Howzzat again, Sherf?

There's an update on the Rep. Boswell home invasion this morning, including a quote from a lawman:

Decatur County Sheriff Herbert Muir said Sunday night that he doesn’t think Boswell’s house was targeted, either because of his job or for another reason. He said it was probably a random attempted robbery thwarted in part because the robber didn’t realize how many people were in the house.


Come on, Herb. There were three people in the farmhouse -- two of them aged -- and one young man. The thug had a gun, so we presume he was prepared to deal with people.  He wasn't at all thwarted until he he found himself eyeball to muzzle with the owners' shotgun. Then he was thwarted.


Perhaps a litle practice will help you out, Sherf. Say to yourself, over and over: "The robbery and potential murder were thwarted by a citizen's private gun and a young man unafraid to use it." In due course you'll probably be able to utter it in public without hurting your head at all.

Roger Clemens

Roger Clemens gets a mistrial.

Roger is a baseball pitcher, but this isn't about baseball. My limpid interest in the professional version of the pastime died years ago when it bloated its roster and schedules to commandeer teevee time that would otherwise have been filled with synchronized swimming. It isn't even about Clemens as such. He may be an admirable man with seven Cy Young awards. He may be a jerk, thug, dope addict, or golfer for all I know or care.

Clemens may or may not have taken steroids when he was winning all those trophies. After he got famous enough, he was accused of it. So what? At the time there was no law forbidding it. If he doped himself he violated a private contract with a private employer.

Enter Henry Waxman, a righteous congressthing  representing the virtuous settlement of Beverly Hills. Hank summoned him to testify under oath before his House Oversight Committee. Roger said he took no steroids. Others said he did. Waxman believed the others and called the federal cops.

The charge was perjury, lying to Congress, which is like charging a guy in a Nevada whore house with eyeballing a boob.

The prosecutors had to win this one to uphold the principle that citizens may not lie. That usurps a congressional privilege. So the desperate federal  lawyers decided to ignore  explicit directions from Judge Reggie Walton, and I think one of the lessons here is that you don't piss off a guy like Reggie by presenting evidence he had explicitly forbidden.

"A first-year law student would know that you can't bolster the credibility of one witness with clearly inadmissible evidence," Walton said, raising his voice in anger at (prosecutor Steven) Durham."


(That should be a career buster for Steve, but he works for Holder so you never know.)

You may want to consider all this in terms of cost -- millions of dollars to hound a meaningless player of a boy's game at a time when we're scaring Hell out of grandma, telling her she may starve in the cold when her social security checks stop coming.

You may want to wonder how much more it will cost if the feds decide it's worth trying to get around his double-jeopardy protection and try him again.

The larger question here is about how petty an alleged transgression must be to avoid becoming a subject of monumental government concern.

Roger, I don't know you, never will, but, by God, I'm glad you beat those overbearing, self-important, bastards in this round.

Bacon, curried on the hoof

I must be sick. Despite foul weather I am unable to summon up the bile, scorn, and hatred necessary for socially useful blogging. It is a serious case, friends; if I had a  copy of The Sound of Music I would watch it.

Hence this morning's link, to a genuine feel-good story about some diligent kids unafraid of actual work, not panicked at the thought of getting their hands dirty as they prepare for a life's working putting bacon next to our over-easies.

One of the nice things is that any nose rings present would be on the hogs. Another is the illustration that bacon can be beautiful even when  still in its oinking and grunting stage.

What, if anything, happens in their minds?

All across Iowa, local governments are tinkering with ideas for gun bans for public buildings. It's a reaction to the new shall-issue law. Up in Dickinson County, the hoplophobes didn't get far.

A county supervisor named Paul Johnson introduced  a resolution to post no-guns signs at the court house and other county buildings. And he sure wanted you to know he is passionate about this.

"I will err on the side of going overboard as opposed to not going far enough," he told the board.

This sublime logic of  Johnson's statement was lost on the other four supers, and his measure died for lack of a second.

