Month: April 2011

Anti-Gunners Finally Win One

Apparently the anti-gunners are rather desperate for victories and are cheering their latest one… in a few years. They managed to get a rider removed that would have abolished all funding for the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to establish any form of long gun registry:

The amendment, offered by Reps. Dan Boren (D-Okla.) and Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.), would have prevented federal funds from being used by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) to track bulk sales of long guns in southwestern states. Up until late moments in the negotiations, sources familiar with the discussions say, it remained in the text of the final continuing resolution.

It’s sickening but honestly I don’t feel it’s that big of a victory. As it currently sits federal laws prohibition the establishment of a long gun registry anyways so this would have simply been extra insurance. What I did find hilarious was the following:

“ATF is already chronically underfunded and has been without a confirmed director since 2006 as a result of inaction by past sessions of Congress,” New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a co-chair of the coalition Mayors Against Illegal Guns, said in a statement. “We welcome this sign that leaders in Washington may be ready to step up and help law enforcement save lives.”

Yeah the ATF is underfunded, especially with the cost of fuel going up. Soon they aren’t going to be able to afford driving down to gun shops sitting on the border and telling them to sell guns to sketchy individuals in order to supply the drug cartels with money. How will the ATF be able to function if they can’t afford to help run guns?

Green as in Money

Yesterday I had the oil changed on my truck. I usually got to one of the Valvoline instant oil change places because then I can do it over lunch and as I live in an apartment complex I have no place to dispose of old oil thus it’s a pain in the ass to do it myself.

While they were changing my oil they did the usual attempt to up sell me on the synthetic oil. As usual I turned them down but then they tried to sell me on Valvoline’s new link of “green” oil. I shit you not, it was oil labeled as being more environmentally friendly and game in a green bottle. The guy claimed it had the same properties as regular oil and only cost $5.00 more. I politely informed him that I derive some pleasure off of irritating greenies and thus I’d stick with the non-green oil.

Either way I learned that greenies will pay extra for anything “green.” That’s great as the greenies get more green and the company making these “green” products get more green (money). Well I decided to look into this fancy new “green” oil and have come to the conclusion the “green” oil is actually recycled oil. I can tell you I’m already not a fan. Instead of putting new oil into my engine they’re trying to put reprocessed previously used motor oil into my engine… and they’re charing you more for the privilege! It’s a great little scam and I must applaud Valvoline’s marketing department for something up with such a great way to exploit environmental concern.

Doctors Who and Brown Banned from China

I guess the Chinese government has gotten sick of constant Dalek invasions and guys named Biff because they’ve made a move to ban references to time travel:

In a statement (available here in Chinese) dated March 31, the State Administration for Radio, Film & Television said that TV dramas that involve characters traveling back in time “lack positive thoughts and meaning.” The guidelines discouraging this type of show said that some “casually make up myths, have monstrous and weird plots, use absurd tactics, and even promote feudalism, superstition, fatalism and reincarnation.”

Isn’t socialism great? What other system of society has so much vested interested in controlling what its people think that it makes a rule prohibition the idea of time travel? Seriously Doctor Who and Emmet Brown never hurt anybody… OK maybe a few people. But those people all had it coming!

New Dinosaur is a Missing Link

Paleontology is awesome. There is one Hell of a challenge in digging up the fossils of animals that have been dead for millions of years and trying to piece together their world and how they fit in the wonderful chain of events that we call life.

There has been a gap in the evolution of predatory dinosaurs that was until now unfilled. The remains of a new species were discovered in the famous (for paleontology nears) Ghost Ranch in New Mexico. The species has been labeled Daemonosaurus:

“Various features of the skull and neck in Daemonosaurus indicate that it was intermediate between the earliest known predatory dinosaurs from South America and more advanced theropod dinosaurs,” said Hans Sues, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and lead author of the team’s findings. “One such feature is the presence of cavities on some of the neck vertebrae related to the structure of the respiratory system.”

How cool is that? Let me rephrase, how cool is that if you’re a paleontology nerd?

If You’re Going to Commit a Crime Keep it Quiet

If you’re going to be one of those blokes who goes out and commits a crime it would probably be smart to avoid bragging about it. What would be really stupid is going on television and bragging about your capers which was the mistake made by a French hacker who is now in custody:

A French hacker has effectually tied a noose around his own neck when he bragged about hacking into the systems of a big government contractor on national TV.

