I Could've Used This a Couple of Weeks Ago

The latest update from the upcoming Gun Blogger Rendezvous (Sept. 9-12, Reno, NV):

As the Gun Bloggers Unite this month in Reno Nevada, MidwayUSA would like to extend our special appreciation for what they accomplish in shooting industry. First, we would like for each Blogger to receive a special gift from MidwayUSA when they arrive at the Rendezvous. Second, we would like to extend some exclusive discounts for each of the Bloggers and their respected communities/following to take advantage of. We hope these exclusive discounts help as many people and Bloggers as possible to enjoy the shooting sports industry.

Mr. Completely, would you please forward the following promotion codes and guidelines along so that people can start saving on shooting and outdoor gear.

1) Place regularly priced in-stock products in your shopping cart and receive:

* $10 off a Purchase of $100 or more - Use Promotion Code 19410
* $50 off a Purchase of $500 or more - Use Promotion Code 59410
* $100 off a Purchase of $1,000 or more - Use Promotion Code 109410

2) Enter the promotion code in the box entitled "Promotion Code" on the shopping cart page.
3) You will see the discount on the Confirmation page before placing your order
4) Remember, this promotion code is valid for orders placed on MidwayUSA.com.
5) Limited to one per Customer and one promotion code per retail order.
6) Offer cannot be combined with Birthday, Special or Dealer Pricing.
7) Offer not valid on MidwayUSA Gift Certificates, Nightforce, Sale and Clearance products.
8) Offer valid on regularly priced products only.
9) Hurry, offer ends at 11:59 PM CT September 15, 2010.

Cool!

Oh, and here's a list of blogs and websites that will have representation at this year's Rendezvous. More of y'all need to pull the trigger and come on up!

Random Nuclear Strikes
True Blue Sam
Traction Control
The Smallest Minority (Me!)
The Molly Minute
The Packing Rat
Our Gun Thing
(Yes, we're being "infiltrated" by a gun-owning Lefty! Come show him the error of his ways!)
The Clue Meter
Anthroblogogy
AR15.Com
NSSF Blog
NRA Blog
* Joe's Crabby shack (Inactive)
CS Tactical
* Gunup blog (launching soon)
Mr. Completely
Keewee's Corner

Hell, all we need now is Oleg Volk and his cameras. And, of course, YOU. You don't need to BE a blogger, just read one or more of us. We don't bite! And we'll let you shoot our guns!

Quote of the Day - Education Edition

Our kids have become cannon fodder for two rival ideologies battling to control America’s future.

In one camp are conservative Christians and their champion, the Texas State Board of Education; in the other are politically radical multiculturalists and their de facto champion, President Barack Obama. The two competing visions couldn’t be more different. And the stakes couldn’t be higher. Unfortunately, whichever side wins — your kid ends up losing.

That’s because this war is for the power to dictate what our children are taught — and, by extension, how future generations of Americans will view the world. Long gone are the days when classrooms were for learning: now each side sees the public school system as a vast indoctrination camp in which future culture-warriors are trained. The problem is, two diametrically opposed philosophies are struggling for supremacy, and neither is willing to give an inch, so the end result is extremism, no matter which side temporarily comes out on top.

Both visions are grotesque and unacceptable — and yet they are currently the only two choices on the national menu. Which shall it be, sir: Brainwashing Fricassee, or a Fried Ignorance Sandwich?

Zombie - Ideological War Spells Doom for America's Schoolkids

Homeschool if at all possible.

UPDATE: Read ALL FIVE PARTS of Zombie's Überpost. I mean it. He's done parts I and II. I await with bated breath the rest of this magnum opus.

I'm Still Thinking About This

But you've got to admit, he drew an impressive crowd.

The media, however, has found its buzzphrase.

And we're supposed to believe that JournoList was some kind of unique aberrant behavior among that crowd?

Quote of the Day - Politics Again

This time from Mostly Cajun:

Then there’s our own upcoming election. The republican party may indeed win the house. They may indeed get a secure, cloture-proof number of seats in the senate. And then it'll be back to the same old tricks as the bright, enthusiastic newbies hit the capitol all filled with Tea party enthusiasm. forgive my cynicism, but I've seen it all before, back when Newt and the Gang rolled in with the Contract with America. And in one term, the bright faces of the iconoclasts were stilled, replaced every one with the steely glare of the Beltway commandos, happily buying into the idea that a seat in Washington was the single greatest expression of one's worth on the planet, and said seat could be secured by pork and pander.

Except that "pork and pander" has bankrupted the country, and about the first time that Billy Bob's paycheck fails to buy groceries due to the inflation of a failed monetary system, and the first time DaMarcus's food stamps don't work, there's going to be a new game being played.

