Quote of the Day - Silicon Graybeard

From this excellent post:

The reason MAD - Mutually Assured Destruction - worked was that at heart the Soviets didn't want to kill off all of their population just as the US didn't want to kill off all of its population. When push came to shove, nobody wanted to destroy the world and wash it in blood.

Most modern mailings of this story end with something like, "This was back in the days when there was honour in being a warrior. They proudly wore uniforms, and they didn't hide behind women and children, nor did they plant bombs amidst innocent crowds. How times have changed.." And this difference in value systems, this willingness to kill innocent bystanders, and the eagerness to wash the world in blood - this is the main difference we face today.

Eric Sevareid - Last of the True Journalists

I've quoted several times from one of Eric Sevareid's books, Conversations with Eric Sevareid: Interviews with Notable Americans. It's an interesting book that followed his short-lived interview program of the same name.

A reader sent me an email this evening with the link to this YouTube clip of Eric's farewell address, "Just to contrast how far we've fallen."

I think he's right.

From November 30, 1977:


Pullquote:

A friend and teacher of the late Walter Lippmann described the role of the professional reporter and observer of the news in this manner: "We make it our business," he said, "to find out what is going on under the surface and beyond the horizon; to infer, to deduce, to imagine and to guess what is going on inside, and what this meant yesterday and what it could mean tomorrow. In this way we do what every sovereign citizen is supposed to do, but has not the time or the interest to do it for himself. This is our job. It is no mean calling. We have a right to be proud of it and to be glad it is our work."

In the end, of course, it is not ones employers or colleagues that sustain one quite so much as a listening public, when it be so minded. And I have found it applies only one consistent test, not agreement with one on substance, but the perception of honesty and fair intent. There is, in the American people, a tough, undiminished instinct for what is fair. Rightly or wrongly, I have the feeling that I have passed that test. I shall wear this like a medal.

How far they have fallen, indeed.

Agenda? What Agenda?

Pat Caddell on media bias and the 2012 election.


Full transcript available at AIM.ORG

Pullquote:

When we see what happened this week in Libya—and when I said I was more frightened than I've ever been, this is true, because I think it's one thing that, as they did in 2008, when the mainstream press, the mainstream media and all the press, jumped on the Obama bandwagon and made it a moral commitment on their part to help him get elected in a way that has never happened, whatever the biases in the past. To give you an example of the difference, I'll just shortly tell you this: In 1980, when [Jimmy] Carter was running for reelection, the press—even though 80% of them, after the election, reporters said they voted for Carter over [Ronald] Reagan, or 70% percent of them, a very high percentage—they believed, so much, that the Carter campaign and the Carter White House had abused the Rose Garden against [Ted] Kennedy that they made a commitment, as they discussed, that they would not serve as the attack dogs on Reagan for the Carter White House because they thought it was unfair and they weren't to be manipulated. I totally disagree with their analysis, but that was when you actually had a press corps. Whatever their own personal feelings, they made judgments that were, "We're not going to be manipulated." This press corps serves at the pleasure of this White House and President, led by people like Ezra Klein and JournoList, where they plot the stories together.

Pat, Pat, Pat.

You poor racist....

"Once You Stop Going Forward, You Start Going Backwards."

Bill Whittle's latest Afterburner:

Tolerance

Political Correctness is a doctrine fostered by a delusional illogical liberal minority & rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous liberal press which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end.

Art by Chuck Asay. Quote from Texas A&M via Grouchy Old Cripple.

Fleeing Libertopia

So Breitbart is reporting that Campbell's Soup is closing their Sacramento, CA plant (700 jobs) and relocating production to plants in Texas, North Carolina, and Ohio.  In related news, they're pulling out of South Plainfield, New Jersey, too. Can't imagine what would prompt such moves, can you?

Breitbart also reports:

Campbell's isn't the only big business to flee California's oppressive business climate this week. Comcast announced two days ago that it will close all three of its call centers in Northern California, including one in Sacramento. 1,000 Comcast employees, including 300 in Sacramento, will have to pull up stakes.

Doubt they'll all relocate.  Jerry Brown's just wowin' 'em, isn't he?

Hell, maybe Tucson will get a new call center. It seems like that's the only kind of business our city wants moving in.

BRILLIANT!

Found at Van der Leun's:


Main difference:  If Romney's elected, you'll never hear the words "Supreme Court Justice Eric Holder."

(Not that whoever Romney nominates will be anything less than squishy....)

