A good article on overuse of SWAT teams by local pd's

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/381446/barney-fife-meets-delta-force-charles-c-w-cooke

Anybody that believes any of these muscled up thugs when they say, "I'm a second amendment supporter! I'll neeeeeeever confiscate anyone's gun," is naive at best.

AR parts organization

I saw a friend of mine looking at this site, Imminent Threat Solutions, a few days ago. There is a lot of surfing to be done here with articles about finding adventure all around you wherever you are, how to be tougher, and of course lots of gear porn too.

I found this article today, Organizing You AR Small Parts. This is something I've wrestled with before with AR parts as well as other assorted small gun parts. This is something I'll be doing asap.

SC requires colleges to teach Founding Documents

Liberals panties in a twist over SC requiring Constitution to be taught at college

There are several things about this article both good and bad.

First, I find no fault with requiring a school that receives tax money to teach the founding documents. Considering how mushy headed our college aged young people are today, partly because of mush headed teachers and professors, a college refresher of The Declaration of Independence, Constitution, Federalist Papers and the like could only help,.......maybe. Because I'm sure professor smarty pants will be pointing out how Ben, George, Thomas and all them cats were just old white oppressors getting rich off the suffering of others.
Second, I'm not sure I care for our Governor signing a bill because, "lawmakers spent so much time on it."  Huh?
But then she points out that the congress is micromanaging the college's boards. I mostly agree with this. Appoint the boards then get out of the way. But then they could remove the board members or the funding. Hmm, a lesson in how being in bed with the gubmint never works to your advantage.
Personally, I don't care what the gays do, unless what they are doing is rubbing the gay thing in my face. I don't care for xyz "studies" in college; women's studies, gay studies, black studies and on and on.
Culledge should be physics, chemistry, calculus, English lit, etc, etc. But then I'm crashing my way downhill through the woods headed for camp curmudgeon too.
My wife once accused me of brainwashing one of my kids after listening to me talk to him. "Of course *I* am brainwashing him. Better me than some lib-tard commie, America hating, queer recruiter, in college."

Finally got the clutch out

This is the clutch from my F350 diesel. The needle bearing in the flywheel is also toast. I'm replacing the flywheel because the last fella that worked on my clutch said I had a dual mass flywheel and that with my next clutch I'd need a new one. Well, I'm pretty sure the flywheel I just pulled out is a single mass and 100% good.
I got an exceptionally good deal on my new FW so I don't feel bad about it at all. Ill just save the used one, just in case something happens down the road.
This is the first clutch I've ever put in so discounting the moments of frustration due to inexperience, it hasn't been too bad, so far. Today I start reassembling it.

update, camping and clutches

Last week the clutch in my truck quit working. So now it's sitting in a state of semi disassembly waiting for my next day off when I will attempt to install my first ever clutch AND flywheel.
Over the weekend we went to Athens Ga and spent some time camping at Stone Mtn park instead of fixing my truck.
My daughter and I climbed the back of the mountain. That's 825 vertical feet in about 1 mile.

Got a New Kindle

I have had a Kindle Fire for 2 or 3 years now. It took me almost a year before I used it for anything other than internet browsing. I've always been a reader and have quite a few books here at home. So many, in fact, that I have to cull some every so often.
So it took some time to get used to having a book on a tablet. Eventually I did and now enjoy having many books available at once. I confess to often being in the process of reading several books at once. Right now the current list includes an electronics book, an algebra book, Colonel Roosevelt, We Were Soldiers Once, The Bear Went Over The Mountain, and Adams Smith's .......Wealth of Nations, not to mention several magazines that show up every month. The Kindle makes all of this possible and easy. Some books aren't even available in hard copy like Matt Bracken's Anthology. Now, there are some books that I still want copies of, the electronics and algebra books I'm reading now being examples. I can make notes in margins or save for later or pass on to somebody.
My older kindle had much less storage, wasn't great for magazines (print was too small) and did not do well too far from my router in my house.
My new Kindle is the 8.9 HDX 32g. The magazines are much easier to read, the keyboard is a regular qwerty type (I never got used to the punctuation above the keyboard on my other,) the resolution is better on videos and I'm typing this on the new K now. Blogging was something I gave up trying on the other one.
I'm very happy I decided to "upgrade." Amazon letting me buy it with 5 no interest payments doesn't hurt either.