I think more than one of his constituents grins at image of Supervisor Johnson madly treading water next to his row boat and screaming (passionately, of course)  that he was only trying to do good.

It helped that County Sheriff Greg Baloun calmly reported to the board the ban would be unenforceable short of setting up a TSA-style security gate at every door.

Unconstitutional

A federal judge says the federal government does not have the authority to require  you to buy health insurance.  That element of Obamacare is, therefore, unconstitutional.

The pleasure here has nothing to do with health care, and little with Obamacare.

Break out the Templeton Rye and toast U.S. District Judge Henry Hudson of Richmond for simply pronouncing what should be a self-evident truth: There are some things governments have no privilege  to do.

Get lost, Washington

A guy really hates to say anything nice about California, but since I'm about to praise Montana and Arizona again, it would be gauche to decline a nod of approval to the Golden Bear.

Proposition 19  could pass, sending California before the federal long robes, just like Montana with its Firearms Freedom Act and Arizona, where citizens decided to take it on themselves to repair the massive federal immigration cockup.

The strictly legal points in all three cases seem to center on the Constitution's supremacy clause. Morally they test our cherished cultural myth that laws require the consent of the governed, not to mention the abuse to which malum   prohibitum   statutes are  prone.

Malum prohibitum?  Wrong because there's a law against it, period.  In 1961, for instance, Sammy Davis Junior married May Britt. If he had done so in Virginia both he and Britt would  have been felons, guilty of miscegenation.

Malum in se laws are what we're after. They  prohibit acts which are evil in and of themselves, like stealing  a Twinkie from your buddy's lunch box or auctioning off a senate seat in Illinois.

In one way or another, the Arizona, California,  and Montana laws, reflect a popular revolt against the mala prohibita which is too often a simple lust for federal political control of the citizenry or of local jurisdictions.

I don't know how any of the three issues will be resolved, of course.  I suspect the firearms freedom acts will fail and that the courts will  gut Arizona's immigration control drive. The California initiative to legalize personal marijuana use for adults is said to be a dead heat this week. If it happens to pass, I'd give it at least a slim chance of judicial approval.

But the results are less interesting that the grass-roots pressure. Libertarian thought -- even among those who couldn't define "libertarian"  -- seems to have come a long way.

EDIT: An Ipso poll just reported has Proposition 19 down, 53-43.

I say, aren't those guns wonderful, Cyril?

in Kennesaw, Georgia, police estimate that half the residents are lawbreakers.

That's all right, though, because rapists, burglars, and similar vermin don't know which half does honor Kennesaw's mandatory gun ownership law. So they ply their trades in other towns, and Kennesaw is the safer for it.

Even the Financial Times of London seems impressed that Kennesaw sports an amazingly low crime rate.

Reporter Anna Fifield, a New Zealander who proclaims herself a liberal, writes:

"But almost 30 years after the law was passed, it is still in place and still popular, not least because Kennesaw’s crime rate has remained disproportionately low, even as the town’s population swelled from 5,000 in 1982 to almost 35,000 now. According to the latest FBI statistics, Kennesaw recorded 31 violent crimes – mainly robberies and aggravated assaults – during 2008. In other similar-sized local towns the figures were much higher – 127 in Dalton and 188 in Hinesville. For property crimes – largely burglaries and thefts – Kennesaw recorded 555 while Dalton had 1,124 and Hinesville 1,802.." 


I think we'd like Anna.  As she interviewed sources at Nick's Gun Shop there was some talk of taking her in back for a bit of shooting.

"But the trainer is out and the firing range at the back of the shop is busy. I spot groups of women in purple earmuffs, and fathers and sons lining up in the 10 alleys to shoot bullets into posters of deranged zombies called Bob and Steve. I am relieved: while I am game to try shooting, I am afraid I might enjoy it." 


(h/t  Jeff)

You can show Gotham your rear  cleavage if you want. A judge in New York has thrown out a case against a guy wearing baggie low slungs. Good. It's  decision on the side of liberty.

Now, pull up your pants. You look like an idiot.

