Author: Christopher Burg

Guns are Inanimate Objects

Advocates for gun control like to scream, “Guns kill,” and gun rights advocates like to respond by screaming, “Guns salve lives!”

I tend to give gun control advocates a bit more leeway in this case because I understand that their entire platform is built upon make-believe. If you believe in unicorns, it’s not inconsistent to argue for unicorn rights. But many gun rights advocates seem to want to have their cake and eat it too. On the one hand, gun rights advocates rightly point out that guns are inanimate objects and are therefore incapable of killing. However, an inanimate object is also incapable of saving lives.

To my fellow gun rights advocates, I urge you to be consistent in your arguments. If you rightly point out that guns are inanimate objects incapable of taking a life, don’t follow up by saying that guns save lives. Don’t restrict yourself to arguing inside of the gun control advocates’ fantasy land where guns are animate objects capable of acting.

Arm the Homeless

One of the rarest things in politics is a politician who advocates for actual solutions to actual problems. Brian Ellison is one of those rare politicians:

Brian Ellison, who is running against Democratic incumbent Debbie Stabenow, says homeless people are “constantly victims of violent crime” and providing them with firearms would provide a deterrent.

Ellison, a Libertarian who is expected to be the party’s candidate in the November midterm election, said he had settled on pump-action shotguns for practicality purposes.

“Frankly I think the ideal weapon would be a pistol,” he told the Guardian, “but due to the licensing requirements in the state we’re going to have a hard enough time getting homeless people shotguns as it is.

“Getting them pistols is probably next to impossible. The pistols need to be registered, people have to have addresses.”

Carrying a concealed pistol is illegal without a permit, Ellison said, “whereas open-carrying a long gun is completely legal”.

It’s too bad that he’s running as a Libertarian Party candidate and therefore has pretty no chance whatsoever of actually being elected. But I’m glad to see he’s at least throwing a good idea out there. The war being waged by most municipal governments against their homeless population is currently one-sided.

I also like how this policy points out the discriminatory nature of Michigan’s pistol laws. If you don’t have an address, you don’t have a right to defend yourself. Although I’d call this a flaw, I’m fairly certain that the politicians who wrote the law consider it a feature.

Dealing with Uppity Slaves

A lot of parents feed their children into the government’s indoctrination camps. While you might think that propagandizing children starting at a very young age would be 100 percent effective, every now and then one child slips through the cracks. One student in New Prague, Minnesota failed to mindlessly parrot the gun control propaganda he was expected to parrot. Fortunately, a brave principal stepped in and put that uppity slave in his place:

On Wednesday, a student at a high school in Minnesota joined his classmates who were participating in the National School Walkout and was singled out and removed by his principal for holding a sign that said, “Guns Don’t Kill People, People Kill People.”

As the article notes, the video doesn’t show what happened before the uppity slave was removed. But now we know for certain why the student was removed thanks to the tireless efforts of Snopes:

Yesterday approximately 100 of our high school students participated in a walkout, as did many of their peers across the country. The walkout was conducted peacefully and without conflict. Since then, attention has been focused on a sign that was present during the walkout.

The District has a policy that such items must be submitted to and reviewed by school administration at least 24-hours in advance. In compliance with the District’s policy “… to protect the exercise of students’ and employees’ free speech rights, [while] taking into consideration the educational objectives and responsibilities of the School District,” the sign was moved to non-school grounds. The District has an obligation to enforce this policy without regard to political viewpoint.

No student was disciplined and law enforcement was not involved with any of the students present during the walkout.

I’m a suspicious man by nature but I have my doubts that the gun control protesters submitted their signage for approval. But I also know that written rules exist to be enforced selectively. If somebody is doing something you don’t like that violates a written rule, you enforce it. If somebody is doing something you do like that violates a written rule, you don’t enforce it. If anybody calls you out on selectively enforcing a written rule, you claim that you didn’t see the violation but if you had you would have enforced the rule. It’s a fantastic way to cover your own ass when shutting down the opposition.

Government indoctrination camps are a place where opposition isn’t tolerated. The administrators have written rules to cover their asses under almost any circumstance. The only real solution to this problem is to pull your kids out of the government’s indoctrination camps.