He participated in a France 2 television program called “Complément d’enquête” (Further investigation), and he said – and demonstrated – that he has gained access to computers belonging to the French Army and Thales Group, a French company that provides information systems and services for the aerospace, defense, and security markets.

What I said goes double if your crime is against the government or its military. Doing crime is the government’s job and they don’t like competition.

Bend over Californians

If you live in California you might as well bend over and prepare to have three rights removing bills rammed clear up your ass. The California Senate and Assembly Public Safety Committees just approved three anti-gun bills (although they tossed you guys a bone with one pro-gun bill) which will be going to the next leven in California’s legislative process:

Yesterday, the California Senate and Assembly Public Safety Committees heard three anti-guns bills and one pro-gun bill. The anti-gun bills were: Senate Bill 124 would ban virtually all handgun and rifle ammunition and cartridges, Assembly Bill 144 would ban open carry of firearms and Assembly Bill 809 would require long gun registration. The pro-gun bill was Assembly Bill 1402 would make a technical clean-up of California’s deadly weapons laws.

The three anti-gun bills are absurd enough that I’d not worry about them passing in most places but California is the same state that passed a bill that required the recording of sale and a finger print from the purchaser of all handgun ammunition. Needless to say if you live in California you should making your moves against the three anti-gun bills. I highly doubt most of your “representatives” will listen to you but hey you can try. If that doesn’t work you can always move to one of the remaining free states although you probably need to move quickly before California goes full Soviet Union and bars anybody from leaving.

Why People Should Be Allowed to Carry a Gun

Anti-gunners often claim there is no need for regular serfs to carry firearms. They go on about how the chances of somebody being attacked it almost zero and if it does happen you can just call 911 and a police officer will be magically teleported to your location instantly. Those of us who promote the right to carry see things quite differently. Every person should have the right to defend themselves regardless of where they are and the best tool for self-defense is a firearm. A story was posted on the Red Star that gives an example of one fo those situations where a firearm would have been good to have:

A St. Catherine University student reported that while she was out for a walk Sunday three men ambushed her and were laughing as they sexually assaulted her near the Ford plant in St. Paul.

The woman was sexually assaulted by three thugs. Disparity of force was obviously against her as there were three versus her one. Sadly she had no means of defense available to her at the time and ended up becoming yet another crime statistic. Yes these situations are relatively rare but go ahead and tell somebody who has been a victim of such a crime that these events almost never happen. Bad people do bad things to good people.

A firearm is an force multiplier. In a situation where the scales are tipped completely against you having a firearm will tip the scales back towards your favor (maybe not back into your favor but at least the scale will have moved a bit in your direction). One person with a firearm and the training to use it can stand against three assailants. Maybe the armed person won’t win every time but at least there is a chance and honestly many situations can be defused by the insertion of armed resistance.

The golden rules are always be aware of your situation and surroundings and have a plan.

Political Correctness and Geometry

Political correctness has to be one of the dumbest concepts the human race has ever decided to waste time on. It seems people are paid to find phrases that may be offensive to somebody and then come up with a new phrase that’s fifty fucking words in length and somehow less offensive. I believe a theory was written somewhere that states the more words a phrase has the less offensive it is.

Well let’s take a look at the latest cluster fuck brought to us by a Seattle school who just renamed Easter eggs “spring spheres.” No I’m not making this up:

“At the end of the week I had an idea to fill little plastic eggs with treats and jelly beans and other candy, but I was kind of unsure how the teacher would feel about that,” Jessica said.

She was concerned how the teacher might react to the eggs after of a meeting earlier in the week where she learned about “their abstract behavior rules.”

“I went to the teacher to get her approval and she wanted to ask the administration to see if it was okay,” Jessica explained. “She said that I could do it as long as I called this treat ‘spring spheres.’ I couldn’t call them Easter eggs.”

In the frantic move to make something politically correct some administrative bozo also managed to screw these kids with geometry. An egg is not a sphere, it’s not even close. Obviously these teachers failed geometry because if they had passed they would know that a sphere is a perfectly round geometric object in three dimensional space.

Now that I think about it I believe the word school has bad connotations attached to it. Because of this I propose we renamed schools “equal opportunity non-discriminatory community oriented education environment.” Look how many words are in there, it can’t possibly be offensive!

What we really need right now is a lesson in political correctness by everybody’s favorite Gunnery Sergeant:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4o7oKQECBjs]