Holy Loophole, Batman

Run over to Turk's place for an articulate version -- from a surprising source --  of what we all know. There is no gun show loophole.

Fear and Loathing in Chicago

The Chicago Tribune hasn't  yet been able to get Boss Daley's latest opinion on the mercy killing of his cherished  gun ban.*

But the Trib is on the streets with a fairly straightforward report of McDonald. Deliciously,  it reports Justice Alito's reference to legislative calls for the National Guard to be summoned to fight  Chicago criminals since Daley's mob  has obviously failed. The  paper also notes Alito's reference to the number of Chicago homicides this year which just happen to equal the number of American military deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan for the same period. Then:




"If (the) safety of . . . law abiding members of the community would be enhanced by the possession of handguns in the home for self-defense, then the Second Amendment right protects the rights of minorities and other residents of high-crime areas whose needs are not being met by elected public officials, (Alito wrote.) "


This is beginning to sound like a mirror image of Arizona and Fremont, Nebraska.
They took local action against crime  because the federal government couldn't or wouldn't do its job.   In McDonald,  the federal judiciary justified federal  action  -- however indirect -- against local crime because  Chicago politicians had buggered the job. I know the parallel is strained, but the irony makes it worthwhile.


---
*As a matter of reality, the ban applied exclusively to Daley's  law-abiding subjects.


   

Old gun serendipity

A while ago I put up a bad shot of an old H&R "The American Double Action."

I finally started putting it back where it belongs this morning, and for some reason stirred the box of old partial guns ( plus gun parts I can't identify).

Lo and behold, I find I have a second YADA, identical except for barrel length, and it seems to bear all the parts the other one is missing. I feel a half-day in the shop coming on to meet my urgent need for another ancient revolver shooting an obsolete, barely available, largely useless, and ruinously expensive caliber for which I have neither brass nor dies.

EDIT: Fuggitaboutid. No trigger spring. But it looks good on the wall.

Some despicable interloper

...has been posting on my blog, reporting on all sorts of irresponsible speculation that the Honorable Chester Culver, Governor of the Great State of Iowa, might pocket veto the shall-issue and reciprocity bill. If I ever find that dastardly rumor monger, he is in great trouble.

I , for one, never doubted for a moment that Governor Culver would do the right and honorable thing. But you know that.

He says today that he will sign the bill Thursday, either the last or next-to-last possible day.

I will relay the implementing rules and timing as soon as I can get them from the agencies.

---

Edit: How thoughtless of me to neglect warning you of the blood bath to come.

Two and oh

It may be a little gauche to post about strictly personal affairs, but I have just scored twice against the retail automobile establishment, and that's newsworthy.

The new F150 clutch didn't hold up under even the light use I've made of it for the 4,000 miles since the the $1,350 repair job, and I was being set up to pay for the entire replacement cost. The installing dealer blamed me and the clutch manufacturer. The clutch maker blamed me and/or the installers. Serious negotiation ensued with a certain firmness on the part of yours truly. ("Pardner, a new clutch on a four-by-four truck ought to be all but immune to even an intentional effort to burn the SOB out just to see what a melted clutch smells like.") A letter with an undertone of "also got a lawyer in my back pocket" may have helped. I'll get the job done for the clutch-kit cost. The dealer will eat the labor. Not perfect , but better than I expected without a good deal more hassle.

Smaller but still satisfying: At the quickie lube center today the bill for routine van service looked a little high. I found a six-buck bite for a new oil plug. The lad in charge and I performed an autopsy on the old plug and then engaged in a deep philosophical discussion. In due course he agreed it wasn't stripped at all and the slight rounding of the hex head might have resulted from his man's use of a wrench one millimeter too large. He seemed relieved that I left smiling after saying I bore him no hard feelings for trying to follow the owner's marketing orders.

It's scummy industry, and it feels kind of good to evade two stabs at sodomy in the same day.

