America's most successful organizer of neighborhoods south of the Blackstone Hotel may be laying the groundwork for a career move. Up until Mayor Daly gave him permission to be a U.S. senator, HIs Obamaness made a living on street corners, haranguing the welfare class to stick it to Duh Man.
His priority seems to be shifting to making sure Duh Man loves him, maybe even enough to reserve a nicely upholstered chair for him somewhere in the Wall and Broad neighborhood upon his retirement from government service, in, one hopes, 2012.
He has appointed General Electric Boss Jeff Immelt to head up a new federal Chablis klatch called the "Council on Jobs and Competitiveness."
This replaces the old Obama Economic Recovery Advisory Board, whose demise remains unlamented even among the 769 Americans who were aware of its existence. (This number includes the 466 payrollers who earned their livings typing memos and pouring wine for said council.)
AP paraphrases Obama's thought processes this way: "Obama, in a statement after midnight, said the council's mission will be to help generate ideas from the private sector to speed up economic growth and promote American competitiveness."
(When I say dimwitted things, I try to do it in the wee hours, too, Mr.President. So I do not criticize your timing.)
Well, I probably won't be appointed to the council, but I generated an idea anyway, andI hope it's okay with you if I say it: Mr. President, call your favorite congresspersons and economic advisers and invite them on a pleasant golf vacation, preferably at that nice Ulan Batar course. Check your voice mail every couple of months. If we need y'all, we'll let you know.
---
The old council held the usual conglomeration of successful union bone crunchers and government has-beens, but it was dominated by NGO guys who made their bones running conglomerates with hefty government contracts and/or selling one another repos to protect their Singapore pickle-futures positions.
It's a lock that similar parasites will run the new council, which is a shame. Because among all the names with even the remotest chance of getting to stir their coffee with White House spoons, not one will have the balls to address America's First Orator thusly.
"Sir, like most of Washington's stupid meddling, this council and -- more to the point -- its premise are a bull on Ex-Lax. Governments don't create jobs. Governments create positions for slugs and thugs who get off on extorting citizen's honestly earned wealth, then (a) passing it around among themselves and (b) using the residue to buy voting blocks. Me? I just discovered my parents were married, so I quit."
All by itself, that wouldn't be enough to make it morning in American, but it would reveal a tinge of orange just peeking over the eastern horizon.
And if that ain't professor Von Mises' own ever-lovin' truth I'll kiss Geithner's inflationary arse at the Bureau of Printing and Engraving and give you a full day to announce the festivities to all your Acorn buddies.
Jan 21, 2011
Jan 19, 2011
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.
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.
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.
Cold
Fifteen below.
This makes me cheery because the season is so far advanced I can speculate that this clipper may be the last nasty one of the winter.
(See the midnight grave yard; hear me whistle.)
This makes me cheery because the season is so far advanced I can speculate that this clipper may be the last nasty one of the winter.
(See the midnight grave yard; hear me whistle.)
Jan 18, 2011
Cowboy fantasies
The July sun glints from the can some slob dropped. Your pleasure is in making the glint jump, 15 times without reloading if you're perfect with your long rifles, 22 times with shorts, a fire power haiku .
The BL22 comes from Japan, precisely made to occidental specifications and as smooth a lever gun can be. It hangs on the living room wall, in deep winter a constant reminder that the world will awaken again.
The real cowboys would have loved its action, quiet for the breed and speedier than anything they knew with its 33-degree lever throw.
In my 1960s hippie-dippie garb I would never be mistaken for a cowboy. That is a problem only for others. The Browning in hand, I am Rory Calhoun, and the womenfolk back in camp tend the dutch oven in perfect safety.
Haiti Cheri
The teevee pundits are all over themselves wondering why Baby Doc came home. The dunderheads. Two simple explanations cover it.
1. He's run through what he stole prior to 1986 and needs to replenish the numbered accounts.
2. Not even the French could stand him anymore.
---
And isn't it weird to think that if the cheering throngs who greeted him at Port au Prince put him back in power, it might represent an improvement on what those poor bastards have suffered in past quarter century?
1. He's run through what he stole prior to 1986 and needs to replenish the numbered accounts.
2. Not even the French could stand him anymore.
---
And isn't it weird to think that if the cheering throngs who greeted him at Port au Prince put him back in power, it might represent an improvement on what those poor bastards have suffered in past quarter century?
I don't know how I feel about the California future, the coast cracking off and sliding down the continental slope when San Andreas burps again, brush fires taking out everything up to 4,000 feet.
Or the latest revenge of the Cosmos, the central valley flooded by Noah V. 2. (No kidding, the geologist mentions 40 days.)
On the surface, ridding ourselves of the California SSR menace seems like a fine idea. But the silly place has long attracted otherwise perfectly sensible Midwesterners*, and a fellow hates to think of them so badly inconvenienced. Life is full of moral quandaries.
---
*It is long suspected that these transplanted flyover-country folks -- along with the swarthy illegals -- perform whatever useful work gets done out there.
Or the latest revenge of the Cosmos, the central valley flooded by Noah V. 2. (No kidding, the geologist mentions 40 days.)
On the surface, ridding ourselves of the California SSR menace seems like a fine idea. But the silly place has long attracted otherwise perfectly sensible Midwesterners*, and a fellow hates to think of them so badly inconvenienced. Life is full of moral quandaries.
---
*It is long suspected that these transplanted flyover-country folks -- along with the swarthy illegals -- perform whatever useful work gets done out there.
Tan me hide when I've died, Clyde
Nothing like good chuckle to lighten an arctic morning.
The kangaroo stomp, at Brigid's place.
(Besides, it is about the correct length for an internet video -- 12 seconds.)
The kangaroo stomp, at Brigid's place.
(Besides, it is about the correct length for an internet video -- 12 seconds.)
Jan 16, 2011
Sunday Mission
It isn't usually this bad, although it will never win a New Yankee Workshop award for compulsive neatness. Too many late fall projects -- plus the tendency to toss stuff into the shop just because I can't immediately think of a better idea -- have left it in this chaos. I couldn't put my hand on a two-inch C clamp if my life depended on it.
And so to work. The Knipco is drinking kerosene, and in a few minutes it should be warm enough to turn to out there.
If I post an "after" picture today, you'll know I was diligent. If not, you can ask me which book I decided I must read immediately.
Ahhhhhh, that's better
For two days the wood stove has been cold, and for no better reason than pure, cussed laziness, the Commandant's Quarters at Camp J (home of the Northern Expeditionary Force) has been heated to 78 degrees with propane, the first time this season the little gas furnace has been on.
It made me feel unmanly. No man ought to secure comfort with no more effort than twisting a knob. So, as of 0906 local, the flames dance and a ready supply of wood is on the hearh.
Yes, I feel much manlier.Thank you for asking.
It made me feel unmanly. No man ought to secure comfort with no more effort than twisting a knob. So, as of 0906 local, the flames dance and a ready supply of wood is on the hearh.
Yes, I feel much manlier.Thank you for asking.