As an aside, the power of modern media tools really is impressive, isn't it?

Racism Explained

Just wanted to get that out of the way....

Once a Month Until the Election

And this one:


And this:


And these:

The Thomas Sowell excerpt is seven minutes, the Caroline Glick piece is 50 minutes.  Both are absolutely worth your time.

A Leftist Approaches a Chessboard...

The latest xkcd:



Remind you of anyone?

It's a LEGAL System, Not a JUSTICE System

Today's Quote of the Day comes from Professor Victor Davis Hanson's latest, Life with the Vandals:

Law enforcement seems not so much overburdened as brilliantly entrepreneurial. Patrol cars flood the highways as never before, looking for the tiniest revenue-raising infraction; the police realize that going after the man who throws a freezer into the local pond is costly and futile, while citing the cell-phone-using but otherwise responsible driver is profitable. In 2009, the most recent year for which traffic statistics have been released, the highway patrol issued 200,000 more violations than in 2006.

RTWT.

I'm reminded of something the Geekwitha.45 said just before he moved from New Jersey to Pennsylvania:

We'll be starting the house hunt after the first of the year. With the miniGeeks, we need a bigger place anyway, and shortly, this will all be a bad dream.

The thing is, I don’t think that’ll be the happy end of the story. I think the story is just beginning to be told.

As I mentioned to Kim, there is a hidden exodus that you won’t read about in the papers:

"People are moving away from certain states: not because they've got a job offer, not because they want to be closer to family, but because the state they are living in doesn't measure up to the level of freedom they believe is appropriate for Americans. We are internal refugees."

The fact that things have gone so far south in some places that people actually feel compelled to move the fuck out should frighten the almighty piss out of you.

Ten or fifteen years ago, I would've dismissed that notion, that people were relocating themselves for freedom within America as the wild rantings of a fringe lunatic, but today, I'm looking for a real estate agent.

It is a symptom of a deep schism in the American scene, one that has been building bit by bit for at least fifty, and probably more like seventy years, and whose effects are now visibly bubbling to the surface.

Just open your eyes and take a long look around you.

If you're an informed firearms enthusiast, you know how much has been lost since 1934.

Even if you lay aside gun rights issues, let me ask you some questions.

No, on second thought, let's save the 50 questions for another posting, for now, lets just ask one:

When was the last time you built a bonfire on a beach, openly drank a beer and the presence of a policeman was absolutely no cause for concern? Hmmm?

Professor Hanson will not willingly abandon his ancestral home to the vandals, but a lot of people are bailing out of California, and Professor Hanson has been patiently explaining why.  And it should frighten the almighty piss out of you.

Update: The Manhattan Institute reports on the Great California Exodus.

I Agree With Pat

Give 'em hell, Pat.

In Lieu of Original Content... Thomas Sowell!

Quote of the day:

This election is not just a test of opposing candidates, but of the voting public.

UPDATE: I've just had the time to sit and listen to this entire interview for the first time. I'm struck that Dr. Sowell refutes pretty much every Markadelphia talking point in this single interview - Obama, taxation, economics, the federal budget, education, etc.

It's uncanny!

No Sense of Humor

Ah, those Muslims, no sense of humor!

On the way in to the office this morning, I heard a news report that a French satire magazine, Charlie Hebdo was deliberately publishing offensive cartoons featuring Mohammed. This is not their first rodeo. The last time they did something similar, their offices were firebombed.

This time there's a cartoon on the cover page of a Jew pushing an (apparent) Muslim in a wheelchair, both saying "You must not mock us!" while, reportedly, there are "more shocking cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad inside the magazine 'in daring positions'."

France is preparing for riots by Muslim unemployed, disaffected youths.

Meanwhile, a cartoon was posted to the interwebs a few days ago depicting the Hindu god Ganesha, Buddha, Moses and Jesus "in daring positions" and nobody got firebombed, nobody rioted, and no one died. If you're interested, that image (very, VERY NSFW) is here.

I'm reminded once again of one of the quotes on the masthead of this blog - the one by MaxedOutMama:

Liberty is an inherently offensive lifestyle. Living in a free society guarantees that each one of us will see our most cherished principles and beliefs questioned and in some cases mocked. That psychic discomfort is the price we pay for basic civic peace. It's worth it. It's a pragmatic principle. Defend everyone else's rights, because if you don't there is no one to defend yours.

Which reminds me, I've got another essay on Rights I promised some people a couple of weeks ago. I'd better get back to that....

