion to those respective products, but I think it's a tad petty to sit there and call Macintosh users fools, no matter the reason. I personally never had much of a problem with any Microsoft-based computer I owned - as a matter of fact, I'd say XP was the closest Microsoft came to getting it right -- but Microsoft's history speaks for itself. And if this is any indication, the new Vista operating system is going to be suffering from the problems endemic to every new operating system from Microsoft since Windows 95. Sooner or later Microsoft is going to stop offering support for Windows XP, and then where will they be? Who's to say they'll have all the bugs worked out of Vista by then? I know I certainly wouldn't want to be in that boat...and nor would I want to be in the position of having to upgrade to Vista and spend half the cost of a new machine to upgrade my computer's internals so it could handle the system requirements of Vista.
A fool? No, I think I made a pretty smart decision, and I don't appreciate anyone looking down on me for that decision just because a lot of others who made it are so insufferably smug about it.

More Shooting Fun

So a couple of weeks ago I loaded some more ammunition for the Kimber Stainless Target II and it was off to the range day before yesterday with it. Lucky for me I beat the rain...
155-grain Hornady XTPs in front of 14.3 grains of Accurate No. 9 for a muzzle velocity of about 1350 fps, give or take 5-10 fps. Monday I was averaging about 1346.2 fps, but with an extreme spread big enough to drive a truck through...83 fps, which means I was driving them out at anywhere from 1300 to 1383 fps. I think I might have narrowed down the problem a little bit, though
I've heard people say here and there that if you put a tighter crimp on the round, it helps to cut down on that, so I tried that and still it didn't help. Not sure when I'll be doing it, but some gun mods will be in the future..flat-bottom firing pin stop, stiffer mainspring & recoil spring to delay unlocking. I've heard all those help as well, with another benefit -- slowing down the slide so it doesn't throw the brass so far. I recovered about half of mine yesterday, which was pretty good, but still I wish I could have done better. Such is life, though...and the fun with the 10mm is more than worth chasing the empties. ;-)

I Get Referrals...

from Connecticut, just a few minutes ago, from a search for "line paying my dues larry cordle." I could be wrong, but I think the song they were looking for is Ricky Skaggs' mid-'80s hit "Highway 40 Blues," which, of course, was written by Larry Cordle:

Well, these Highway 40 blues,
I've walked holes in both my shoes.
Counted the days since I've been gone,
And I'd love to see the lights of home.
Wasted time and money too;
Squandered youth in search of truth.
But in the end I had to lose,
Lord above, I've paid my dues.
Got the Highway 40 blues.


Awesome song and record, a killer country-bluegrass hybrid. Ricky Skaggs was another of my favorite 1980s hitmakers, a true talent. I have the Super Hits from him in my collection, with all those songs from the '80s. I might just have to pull that out today.

Just A Thought...

...is is just me, or do Apple's non-computer products get way the hell too much publicity and hype relative to their computers? I don't have an iPhone, don't plan to get one, still don't have an iPod either, but when I went to buy myself a new computer some months ago, I made the switch to Mac and have been very happy with it. Meanwhile, everyone and their brother's talking about Microsoft Vista and how it's so great...or, well, maybe not.
Call it a cult if you want, and I can see why a lot of people would think that, but Macs are awesome computers...more expensive then comparable PCs, but just like a good firearm, a good computer doesn't come cheap. If you ever get the spare cash in your pocket, you oughta try one out.

What Was Reba Thinking?

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. I love traditional country music, but I am not completely locked into it; I'll listen to just about anything these days, and my music collection's really diversified in the last few years and no doubt will keep doing so. That said, I just have to ask...what on God's green earth was Reba McEntire doing when she decided to cover Kelly Clarkson?
I really like Kelly, and "Because Of You" is one of the best songs on the Breakaway cd, but I think some things are just better left alone and this was one of them. I suppose you could call this just the latest milestone in Reba's decline. She made some of the best traditional country to come out of the '80s..."Somebody Should Leave," "One Promise Too Late," "How Blue," and the list goes on. I hated to see her get away from that as the '90s rolled around, as I'd hoped to see her take a lesson from George Strait; some of his stuff has been a little more pop-sounding, but on the whole I think it's safe to say that he hasn't gotten that far from what got him to where he is. The same can't be said for Reba, especially in recent years, and it would seem she'd paid for that at least a little bit, as she hasn't gotten quite as much radio airplay as she once did. (And it should be noted that the Strait man is still a fixture on country radio, at least around here.) I don't know if I'd go so far as to call this a desperate attempt at popularity with the younger generation, but all the same I just don't like it.
It could have been worse, though. She could have covered "Gone" or "Walk Away."