Jan 15, 2011
With or without a Glock,
it takes no wild flight of imagination for me to visualize how hideous I would look in a red g-string, so I guess I'll need to continue my non-violent approach to disciplining congressfolk.
Jan 14, 2011
It probably will happen
My pal Fred is salivating over the prospect of of some guy on a copy desk penning the headline, "Democrats Take Aim at Gun Lobby for use of Weapons Metaphors."
.
.
Another wheel barrow of bank notes, if you please, Mr. Bernanke
A guy who has made his bones in the commodity business, Jim Rogers, is worried. He doesn't think we're necessarily on the road to a Mad Max world, but, then again, he isn't sure we're not.
Jim stares at $3.15 gasoline, $4.35 copper, and $6.40 corn and says the prices will go much higher. Maybe by enough to make us think a little more seriously about governments falling and street riots by the hungry.
Some governments and some politicians might respond by blaming speculators for rising prices. He used the example of how exchanges in India will sometimes be forced to shut to cool down rising commodity prices. “But every time it happens, prices go higher and higher. That’s the reaction of a simple-minded politician,” he said.
(If "simple-minded politician" is hate speech designed to move some loon to start shooting, well, I sure do apologize. And imagine how the Left would get after us if we proposed that our money be backed by something more glittery than an Obama turn of phrase.)
Jim stares at $3.15 gasoline, $4.35 copper, and $6.40 corn and says the prices will go much higher. Maybe by enough to make us think a little more seriously about governments falling and street riots by the hungry.
Some governments and some politicians might respond by blaming speculators for rising prices. He used the example of how exchanges in India will sometimes be forced to shut to cool down rising commodity prices. “But every time it happens, prices go higher and higher. That’s the reaction of a simple-minded politician,” he said.
(If "simple-minded politician" is hate speech designed to move some loon to start shooting, well, I sure do apologize. And imagine how the Left would get after us if we proposed that our money be backed by something more glittery than an Obama turn of phrase.)
Jan 13, 2011
Lucky John Wayne
Just warming up my morning, here, folks. The weather also requires wolverine fur, mukluks, and a certain ration of uisge beatha
Iowa top cop: Law, schmaw
It's no longer news that Iowa has has just become a shall-issue CCW state. A little less known is a Dec. 29 letter from Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, D, telling local officials they have authority to forbid firearms on local public property. Two things stand out.
(1) -- Miller's letter shunts aside a broad state pre-emption statute and advises local officials to get around it by using criminal trespass laws to prosecute a CCW holder paying his property tax over at the court house. That, in turn, conflicts with another law exempting public property from criminal trespass laws.
(2) -- The Miller letter cites a single legal precedent for his opinion, a similar 2003 letter written by Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller.
Down in Sioux City (Woodbury County), they're not quite buying it yet. Yesterday the supervisors defeated a motion to ban CCW holders from carrying on public property. The news could be better. The vote was 3-2 against the ban, but at least one of the supers said he might change his mind if someone could offer a better means of enforcement. That's a coded message meaning country taxpayers should fork over a little more for metal detectors at court house doors.
(1) -- Miller's letter shunts aside a broad state pre-emption statute and advises local officials to get around it by using criminal trespass laws to prosecute a CCW holder paying his property tax over at the court house. That, in turn, conflicts with another law exempting public property from criminal trespass laws.
(2) -- The Miller letter cites a single legal precedent for his opinion, a similar 2003 letter written by Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller.
Down in Sioux City (Woodbury County), they're not quite buying it yet. Yesterday the supervisors defeated a motion to ban CCW holders from carrying on public property. The news could be better. The vote was 3-2 against the ban, but at least one of the supers said he might change his mind if someone could offer a better means of enforcement. That's a coded message meaning country taxpayers should fork over a little more for metal detectors at court house doors.
Jan 12, 2011
About time someone in the MSM said it
Congresswoman McCarthy notwithstanding, this fellow thinks a rape of the 2nd Amendment doesn't look too likely in the near futue.
Democrats have been so spooked by the issue, party members and gun-control advocates say, that few are willing to push hard for tougher laws. Several days after the Giffords shooting, Democratic leaders in Congress have yet to weigh in, and President Barack Obama has also been silent ahead of his arrival in Tucson.
We'll soon be seeing polls claiming public opinion favors tighter laws, especially on the "high-cap" issue. That spike will flatten quickly.
Democrats have been so spooked by the issue, party members and gun-control advocates say, that few are willing to push hard for tougher laws. Several days after the Giffords shooting, Democratic leaders in Congress have yet to weigh in, and President Barack Obama has also been silent ahead of his arrival in Tucson.
We'll soon be seeing polls claiming public opinion favors tighter laws, especially on the "high-cap" issue. That spike will flatten quickly.
Jan 11, 2011
Reloading Note - Bullseye
Random Acts of Patriotism features a photo of a maimed revolver which appears to have been destroyed by a massive loading bench error, possibly a double charge of powder.
Reloading is as dangerous as negotiating the on-ramp of an urban freeway. So you say to yourself as you unlock the reloading shack, "Let's be careful in here."
---
Bullseye powder is almost as old as the 1911. Over its 98 years, it became almost the de facto standard for, among other things, .38 Special target loads. You capped three grains (or a little less) of it with a 148-grain lead wad cutter for cheap and pleasant afternoons at the range.
The problem lies in its almost non-existent bulk. Responsible amounts all but disappear in the case, and six grains amputates a thumb as it destroys your Officers Model Target.
I still use it once in a while for a number of plinking loads. But I treat it like a pet cobra, My most religious practice requires a very bright flashlight. Charged cases are neatly aligned in the loading block and carefully inspected -- not glanced at but inspected -- one by one, in a regular order. Anything that looks even slightly unusual is dumped and recharged.
It isn't fool proof. A double charge is not necessarily obvious, but it should be apparent if your attention isn't diluted by memories of your first girl friend or a bacon sandwich or something.
Most other powders are bulkier. Overloads are more apparent. But in my shack, the flashlight routine is used on them, too. I am pleased with my opposable thumb and desire to keep it attached.
Please pardon the preaching.
Reloading is as dangerous as negotiating the on-ramp of an urban freeway. So you say to yourself as you unlock the reloading shack, "Let's be careful in here."
---
Bullseye powder is almost as old as the 1911. Over its 98 years, it became almost the de facto standard for, among other things, .38 Special target loads. You capped three grains (or a little less) of it with a 148-grain lead wad cutter for cheap and pleasant afternoons at the range.
The problem lies in its almost non-existent bulk. Responsible amounts all but disappear in the case, and six grains amputates a thumb as it destroys your Officers Model Target.
I still use it once in a while for a number of plinking loads. But I treat it like a pet cobra, My most religious practice requires a very bright flashlight. Charged cases are neatly aligned in the loading block and carefully inspected -- not glanced at but inspected -- one by one, in a regular order. Anything that looks even slightly unusual is dumped and recharged.
It isn't fool proof. A double charge is not necessarily obvious, but it should be apparent if your attention isn't diluted by memories of your first girl friend or a bacon sandwich or something.