Quote of the Day - Markadelphia's Back!

From the comment thread to Bitter Clingers, Unix Jedi gets the nod for today's Quote of the Day:

You're lecturing, and you're telling us that 2+2 = yellow.  Further, if you multiply by Pie, you get Jasmine scent.

Let's break down your broken-down thought.

that there are very wealthy

Wealth does not equal income.

people in the 47 percent who also don't pay federal income tax

So you admit that the 47 percent figure is only discussing "federal income tax", so your strawmen of other people's "confusion" and "incorrectness" are deliberate obfuscations and deceptions.

so the tax cuts argument will most certainly reach them.

Why? If they're not paying income tax, why would a further reduction matter to them, personally?

Lemme restate what you just said:

People who have a lot of stuff, don't pay income taxes, but the chance they might pay less would affect them.

Mark, and you've got the effrontery to try and "Furthermore", lecture us?

You can't even keep your own "facts" coherent for 20 sentences!

You, sir, win one Internet! Where would you like it delivered?

In Relation to Today's QotD

My favorite Merchant O'Death sent me an email which contained this image I found appropriate to today's Quote of the Day:

Anything Too Good to be True...

...usually is.

I got a link to this very interesting story, Hardware is Dead, at the site VentureBeat. Excerpt:

In the US, when we talk about tablets we usually mean the iPad and increasingly the Kindle devices, but beyond that there is not much else in the market. I had heard that tablets in China had already reached low price points. You can buy a reasonable Android phone for $100 retail, and I wanted to see if I could find a $150 tablet. This consultant pointed me to a mall filled with hundreds of stalls selling nothing but tablets. I walked into the middle of the scrum to a random stall. I pointed to one of the devices on display and asked, "How much for this one?" 300 kuai. My Mandarin is a bit rusty, so I had to ask again. Slowly, the stall owner repeated renminbi 300 yuan.

If this were a movie, the lights would have dimmed and all the activity in the room frozen. 300 renminbi is US $45. And that was the initial offer price given to a bewildered foreigner in China, no haggling. I felt a literal shock.

I bought the device and did some more research. This was a 7-inch tablet, Wi-Fi only with all the attributes of a good tablet. Capacitive touchscreen. Snappy processor. Front facing camera. 4GB of internal memory and an expandable memory slot.

I later found out that these devices are now all over the supply chain in Shenzhen. At volume, say 20,000 units, you can get them for $35 apiece. My device ran full Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and had access to the full Google API, including Gmail, Maps, YouTube and Google Play (not quite sure how that works either).

A $45 tablet computer.

The thrust of the article is that this is a game-changer. That at that price point, everyone will buy a tablet computer. I think the author is probably right about that. But here's what I found interesting:

My contacts in the supply chain tell me they expect these devices to ship 20 million to 40 million units this year. Most of these designs are powered by a processor from a company that is not known outside China — All Winner. As a result, we have heard the tablets referred to as "A-Pads."

When I show this tablet to people in the industry, they have universally shared my shock. And then they always ask "Who made it?" My stock answer is "Who cares?" But the truth of it is that I do not know. There was no brand on the box or on the device. I have combed some of the internal documentation and cannot find an answer. This is how far the Shenzhen electronics complex has evolved. The hardware maker literally does not matter. Contract manufacturers can download a reference design from the chip maker and build to suit customer orders.

Now China is the land from which rumors have been spreading about counterfeit microchips with embedded spyware.

If you wanted to do a real cyberjob on the American economy, imagine what a few months of spying on millions of people doing online purchases and online banking with their "A-Pads" would net you. Bank accounts and routing numbers, credit card numbers and security codes, or just introduce a Stuxnet-like virus into our financial system and let it run wild.

After all, nobody knows who's building these things, right?  Doesn't matter!

"All Winner."  Well, the Chinese have a saying:  "Business is war."

I know I'm paranoid, but sometimes I wonder if I'm paranoid enough.

Oh, sorry forgot to add this before I hit "Publish":

Postscript
I thought discovering the A-Pad was pretty exciting. So I was dismayed to find that the week after I got back from China, a device that looks a lot like my A-Pad was on sale at Fry’s Electronics for $79. No brand listed. The process has already begun.

Meanwhile, in Sarah Brady Paradise™

UK expat reader Phil B. (now living in Middle Earth) sends links to the story of Dale Cregan, fine upstanding British subject now suspected in the murders of at least four people, most recently two female constables in an ambush:

For the two unarmed policewomen it was a routine call to a suspected burglary.