Solve the World’s Problems, Befriend the Weird Kid

Yesterday was the National School Walkout, where students were given an excuse to leave school and took it. Gun control advocates, of course, claimed that every student who walked out was doing so for the express purpose of demanding gun control. In response a lot of gun rights advocates urged students to instead walk up to the quiet kid who sits by himself at lunch and attempt to befriend him.

While that seems like a nice gesture, I feel the need to point something out. Sometimes the quiet student who is sitting alone isn’t sitting alone because they’re being shunned for being weird. Sometimes they’re sitting alone because they think their fellow classmates are a bunch of dumb fuckers and they don’t want to associate with them. They don’t want to be friends with their classmates, they want to graduate so they can get the hell away from their classmates and never look back.

It’s Not Your Body, Slave

I’m of the opinion that each person has the right to do whatever they want with their own body. My opinion isn’t shared by the government. As far as the government is concerned it owns your body and therefore has the final say regarding what you can do with it. For example, if you’re suffering from a terminal illness and want to try an experimental treatment, the government isn’t going to allow you to do so:

WASHINGTON — In a surprising rebuff to President Trump and Republican leaders, the House derailed a bill on Tuesday that would have given patients with terminal illnesses a right to try unproven experimental treatments.

The bill was considered under special fast-track procedures that required a two-thirds majority for passage, and it fell short. When the roll was called, 259 House members supported the bill, and 140 opposed it.

Most of the opposition came from Democrats, who said the bill gave false hope to patients and could actually endanger people dying of incurable diseases, because it would undermine protections provided by the Food and Drug Administration.

We wouldn’t want terminally ill patients trying experimental procedures because that might endanger their lives!

This is just another example of blatant partisanism. The Democrats didn’t shut the bill down because experimental procedures could endanger the lives of those who are already dying, they shut the bill down because it was introduced by Republicans. But both parties do agree that without the passage of this bill it is still illegal for terminally ill individuals to seek experimental treatments, which means both parties are claiming that they own those terminally ill patients. That is the real tragedy of this entire mess.

A Security Issue Is Still a Security Issue Even If It’s a Hit Job

A series of flaws were revealed in AMD’s line of processors. The aftermath of these kinds of revelations usually involves a lot of people trying to assess the impact and threat. Can the flaws be exploited remotely? If they can be exploited remotely, is there a way to detect if a system has been exploited? What actions can be taken to mitigate these flaws? Instead of the usual assessment, the aftermath of this revelation has been dominated by people claiming that this revelation was actually a hit job secretly instigated by Intel and individuals wanting to manipulate AMD’s stock price:

Here’s a histrionic quote for you: “AMD must cease the sale of Ryzen and EPYC chips in the interest of public safety.”

That’s a real quote from Viceroy Research’s deranged, apoplectic report on CTS Labs’ security allegations against AMD’s Ryzen architecture. The big story today seemed to mirror Meltdown, except for AMD: CTS Labs, a research company supposedly started in 2017, has launched a report declaring glaring security flaws for AMD’s processors. By and large, the biggest flaw revolves around the user installing bad microcode.

There are roots in legitimacy here, but as we dug deep into the origins of the companies involved in this new hit piece on AMD, we found peculiar financial connections that make us question the motive behind the reportage.

The goal here is to research whether the hysterical whitepapers — hysterical as in “crazy,” not “funny” — have any weight to them, and where these previously unknown companies come from.

A lot of people seem to have lost sight of the fact that just because a revelation is a hit job (which I’m not saying this revelation is) doesn’t mean that the revealed exploit isn’t a legitimate exploit. Even if CTS Labs is a company secretly created by Intel for the specific purpose of wrecking AMD’s reputation, the revealed exploits need to be assessed and, if they’re found to be legitimate exploits, addressed.

Unconsciously Accepting Our Programming

One phenomenon that continues to fascinate me is the habit of individuals to take on outside programming seemingly without conscious thought.

For example, if you ask people whether Nazis should be punched, you will likely receive one of two responses: yes or no. This become interesting when you press either side to explain their reasoning.

Those who are against punching Nazis will explain that they oppose using violence in response to mere speech. However, if you press them by submitting scenarios where speech an lead to deadly consequences and ask them where the line is drawn, they usually won’t be able to provide much in the way of a response.

Those who are in favor of punching Nazis will explain that Nazis are dangerous individuals and therefore must be dealt with before they obtain power. However, if you press them by asking them why they only want to punch such deadly people instead of outright kill them, they usually won’t be able to provide much in the way of a response.