I'm an old (well, getting there, anyway) man, and I'm an optimist on many things, but I fail to see a peaceful way out of this present unpleasantness. I can hope. I can keep trying, and do my little bit. I can remain watchful. But I'm thinking things will get MUCH worse before they get better.

I'm not quite as old as Dale, and I'm not an optimist, and I think he's accurately described exactly what's coming.

Twelve Days to the Rendezvous

Are you going? Still plenty of time to make travel arrangements. Here's some more incentives to come:

As you've already been told, Hi-Point is donating a pistol caliber carbine, Glock is donating a certificate for any standard model handgun, Ruger is sending a factory representative, the NRA is sending a representative, the National Shooting Sports Foundation is sending a rep, SFC Toby Nunn will be representing Project Valour IT, and Molly Smith will be there again, so you too can be beaten by a little girl at the game of Steel Challenge.

But in addition, Leupold has donated one of their new VX3 scopes, and Derek of The Packing Rat (who has won, I believe, two firearms at previous GBRs) is donating a Venturi Bronco air rifle for the raffle.

And last but not least, Mr. Completely says that something major is going to be announced at GBRV:

At this year's Gun Blogger Rendezvous the head of a major internet start up endeavor will be announcing something new and big and cool! It will involve the internet, guns, shooting, hunting, shooting sports, forum-ing (is that a word? Should it be?), 2nd. Amendment Issues, blogging, and a lot of other stuff too.

Sounds interesting!

Make your plans. It's one of the most enjoyable weekends you'll ever have.

Quote of the Day - Politics Edition

From the comments to the announcement that the EPA has decided not to consider a ban of lead in ammunition:

I wonder how many Donk congresscritters were calling up the EPA and screaming "NOT NOW! NOT F*&KING NOW!" -- Ragin' Dave

That Was Quicker Than Last Time

From the NRA:

EPA Denies Ammo Ban Petition

Friday, August 27, 2010

Responding to a grassroots outcry from gun owners, the Environmental Protection Agency today announced that it has denied a petition by the Center for Biological Diversity and other radical groups that had sought to ban the use of lead in ammunition.

Agreeing with the position of the NRA and the firearms industry, the agency explained in a news release that it "does not have the legal authority to regulate this type of product under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA)." Further crushing the hopes of anti-gun and anti-hunting activists, the release added: "nor is the agency seeking such authority."

I guess somebody told them about the sudden rush on Wookie suits.

The NRA Finally Throws Harry Reid Under the Bus

Via email today:

In the coming days and weeks, the NRA Political Victory Fund (NRA-PVF) will be announcing endorsements and candidate ratings in hundreds of federal races, as well as thousands of state legislative races. Unless these announcements are required by the timing of primary or special elections, the NRA-PVF generally does not issue endorsements while important legislative business is pending. The NRA-PVF also operates under a long-standing policy that gives preference to incumbent candidates who have voted with the NRA on key issues, which is explained in more detail here.

The U.S. Senate recently considered a number of issues important to NRA members, including the confirmation of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court. Out of respect for the confirmation process, the NRA did not announce its position on Ms. Kagan's confirmation until the conclusion of her testimony before the Senate Judiciary committee. Her evasive testimony exacerbated grave concerns we had about her long-standing hostility towards the Second Amendment. As a result, the NRA strongly opposed her confirmation and made it clear at the time that we would be scoring this important vote.

The vote on Elena Kagan's confirmation to the Court, along with the previous year's confirmation vote on Sonia Sotomayor, are critical for the future of the Second Amendment. After careful consideration, the NRA-PVF announced today that it will not be endorsing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for re-election in the 2010 U.S. Senate race in Nevada.

The NRA, contrary to the beliefs that it is a exclusively Republican organization, has endorsed Harry Reid in the past because of his support of the right to arms, at least when voting on specific legislation. However, there's more to it than just that, and the NRA has at long last weighed the balance of Reid's behavior (or, on the other hand, sees which way the political winds are blowing) and has dropped that support like a hot rock.

About time.

Quote of the Day - "Word!" Edition

Tam expresses precisely my feelings about the EPA considering a ban on lead ammunition:

This would make me want to get my wookie on. This would make me want to saddle up and bust caps. If the .gov was wondering what it would take to turn me into a wild-eyed militia kook, well, they've found it.

And:

*There is anecdotal evidence that the banning of traditional ammunition would have an adverse impact on government bureaucrat populations.

Re-read Personal Sovereignty and "Killing Their Asses" if you don't believe me.

Oh HELL No! (Part II)

Well, one does have to wonder at the current .gov. Back in March 2009 the Department of Defense attempted to change its rules for the disposal of once-fired small-arms ammunition casings by requiring the brass to be destroyed, suitable only as scrap metal.

The reaction of the shooting community was swift, vocal, and effective.