Most other powders are bulkier. Overloads are more apparent. But in my shack, the flashlight routine is used on them, too. I am pleased with my opposable thumb and desire to keep it attached.
Please pardon the preaching.
Jan 10, 2011
Now, again please, what did you say I couldn't say?
The TMR had planned a little Bing work to illustrate that we anti-gummint types do not hold exclusive rights to vivid speech.
No need. Kurt beat me to it.
Nothing much needs to be added, except maybe His Obamaness's pledge to keep keep his boot ready for neck-stomping.
No need. Kurt beat me to it.
Nothing much needs to be added, except maybe His Obamaness's pledge to keep keep his boot ready for neck-stomping.
Mental health
Analogies prove nothing.
With that out of the way, let the debate about who's mentally ill and who's not tip its hat to an historical observation.
In the fullest flowering of 20th Century tyranny -- Hitler's perhaps excepted -- a favored method of of human control was to dump inconvenient people into psychiatric hospitals, Lubyankas with white-coated attendants.
With that out of the way, let the debate about who's mentally ill and who's not tip its hat to an historical observation.
In the fullest flowering of 20th Century tyranny -- Hitler's perhaps excepted -- a favored method of of human control was to dump inconvenient people into psychiatric hospitals, Lubyankas with white-coated attendants.
Here we go again
A guy wishes we could let some of the Tucson dust settle before we begin what I suppose will need to be an epic defense of rights guaranteed by Amendment Two.
Not that our adversaries will take a deep breath and do a bit of thinking . The most usual of suspects, Carolyn McCarthy, is on the home stretch to orgasm with her new opportunity to decide what sorts of rights should be sacrificed in the wake of the Tucson madness. Right now.
Good politics, there, Congresswoman. Your plan to get your new bill filed today or tomorrow represents a sterling example of trying to draft carefully thought-out legislation.
And then, in the same Politico report, there's:
Pennsylvania Rep. Robert Brady, a Democrat from Philadelphia, told CNN that he also plans to take legislative action. He will introduce a bill that would make it a crime for anyone to use language or symbols that could be seen as threatening or violent against a federal official, including a member of Congress.
Which is ill-advised unless we decide we must indict a certain high federal official for promulgating a symbol of death -- officially defined as such by federal authorities -- from and in the White House.
Photo credit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/craxxi/3287463155/
Not that our adversaries will take a deep breath and do a bit of thinking . The most usual of suspects, Carolyn McCarthy, is on the home stretch to orgasm with her new opportunity to decide what sorts of rights should be sacrificed in the wake of the Tucson madness. Right now.
Good politics, there, Congresswoman. Your plan to get your new bill filed today or tomorrow represents a sterling example of trying to draft carefully thought-out legislation.
And then, in the same Politico report, there's:
Pennsylvania Rep. Robert Brady, a Democrat from Philadelphia, told CNN that he also plans to take legislative action. He will introduce a bill that would make it a crime for anyone to use language or symbols that could be seen as threatening or violent against a federal official, including a member of Congress.
Which is ill-advised unless we decide we must indict a certain high federal official for promulgating a symbol of death -- officially defined as such by federal authorities -- from and in the White House.
Photo credit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/craxxi/3287463155/
Jan 9, 2011
Tucson
1. The shooter had no political philosophy in any meaningful sense of the term. He was an emotional pimple and finally squeezed himself. The consequences are tragic.
2. The blaming of the gun is not so much muted as delayed. The media is still in its obligatory "Oh, how 'horrific' stage."
3. This is useful. Without the minute-by-minute expressions of ratings-building abject grief, we proles might think it only mildly annoying that the guy murdered a little girl, an apparently unobjectionable political operative, a judge, and three old folks.
4. Our opinion leaders will get around to the full-force horror of the armed citizen, per se, before too many more hours have passed.
Stay tuned.
2. The blaming of the gun is not so much muted as delayed. The media is still in its obligatory "Oh, how 'horrific' stage."
3. This is useful. Without the minute-by-minute expressions of ratings-building abject grief, we proles might think it only mildly annoying that the guy murdered a little girl, an apparently unobjectionable political operative, a judge, and three old folks.
4. Our opinion leaders will get around to the full-force horror of the armed citizen, per se, before too many more hours have passed.
Stay tuned.
Jan 8, 2011
Hi Ho, HI Ho
Off to the first 2011 loophole, a little c. 100-table production in sovereign state of Minnesota. No big personal agenda for this one other than a bit of good-ol'-boy comradeship and junk-box snooping.
' course, I'll be strapping on the money belt. A fellow never knows when he'll run across another $850 Python.
Actually, I do need some small stuff -- pilots for the old Pacific trimmer, a magazine release mechanism for a Winchester 69, a better magazine spring for the Marlin 38. I can hear it now, "Rotsa ruck, Jim."
Do I hope too highly that there's an issue 1911 frame, preferably Colt? Those lonesome slides and barrels are starting to get on my nerves. Finding one would be the neatest brazen act of loopholism I can think of.
EDIT: Nada.
' course, I'll be strapping on the money belt. A fellow never knows when he'll run across another $850 Python.
Actually, I do need some small stuff -- pilots for the old Pacific trimmer, a magazine release mechanism for a Winchester 69, a better magazine spring for the Marlin 38. I can hear it now, "Rotsa ruck, Jim."
Do I hope too highly that there's an issue 1911 frame, preferably Colt? Those lonesome slides and barrels are starting to get on my nerves. Finding one would be the neatest brazen act of loopholism I can think of.
EDIT: Nada.
Jan 7, 2011
G'day, Mate. Have a House on Me
The Down-Under bankers seem to be following the U.S. mortgage model. Y'all can afford any kind of McMansion you want. Trust me. After all, I'm a banker.
To achieve that modest goal of palaces for peons, they've come up with a clever new trick to (a) make would-be borrowers feel richer than they are and (b) to make their ugly (that is, unpayable) mortgages look like AAA investments.
To do so they're telling potential borrowers, "You don't really pay the rent you pay. It's really part of your savings account, so we'll loan you more."
(The link takes you to a longish explanation of Canberra's latest whim, and, like Mythbusters, it should carry a preview line, "Caution, Economics content." But it's still worth the read for anyone interested in money as Charmin.)
To achieve that modest goal of palaces for peons, they've come up with a clever new trick to (a) make would-be borrowers feel richer than they are and (b) to make their ugly (that is, unpayable) mortgages look like AAA investments.
To do so they're telling potential borrowers, "You don't really pay the rent you pay. It's really part of your savings account, so we'll loan you more."
(The link takes you to a longish explanation of Canberra's latest whim, and, like Mythbusters, it should carry a preview line, "Caution, Economics content." But it's still worth the read for anyone interested in money as Charmin.)
Vintage and exotic gun porn in .32 ACP
Or, as the auctioneer announced it, 7 and, uhhh, point 65 caliber, causing just enough confusion in the country crowd that the gavel fell at $60, tickling the buyer to no end. At least it looks something like the Browning that inspired it.