But, half an hour later, Fiona Bone, 32, and Nicola Hughes, 23, were gunned down in an act of 'despicable evil'.

The story of the break-in was apparently a fabrication and lying in wait was a killer.

He cut the constables down in a hail of bullets before tossing a grenade at them.

(My emphasis.)

So, how are those "toughest gun laws in the world" working out for you?

And this isn't Mr. Cregan's (alleged) first use of a hand grenade, either:

Police had offered a £50,000 reward for information about the murders of David Short, 46, and his son Mark, 23.

The Short family had been at loggerheads with a rival clan for more than ten years but it spilled into bloodshed – reputedly over drug debts – in May when Mark Short was killed.

A gunman walked into the Cotton Tree pub in Droylsden on May 25 and Mark Short died from a gunshot wound to the neck.

Four men have been charged in connection with his murder and are due to enter pleas at Manchester Crown Court in November.

David Short was killed in a gun and grenade attack at his home in Clayton on August 10 and earlier this month a 33-year-old man appeared at Manchester Crown Court charged with his murder.

That man was Dale Cregan, who had been "released on police bail pending further inquiries".

Now in that last link there's a very interesting sidebar. Guess what the "new weapon of choice" is over in "Gun Free Britain"?

Teams of armed officers involved in the manhunt were aware of the increasing involvement of grenades in crime in the North West. (My emphasis.)

They were told the Russian-made military devices each contained 1,000 ball bearings with a 'kill zone' of more than 25 yards.

One of the best-known Soviet grenades is the F1, nicknamed the Little Lemon, which has a four-second fuse.

Based on a French design and introduced during World War II, it is now obsolete but can still be found in war zones and is highly prized by gangsters.

This year two Merseyside gangsters were jailed for life after planting a grenade in bushes outside former Liverpool manager Kenny Dalglish’s home. It was apparently intended for a neighbour.

They were responsible for a merciless campaign of violence including numerous shootings but their weapon of choice was the grenade.

Phil notes in his email:

Of course the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS - which among the cognoscenti stands for "Couldn't Prosecute Satan") which couldn't get its act together and the Courts that refuse to jail offenders are to blame and deserve their share of criticism for not dong their job....

Not Satan, but they'll prosecute homeowners for defending themselves, as long as there's not too much negative press first.

He concludes:

But of course years and years of social engineering have taken their toll on the fabric and morals of society - and why not? Who but the law abiding fears the law?

I am SO glad that I am 12,000 miles away from this lot....

I'm glad you escaped too, Phil.

I'm going back to Left4Dead2.

Quote of the Day - We're Winning Edition

From A Girl and Her Gun:

About an hour later TSM and I are chit chatting with a woman and out of no where she whispers "Are you preppers?" Up until this point I had not mentioned guns, self defense, zombies…nothing. She said just the way I spoke made her wonder. Anyway she and her husband are and she writes for a small prepping blog. I forgot exactly which one or I would link it. During the course of that first conversation about guns, I mentioned working for John and she told me her friend is a firearms instructor and handed me her card. Turns out her friend is one of The Pistol Packing Ladies. The blog came up and she said, Oh, I have read that.

The whole rest of the night was spent discussing guns, fighting, knives, politics and self defense. She is not a women that is going to let anyone mess with her. She shared a couple of very cool stories. Her daughter is being raised to be a strong, confident, young lady, who knows her worth and is hundred percent willing to fight for herself.

Another lady there was a former police officer and she is looking to buy a gun. Lots of fun talk about that. She has actually had a bit of trouble where she lives and with a husband who travels, she is getting more serious about an improved home protection plan.

When we left the host said, well, I have never been to a party where the women spent the entire night talking about knife fighting.

Just a point of clarification - in this case "TSM" is a TLA for "The Sexy Marine" - AGirl's better half, not "The Smallest Minority."










(*sigh*)

Bitter Clingers

Following up on the media's salivation over Mitt Romney's "bitter clinger" moment, let's review the two statements, shall we?

Obama, in a closed-door fundraiser, surrounded by what he believed to be like-minded people said:

You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton administration, and the Bush administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not.

And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

Romney, at a closed-door fundraiser, surrounded by what he believed to be like-minded people said:

There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what.

And I mean the president starts off with 48, 49, 4— he starts off with a huge number. These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message of low taxes doesn't connect. So he'll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich.