Now the Environmental Protection Agency is considering banning lead in firearm ammunition. Click on that link. Follow the NSSF's recommendations. Write your congresscritters, then call them. Comment on the EPA's public commentary site. Write - hell, call - Administrator Lisa Jackson's office and voice your objections.

Repeatedly.

Be calm, be collected, be polite. But be insistent and persistent.

UPDATE: It's over. The EPA backed down.

In Even Better Political News . . .

Ruth McClung has won the Republican primary and will be running against (*hawk, spit!*) Raul Grijalva for the AZ Congressional District 7 seat. I met Ms. McClung at a blogger gathering in Phoenix a few months ago (she's not in my district, I live in District 8.) Now she has to face the Grijalva political machine. I wish her great luck.

One of her campaign slogans I really like is "Maybe it does take a rocket scientist . . . "

She's an engineer, and her expertise is in missile guidance systems.

Lt. Col. Allen West Wins!

Ron Klein and Allen West set for contentious general election battle

Voters in Broward and Palm Beach counties set the table for a vicious political food fight in November – the race between U.S. Rep. Ron Klein, D-Boca Raton, and challenger Allen West, R-Plantation.

Each candidate easily won his party’s nomination. Klein crushed Paul Francis Renneisen and West easily bested David Brady.

With half the precincts counted shortly before 10 p.m., Klein had 84 percent of the Democratic primary vote.

With half the precincts counted shortly befoare 10 p.m., West had 76 percent of the Republican primary vote.

In other news, it looks like McLame will be going back to the Senate for another six years.

Dammit.

My New Favorite Flag

We're not quite there yet, but we're closer than we've been since 1775. Or 1860.

In Our New Spirit of Cooperation . . .

Here's a story that backs up some of what Markadelphia has been saying:

Who's teaching L.A.'s kids?

A Times analysis, using data largely ignored by LAUSD, looks at which educators help students learn, and which hold them back.

August 14, 2010|By Jason Felch, Jason Song and Doug Smith, Los Angeles Times

The fifth-graders at Broadous Elementary School come from the same world — the poorest corner of the San Fernando Valley, a Pacoima neighborhood framed by two freeways where some have lost friends to the stray bullets of rival gangs.

Many are the sons and daughters of Latino immigrants who never finished high school, hard-working parents who keep a respectful distance and trust educators to do what's best.

The students study the same lessons. They are often on the same chapter of the same book.

Yet year after year, one fifth-grade class learns far more than the other down the hall. The difference has almost nothing to do with the size of the class, the students or their parents.

It's their teachers.

There's a lot more, many pages. And the differences are, of course, measured by means of standardized tests. But the differences are real.

Yes, teachers make a helluva difference - I've never argued otherwise. What we've been arguing about is what they're teaching. Or not teaching.

Book Update

I swung by my local used-book superstore, Bookman's. As others have noticed, Pratchett doesn't get traded in much. They had one hardcover of Going Postal. Period. So I went to Barnes & Noble and picked up Guards! Guards! and The Truth. I also picked up another book I knew nothing about, Craig Ferguson's American On Purpose.

Here's what sold me, from the preface:

One of the greatest moments in American sports history was provided by Bobby Thomson, the "Staten Island Scot." Born in my hometown of Glasgow, Scotland, in 1923, he hit the shot heard round the world that won the Giants the National League pennant in 1951. Had Bobby stayed in Glasgow he would never have played baseball, he would never have faced the fearsome Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher Ralph Branca in that championship game, and he would never have learned that if you can hit the ball three times out of ten you'll make it to the Hall of Fame.

Today I watch my son at Little League games, his freckled Scottish face squinting in the California sunshine, the bat held high on his shoulder, waiting for the moment, and I rejoice that he loves this most American game. He will know from an early age that failure is not disgrace. It's just a pitch that you missed, and you'd better get ready for the next one. The next one might be the shot heard round the world. My son and I are Americans, we prepare for glory by failing until we don't.

I wish I'd known all this earlier. It would have saved me a lot of trouble.

"...Americans, we prepare for glory by failing until we don't."

And that right there is Quote of the MONTH.

This promises to be a most interesting book. Here's the rest of the preface:

In order to write this book I reached into the darkness for my past and found to my surprise that most of it was still there, just as I had left it. Some of it, though, had grown and morphed into what now appears to be hideous and reprehensible selfishness. Some of it had crumbled into the ruins of former shame.

This is not journalism. This is just my story. There are bound to be some lies here, but I've been telling them so long they've become truth, my truth, as close as I can get to what really happened. I left some tales out because to tell them would be excessively cruel to people who probably don't deserve it, and altered a few names for the same reason, but I believe I spared myself no blushes.

I didn't flee a dictator or swim an ocean to be an American like some do. I just thought long and hard about it.

I looked at the evidence of my life and gratefully signed up.

"Our" Blog?