The VA scandal

I am no fan of the current occupant of the White House and that is a grand understatement!

But this VA scandal is not something that the genesis of should be laid at his feet, although he is a great admirer of and promoter of the nexus of the problem. The VA scandal is the Arlington Cemetery Mismanagement Scandal, is the  Katrina response scandal is the....you get the gist.

Fed.gov is toooooo BIG! The analogy of cancer is quick to hand, the many cells consuming what the healthy need, taking over, crowding out. The Fed.gov is too corpulent to move at any rate of speed even approaching glacial.

The bosses of the VA, Arlington NC, etc, Secretaries and the like, are mostly in place due to favors owed them, always have been. These people are much too removed from their charges to care or to be feared in the main. Scandals have to reach a certain "stage" in the national media before a head will roll. Probably because up until head rolling time that person is serving as a shield for the POTUS.

The current VA situation is most likely worse now because of the many veterans we have now due to Iraq and Afghanistan, but our Veterans have deserved better for many years. Welcoming Sgt Jones home with a parade is cool, everyone can get into the rhythm of that. But when Jones starts drinking or acting different most of us want the problem to go away.

I'd also like to add that the fact we need things like the Wounded Warrior Project is upsetting. These men and women should already have the best care for anything they need, IN THE WORLD! Now, each community should band together and help their veterans, show them they are appreciated and valued. Maybe that means building a house or retrofitting a house to make a vet more independent. But we have far too many .orgs here that exist because of the hell that is red tape and denials of service that many vets face.

I'm not sure that there is any possibility that this country with as many people in it as there are now is manageable at a Federal level at all. I've said for years we should divide up into maybe 4 equal parts. With each part responsible for almost all of its own business, a vice president, elected in that section, to be part of a board of directors with the POTUS as the chair for anything like a war or some other thing that needs 300+ million peoples attention. Maybe that could be an answer. Of course the original framers had a similar idea what with the Constitution and that 10th amendment and all.

What is certain and for sure is that as long as we depend on the bloated fed.gov to administer anything it will be done wastefully, slowly, and with little compassion.

Happy Memorial Day.

I apologize for being most of 2 months between my last post and this. I have no excuse good enough, except maybe I had little in the way of ideas or doings I thought you good people might care to read.

I hope everyone had a good Memorial Day. It is 8 p.m. Mon evening here. I saw a great many motorcycles, boats and campers on my way to work this evening, which is where I am at now. It was suggested at my home this weekend that a trip to a local mountain swimming hole would be nice. Thankfully, the clock argued against that idea. I hate going to that place on ANY holiday weekend much less the "Official start to summer!"
 According to the inter webs and as is fitting, soldiers graves have been remembered for a long time. Whether forced to the task by lashes across their backs or driven by a sense of duty, honor, love of country and or brother, a man that marches forward into the unknown unsure of his injury or death or that of his compatriots is to be admired with deep heartfelt emotions. I am unsure of the evolution of a person's humanity that is not stirred by the notes of Taps or who doesn't feel a deep tugging while walking hallowed ground be it battlefield or cemetery
 The practice of remembrance seems to have been much accelerated though by the ladies of the South during and after the War of Northern Aggression although there are many instances of organized remembrances from that period of our history, owing mainly to the fact, I'm sure, that  more than 600,000 soldiers died in those four years.
I had wrote (tapped) a bunch of stuff lamenting the loss of this days.......... Honor, I suppose is the word.
But I deleted it.
We have a fight coming in this country, I hope, as opposed to just sliding away into the cavernous, fetid, gullet of slavery. It will be a few committed Patriots vs the oligarchy and its minions, both conscripted and bamboozled. The odds will be much worse than the South faced during The War of NA.
If we are to win, I feel, we must not desire so much to survive as to be remembered on future Decoration days. We must not dash ourselves carelessly away upon nothing, but must willingly give of ourselves at the right time and place so that our offspring know that they possess something of value, the freedom we earned for them and that they may honor us on our Decoration Day.
My blog friend Harry Flashman has often said that he thinks he was born some years too late. I share that feeling. In that, among other things, generations past seem to have a deeper more meaningful connection to their past generations. There was a deeper respect and understanding, a more, Gentlemanly attitude.
In closing to my ramblings I post some things I thought of this weekend.