I mean, that's what they sell ever four years. And so my job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. What I have to do is to convince the five to ten percent in the center that are independents, that are thoughtful, that look at voting one way or the other depending upon in some cases emotion, whether they like the guy or not.

So in essence the first guy said "There's this large group of people who don't trust the government to save them, and instead cling to religion and/or guns," and the second guy said "There's this large group of people who are dependent on government, and won't be weened off of it."

And you know what? Both of 'em are RIGHT.

The question now is "how many in the middle can be swayed?"

In More "It's 1938 Again" News...

China and Japan are playing dominance-games:

China and Japan’s worst diplomatic crisis since 2005 is putting at risk a trade relationship that’s tripled in the past decade to more than $340 billion.

Toyota Motor Corp., Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. halted production at some plants while Panasonic Corp. reported damage to its operations in China as thousands marched in more than a dozen cities on Sept. 16. Shares of automakers fell in Tokyo after protesters called for boycotts of Japanese goods and in some instances smashed store fronts and cars after Japan last week said it will purchase islands claimed by both countries.

Read the whole article. It's a litany of bad Asian economic news.

And things are not better in EUrope.

Meanwhile, Mitt Romney has his own "bitter clinger" moment in the press. Unlike last time, however, expect to hear about this every day for the next two months.

And in IslamicRageLand, more Islamic rage!  Expect to hear as little about this as the media can get away with, but they will be forced to cover it.

While I type this, my wife is in the living room watching In the Land of Blood and Honey, a charming little film about the 1990's war in Bosnia. It begins with a little paragraph of background:

Before the war, the Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina was part of one of the most ethnically and religiously diverse countries in Europe. Muslims, Serbs and Croats lived together in harmony.

And then they didn't anymore.

I do not like the parallels I'm seeing.

Fuckit. I'm going to fire up Left4Dead2 and deanimate some zombies.

UPDATE:  Tam says it's not 1938 again, it's 1914. My only quibble - this time everybody's got machine-guns and tanks.

Well! THIS is Encouraging!

Armada of British naval power massing in the Gulf as Israel prepares an Iran strike

Battleships, aircraft carriers, minesweepers and submarines from 25 nations are converging on the strategically important Strait of Hormuz in an unprecedented show of force as Israel and Iran move towards the brink of war.

Western leaders are convinced that Iran will retaliate to any attack by attempting to mine or blockade the shipping lane through which passes around 18 million barrels of oil every day, approximately 35 per cent of the world’s petroleum traded by sea.

A blockade would have a catastrophic effect on the fragile economies of Britain, Europe the United States and Japan, all of which rely heavily on oil and gas supplies from the Gulf.

Marvelous. Juuuust marvelous.

Quote of the Day - Mark Steyn Edition

The men who organized this attack knew the ambassador would be at the consulate in Benghazi rather than at the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli. How did that happen? They knew when he had been moved from the consulate to a "safe house," and switched their attentions accordingly. How did that happen? The United States government lost track of its ambassador for 10 hours. How did that happen? Perhaps, when they've investigated Mitt Romney's press release for another three or four weeks, the court eunuchs of the American media might like to look into some of these fascinating questions, instead of leaving the only interesting reporting on an American story to the foreign press. -- Mark Steyn: An act of war, not a movie protest

Ramirez Strikes Again

And read Big Trouble in Little Benghazi over at Great Satan, Inc.

Truth in Advertising

I bet they teach their eighth-graders how to put a condom on a banana!


Or is that fourth-graders now? Progressives - so hard to keep up with.

Quote of the Day - Tyler Cowen Edition

As people, [Republican leader Mitt] Romney and [U.S. President Barack] Obama are not that different. Both are in bad situations, for reasons not of their own making. If Obama wins, which seems more likely, we probably get more of the same – gridlock, nastiness. If Romney wins, we have to ask, 'Do Republicans really mean what they’ve been saying?' I think they don't. It'll be like the Bush years – right-wing versions of left-wing ideas.

But you won't hear the words "Supreme Court Justice Eric Holder."