It's a Model 1916 Astra patent, made by Esperanza y Unceta in Guernica, up in the Basque country, probably prior to the first great depression, the one before this one. Nine in the magazine. The barrel is marked "Hope," creating a certain insecurity about the confidence of the makers in its objective utility.
The apprehension was unfounded. The new owner might even have gone up to $100 on pure speculation that it was one of the good Spanish pocket pistols, and he would have won the bet. Frittering away a remarkable sum of money running factory ammunition through the new toy, he experienced no malfunctions and minute-of-thug accuracy over the length of an average living room. Or, as he remembers the session that cold afternoon, groups of about four inches at about 25 feet from an F150 hood rest.
It hasn't been shot since, not so much because he agrees the .32 is a little light for heavy situations, but because of the reloading hassle. It tosses brass to Hell and gone, making the tinies hard to find. And he can never get used to placing the bullets over the neck with a pair of tweezers.
But it's nice enough to keep, and he'll probably pop for more practice ammo. Who knows when he'll need something small enough to slip under his cummerbund?
Workin' on the Railroad
Due to a particularly acute bout of sloth yesterday, I woke up this morning to a pile of embers in the wood burner and an empty wood box. This sent me outside to snag an arm load of snowy billets from the pile, and that for some reason got me thinking about a recent chat with a friend -- a railroad buff -- who now works in the small city where I spent my boyhood.
Me: "When I was a little kid we could see poor Fort Dodgers carrying gunny sacks down on the tracks east of the Illinois Central depot to gather coal-car spillage. The railroad dicks left them alone."
Him: "I've heard about that. Now they'd just run down to the welfare office."
Yes, many of them would.
Then I wondered what we could say about the obvious statist objection that some people would, by superior strength or diligence or intelligence, get more coal than others. Who would regulate the coal recovery workers in the named of fairness and equality?
The best answer I could conceive at this early hour is the coal pickers themselves, resulting in some ramshackle homes being warmer than others.
It isn't quite as cruel as it sounds. The very old and the incapacitated always seemed to get heating fuel. Might have been friends, churches, Boy Scouts, Oddfellows -- all sorts of compassionate people feeling compelled to recognize the commonality of interests in helping one another, even before we sold our souls to the redistributionists.
Only those who suffered too many bouts of acute sloth were frozen out, rendering to Darwin his just due.
---
You don't have to use this small personal recollection to arrive at any grand macro conclusions about the way we do things in these latter years. But if you want to, it's okay by me.
Me: "When I was a little kid we could see poor Fort Dodgers carrying gunny sacks down on the tracks east of the Illinois Central depot to gather coal-car spillage. The railroad dicks left them alone."
Him: "I've heard about that. Now they'd just run down to the welfare office."
Yes, many of them would.
Then I wondered what we could say about the obvious statist objection that some people would, by superior strength or diligence or intelligence, get more coal than others. Who would regulate the coal recovery workers in the named of fairness and equality?
The best answer I could conceive at this early hour is the coal pickers themselves, resulting in some ramshackle homes being warmer than others.
It isn't quite as cruel as it sounds. The very old and the incapacitated always seemed to get heating fuel. Might have been friends, churches, Boy Scouts, Oddfellows -- all sorts of compassionate people feeling compelled to recognize the commonality of interests in helping one another, even before we sold our souls to the redistributionists.
Only those who suffered too many bouts of acute sloth were frozen out, rendering to Darwin his just due.
---
You don't have to use this small personal recollection to arrive at any grand macro conclusions about the way we do things in these latter years. But if you want to, it's okay by me.
Jan 6, 2011
Jan 5, 2011
Bigger and Dumber
Roberta is doing a nice little riff on the Goldwater/Reagan line, "A government big enough to give you everything you want is big enough to take away everything you have."
Recalling an Iowa story from about five years back.
State law at that time permitted slot-like gambling devices about everywhere, and a few of them turned up in ice cream shops and the like, prompting a holy outcry about teaching our children to gamble away their lunch money.
The gambling interests, however thug-like the breed may be, followed the law and invested millions in the machines. The political storm moved the governor to call for banning them everywhere, leaving that segment of the gambling industry twisting in the wind.
The guv's most cogent public comment on the matter was, "The Government giveth and the government taketh away."
Such pearls of wisdom elevated him to high national office where he is now the man in charge of takething away your money and givething it to the likes of Monsanto, the Farm Bureau and assorted other ag interests hiding behind the sacred purity of the American family farmer.
I suppose it is okay, though, because as previously reported by the TMR, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack developed unimaginable agricultural expertise growing cherry tomatoes in a five-gallon bucket on his deck when he was mayor of Mount Pleasant.
Recalling an Iowa story from about five years back.
State law at that time permitted slot-like gambling devices about everywhere, and a few of them turned up in ice cream shops and the like, prompting a holy outcry about teaching our children to gamble away their lunch money.
The gambling interests, however thug-like the breed may be, followed the law and invested millions in the machines. The political storm moved the governor to call for banning them everywhere, leaving that segment of the gambling industry twisting in the wind.
The guv's most cogent public comment on the matter was, "The Government giveth and the government taketh away."
Such pearls of wisdom elevated him to high national office where he is now the man in charge of takething away your money and givething it to the likes of Monsanto, the Farm Bureau and assorted other ag interests hiding behind the sacred purity of the American family farmer.
I suppose it is okay, though, because as previously reported by the TMR, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack developed unimaginable agricultural expertise growing cherry tomatoes in a five-gallon bucket on his deck when he was mayor of Mount Pleasant.
The north Pacific blue fin tuna weighed 754 pounds and sold in Tokyo for $396,000.
The record-setting price translates to a whopping 95,000 yen per kilogram, or about $526 per pound.
Or, in other words, about the same price Bernanke, Geithner, Obama, and the ethanol mafia have in mind for a pound of bacon.
.
The record-setting price translates to a whopping 95,000 yen per kilogram, or about $526 per pound.
Or, in other words, about the same price Bernanke, Geithner, Obama, and the ethanol mafia have in mind for a pound of bacon.
.
Jan 4, 2011
Caring for your pregnant woman
H/T Tam
Not to be a copper bore again, but the stuff is selling at another record-- $4.40+ a pound. Lead has hit $1.17+, and this all combines to send me to town for another two or three Federal 550 bulk packs.
I'm already over my locked-away strategic reserve target, but a guy can never have too many rounds in the plinking can when there's every reason to believe that .22 LRs at less than 4 cents a round are about to become history.
I'm already over my locked-away strategic reserve target, but a guy can never have too many rounds in the plinking can when there's every reason to believe that .22 LRs at less than 4 cents a round are about to become history.
Jan 3, 2011
From the Poop Deck
You want to learn about lewd? Make an appointment. I'll teach you lewd. Like a real sailor. Like the talk that got talked in the forward bos'n' locker on the USS Henderson.
Captain Honors of the Bird Farm Enterprise? Hell, Mate, when it comes to lewd he's a brown-shoe flyboy (crudity whose referent is a WAVE's most private regions). He's Ozzie Nelson playing to Oscar Wilde.