One More Reason...

...that the only permit to carry we need should be the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution: (from the Houston Chronicle)

People who received concealed handgun permits through a Harris County deputy constable charged with falsely claiming his students had completed the proper training could have their licenses suspended or revoked, a Texas Department of Public Safety spokesman said Tuesday.

"That's something we would certainly look into," said DPS spokesman Tom Vinger. "Whether or not the licenses would be suspended or revoked would be dependent on further investigation."

Deputy Wilbert Jue, 52, was fired from his job in Precinct 1 Constable Jack Abercia's office on Monday after being charged with two felony counts of tampering with records. He was released from jail that same day on a $4,000 bail.

*snip*

"The allegations are that he falsified documents that his students performed hours or accomplished the necessary tests to carry a concealed weapon under our law," said Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal, whose office led the investigation along with the Houston Police Department.

So many people say we should have to go through government certification to be permitted to carry a concealed weapon...but what happens when the government agents basically drop the ball, or in this case willfully throw it down? The Texas CHL isn't cheap...$140 plus whatever your instructor charges for the class, and we're not even getting into the cost of a good weapon or ammunition for that weapon. And now God only knows how many people are in danger of getting their licenses revoked after laying down that money. Probably at least $200 down the drain for each of them. Way to go, Wilbert Jue...way to effing go. The state should make you pay that money back to each CHL holder who loses his license, but I'm betting they won't, and as I said, things like this are just one more reason the only permit we need should be the Second Amendment...and the only reason is our natural, God-given right to protect ourselves and our loved ones from harm.

Friday Morning Political Musings

...from the nightly blog-run...

First up, from a commenter at Hot Air:

I still worry that the life/guns/amnesty people will bail.

Yeah, damn those knuckle-dragging rubes who think there are other things that are just as important as fighting fundamentalist Muslims. Some people might think this to be a bit of a stretch, but I don't think it's that outrageous to contend that if the American people had not been so indoctrinated over the last 30 years or so with anti-gun propaganda, they'd be more willing to fight threats that come from the outside (as with the fundie Muslims), because it seems with all the anti-gun propaganda has come the promotion of a "let-the-badguys-take-what-they-want," or "let-the-police-handle-it" mentality..but when police get killed, or soldiers die, it has always seemed that people from various corners advocate either more restrictions of citizens rights (as with Bill Clinton's odious semiautomatic rifle ban) or cutting and running. In short, the American people have been conditioned to believe that conflict is bad and should be avoided at all costs, even when the conflict carries the potential of a positive outcome, as in a mugger with a knife getting a .45-caliber hole in his forehead as he tries to take your wallet. Rudy may well be willing to fight the fundamentalist Muslims, but his past record has shown he has no compunction whatsoever about not letting the American people fight the wolves in their midst instead of waiting on someone ELSE with a gun to do it. One more time...were it not for 9/11, we'd all be saying, "Rudy who?"

Next up, from Sithmonkey at Cold Fury...

If you think the people “doing the jobs the lazy Americans won’t do” are grateful for the chance to mow your lawns, bus your tables, and wipe the dirty asses of your spoiled rotten brood, you’re deluding yourself.

They’re bitter and resentful as hell.

How can any sane individual believe that an immigrant, illegal or otherwise, will be excited about assimilating into a culture that only sees them as a source of easy votes, or cheap labor?

France had the same attitude with the African immigrants they brought in as cheap labor…we all know how that snuck around and bit them in the ass…

Excellent point indeed...but of course, we Americans are a hell of a lot better armed than the French, at least in some quarters. It would be quite interesting to see how things would play out in Boston, as opposed to a place like Dallas, in the case of Mexican immigrants raising hell like the Africans did in France. In any event, it's not something I for one would like to see.