The ubiquitous In Flanders Fields. A poem written by a Canadian Dr in WW1, John McRae.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
      Between the crosses, row on row,
   That mark our place; and in the sky
   The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
   Loved and were loved, and now we lie
         In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
   The torch; be yours to hold it high.
   If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
         In Flanders fields.

.
From the same period, WW1, there is the Scottish song Sgt MacKenzie, with much the same feeling as Flander Fields.

 Wikepedia for Sgt MacKenzie

And a contemporary song, Arlington. I've been to Arlington twice. It is a very moving and humbling experience.

Once again, I hope you had a fantastic Memorial Day!

Thief in my house.

Last week I ordered some silver bars from APMEX. Saturday morning I went to put them in my gunsafe and found that I had been robbed.

I have a wooden cigar box that I have kept my silver in for several years. Most of the coins were pre-64 junk. Dollars down to dimes with several "new" silver dollars thrown in. When each of my kids (4) was born I would buy several dollars with their birth years on them as a possible way to generate their interest later on. I've been buying coins since 1990.

Most of the coins were bought off  Ebay and from local dealers. There was one $5 Canadian piece my (deceased) mother in law gave me for one of my kids at Christmas years ago, a mercury dime I got from a vending machine at work and a few halves I got at a Family Dollar store when the person in front of me paid with them years ago. Last weeks purchase of bars was my first ever non coin silver purchase.

Anyway, I picked the box up off the shelf and knew it was light. Several rolls each of quarters, dimes, halves and dollars isn't light. All of my rolls are gone. All but a couple of the "birth year" dollars included. Some of the coins were wrapped in the little cardboard protectors collectors use and some of those were left. Why, I do not know. Maybe the thief grew a sudden kernel of a conscience?  Doubt it, I figure they were left to get later on.

I suppose they were taken one day when I had gotten something from the safe to go shoot out in the yard. There are 2 "suspects," both known to lie and steal, both sons of mine, 1 took my wife's wedding set and a couple other rings, last year. We found 2 of the rings, THE diamond missing from the big one (not the original set, the original set had more in common with Cracker Jacks than diamonds and gold.) He said he found the rings in our driveway and figured they were TREASURE! and pawned them in town. We had the diamond ring repaired at a large out of pocket expense AFTER insurance.

The wife doesn't want to kick the one out of the house for fear of how he may end up. My pointing out that we can't afford to keep going like this, in constant fear of large losses, and that he has ALREADY mostly "ended up" doesn't seem to make a dent. The other son doesn't live "with us," right now he is sponging off my father in law but he does visit with our grandson.

 I have no way of knowing which one took the coins. I am thinking of offering a $100 cash reward, coupled with "staying in the will" for proof of who did it. The "will" isn't much but it does have a few firearms. Until I figure who the guilty party is I'm probably cutting both out and off.

The loss of the $$$ is bothersome (A LOT!!) but it hurts more to know that I raised 2 of the kind of people I despise the most, that I cannot walk out of the room without locking anything of value up so it will be there when I get back. I suppose I better look into security for my other things like ammo and tools now. Instead of a new rifle or pistol I'll be buying gang boxes.

How do you raise a thief? I'm sure it's easy if you set out to do it, but how do you manage to accidentally do it? I made both of them give back extra change when they were little. I always talked (lectured) on morals and such when alone with any one of them in the truck or elsewhere. I've never stolen anything so I couldn't have done that in front of them.

 I don't understand. I tried to do all the right stuff and ended up with 2 people I would not speak to in public once I got to know them if I say, met them at work or school or wherever. They both talk a good game up front. They both dislike Obama and liberals. They both sound just like me, according to other people. So.......do other people think I'm a thief and they've just never caught me? Or do my kids only steal from me? Doubtful.