Now, maybe the New Navy isn't the place for scurvy-arsed shellbacks who can still whip out a long splice blindfolded on the fo'c's'le at Beaufort 10 while belting out a chorus of On The Good Ship Venus.
So maybe Captain Honors should have read to the crew from the Collected Wit and Wisdom of Joe Biden.
The main thing that really gripes my briny butt is the generality of the shave-arse media lubbers screaming for his keel-haul. Who the eff are they to be evaluating anything saltier than whether the Lohan wench ought to spend another week in rehab? Bunch of flotsam from Miss Porter's Country Day School, and they ought to shove a bung or something into their gaping polliwog chow holes.
---
"First we set sail for the Canaries..."
Captain Honors of the Bird Farm Enterprise? Hell, Mate, when it comes to lewd he's a brown-shoe flyboy (crudity whose referent is a WAVE's most private regions). He's Ozzie Nelson playing to Oscar Wilde.
Now, maybe the New Navy isn't the place for scurvy-arsed shellbacks who can still whip out a long splice blindfolded on the fo'c's'le at Beaufort 10 while belting out a chorus of On The Good Ship Venus.
So maybe Captain Honors should have read to the crew from the Collected Wit and Wisdom of Joe Biden.
The main thing that really gripes my briny butt is the generality of the shave-arse media lubbers screaming for his keel-haul. Who the eff are they to be evaluating anything saltier than whether the Lohan wench ought to spend another week in rehab? Bunch of flotsam from Miss Porter's Country Day School, and they ought to shove a bung or something into their gaping polliwog chow holes.
---
"First we set sail for the Canaries..."
The Tea Party Goes to Work
Joe Scarborough is leading a not unintelligent discussion of raising the debt ceiling this morning. It covers some of the reasons why Washington's credit limit will be raised by at least enough to let your grandkids redeem those federal savings bonds you've been buying them all these years.
And of course to put gas in the cabinet officers' limos, support a million and more more otherwise unemployable androids in the bureaucracies, hire the curviest office drones for congressleches, and pay farmers to refrain from growing food.
The Obama Wing of economic stupidity is correct about one narrow point. Government must protect its FICA score by desperation measures. It must borrow more long-term money to head off immediate default which, aside from robbing your grandkids of their college nest egg, would piss off China to no end.
Scarborough got some general agreement that the debt-limit debate could generate that storied "adult" moment in congress. The critters might say, "Yep, if we keep trying to buy some peoples' votes with other peoples' money, we're shortly going to get our adult members caught in the wringer."
So let's watch the action on "reducing discretionary spending." Let's immediately and scornfully dismiss the political posturing for what it is.
The critter to praise will be the first one who votes against a new interstate highway spur in his home district.
Publish Post
And of course to put gas in the cabinet officers' limos, support a million and more more otherwise unemployable androids in the bureaucracies, hire the curviest office drones for congressleches, and pay farmers to refrain from growing food.
The Obama Wing of economic stupidity is correct about one narrow point. Government must protect its FICA score by desperation measures. It must borrow more long-term money to head off immediate default which, aside from robbing your grandkids of their college nest egg, would piss off China to no end.
Scarborough got some general agreement that the debt-limit debate could generate that storied "adult" moment in congress. The critters might say, "Yep, if we keep trying to buy some peoples' votes with other peoples' money, we're shortly going to get our adult members caught in the wringer."
So let's watch the action on "reducing discretionary spending." Let's immediately and scornfully dismiss the political posturing for what it is.
The critter to praise will be the first one who votes against a new interstate highway spur in his home district.
Publish Post
Jan 2, 2011
You meet the nicest people around here.
A good Texas cop named Matt -- Better and Better -- is now on the TMR blog roll.
Death of a City
You know all you need to know about Texas -- that big braggart of a state where everyone goes around armed with a handgun, threatening peaceable citizens, and shooting up the town every boozy Saturday night.
And you know all about Mexico, that gentle southern neighbor where disarmed peasants go humbly around, doffing their sombreros to the damas, smiling "manana, senor," and donating their pitifully few small pieces of silver for a new bell for Santa Maria's Cathedral.
Ahem. It isn't the guns. It is the politicians.
Massacres, beheadings, YouTube videos featuring cartel torture sessions and even car bombs are becoming commonplace in Juarez, where more than 3,000 people were killed in 2010, according to the federal government, making it among the most dangerous places on earth.
El Paso, by contrast, has had three violent deaths — and one was a murder-suicide.
And you know all about Mexico, that gentle southern neighbor where disarmed peasants go humbly around, doffing their sombreros to the damas, smiling "manana, senor," and donating their pitifully few small pieces of silver for a new bell for Santa Maria's Cathedral.
Ahem. It isn't the guns. It is the politicians.
Massacres, beheadings, YouTube videos featuring cartel torture sessions and even car bombs are becoming commonplace in Juarez, where more than 3,000 people were killed in 2010, according to the federal government, making it among the most dangerous places on earth.
El Paso, by contrast, has had three violent deaths — and one was a murder-suicide.
---
The piece concentrates on citizens' flight from a city I once loved. It's the drug violence, of course, but the most frightening and revealing passage is about the federales' effort to figure out just how many Juarez people have fled.
The piece concentrates on citizens' flight from a city I once loved. It's the drug violence, of course, but the most frightening and revealing passage is about the federales' effort to figure out just how many Juarez people have fled.
Now, the Mexican army and federal authorities are going door-to-door, conducting an emergency census to determine just how many residents have fled.
Many people, however, refuse to answer their questions for fear authorities are simply collecting information about neighborhoods so they can begin extorting residents — just like the drug gangs.
---
Mexico is a failed country because it has been corruptly governed since September 16, 1810, and because its people have no tradition of standing tall and telling its dictators du jour to go the Hell. And because of the "war on drugs" -- lost the instant it was declared. When unworkable and unenforceable laws create a market so skewed that drugs easily command 100 times their pharmaceutical costs, the war lords are in control. No level of horribly expensive DEA macho can alter that.
RTWT, if you please.
---
EDIT: Link fixed -- to AOL reprint of disappearing AP original. Thank you, Billll
RTWT, if you please.
---
EDIT: Link fixed -- to AOL reprint of disappearing AP original. Thank you, Billll
Home to The Big Chill
The kids and their kids treated me to a fine Christmas celebration over on the river. The weather for the 340-mile drive home wasn't nearly so accommodating, but at least it was diverse, beginning with rain, then fog, then sleet, then snow. Sort of a mishmash including the worst of everything. (Think Obamacare, here.)
So the trip took a little longer than usual, but the real shocker came when I opened the living room door. It felt chilly. A thermometer check revealed 31 degrees. Some dumdum had set the thermostat on the new electric heater a little too low. The good news is that the water didn't freeze, and that's a big bullet dodged. An armload of dry oak soon produced a comfy 75.
A standout gift came from a lad named Ryan who wrapped a surplus ammo can for me. As one of the revelers said, "He knows his grandpa." I was touched and promised the boy I would use it only for .45ACP, never desecrating it with a less noble caliber.
-0-
Onward and upward tin 2011. May you thrive. May we all survive to heap another year of scorn on the statists of the right and the statists of the left.