Political Musings For Your Wednesday Morning

First up, via the inimitable Kim du Toit, we have this, from Bill Quick:

The moment Fred Thompson enters the GOP race, Rudy ceases to be a viable candidate for the nomination. Here’s why: Absent a real conservative contender, Rudy can capitalize on the base’s visceral loathing for McCain, and swing them into his camp on the basis of the leadership issue - if not happily, at least with resignation.

I really would love to know what they're saying to themselves in Rudy's camp away from the cameras and the microphones. You know Fred has to be scaring the bejesus out of them. Hell, he hasn't even officially declared his candidacy yet and he's already just six points behind in the L.A. Times poll. And personally, I wouldn't be terribly surprised to find out that the pollsters had to rig the poll to get Fred even that far behind.
As for the immigration bill, I really can't do better than du Toit's suggestions: Secure the border, deny benefits to illegals, deport them if they keep coming, and of course, make English this country's official language and mandate that it be learned by those who want to come here. John Walton, from the Walton & Johnson show, pretty much summed it up, as far as I am concerned:

"If you don't have borders and a common language, you don't have a country."

Would that our leaders took that to heart, as opposed to basically throwing our country away for another few terms in office.

Gun Grabbers Singing the Same Old Song

Via THR, Dennis Henigan of the Group Formerly Known as Handgun Control on the Parker v. D.C. decision:

The Second Amendment is the only provision in our Bill of Rights that actually states its own purpose. It says a well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. And the Court has held, the Supreme Court has held, that that statement of purpose must be taken seriously and the right must be evaluated and interpreted in light of that purpose. And by ignoring that purpose the D.C. Circuit not only contradicted the Supreme Court but also years of precedent which establishes that it is not legitimate for courts to edit the Constitution. The courts must interpret the Constitution as it was written by the framers. That is what the D.C. Circuit did not do.

It would seem Mr. Henigan conveniently left out a critical part of the Second Amendment -- although, even if he had included it, of course, he'd have gone back to the militia as being what the 2A protects. Of course, going back to what the Founding Fathers believed, that's absolute lunacy, which Mac Johnson at Human Events summed up very nicely:

Henderson's second insight was that despite the right belonging to "the people" in the amendment, it actually belonged only to the militia as an organized military force. To believe this, you have to believe that the United States is the only nation on Earth that felt a need to guarantee its government, in writing, the right to have an army -- which is possible, I suppose, if Jefferson foresaw the attitude of the modern Democrat party towards the military.

And, of course, anyone who knows anything about what the Founding Fathers believed knows damn good and well that almost to a man, they absolutely despised the idea of a standing army. Which by process of elimination leaves only the people -- individuals -- you, me, and every other individual -- that have the right to keep and bear arms. Why anyone with even a shred of critical thinking skills left ascribes any kind of benevolent motive, or gives any kind of legitimacy, to Henigan and his band of nanny-staters is completely beyond me. Some time ago, Kevin Baker came across this anonymous quote:

Simply put, gun control cannot survive without an accompanying sea of disinformation.

And it just hasn't been said any better than that. If the people at large were nearly as informed and educated as they should be, gun control in this country would be six feet under.

Not Quite Sure What to Say To This...

...but, OUCH! (via Nashville is Talking, via SayUncle)

It goes without saying that the term “house negro” gets bandied about with great frequency against anyone of seemingly African descent when they are on the Right. Be you Clarence Thomas, Condoleeza Rice, Michael Steele, or J.C. Watts, you can expect a Harry Belafonte, a Danny Glover, or yes - even a Steve Gilliard to call you out for being the race traitor that you are. The sell-out, Oreo cookies who do Whitey’s bidding and put a black face on racist policies that would otherwise be rightly called out for what they are. Uncle Thomas and Aunt Thomasinas alike.

But really, who is doing whose bidding in those situations? Can Howard Dean call Condoleeza his “do right answer mammy who be smart”? Can James Carville call out Clarence for collard greens?

Which brings us to today’s marquee morbidity. The tragic, untimely death of Donk House Negro and all around bigot Steve Gilliard. Who knew that boiling bacon grease in a spoon and mainlining it into the neck vein was bad for your health?

Not exactly the classiest thing to do upon a man's untimely death, but it's about on par with the race-baiting vitriol Mr. Gilliard freely slung before he shuffled off this mortal coil. No doubt many remember the creation below...