I just received this in email from Markadelphia - in its entirety:

http://www.theonion.com/articles/new-edition-of-bible-specifically-mentions-second,17882/

This has to be worthy of some kind of recognition on our blog, right?

"Our" blog?

"OUR"?!? (Must resist ban hammer . . . must resist . . . .)

UPDATE: In comments, Markadelphia apologizes for his Freudian slip:

Crap. I'm a moron. I left the "y" out of "our." All apologies and it was not intentional. I honestly am abysmal at typing.

Well, then.

Your Moment of Zen

Time for another:

(Click for full size.)

Regarding Pratchett

A couple of excerpts from Night Watch that resonated with me:

Swing, though, started in the wrong place. He didn't look around, and watch, and learn, and then say "This is how people are, how do we deal with it?" No, he sat and thought "This is how people ought to be, how do we change them?" And that was a good enough thought for a priest but not for a copper, because Swing's patient, pedantic way had turned policing on its head.

There had been that Weapons Law, for a start. Weapons were involved in so many crimes that, Swing reasoned, reducing the number of weapons had to reduce the crime rate.

Vimes wondered if he'd sat up in bed in the middle of the night and hugged himself when he'd dreamed that one up. Confiscate all weapons, and crime would go down. It made sense. It would have worked too, if only there had been enough coppers -- say, three per citizen.

Amazingly, quite a few weapons were handed in. The flaw, though, was one that somehow managed escape Swing, and it was this: criminals don't obey the law. It's more or less a requirement for the job. They had no particular interest in making the streets safer for anyone but themselves. And they couldn't believe what was happening.

--

And then, one after another, horrible things would happen. By then it was too late for them not to. The tension would unwind like a spring, scything through the city.

There were plotters, there was no doubt about it. Some had been ordinary people who'd had enough. Some were young people with no money who objected to the fact that the world was run by old people who were rich. Some were in it to get girls. And some had been idiots as mad as Swing, with a view of the world just as rigid and unreal, who were on the side of what they called "The People." Vimes had spent his life on the streets and had met decent men, and fools, and people who'd steal a penny from a blind beggar, and people who performed silent miracles or desperate crimes every day behind the grubby windows of little houses, but he'd never met The People.

People on the side of The People always ended up disappointed in any case. They found that The People tended not to be grateful or appreciative or forward-thinking or obedient. The People tended to be small minded and conservative and not very clever and were even distrustful of cleverness. And so, the children of the revolution were faced with the age-old problem: it wasn't that you had the wrong kind of government, which was obvious, but that you had the wrong kind of people.

As soon as you saw people as things to be measured, they didn't measure up.

--

The People's Republic of Treacle Mine Road lacked all the big, important buildings in the city, the ones that traditional rebels were supposed to take. It had no government buildings, no banks, and very few temples. It was almost completely bereft of important civic architecture.

All it had was the unimportant stuff. It had the entire slaughterhouse district, and the butter market, and the cheese market. It had the tobacco factors, and the candlemakers, and most of the fruit and vegetable warehouses, and the grain and flour stores. This meant that while the Republicans were being starved of important things like government, banking services, and salvation, they were self-sufficient in terms of humdrum, everyday things like food and drink.

People are content to wait a long time for salvation, but prefer dinner to turn up inside an hour.

OK, Now I Get Terry Pratchett

Most (if not all) of the cool people other gun bloggers have raved about Terry Pratchett and his Discworld books. Some time ago I picked up the first couple of the series, The Colour of Magic, and The Light Fantastic.

And they didn't do it for me.

I've mentioned that to a couple of people, and they were surprised to hear it, but a couple of others advised me to delve further into the 38-book series. Thursday afternoon I picked up Night Watch.

I haven't gotten a lot of sleep since then.

Last night I did a four (4!) hour Vicious Circle, signing off early (!) so I could get up this morning and go shoot a USPSA match. But I picked up Night Watch again, and read until I couldn't hold my eyes open. I finished it this morning.

I think I'll just take the 5R and the M25 to the range and do some load testing instead. And I may drop by Bookman's on the way home.

Quote of the Day for Saturday

Because I'm going to the USPSA match, and probably won't be posting anything tomorrow, and I don't want to post-date this particular bit of linkage. From Dr. Sanity:

Eleven score and four years ago, our forefathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Today we live in an Animal Farm world where our elites in Congress consider themselves more equal than you or I; and the wealth created by the productive people in our society is regularly redistributed to those who produce nothing; or, it is wasted on the pet projects of those preening elites who are certain that they know what is best for for everyone. In short, we (and our children and their children) are slowly but inexorably being transformed into slaves of the State.

From Our Very Own Little Country of Horrors which I urge you to read in its (brief) entirety.

Then skip down and read Between Brains, which is longer, deeper, and more important.