Both sides are usually regurgitating programming they’ve received from others. One side is regurgitating the ideal of free speech whereas the other side is regurgitating the ideal of using force preemptively to prevent a more dangerous situation from arising.

All of us unconsciously accept programming to some extent. But we are capable of rational thought and therefore capable of overcoming programming (or deciding whether the programming is actually beneficial and keeping it). However, employing rational thought to overcome programming seems to be uncommon and some people even actively push against doing so. It’s almost like people enjoy the fact that they’ve unconsciously accepted programming.

We Require More Stolen Money

The constitutionality of speed cameras has been raised in several court cases. Many of these cases have resulted in speed cameras being ruled unconstitutional because the people who were ticket had no opportunity to defend themselves. A case in Ohio recently found this to be the case. However, the city that was sued is claiming that it will be financially ruined if the ruling isn’t reversed:

The village of New Miami told the Ohio Supreme Court last week that its “fiscal integrity” would be compromised if a lawsuit succeeds in stopping the use of speed cameras. In January, the state Court of Appeals sided with motorists who challenged the constitutionality of the one-square-mile speed trap town’s photo radar program (view ruling). To avoid paying the resulting $3 million in refunds, New Miami is begging the high court for relief.

“The village now faces financial ruin should the Twelfth District’s overly restrictive reading of the sovereign immunity statutes be allowed to stand, and the matter proceed to final judgment,” New Miami attorney James J. Englert wrote.

If a private company claimed that a ruling should be reversed because it was detrimental to its bottom line, the judge presiding over the case would probably laugh at the company’s lawyers and then tell them to get the fuck out of the courtroom. This would be especially true if the company was found to have stolen the money in question. But rules are often different for governmental bodies. When a governmental body steals it’s usually referred to as “taxation,” a “citation,” or an “inspection fee” and considered legitimate.

Personally, I hope the judge refuses to grant the city relief and it ends up having to go into bankruptcy. Any organization that is only able to survive on theft should be tossed into the dustbin of history.

Euthanasia Airlines

Flying United Airlines is a dangerous proposition. You might be brutally beaten and removed from your flight, you might be randomly selected to lose your seat on a plane and be forcibly removed, or your dog might be killed:

A dog has died on a United Airlines flight from Houston to New York after a flight attendant ordered the animal be put in the plane’s overhead bin.

I’m sure United Airlines is very sorry about this incident just as it was very sorry about that doctor who was beaten and that poor bastard who was removed after the ticket he paid for was cancelled because the flight was overbooked. However, I’m starting to think that United’s claims of remorse may not be sincere. I’m also concerned that United Airlines may start outright executing passengers soon.

You Can’t Take the Sky from Me

Swarm Technologies applied to the Federal Communications Commission Fascist Communications Club (FCC) for permission to launch a handful of satellites. The FCC denied the company’s application. But the United States doesn’t have a monopoly on spaceflight so Swarm Technologies shopped around and was able to get its satellites into the air thanks to India. Now the FCC is claiming that it owns all of space:

One company might not have been willing to take “no” for an answer, however. IEEE Spectrum has discovered that the FCC accused startup Swarm Technologies of launching four of its tiny SpaceBEE (Basic Electronic Elements) communication cubesats without obtaining the necessary approvals — in effect, it would be the first satellite maker to go rogue.

The FCC denied Swarm’s application to launch its satellites in December 2017 on the grounds that they posed a safety hazard to other spacecraft orbiting Earth. That apparently wasn’t a deterrent, as the SpaceBEEs appear to have launched aboard one of India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicles on January 12th (you’re looking at the rocket above). Needless to say, that left officials fuming. The FCC revoked Swarm’s approval for a subsequent mission that would have taken place this April, citing an “apparent unauthorized launch and operation” of the four satellites.

The fact that the FCC revoked Swarm Technology’s approval for future missions is especially funny since the company demonstrated that it didn’t need FCC approval to get its satellites into space. But doing so probably fed some petty bureaucrat’s power trip and that’s all government approval is capable of doing in a global economy.

The world has become more connected. It’s trivial to communication with people on the other side of the globe in real time. Traveling across oceans takes a matter of hours, not days or weeks. If the government of a region is standing in your way, you can shop around for a region that will allow you to do what you want to do and transport whatever you need to that region. If worst comes to worst, a company can move itself entirely to a friendlier region.