SandCastle Air

For the first six Gun Blogger Rendezvous, I drove from Tucson to Reno.  It's about 15 hours each way, if you average 55MPH over the trip including stops for food and fuel.  I can do that in one shot, but that's about my limit.  This year I got an interesting offer.  Danno from Sandcastle Scrolls was going for the first time - and Dan owns a plane.  A plane that cruises at 200MPH.  Specifically, this plane:




Pretty, isn't it?  It's a 1967 Cessna 310, with two Continental fuel-injected 471 cubic-inch six-cylinder boxer engines rated at about 260Hp each.  At 200MPH, they burn about 25GPH for an average fuel economy of 8MPG - not bad at that speed.  As Dan reported on his blog,

We fired up the #1 engine at 10:27 local and shut them down 3:26 later on the ramp at Carson City.  (note flight time is not the same as engine time.  Engine time includes taxi time at each end while flight time is from take off to landing.)

Beats the hell out of 15 hours.  Including idling, run-up, takeoff and landing, we burned about 91 gallons each way.  At well over $5/gal.  Ouch.  Still, the scenery from 8500 to 10,000 ft ASL is a lot nicer than it is at ground level over Nevada:






Trust me, the desert is MUCH prettier from the air.  And you don't get to do this - our approach and landing at Carson City:


Dan's been flying about 25 years.  He greased the landing at Carson, and did it even better on our return to Chandler.  Not a bad way to travel!  And without blogging, I'd never have gotten this chance.

Oh, and the speed?  Here's the proof:


That's from the GPS on my Blackberry.

Quote of the Day - The Brink Edition

On paper, given Obama’s record, this election should be a cakewalk for the Republicans. Why isn’t it? I am afraid the answer may be that the country is closer to the point of no return than most of us believed. With over 100 million Americans receiving federal welfare benefits, millions more going on Social Security disability, and many millions on top of that living on entitlement programs–not to mention enormous numbers of public employees–we may have gotten to the point where the government economy is more important, in the short term, than the real economy. My father, the least cynical of men, used to quote a political philosopher to the effect that democracy will work until people figure out they can vote themselves money. I fear that time may have come.

--

I am afraid the problem in this year’s race is economic self-interest: we are perilously close to the point where 50% of our population cares more about the money it gets (or expects to get) from government than about the well-being of the nation as a whole. Throw in a few confused students, pro-abortion fanatics, etc., and you have a Democratic majority.

John Hinderaker, Powerline, Why is This Election Close?

Don't they always protest after losing an election that the populace inexplicably didn't "vote in their own best interest"?

Nuke the Site from Orbit

It's the only way to be sure.

9/11

So, Muslim protesters attacked the U.S. Embassies in Cairo, Egypt and Benghazi, Libya because they were upset about

A 14-minute movie trailer, posted on YouTube in English and Arabic, (that) portrays Muhammad as a womanizer and fraud

Well whoop-te-do.

Reportedly, the attackers killed one person in Libya. It is not known whether the victim was American or not.

And you know what the most important thing I learned is?


According to Bloomberg:

In Egypt's capital, Cairo, Islamist demonstrators scaled the walls of the U.S. Embassy, ripped down a U.S. flag and chanted "Obama, we are here to sacrifice for Osama."

The Egyptian crowds, numbering in the hundreds, chanted "We are all Osama bin Laden" as the U.S. marked the 11th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks that killed about 3,000 people on orders of the man the protesters were extolling.

Isn't that special!

I think we've restocked on JDAMs and Mavericks, and I understand that the Army is issuing a new and much-improved round for the M4.

UPDATE 9/12/11:  The U.S. Ambassador to Libya and three staffers have been killed.  That's our thanks for helping oust Gaddafi.

"We sacrificed dozens and hundreds during the uprising for our dignity. The Prophet's dignity is more important to us and we are ready to sacrifice millions," said mosque preacher Mohamed Abu Gabal who joined the protest.

Well, there are tens of millions of Americans prepared to help you make that sacrifice, Mohamed.

What the (Blank) Could Possibly Go Worng?

Dr. Barbara Bellar, a Candidate for Illinois State Senate, summed up in one sentence the sheer folly of the entire Obamacare operation.

0 for 7

Well, I've been attending the Gun Blogger Rendezvous since its inception.  The first year the top prize at the Saturday night raffle was a pistol - a High Point 9mm.  Each year since the prizes have gotten better and better - more guns, more neat swag.  I even gave away a gun at the 2009 GBR.

But I've never won one.

I'd hoped that last year would end my dry streak.  Bea had donated a Ruger Blackhawk that she said she wanted me to win, but it was not to be.  Molly Smith took home the certificate for that one.

This year, Ruger Engineering Johnson donated a .45LC Vaquero I really wanted.

