Dec 8, 2013

Ho Ho Ho and maybe Bang Bang Bang

A good little boy around here is thinking hard about buying himself a Christmas present when Tom Eberle auctions off bunch of lethal weapons (pdf) later this morning.

Who wouldn't want chance to augment his fantasy command to a full squad, just in case the captain orders him to take the MG42 nest from the Nazis, somewhere in France, 1944.

His current in-place TOE arms and equips only a scant fire team -- webbing and weapons for a private, a senior corporal. And himself, of course, a young but grizzled staff who left his carbine back in the foxhole to permit greater mobility as  -- and we're talking Audie Murphy here -- he leads the charge with his 1911A.

Of course we'd wipe them out and earn two silver stars and The Medal, but a squad would be better, even if scant -- my vets plus a couple of peach fuzz draftees from the repple depple. I'd arm them myself with the Springfield Garand and Rockola  carbine which lead off the rifle section in the sale bill.

N.B. -- Yeah, it's possible that I could expand my team to seven or eight with captured German, Frog, and Norwegian stuff, but that is not part of the fantasy which compels me to blow them away with Made in America.

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We'll see what the disbursing officer thinks.

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I'll try to log and post the prices, at least for the more interesting stuff.  Beats working.











Dec 6, 2013

Winter havoc

Twelve below this night. And me with only one dog.



I know some of you guys don't believe us when we talk about bigass continental highs, huge, cold, sluggish ones. Almost Jack London cold;  Vilhjalmur Stefansson cold.

Take a look at the weather map, dammit. See the triangle with its point down in the Texas malarial zones? Even there around Houston shivering white guys are hiring mules named Pedro to sneak them across the border and on down to Coatzacoalcos.

Anyway, the cold high spreads up and out. By the time it hits my  sorry latitude it  spans Flyover from the Cascades to the Soo Locks and plops its butt down for a nice, long visit.

Oh sure, it goes up into Canada too, but screw those guys. Buncha foreigners.  Let 'em freeze from their heads right down to their long-gun registry. What's Canada ever done for us?

Huh?

































Okay. I meant to say what's Canada done for us lately?


Dec 5, 2013

As if hi-cap magazines aren't evil enough...

... now we face the threat of hi-cap -- multiple warhead? --  cartridges.

Down in Des Moines a thugnut went out in his yard and started blazing away at this and that with something that looked to Des Moines Register reporters like an assault rifle.

No one got hurt until cops arrived and shot the perp down.

Later, a police spokesman and the six -- repeat six -- Register reporters combined to produce this explanation:


Police found a semi-automatic rifle similar to an AR-15 and a handgun with the suspect in the backyard. Several gun cartridges were found in the backyard, police said. (Police Sgt. and spokesman) Halifax said cartridges for the rifle used often contain 10 or 15 rounds.

It is simply mind-numbing that a mirvel like this was developed without any of us gun freeks having heard about it.



Dec 4, 2013

A little educashun Muzak if you please, Maestro

Randi Weingarten is not all that's wrong with the United States, but if you happen to be looking for a poster girl for the fubarity of our schools,  she might be on your short list.

Randi is president of the American Federation of Teachers. She appeared on C-Span today to explain away why her 1.5 million union educators can't educate kids. As you might expect, it's because they don't get paid enough and don't get enough respect.

There's nothing unusual about that sort of nonsense from AFT or the other teacher unions.  The striking thing is this woman's analytical and rhetorical approach. In essence, she rilly rilly rilly cares, and her wise and sincere concerns are products of her autobiography.

A reporter asked a how schools might reduce bullying. Ms. Randi responded that she is gay and that makes her an extra-caring expert on bullying.

Another reporter asked about the impact of city bankruptcies on teacher pensions.  She revealed that her father was an engineer and didn't get a very good pension.

Near the end, a crusty old guy tried to cut through the crap with a question about "zero tolerance" for most everything public school drones find politically incorrect. (Jack gives Jill a little hug at the bottom of the hill and is expelled for sexual harassment.)  Ms. Randi explains she understands the issue because she can remember being a high school teacher. And because "...I sometimes close my eyes and think." ( About half right there, Ms. Randi, if you ask me.)

It's all accompanied by great body language of engaged emotion. Her head blurs from the motion. Her  neck stretchs and retracts beneath a visage well-practiced in broad, dramatic segues from smiley to frowny to amazement to just plain querulousness.

I blame public eduction for that, too. I'm all but certain her high school speech teacher told her class that the key element in exposition is enthusiasm (!).  "Say it like you mean it, kids, and everything else will fall into place." Yeah. everything except a useful contribution to an important discussion.

I repeat. This woman leads the American Federation of Teachers. It's as though we still have the student on one end of the log but sent Horace Mann off to sell insurance and replaced him with Phyllis Diller.