So the trip took a little longer than usual, but the real shocker came when I opened the living room door. It felt chilly. A thermometer check revealed 31 degrees. Some dumdum had set the thermostat on the new electric heater a little too low. The good news is that the water didn't freeze, and that's a big bullet dodged. An armload of dry oak soon produced a comfy 75.
A standout gift came from a lad named Ryan who wrapped a surplus ammo can for me. As one of the revelers said, "He knows his grandpa." I was touched and promised the boy I would use it only for .45ACP, never desecrating it with a less noble caliber.
-0-
Onward and upward tin 2011. May you thrive. May we all survive to heap another year of scorn on the statists of the right and the statists of the left.
Dec 28, 2010
Sarah Palin Really Can't Spell
She typed it refudiate.
She meant refeudiate, of course.
As in: "In 1941 we had to refeudiate with the Germans."
She meant refeudiate, of course.
As in: "In 1941 we had to refeudiate with the Germans."
A little while ago I wrote about $4 bacon. Looks like I understated the case. As bad as 2010 is, next year looks worse for the two basic food groups, i.e., (1) bacon and (2) everything lese.
More government-mandated and subsidized corn likker is going into our Suburbans and Lexi. That makes corn dearer. Right now it's trading at an amazing $6+ a bushel. That means it is harder for pig farmers to make a buck. That means they're not so anxious to raise pigs. That means fewer critters on the market. That means higher-priced pig parts.
No such post would be complete without a reminder that the Washington payday loan office operated by Bernanke and Geithner plays a leading role in this stunning remake of that movie classic, "March to Weimar."
.
More government-mandated and subsidized corn likker is going into our Suburbans and Lexi. That makes corn dearer. Right now it's trading at an amazing $6+ a bushel. That means it is harder for pig farmers to make a buck. That means they're not so anxious to raise pigs. That means fewer critters on the market. That means higher-priced pig parts.
No such post would be complete without a reminder that the Washington payday loan office operated by Bernanke and Geithner plays a leading role in this stunning remake of that movie classic, "March to Weimar."
.
I'd have used a more clinical word
So Pennsylvania Boss Democrat Rendell thinks we're becoming a nation of wusses because a little snow storm moved big-money football to cancel a game. Right on, Ed. That's what I've been saying all along.
Although canceling ball games wasn't really one of the reasons I had in mind. I was thinking more along the lines of governors who veto self-defense bills because they might irritate enough scared soccer moms and dads to make a difference at election time.
Although canceling ball games wasn't really one of the reasons I had in mind. I was thinking more along the lines of governors who veto self-defense bills because they might irritate enough scared soccer moms and dads to make a difference at election time.
Dec 26, 2010
A rasher of dumb
In case you're wondering why your pig fat laced with microscopic meat slivers costs upwards of four bucks a pound lately, most of the answer is here:
The (U.S. Energy Information) agency said 4.8 billion bushels of this year's 12 billion to 13 billion bushel corn crop will be needed to satisfy ethanol demand.
The word "demand" is a fraudulent use of language unless you think a political bribe to Monsanto and the Farm Bureau constitutes "demand."
The reporter seems doubly joyful that the 48-cent to one-dollar per gallon subsidies on ethanol and biodiesel have been renewed. The agrithugs get richer.
The rest of the four-buck bacon price is due to a Bernanke/Geithner /Obama trick with disabling the governor on the currency engine.
---
Possibly, just possibly, some one from the depths of Pelosi land will stumble across this and go "Huh?" It's like this, Sunshine. Bacon comes from hogs. Hogs eat corn.
The (U.S. Energy Information) agency said 4.8 billion bushels of this year's 12 billion to 13 billion bushel corn crop will be needed to satisfy ethanol demand.
The word "demand" is a fraudulent use of language unless you think a political bribe to Monsanto and the Farm Bureau constitutes "demand."
The reporter seems doubly joyful that the 48-cent to one-dollar per gallon subsidies on ethanol and biodiesel have been renewed. The agrithugs get richer.
The rest of the four-buck bacon price is due to a Bernanke/Geithner /Obama trick with disabling the governor on the currency engine.
---
Possibly, just possibly, some one from the depths of Pelosi land will stumble across this and go "Huh?" It's like this, Sunshine. Bacon comes from hogs. Hogs eat corn.
My most obnoxious personal geekery begins on Boxing Day, the countdown to that glorious date when wearing socks is an option.
At these coordinates we have 20 days until the average daily high begins rising -- from 21 to 22. This is my personal favorite; my Six has just been told extraction Hueys are on the way.
In 59 days, on Feb. 22, the average daily high reaches the freezing point.
And in just 79 days the daily mean exceeds 32. Three days later, on St. Patrick's Day, we plant our potatoes. On average. :)
Dec 25, 2010
Christmas dispensation
--In Iraq, a father kills his daughter for wanting to be a suicide bomber. (H/T Roberta)
--Iowa Area Education Agency bigwumps use your tax money to create a private subsidiary which is apparently making money for someone through bid-rigging and other fiscal peccadilloes.
--A Pakistani father doesn't kill his daughter for wanting to be a suicide bomber, and she blows up 40-some folks.
--Congress won't pass cap and trade, so the EPA says it will do it, or something very like it, by decree.
--French officials are congratulating themselves for finding most of their jetliners in the Orly drifts and persuading America to ship them some de-icing fluid, which they forgot to re-order.
--Italian thugs (calling themselves anarchists) bomb some embassies.
--Et al. Just another Yuletide season.
But I revert to my childhood training. On Christmas, don't worry, be happy, love everybody.
Time enough to nail the poor, misunderstood, miscreants next week.
(Edit: Correcting an error in the second paragraph. The probabable thugs are not from the community colleges in this case. They're from the AEAS which were established to improve publek skuls by adding a layer of bureaucracy to vital process of tossing your money around.)
--Iowa Area Education Agency bigwumps use your tax money to create a private subsidiary which is apparently making money for someone through bid-rigging and other fiscal peccadilloes.
--A Pakistani father doesn't kill his daughter for wanting to be a suicide bomber, and she blows up 40-some folks.
--Congress won't pass cap and trade, so the EPA says it will do it, or something very like it, by decree.
--French officials are congratulating themselves for finding most of their jetliners in the Orly drifts and persuading America to ship them some de-icing fluid, which they forgot to re-order.
--Italian thugs (calling themselves anarchists) bomb some embassies.
--Et al. Just another Yuletide season.
But I revert to my childhood training. On Christmas, don't worry, be happy, love everybody.
Time enough to nail the poor, misunderstood, miscreants next week.
(Edit: Correcting an error in the second paragraph. The probabable thugs are not from the community colleges in this case. They're from the AEAS which were established to improve publek skuls by adding a layer of bureaucracy to vital process of tossing your money around.)
Dec 24, 2010
December 24, 2010
The smartest people I know carry their cynicism openly, like a Peacemaker in a fast-draw rig. It is the best defense against a world of questionable sanity and undeniable unkindness.