My nemesis took it once again.  (Meddling kids!)  And she's sponsored by Smith & Wesson!

Oh well, I guess winning a gun will be a once-in-a-lifetime event for me.

Buth there's always next year.

(Typos corrected.  I was in a hurry and typing on my EeePC keyboard.  Sue me.)

Quote of the Day - Mr C.Edition

Commenting on his win in the Super Senior Rimfire class at the Western National Steel Challenge Chamionship:

You don't have to outshoot 'em, you just have to outlive 'em!

Off to See the Wizard

The trip will be a bit different this year. Instead of driving the Mustang for 15 hours each way, I'll be traveling up with first timer Danno of the blog SandCastle Scrolls.

In his Cessna 310.

Too cool.

It has just a bit more horsepower than the 'Stang, but it'll do the better part of 200mph, and will take us from Chandler, AZ to Carson City, NV in about 3½ hours, where we'll pick up a rental and drive the remaining thirty minutes to Reno.

Unfortunately, the Cessna doesn't have the cargo capacity of the Mustang, so I had to leave a few things behind this year I'd planned on taking. I'll be bringing my Garand, my M1 Carbine, and three handguns, but I'm leaving a (borrowed) semi-auto Thompson, my 1917 Enfield, and my "Power Tool" - the T/C Encore chambered in .260 Remington.

Anyway, we hope to be off the ground and en route by 10:30 AM, which should put us on the ground in time to meet up with the group at Cabela's.

Hope you're coming this year. Should be a good one!

Oh, and blogging will be light for the next couple of days.

Peter Schiff at the DNC

Also this:

Movie Recommendation

No, not 2016 - if you read this blog you probably already know everything Dinesh D'Souza had to say in that one.  No, the film I want to recommend to you today is also a documentary, but it's not about politics, it's about a lot of other things - education looming largely among them.  It's Thunder Soul, a 2010 documentary about the Kashmere High School Stage Band:

Largely, it's about Conrad O. "Prof" Johnson, the music director of Houston, Texas's Kashmere High School from the late 60's until 1978, and the effect he had on the kids he helped educate. From an Amazon review:

The action which forms the core of the film takes place in 2008 when a couple of band alumni from the 1971-4 period - just before Prof retired - decide to find all the old band members - now scattered around the country, with most having not lifted their instruments in years - and hold a "reunion concert" for the then 93 year old teacher. We watch as they come together and practice for the "big night". Director Mark Landesman interviews Prof in these later years but also incorporates clips from a 1974 documentary on the band titled "Prof & the Band".

The documentary is available from Netflix streaming.

Watch this documentary, pay attention to what "Prof" has to say, and what his students have to say about him, and ask yourself how we went from that in the turbulent early 1970's to what we have today. 

Quote of the Day - Milton Friedman Edition

From this video:

In my opinion, a society that aims at equality before liberty will end up with neither equality nor liberty.  And a society that aims first for liberty will not end up with equality, but it will end up a closer approach to equality than any other kind of system that has ever been developed.  Now that conclusion is based both on evidence across history, and also I believe, on reasoning.  Which, if you try to follow through the implications of aiming first at equality, will become clear to you:

You can only aim at equality by giving some people the right to take things from others.  And what ultimately happens when you aim at equality is that A and B decide what C shall do for D - except that they take a little bit of a commission off on the way. 

Quote of the Day - Instapundit Edition

At this post, Glenn links to the Hot Air headline:  Obama: I give myself an "incomplete" on the economy, and responds:

I GUESS THAT’S BECAUSE SOME PEOPLE STILL HAVE JOBS

THAT left a mark!

Brilliant!

So they're doing "Empty Chair Day" on Twitter.

I laughed out loud at this one:


But these aren't bad either:

I Guess This Time He Couldn't Claim the Gun Went Off "Accidentally"

British expat Phil B. emails a couple of interesting links. First up:

A government minister has issued an impassioned defence of two of his constituents, saying they should not be prosecuted for shooting two suspected burglars who allegedly broke into their remote farm cottage.

Once again, the weapon involved was a shotgun, but this time Mr. Andy Ferrie cannot claim before the court that the gun discharged by accident. That defense worked for Kenneth Batchelor, but he fired only one shot. Mr. Ferrie fired two rounds, and hit two of the four burglars invading his home.

