Tag: Politics

I’m Losing Count

It seems Wyoming and New Hampshire aren’t the only new states pushing permitless concealed carry legislation. Montana has now jumped onto the band wagon. Montana’s is a bit different though as it would require people who carry to still receive training:

Republican Rep. Krayton Kerns’ House Bill 271 cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee Monday. The bill was amended to require completion of a training course to carry without a permit.

This seems unenforceable. How is an officer going to determine if a person carry a firearm received training? Is the person supposed to carry their training certificate at all times? In that case there is little difference in requiring a permit. Still it’s progress.

Priorities

With the spiraling deficit looking to cause a massive economic catastrophe it’s nice to see our “representatives” can find time out of their busy schedule to deal with the most important issues:

Four U.S. senators Tuesday called on Apple to yank iPhone and iPad apps that help drunken drivers evade police, saying the programs are “harmful to public safety.”

Sens. Harry Reid (D-Nev.), Charles Schumer (D-NY), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) and Tom Udall (D-NM) asked Scott Forstall, the head of Apple’s iPhone software group, to pull an unspecified number of apps from the company’s App Store. The senators also made similar requests of Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt and Research in Motion’s (RIM) co-CEOs, James Balsillie and Michael Lazaridis.

Yup instead of dealing with real issues they’re taking time whining about applications available for phones. Do we even know if these applications work? Has a drunk driver been able to evade arrest because of this application? These things should be answered before time paid for by tax payers is taken up by “representatives” to bitch about such applications.

I guess these “representatives” will also have to go after the police as they often advertise these checkpoints:

“Many police departments promote or advertise DUI [driving under the influence] crackdowns through the media as PSAs or through PR,” Scott said. “We are just taking it a bit further and pushing the info to drivers through GPS and smart phone technology. The idea is to deter drivers from drinking and driving. When drivers get alerts for DUI checkpoints on their smart phones and GPS, they will think twice about drinking and driving.”

Apparently Capitalism Killed Life on Mars

Hugo Chavez is one of my favorite punching bags. First he claims that the earthquake in Haiti was caused by the United State’s super top secret earthquake machine and now he’s claiming capitalism is likely what killed all life on Mars:

“I have always said, heard, that it would not be strange that there had been civilization on Mars, but maybe capitalism arrived there, imperialism arrived and finished off the planet,” Chavez said in speech to mark World Water Day.

Chavez, who also holds capitalism responsible for many of the world’s problems, warned that water supplies on Earth were drying up.

Well Mr. Chavez I’d say it’s far more probably that socialism arrived as it has a nasty habit of leading to horrible loss of life as exemplified by the Soviet Union’s attempt at collectivization and China’s Great Leap Forward. It is the red planet after all.

The Raw Milk Battle Wages On

There has been a rather interesting although little know battle taking place in the state of Minnesota. The battle is over raw milk which is legal to sell in this state so long as some guidelines are followed. One of the problems, as pointed out by Nathan Hansen, is the fact the guidelines are fucking ridiculous. I think the most messed up one is the following:

4) Consumer must bring their own bottling materials. Forget about buying a nice jug of milk from an already inspected bottling facility. Bring your own jug, bring a bucket, bring your oil pan, bring your cat litter pan, all of these are acceptable over the dreaded farmer bottling the milk.

I’ve never understood what right a state has to tell you what you can and can’t put into your body. When somebody else is able to determine what you do with yourself you can no longer lay claim to self-ownership. If I wish to consume raw milk that’s my business, if I choose not to that is also my business. By coming in and trying to do everything by ban the sale of raw milk the state is laying claim to you as a consumer. They are claiming that you’re too stupid to make your own decisions and thus need somebody to step in on your behalf and tell you what you can and can’t do.

If a farmer wants to sell raw milk they should be allowed to. If you want to consume raw milk you should be allowed to. If you want to consume raw milk and a farmer wants to sell it the two of you should be allowed to make a voluntary transaction that is mutually beneficial.

ATF Reform Bill

The National Rifle Association (NRA) has a write up on H.R. 1093, The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) Reform Act of 2011. Sadly the bill doesn’t take the only correct measure that would ultimately fix most of the problems crated by the ATF as it doesn’t abolish the ATF. There are a couple nice clauses in this bill but none of them prevent the ATF from smuggling or allowing somebody else to smuggle guns into other countries and then claim the need for more funding to fight arms smuggling.

Most of the things the NRA listed on their site are very good I’ll admit. For instance is bars the ATF from establishing a long gun registry and from creating a centralized electronic index of gun owners. The bill would also require the ATF to establish clear guidelines for their investigations although I think that would be better done by an outside party.

