Category: News You Need to Know

NFA Style Laws for Automobiles

At least that’s what the anti-gunners should say after reading this story:

One person is dead after a car slammed into a group of people on a Minneapolis porch Saturday morning.

Yup somebody ran a car into a group of people. With dangerous automobiles that have the potential of killing multiple people with a single step of the gas pedal the anti-gunners should be advocating for a complete ban of all automobiles manufactured after 1986. Such dangerous weapons should also require permission by both the Department of Transportation and the local sheriff of your area. I’d mention a need for a tax stamp but that already exists in the form of renewing your license plates every year.

Hope and Change Baby

It’s so good we rid ourselves of that evil and tyrannical Bush administration and replaced it with the good civil rights aware Obama administration:

The Obama administration is developing plans that would require all Internet-based communication services — such as encrypted BlackBerry e-mail, Facebook, and Skype — to be capable of complying with federal wiretap orders, according to a report published Monday.

Oh… wait.

Facebook Fraud

A strange thing is happening on Facebook. Out of nowhere all these attractive women with profile pictures of themselves scantily clad want to be my friend. Obviously I’ve become a hot commodity all of the sudden which I can understand being awesome and all.

Of course I’m a big believer in, “If you’re going to do fraud do it right.” I’m sorry I can’t bring myself to believe that the girl in the profile picture graduated college in 1978. If that’s the truth then plastic surgery has really advanced in the last couple of years.

The question is raised why the sudden surge of random people trying to add themselves to my friends list? Well the Occam’s Razor stated that the simplest explanation is usually the best one and that holds true here. These fake friend requests are most likely attempts at identity theft. Many people put a lot of personal information on their profiles such as their home address, phone number, and place of work. All of these pieces of information can be useful in stealing a person’s identity.

If you’re going to use these types of social networking sites be careful. Remember not to post any important personal information such as you home address and don’t add people to your friends list unless you know them. The weakest link in any security system are the people. Social engineering can be used with far better results than physical hacking as people are generally very gullible. Having a healthy dose of paranoia isn’t a bad thing.

Try to Top This

I personally don’t believe being knighted by a monarch is an honor but some people do. And one of these knighted people took the extra step and pretty much topped everybody. Author Terry Pratchett was knighted and decided he needed a sword. The means a trip to the sword shop right? Not for Terry Pratchett.

With help from his friend Jake Keen — an expert on ancient metal-making techniques — the author dug up 81kg of ore and smelted it in the grounds of his house, using a makeshift kiln built from clay and hay and fuelled with damp sheep manure.

Yeah that’s right he make his own sword out of fucking iron ore deposits dug up on his property. Just in case that wasn’t bad ass enough:

Pratchett, who has Alzheimer’s disease, also said he had thrown in “several pieces of meteorites — thunderbolt iron, you see — highly magical, you’ve got to chuck that stuff in whether you believe in it or not”.

Yes he did this while suffering from Alzheimer’s and tossed in a few pieces of meteorites just to show off how awesome he is. Of course he lives in Britain so:

Pratchett has stored the sword, which he completed last year, in a secret location, apparently concerned about the authorities taking an interest in it.

He said: “It annoys me that knights aren’t allowed to carry their swords. That would be knife crime.”

All that work and he lacks the right to show it off for the bad ass piece of labor it is.

Seriously you can’t top Terry Pratchett and neither can I. Also here is an article with a picture of the sword.

I Think There is More to This Story

I read the summary of a story on the BBC and have come to the conclusion we have some missing information:

A US man has killed himself after shooting dead five people, including his wife and stepdaughter, during an argument about his breakfast.

I’m guessing the man was mentally disturbed. This story also provides another example as to what relying on the police to arrive in a timely manner isn’t a good defensive strategy:

Neace apparently waited an hour for the police to arrive before shooting himself; police heard the shot as they drove up to the trailer.

You also have to appreciate this part:

Breathitt County is in Kentucky’s rural eastern region, where gun ownership is widespread.

Let me rephrase that for you, “The United States, where gun ownership is widespread and we’re proud of it!” What a lame attempt at trying to shove a little piece of anti-gun propaganda into a story. I’m sure the author believes if a story involving the improper use of firearms is being printed he’s duty bound to include some blurb about widespread gun ownership at a mechanism to place the thought into readers’ heads that high gun ownership means high gun crime rates. Prick.

This story is another example of a crazy nut job being a crazy nut job. Sometimes you just can’t avoid insanity in daily life. But hey, this is why I carry a gun when I go for breakfast, dinner, lunch, and every waking moment of the day that I can.

Be Careful What You Post Online

I’m sure some of you reading this enjoy the use of Facebook Places and Foursquare. I’m sure you also enjoy posting about future upcoming vacations and whatnot so your friends will be jealous of your sweet week in Hawaii. You’ve probably noticed by now that I don’t really post when I’ll be away. If there is some reason I’m unable to create new posts on here I’m vague as Hell as to why (maybe it’s a heavy work load, maybe it’s a vacation, who knows). This is the same reason I disable the ability for others on Facebook to check me into locations via Places and it’s because of smart assholes like these:

Nashua police are crediting an alert off-duty police officer who heard fireworks with cracking a burglary ring that targeted homes known to be empty because of Facebook postings.

Criminals being ever vigilant have been using peoples’ postings online to figure out when they were away from home so said criminals could break in and rob the domiciles. Granted most criminals are smart enough to watch a place to determine when a person goes to work or otherwise leaves home on a schedule but generally they can’t tell when somebody is leaving for an extended period of time. It’s information such as this that you never want to hand to the enemy.

What Parents Should Actually Worry About

Bruce Schneier’s blog has a link to an interesting article. Based on surveys parents were asked what their top concerns were involving their children. The top five were:

1. Kidnapping
2. School snipers
3. Terrorists
4. Dangerous strangers
5. Drugs

School snipers? It’s nice to know mass shootings are no longer the concern but individual snipers take patient shots and individual targets. That’s certainly a relief. Oh, and terrorists made the list. This isn’t surprising but it should be. So what are the top five methods of children dying? Well nothing on the above list made the second list:

1. Car accidents
2. Homicide (usually committed by a person who knows the child, not a stranger)
3. Abuse
4. Suicide
5. Drowning

Funny that. Maybe parents need to learn some perspective.

Play Big or Go Home

Iran sure ruffled some features when they brought their first nuclear power plant online. The United Nations (UN) is screaming for everybody to place sanctions against Iran because only members of the UN can have nuclear anything. Of course sanctions work about as well as scolding a misbehaving child but who care. Japan decided to play big and enact additional sanctions again Iran above and beyond those called for by the UN:

The measures – which go beyond than those imposed by the UN Security Council – ban transactions with some Iranian banks, and also target energy-related investments.

Oh yeah that will show those Iranians. Nothing will tell a country to fuck off like cutting off money going from your country to theirs… oh wait:

Japan is a major importer of Iranian crude oil, but did not impose any restrictions on oil imports from Iran.

So their still sending buckets of money to Iran. So much for playing big.