About this time of year, however, some of us set it aside if random events conspire to evoke the awe of a four-year-old watching Daddy pretending to clean the chimney lest Santa get too sooty.
About midnight the light snow began, windlessly and perfectly, a Bing Crosby dream of the Christmases we wish we had had. A watery sun will shortly rise to reveal a fresh two inches of whiteness, a virginal cloak hiding the smudge of earlier snowfalls.
Among other things it moves me to imagine the most romantic kind of Currier and Ives winter print, with a sleigh of toys for apple-cheeked children and the makings of a feast. I send it to you with a hand-written "Merry Christmas."
Best
Jim
About this time of year, however, some of us set it aside if random events conspire to evoke the awe of a four-year-old watching Daddy pretending to clean the chimney lest Santa get too sooty.
About midnight the light snow began, windlessly and perfectly, a Bing Crosby dream of the Christmases we wish we had had. A watery sun will shortly rise to reveal a fresh two inches of whiteness, a virginal cloak hiding the smudge of earlier snowfalls.
Among other things it moves me to imagine the most romantic kind of Currier and Ives winter print, with a sleigh of toys for apple-cheeked children and the makings of a feast. I send it to you with a hand-written "Merry Christmas."
Best
Jim
Dec 22, 2010
Far be it from me to suggest Ben Bernanke and Tim Geithner and Barack Obama have their heads up their dark places, but copper is knocking on the $4.30 door, a record, and humble lead continues to command well over a buck.
Never mind the $3+ self-service unleaded of which I burned a bit this morning on a trip to town for the monthly bulk pack of Federal .22s and a 100-round carton of 12 gauges.
The suspects named above, aided and abetted by a bipartisan coalition of congressional zippety-doo-dahs, continue to soothe us with "Hush little baby don't say a word, 'bama's gonna buy you ...".
Inflation in America? Simply not possible.
Never mind the $3+ self-service unleaded of which I burned a bit this morning on a trip to town for the monthly bulk pack of Federal .22s and a 100-round carton of 12 gauges.
The suspects named above, aided and abetted by a bipartisan coalition of congressional zippety-doo-dahs, continue to soothe us with "Hush little baby don't say a word, 'bama's gonna buy you ...".
Inflation in America? Simply not possible.
Dec 20, 2010
Woad trip
I'll depend on you folks for an eclipse report. It's strictly IFR here with ground visibility less than three miles.
In return, I'll pass along my observations if I happen to spot naked blue people dancing around my oak trees in the morning.
In return, I'll pass along my observations if I happen to spot naked blue people dancing around my oak trees in the morning.
Anyone seen my Coppertone?
About this time Kurt was posting this gem from one of the East Anglia climate frauds:
"Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.
...two other things were happening.
The Eurozoners were still digging around in drifts, trying to find their Airbuses, and I was trying to get artsy-craftsie with:
Al, we still gotcher your Glow Ball warming hanging.
"Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said.
...two other things were happening.
The Eurozoners were still digging around in drifts, trying to find their Airbuses, and I was trying to get artsy-craftsie with:
Al, we still gotcher your Glow Ball warming hanging.
....has always been at war with Eastasia
Support your local Telescreen.
Genuflect to your new "state fusion center." It seeks to know you better than God does.
And, for Heaven's sake, do nothing suspicious.
The Washington Post is doing a series on federal, state, and local police lust to put you, me, and the other 330 million of us under the microscope.
A trip to WalMart (which is cooperating with the snoops) for a bag of rose fertilizer and a gallon of kerosene for your shop heater gets you -- or in due course will get you -- a place in the database of suspected terrorist ANFO freaks.
"At the same time that the FBI is expanding its West Virginia database, it is building a vast repository controlled by people who work in a top-secret vault on the fourth floor of the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building in Washington. This one stores the profiles of tens of thousands of Americans and legal residents who are not accused of any crime. What they have done is appear to be acting suspiciously to a town sheriff, a traffic cop or even a neighbor."
The cost is hideous, tens or hundreds of billions; we're in the dark because, of course, telling us what we're paying would alert Osama that we're trying to catch his acolytes.
So far the universal Telescreen seems to be quite effective in nabbing Sad Sacks with outstanding traffic warrants. And tracking the vacationer who photographs a Staten Island ferry boat.
Folks, the WaPo piece is long. It is worth your time.
And it is actionable if your habits are as suspicious as mine. At least three times this year I have entered WalMart in the deep dark of late night to purchase munitions to fit my BL22, (a weapon fully capable of killing at 100 yards). There is no place in the Miniluv database for a lame explanation about disliking crowds. So, from now on, I'll buy the Federal 550 bulk packs at Noon, in the Darkness thereof.
Genuflect to your new "state fusion center." It seeks to know you better than God does.
And, for Heaven's sake, do nothing suspicious.
The Washington Post is doing a series on federal, state, and local police lust to put you, me, and the other 330 million of us under the microscope.
A trip to WalMart (which is cooperating with the snoops) for a bag of rose fertilizer and a gallon of kerosene for your shop heater gets you -- or in due course will get you -- a place in the database of suspected terrorist ANFO freaks.
"At the same time that the FBI is expanding its West Virginia database, it is building a vast repository controlled by people who work in a top-secret vault on the fourth floor of the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building in Washington. This one stores the profiles of tens of thousands of Americans and legal residents who are not accused of any crime. What they have done is appear to be acting suspiciously to a town sheriff, a traffic cop or even a neighbor."
The cost is hideous, tens or hundreds of billions; we're in the dark because, of course, telling us what we're paying would alert Osama that we're trying to catch his acolytes.
So far the universal Telescreen seems to be quite effective in nabbing Sad Sacks with outstanding traffic warrants. And tracking the vacationer who photographs a Staten Island ferry boat.
Folks, the WaPo piece is long. It is worth your time.
And it is actionable if your habits are as suspicious as mine. At least three times this year I have entered WalMart in the deep dark of late night to purchase munitions to fit my BL22, (a weapon fully capable of killing at 100 yards). There is no place in the Miniluv database for a lame explanation about disliking crowds. So, from now on, I'll buy the Federal 550 bulk packs at Noon, in the Darkness thereof.
Dec 19, 2010
About that foreign weenie...
Every time truth requires me to admit to using a 9mm Eurowimp as my bread and butter piece, I feel compelled to get all defensive about it.
I loopholed the 59 cheap, as it should have been. It was intended to be trading stock, but my vestigial conscience denied permission to foist it off until it could be used as intended. So I disassembled, deburred, throated, and polished the internals. Most significantly I ground enough metal from the frame to permit the trigger to go back far enough to trip the sear every time. This is the truth, and I can still display the tool marks to doubters.
About the time I finished making the damned thing work right, I got sucked into the high-capacity vortex which was just gathering speed in those days.
"Look," I thought, "with 13 rounds in one magazine, I am reasonably well covered for any threat I can imagine, even if I can't immediately put my hands on the spare."
It remains a valid point, even after a guy becomes totally disenchanted with the 9mm as a defense round. (You can hedge your bet with zippy hand loads, and I do.) Besides, I really like shooting the thing.