Granting Government Privileges to Unions

It appears the state of Illinois has determined people who are members of a union are somehow safer with firearms. As Thirdpower at Days of our Trailers points out there is an exemption in the Illinois carry bill allowing union workers to ignore ‘No Guns’ signs.

This seems like an odd exemption. There really exists no justifiable reason why union works could gain an exemption while non-union workers can’t. I guess union works are just better then the rest of us.

If You Don’t Like the Law Just Reinterpret It

Oh look yet another instance of a government department not liking the power granted to it and thus have reinterpreted a law to give themselves more power:

The letter says federal officials have reinterpreted the civil-rights laws that require school principals to curb physical bullying, as well as racist and sexist speech, that take place within school boundaries. Under the new interpretation, principals and their schools are legally liable if they fail to curb “harassment” of students, even if it takes place outside the school, on Facebook or in private conversation among a few youths.

Now civil action can be taken against school principals if they fail to stop physical attacks and monitor the actions of every student even when they’re not at school:

Education Department officials are threatening school principals with lawsuits if they fail to monitor and curb students’ lunchtime chat and evening Facebook time for expressing ideas and words that are deemed by Washington special-interest groups to be harassment of some students.

Freedom of speech has been dead in public schools since… well since I was going to one. Will the Education Department soon require two way viewers in every home to monitor students just in case they’re “bullying” somebody online?

Not only do rulings like this destroy the concept of free speech but they also cause students to depend on outside help for everything. If somebody is bullying a student that student should have the right to fight back. Instead they are told to basically shut up and take it and after they’ve gotten their ass kicked they’re suppose to go talk to somebody in “authority.” Strangely enough the school is a government entity and acts as such because when a student reports a bully nothing is likely to happen. OK maybe the bully will get detention for a couple of days but they certainly aren’t going to learn a lesson.

Now that I’m thinking about it public schools works very much like the rest of our society. We’re told to depend on the state for protection and the state fails to offer protection. If somebody does something wrong they’re isolated for others for a short period of time with no other form of punishment. Should one of us defend ourselves we potentially get into trouble. Fuck, now I see where the victim mentality comes from in our society.

Here’s the thing if you’re a student at a school and somebody wants to beat the shit out of you fight back. Self-defense is a natural right afforded all human beings. If the bully is larger balance out the disparity of force with a good old threat-based weapon (for instance smashing somebody in the fact with a text book does some good damage). Nobody needs to submit to the violence of another regardless of what is taught in schools.

I’ll also say if you are cause true psychological trauma by things posted about you online man the fuck up. Words are words and can only cause the amount of harm you allow them. When somebody says something hurtful to you then it’s time for a witty comeback. I usually challenge a person’s cognitive capabilities myself and try to do so using old English but there are many means of doing this. Either way words can’t hurt you. If somebody is spreading lies or slander about you then it’s time to look into civil action. But asking the school officials for help isn’t going to accomplish anything because they’re in the interesting position of being unable to discipline unruly children while being tasked with disciplining unruly children.

Placing Carry Instructor Requirements into Minnesota Law

The Gun Owners Civil Rights Alliance (GOCRA) is pushing to establish the requirements of Minnesota carry instructors into Minnesota law. I’m not a carry instructor so I’m not 100% what is all involved but I do know the commissioner of the Department of Public Safety gets complete authority to determine what is required to become a carry instructor.

Like most government agencies granted authority by the legislator the commissioner can also change the rules on a whim without justification. The legislation GOCRA is proposing would place the current requirements for a carry instructor into law and further establishes a requirement for the Department of Safety to prove cause for revoking an instructor license.

I’m always a fan of taking the establishment of requirements from the hands of government departments and placing them into law (I’m even a bigger fan of completely abolishing such things but alas that won’t be an option here). That way no single person has ungodly authority and everybody can be somewhat assured changes won’t be established on a whim.

New Hampshire is Doing it Right

Wow New Hampshire seems to be on a role. The state’s motto is “Life Free or Die” and apparently they are taking that pretty seriously as of late. The New Hampshire house just passed three very interesting bills. The first is a bill that would turn New Hampshire into the fifth state to abolish the requirement of a permit to carry a firearm in the state.

The second bill passed is one that will prevent police from arresting people who are recording their actions. This has become a big problem in some states where it’s illegal to record the actions of law enforcement even if they are in public places where you or I couldn’t expect the same (it’s legal to record anybody whom lacks a “reasonable expectation of privacy” in most states).

The third bill I found interesting is the one that will allow jury’s to be notified and exercise their right to nullify. If put into law it would require the courts to inform juries of their right to nullify which is far different than many places where judges have actually arrested people trying to inform jury members of this right. Arguably this is the most important bill of the three (which is saying a lot as I’m saying this bill is more important than the right to carry one) as it would allow the citizens of New Hampshire to abolish laws they found unjust.