That MS Paint creation was in response to then-Maryland U.S. Senate candidate Michael Steele's lack of objection to then-Governor Robert Ehrlich's speaking to supporters at the Elkridge Club, a country club that up to that point had never had any black members. Of course, what Gilliard and his ideological soulmates conveniently failed to mention was that Democrats had also used said club, and that blacks were more than welcome to join; it was just that none had, up to that point. And, of course, you'll see Smantix (author of the above-quoted obit) savaged in the post's comments for being insensitive, racist and everything else, while the people calling him out as such resort to the same asshattery that Gilliard and those who agreed with him did when this issue with Steele was in the news. Leftist hypocrisy at its finest.

Remembering: 63 Years Ago Today

Patton's speech to the troops, before they stormed the beaches at Normandy...

"Be Seated."

"Men, this stuff we hear about America wanting to stay out of the war, not wanting to fight, is a lot of bullshit. Americans love to fight - traditionally. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle. When you were kids, you all admired the champion marble player; the fastest runner; the big league ball players; the toughest boxers. Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Americans despise cowards. Americans play to win - all the time. I wouldn't give a hoot in hell for a man who lost and laughed. That's why Americans have never lost, not ever will lose a war, for the very thought of losing is hateful to an American."

"You are not all going to die. Only two percent of you here today would die in a major battle. Death must not be feared. Every man is frightened at first in battle. If he says he isn't, he's a goddamn liar. Some men are cowards, yes! But they fight just the same, or get the hell shamed out of them watching men who do fight who are just as scared. The real hero is the man who fights even though he is scared. Some get over their fright in a minute under fire, some take an hour. For some it takes days. But the real man never lets fear of death overpower his honor, his sense of duty to this country and his innate manhood."

"All through your army career you men have bitched about "This chickenshit drilling." That is all for a purpose. Drilling and discipline must be maintained in any army if for only one reason -- INSTANT OBEDIENCE TO ORDERS AND TO CREATE CONSTANT ALERTNESS. I don't give a damn for a man who is not always on his toes. You men are veterans or you wouldn't be here. You are ready. A man to continue breathing must be alert at all times. If not, sometime a German son-of-a-bitch will sneak up behind him and beat him to death with a sock full of shit."

"There are 400 neatly marked graves somewhere in Sicily all because one man went to sleep on his job -- but they were German graves for we caught the bastard asleep before his officers did. An Army is a team. Lives, sleeps, eats, fights as a team. This individual heroic stuff is a lot of crap. The bilious bastards who wrote that kind of stuff for the Saturday Evening Post don't know any more about real fighting, under fire, than they do about fucking. We have the best food, the finest equipment, the best spirit and the best fighting men in the world. Why, by God, I actually pity these poor sons-of-bitches we are going up against. By God, I do!"

"My men don't surrender. I don't want to hear of any soldier under my command being captured unless he is hit. Even if you are hit, you can still fight. That's not just bullshit, either. The kind of man I want under me is like the lieutenant in Libya, who, with a Lugar against his chest, jerked off his helmet, swept the gun aside with one hand and busted hell out of the Boche with the helmet. Then he jumped on the gun and went out and killed another German: All this with a bullet through his lung. That's a man for you."

"All real heroes are not story book combat fighters either. Every man in the army plays a vital part. Every little job is essential. Don't ever let down, thinking your role is unimportant. Every man has a job to do. Every man is a link in the great chain. What if every truck driver decided that he didn't like the whine of the shells overhead, turned yellow and jumped headlong into the ditch? He could say to himself, "They won't miss me -- just one in thousands." What if every man said that? Where in hell would we be now? No, thank God, Americans don't say that! Every man does his job; every man serves the whole. Every department, every unit, is important to the vast scheme of things. The Ordnance men are needed to supply the guns, the Quartermaster to bring up the food and clothes to us -- for where we're going there isn't a hell of a lot to steal. Every last man in the mess hall, even the one who heats the water to keep us from getting the GI shits has a job to do. Even the chaplain is important, for if we get killed and if he is not there to bury us we'd all go to hell."

"Each man must not only think of himself, but of his buddy fighting beside him. We don't want yellow cowards in this army. They should all be killed off like flies. If not they will go back home after the war and breed more cowards. The brave men will breed brave men. Kill off the goddamn cowards and we'll have a nation of brave men."