Miss Senior Shooter of 2010

Or, The Second Amendment in Action:

Beatrice is 89. More to the point, she stands a chance to become 90 and more because she had a .22 handgun at hand in the wee hours today when a thug smashed in her front door. She requested he desist. He came on in and she fired. From here on the report isn't quite complete, but somehow he was still standing on her front lawn, apparently stunned, when cops arrived. His affliction was pharmacological rather than ballistic. He's in jail, charged with burglary.

Well done, madam. Everybody misses once in a while, and sometimes it's the thought that counts -- as in the thought penetrating this thug's drug-fuddled skull that, holy crap, this woman ain't kidding and maybe I better exit her living room.

More on Ice

Our correspondent from the edge of the permafrost, near St. Cloud, Minnesota, reports that the Mississippi in that latitude is now open water. Can a shore lunch of walleye be far behind?

That prompted the thought that our local lakes are at that stage of appearing solid while harboring many thin spots. Stupidly driven snowmobiles fall through them in a useful Darwinian adjustment of Northern Plains demographics.

Ron Paul, Mitt Romney, and Sarah Palin -- in that order

But I wouldn't get my libertarian gonads in a steamy state if I were y'all. Ron Paul is a figure of fun even when he wins as he did today when young conservative activists straw polled themselves at the CPAC convention. Politico sneered:

Paul’s victory renders a straw poll that was already lightly contested among the likely 2012 GOP hopefuls all but irrelevant, as the 74-year-old Texan is unlikely to be a serious contender for his party’s nomination.

Paul earned 31 per cent; Romney 22, Palin 7.

Politico goes on: "CPAC organizers were plainly embarrassed by the results, which could reduce the perceived impact of a contest that was once thought to offer a window into which White House hopefuls were favored by movement conservatives. A spokesman for the conference rushed over to reporters after the announcement to make sure they had heard the unmistakable boos when the screen first showed Paul had won the straw poll."

It appears that the organizational leaders of "movement conservatives" fear the idea of free markets, honest money, and limited government just as much as the barmiest of Barack Obama's statists.

Straw polls don't amount to a bowl of horse apple pudding, but, still, it is pleasant to see the good doctor so well thought of -- and to panic the movement's conservative arses who are still bemoaning the loss of Tammy Faye's subtlety and Jimmy Swaggert's singular leadership.

The Tea Party Folks

They are a great public blessing. I think of them as a backfire shielding the citizenry from the grossest manifestations of current government stupidity and tyrannical intent.

I also hope I am being realistic in hoping the movement has a grounding in the Constitution and an informed dedication to repairing the abuses against it. Would these folks fight for ending no-knock entry? Civil confiscation of property? Traffic checkpoints? Would they reject substituting "reasonable suspicion" for "probable cause" in Fourth Amendment matters?

I purposely omit mention of gun control, abortion, classroom prayer, gay marriage and similar three-alarm issues.

Discussing the lower-temperature matters first might lead to greater clarity on where they stand on the crucial point: Government by laws which do not offend the Constitution and which are administered by men and women who take their oath of office seriously and literally.

Detesting the works of President Barack Obama and most of our current legislators is an admirable stance and a good start. But it is not a substitute for policy.

A correct understanding

A direct steal from Kevin at The Smallest Minority,

"As Congressman Adam Putnam put it, governments only do two things well: nothing, and overreact. "

It's from his commentary on a letter in which a Canadian woman applauds the possible end of that country's long-gun registration system, but it has much wider application.

One of the more ignorant things we do is assume that governments are competent.

Kristen

Break a rule, Folks. Read HuffPo this morning. The caterwauling over there will do more to get your blood circulating than two espressos and a Vivarin.

According to everybody with a press card, New York Gov. David Paterson will appoint to the United State Senate a female who hunts and shoots and fishes -- and who very often is accused of thinking for herself. Sarah? Naw, but I bet Gov. Palin sends a nice note to Senator-designate Kirsten Gillibrand.

It gives some of us a new fantasy. Kristen and Sarah decide to go moose hunting in the wilderness. We're invited. We sit around the campfire chewing broiled wild-animal meat and snicker at the Brady Bunch.