But the controlling point is that my life has become almost as threat-free as a modern American life can be. On the rare, all but nonexistent, occasions when I don't t think that Pollyanna-ish view is justified, the pipsqueak goes into the safe, and out comes one of Mr. Browning's (PBUH) 1911s in the decisive .45 ACP.
I do not urge this solution on others.
I loopholed the 59 cheap, as it should have been. It was intended to be trading stock, but my vestigial conscience denied permission to foist it off until it could be used as intended. So I disassembled, deburred, throated, and polished the internals. Most significantly I ground enough metal from the frame to permit the trigger to go back far enough to trip the sear every time. This is the truth, and I can still display the tool marks to doubters.
About the time I finished making the damned thing work right, I got sucked into the high-capacity vortex which was just gathering speed in those days.
"Look," I thought, "with 13 rounds in one magazine, I am reasonably well covered for any threat I can imagine, even if I can't immediately put my hands on the spare."
It remains a valid point, even after a guy becomes totally disenchanted with the 9mm as a defense round. (You can hedge your bet with zippy hand loads, and I do.) Besides, I really like shooting the thing.
But the controlling point is that my life has become almost as threat-free as a modern American life can be. On the rare, all but nonexistent, occasions when I don't t think that Pollyanna-ish view is justified, the pipsqueak goes into the safe, and out comes one of Mr. Browning's (PBUH) 1911s in the decisive .45 ACP.
I do not urge this solution on others.
The uncarried pistol
Out of an essential, I had to warm up the van and drive a mile to the country convenience store before sunrise this morning.
---
My usual carry pistol is a SW 59, a turn-in by a police department which could not tolerate the criminally slipshod quality. Diligent frobnistication has turned it into a fast, dependable, and accurate defense piece. It generally lives in the vehicle, as does a purely recreational Ruger RST4.
Yesterday morning I brought them inside for a routine inspection and wipedown. I neglected to put them back.
---
Years ago I spent a three-year career break in some misery, teaching in a high school. Among my burdens was a hard-luck kid of no motivation, a surly attitude, and an explosive rejection of my insistence that everyone, college prep or metal-shop loafer, should have at least a passing acquaintance with Shakespeare, Dickens, and the elements of civilized speech. His hatred of me apparently was profound.
---
I made my purchase and got into the van. As I started the engine a massively-bearded six-foot-something apparition emerged from behind a black Suburban with something in its right hand. It banged on my window. It occurred to me that, being unarmed, a speedy drive-off would best satisfy the requirements of prudence.
But this is a small community, my small community, and habits of friendliness die hard. I cracked the window three or four inches, just enough to communicate. Still, I shifted into gear and held the brake pedal down with the left foot, the right one poised over the accelerator.
Comes the voice:
"Hi Mr. _____________. I had this left over from the box and thought you might want it."
I accepted the rolled Sunday newspaper and said, "Thank you."
I can't imagine the synaptic processes that led to recognition of my old English-hating student.
"Hey, is that you _________ ?
"Yep. Just thought you might like the Sunday paper, Mr.____________. Merry Christmas."
---
My usual carry pistol is a SW 59, a turn-in by a police department which could not tolerate the criminally slipshod quality. Diligent frobnistication has turned it into a fast, dependable, and accurate defense piece. It generally lives in the vehicle, as does a purely recreational Ruger RST4.
Yesterday morning I brought them inside for a routine inspection and wipedown. I neglected to put them back.
---
Years ago I spent a three-year career break in some misery, teaching in a high school. Among my burdens was a hard-luck kid of no motivation, a surly attitude, and an explosive rejection of my insistence that everyone, college prep or metal-shop loafer, should have at least a passing acquaintance with Shakespeare, Dickens, and the elements of civilized speech. His hatred of me apparently was profound.
---
I made my purchase and got into the van. As I started the engine a massively-bearded six-foot-something apparition emerged from behind a black Suburban with something in its right hand. It banged on my window. It occurred to me that, being unarmed, a speedy drive-off would best satisfy the requirements of prudence.
But this is a small community, my small community, and habits of friendliness die hard. I cracked the window three or four inches, just enough to communicate. Still, I shifted into gear and held the brake pedal down with the left foot, the right one poised over the accelerator.
Comes the voice:
"Hi Mr. _____________. I had this left over from the box and thought you might want it."
I accepted the rolled Sunday newspaper and said, "Thank you."
I can't imagine the synaptic processes that led to recognition of my old English-hating student.
"Hey, is that you _________ ?
"Yep. Just thought you might like the Sunday paper, Mr.____________. Merry Christmas."
Dec 18, 2010
Set back, relax, and enjoy your flight.
The Iranian-American businessman who forgot to take his loaded Baby Glock out of his computer bag was a little embarrassed to find it after a flight from Houston. He thought maybe the crack TSA security operatives ought to be, too.
"It's just impossible to miss it, you know. I mean, this is not a small gun," Seif told ABC News. "How can you miss it? You cannot miss it."
But the TSA did miss it, and maybe --- I dunno, just maybe -- I can answer his question.
Was one of these in the security queue, motivating the TSA fellas to lose concentration and squabble quietly over whose turn it was to gape at the pervoscan, or probulate her as a opt-out? I mean, I'm just askin', here.
"It's just impossible to miss it, you know. I mean, this is not a small gun," Seif told ABC News. "How can you miss it? You cannot miss it."
But the TSA did miss it, and maybe --- I dunno, just maybe -- I can answer his question.
Dec 17, 2010
"Hi. I'm Al Sharpton, better known as The Rev.Mr. Al. I have some other peoples' money and I want your gun."
The Rev. Mr. Al's disciples will be at the church tomorrow, cash in hand, allegedly paying $200 - $600 for working guns.
(Note the picture. In the second row down, third from left, is what might be a nice old Smith spur trigger. Don't tell Tam. She'd probably get all hostile at the thought of it being melted down for a manhole cover, especially before she can profile it as a Sunday Smith.
---
If you're too far away from Harlem, you can shed that pesky old Luger in Portland tomorrow. For a fiream they'll give you a $50 local megamart gift certificate. A BB gun will net you a whopper of a $5 "Burgerville" certificate. Cheapass Oregoniads.
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An idle wonder: Do they promise to turn off the surveillance cameras -- especially the ones with digital face recognition -- in and near the buyback sites?
The Rev. Mr. Al's disciples will be at the church tomorrow, cash in hand, allegedly paying $200 - $600 for working guns.
(Note the picture. In the second row down, third from left, is what might be a nice old Smith spur trigger. Don't tell Tam. She'd probably get all hostile at the thought of it being melted down for a manhole cover, especially before she can profile it as a Sunday Smith.
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If you're too far away from Harlem, you can shed that pesky old Luger in Portland tomorrow. For a fiream they'll give you a $50 local megamart gift certificate. A BB gun will net you a whopper of a $5 "Burgerville" certificate. Cheapass Oregoniads.
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An idle wonder: Do they promise to turn off the surveillance cameras -- especially the ones with digital face recognition -- in and near the buyback sites?
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