Mr. Batchelor had unlocked his gun cabinet, retrieved his shotgun, unlocked the ammo cabinet, loaded his shotgun, pointed the shotgun at one Matthew Clements, a 41 year-old 280-lb. professional bouncer, who had climbed up a construction scaffold outside Mr. Batchelor's home and climbed in a bedroom window, verbally threatening violence.  But the actual discharge of the shotgun was accidental. Mr. Batchelor had to claim the shooting was an accident, because otherwise he could be convicted of murder in the death of Mr. Clements.  Clements was "known to police," and had reportedly threatened a garage manager with an Uzi sub-machine gun. But under English law, according to the humorously named lawyer Harry Potter as once explained to murder defendant Brett Osborne,

The law does not require the intention to kill for a prosecution for murder to succeed. All that is required is an intention to cause serious bodily harm. That intention can be fleeting and momentary. But if it is there in any form at all for just a second - that is, if the blow you struck was deliberate rather than accidental - you can be guilty of murder and spend the rest of your life in prison.

Deliberately shooting not one, but two burglars indicates "an intention to cause serious bodily harm."

As it should.

Since the burglars struck by Mr. Ferrie's shotgun blasts did not die, he stands accused of "GBH" - Grievous Bodily Harm.

The Ferries have been burglarized several times previously. RTW story. Very interesting.

And then we have the flip-side, another case of "Only Ones" acting as only they can:

A policeman shouted ‘sweet as’ moments after his colleague gunned down a suspect, an inquiry heard yesterday.

Azelle Rodney, 24, died instantly when he was shot six times in a busy high street.

The rounds were fired from the open window of a patrol car within a split second of it pulling alongside the VW Golf carrying Rodney.

The firearms officer – known only as E7 – was sitting in the front seat and let off eight shots after police in another car had forced the Golf to slow down.

Six hits out of eight shots! Perhaps the NYPD should send their officers to England to learn how to shoot?  Or at least do drive-bys?

Now, in this case the shooting victim died, but the officer involved was not charged with homicide, even though the victim turned out not to have a firearm within reach. Why? Because according to British law, what the officer believed at the time is more important than reality. See the case of Harry Stanley, shot to death by police officers when they thought the table leg he was carrying wrapped in a plastic bag was a sawed-off shotgun. In the case of Mr. Rodney, police believed

that Rodney and the two men with him had machine guns and were on their way to rob Colombian drug dealers.

You'll note that "E7" didn't have to wait until the car pulled alongside to unlock his gun case, take out his gun, unlock the ammo box, and then load his gun before discharging eight rounds into the VW Golf.

No, "E7" is sprinkled with the magic fairy-dust of a government paycheck.  Mr. Ferrie provides that fairy-dust.

Good luck to Mr. Ferrie - and his wife, who was also arrested on the same charges.  Even if they're acquitted, he's going to have a hell of a legal bill.  And they probably won't have enough money left over to get the hell out of England for Australia as they had planned.

I'm betting that they'll plead guilty to some reduced charges to save themselves money - but they'll always have a record.

Haven't You Heard?

Quote of the day, from Tam:

You know, you expect it from MSNBC, but from the national network shows down to the local news programs, the Party Convention-related blurbs this morning have all had an air of

"Now that the Nazis in Tampa have finished their cross-burning, put women back in purdah, and shoved grandma onto an ice floe, let's see what the Real Americans are doing in Charlotte. Bob, over to you; do you have any official sense yet on how much more the Real Americans care about the little guy than the Nazis do, or are they saving that for a surprise?"

Well, Barry still hasn't lost his core constituency: The American media.

But, but George Stephanopoulos says there's no bias in the media!

And by all means, read the rest of Tam's post, which would be a QotD in and of itself.

If Only...

As far as I have been able to determine, most voters aren't paying much attention to anything.

And the politicians have done everything in their power to make it that way.

(Found at the Feral Irishman's.)

Quote of the Day - Parental Government Edition

Parenting is an interesting metaphor for taking care of a country. The Democrats remind me of a family with two kids: one whom they think is "normal" and the other whom they think is "special" – delicate, sensitive, sickly, utterly dependent on them for everything. As parents, they completely ignore the "normal" kid and devote all their love, attention, and money to the "special" one. The life of the whole family revolves around him.

The fact is, half the reason he's so sickly is that he's been treated this way all his life.

When the Democrats are in charge, I feel like the "normal" brother.

-- "Bugs" in a comment at The GOP Goes Alinsky on Obama by J. Christian Adams at PJ Media

Interesting observation.

"The Hope and The Change"

I can hear the howls of outrage now.