"One of the bravest men I ever saw in the African campaign was the fellow I saw on top of a telegraph pole in the midst of furious fire while we were plowing toward Tunis. I stopped and asked what the hell he was doing up there at that time. He answered, "Fixing the wire, sir." "Isn't it a little unhealthy right now?," I asked. "Yes sir, but this goddamn wire's got to be fixed." There was a real soldier. There was a man who devoted all he had to his duty, no matter how great the odds, no matter how seemingly insignificant his duty might appear at the time."

"You should have seen those trucks on the road to Gabes. The drivers were magnificent. All day and all night they rolled over those son-of-a-bitching roads, never stopping, never faltering from their course, with shells bursting around them all the time. We got through on good old American guts. Many of these men drove over forty consecutive hours. These weren't combat men. But they were soldiers with a job to do. They did it -- and in a whale of a way they did it. They were part of a team. Without them the fight would have been lost. All the links in the chain pulled together and that chain became unbreakable."

"Don't forget, you don't know I'm here. No word of the fact is to be mentioned in any letters. The world is not supposed to know what the hell became of me. I'm not supposed to be commanding this Army. I'm not even supposed to be in England. Let the first bastards to find out be the goddamn Germans. Someday I want them to raise up on their hind legs and howl, 'Jesus Christ, it's the goddamn Third Army and that son-of-a-bitch Patton again.'"

"We want to get the hell over there. We want to get over there and clear the goddamn thing up. You can't win a war lying down. The quicker we clean up this goddamn mess, the quicker we can take a jaunt against the purple pissing Japs an clean their nest out too, before the Marines get all the goddamn credit."

"Sure, we all want to be home. We want this thing over with. The quickest way to get it over is to get the bastards. The quicker they are whipped, the quicker we go home. The shortest way home is through Berlin. When a man is lying in a shell hole, if he just stays there all day, a Boche will get him eventually, and the hell with that idea. The hell with taking it. My men don't dig foxholes. I don't want them to. Foxholes only slow up an offensive. Keep moving. And don't give the enemy time to dig one. We'll win this war but we'll win it only by fighting and by showing the Germans we've got more guts than they have."

"There is one great thing you men will all be able to say when you go home. You may thank God for it. Thank God, that at least, thirty years from now, when you are sitting around the fireside with your grandson on your knees, and he asks you what you did in the great war, you won't have to cough and say, 'I shoveled shit in Louisiana.' No, Sir, you can look him straight in the eye and say, 'Son, your Granddaddy rode with the Great Third Army and a Son-of-a-Goddamned-Bitch named George Patton!'"

"That is all."

Rest in peace, you magnificent sons of bitches. May we always be worthy of your sacrifice.

(h/t Bob Owens)

What's the Difference, When It's All Said And Done?

I really like Bryan Preston's blogging over at Hot Air, but considering he's such a shill for Rudy Giuliani, this attitude is really starting to burn my arse:

My own support for Fred depends on the extent to which he runs on issues instead of persona. Every candidate has to run on both and he’s had plenty to say in his radio commentaries so I’m not too worried, but if we end up seeing too much of the pick-up truck or hearing too much about whittling or whatever and it turns into a “he looks the part” campaign, I’m going to balk.

I can almost understand what Preston's saying, but when taking a look at Giuliani, what does he really have going for him besides the events of Sept. 11? I'd bet what I paid for my most recent pistol that were it not for that horrible day, we'd all be saying, "Rudy who?!" -- either that or taking a longer and harder look at his not-so-stellar-for-individual-rights record in New York City, or all of the above. I mean, speaking of image, that's the beginning and the end of Rudy, as far as him being a Republican that other Republicans would really be proud to vote for is concerned -- at least that segment of the party that still thinks smaller government & lower taxes should be what the Pachyderm Party is all about. At this point I really don't care how Thompson tries to cast himself in the race, because he has arguably shown his conservative bona fides to be stronger than those of every other candidate on the GOP side of the race, with the exception of Ron Paul. Cornbread 'n' taters 'n' pickup-truck imagery or not, if there's still any hope for libertarian conservatism in this country, Thompson will beat Giuliani like a red-headed stepchild. You can be damn sure Fred! will have my vote between those two.