It's depressing, in many, many different ways.

This is a gang box or job box. A large metal box for the safekeeping of tools and such on construction sites. When a Master lock is put on it the hasp of the lock is unreachable with bolt cutters. Full of ammo and or tools, you would need a forklift to move one.

Cannibals! Really?

Things that make you say, "Wellll duhhhhh!" "The Stock Market is Rigged"

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2014/mar/31/us-stock-market-rigged-michael-lewis The author says that the super rich, using super computers, see what you want to trade and buy it just before you do, talking micro seconds here, then sell it to you at a higher price. Capitalism, I cannot argue against it. BUT, I do recommend alternate investments (I'm poor & broke so don't ask me) but it seemslike the writing is on the wall. The rich and powerful rig the game, don't play it. If possible, own your own business. I know a couple barbers, 1 bought something from me once. He has STACKS of cash at his business. Invest in commodities you can touch/use. You can eat beans, shoot bullets and band aids....duh. Fight back, don't let Warren Buffet George Soros or anyone else use YOUR own money to get themselves richer.

Albuquerque protests James Boyd murder (and others) by police

Most recent killing by ABQ police.

Coverage of protests, Fox news, and ABQ Journal.

It feels odd. I suppose that there are more "99%-ers" in the protests than there are people like me, and hoping Eric Holder's justice dept finds something actionable gives me the shivers.

One thing I do NOT understand is why the protesters are not doing their thing in front of the homes of the police brass and mayor and council members also. Not to mention the actual trigger men.

Glad to see him go.

One of the many mostly RINO's in the SC Congress is moving on. Glen McConnell, who was forced from his Senatorship not long ago by SC Constitutional rules (probably the first time in a long while he'd followed the state's constitution) is soon to resign his Lt Governorship to be the next College of Charleston president. Supposedly he has craved the CofC job but I submit that if he were still Senator McConnell he would still be Sen McConnell. As it stands he is moving to a position he has been training for for decades, a position where he can openly grovel for and accept money. I'm glad he's gone, now we just need to get rid of a couple dozen more.

The State newspaper.

Where the heck have Y'all been?

Ok, where have *I* been? It has been a busy week. For one thing it was my long week at work, 4 days on 12 hr shifts. Another is that I've been losing some weight, sort of a pre American Hunger Games diet and workout program. Preparing to run, jump and kill commies as it were.

 My weight has stalled the last 2 weeks after some nice progress and being hard headed like I've been accused of I increased my aerobic exercise from an average of 13k steps a day to 30+k steps a day. All I accomplished was some very sore knees and feet that I wish felt as good as my knees.
I've been on the Atkins diet since 2-1, never more than 20 carbs, no diet drinks, no artificial sweeteners of any kind and I'm stuck at 257 pounds. I am wondering if it may be my sleep schedule, complicated by swinging shifts, but that didn't prevent my losing the first 25 pounds. But if it is sleep, or lack of, I am now a night sleeper for the next two and a half weeks, thanks to vacation time.
 If after our spring break vacation I'm still stuck, I'll modify the diet for a few weeks to try a re-kick start. Maybe try vegetarian for a couple of weeks.

And I was all like "Pew, Pew, Pew...AIN'T IT COOL BEING A COP!" with formatting fixed, sorry.

Just got done reading posts at Free North Carolina and Western Rifle Shooters about the murder of James Boyd by the puh-lice. There is a video with their posts that show it was pretty much an execution.

h/t to Western Rifle Shooters blog for the picture.

Another teflon cop.

An Oklahoma police officer shot and killed a family’s dog and later laughed about it to a responding animal control unit, reports claim.

“When the owner, Sarah, got there, the officer said, ‘We shot your dog, she’s dead,”

“I’m not waiting for animal control,” Sgt. Woolley allegedly stated as he grabbed his shotgun to confront the doomed pooch.

“Did you see her collar fly off when I shot her? That was awesome,” Brown claims Woolly bragged to the responding animal control officer, who supposedly replied, “We’ll just write in the report that it tried to attack you and others in the neighborhood.”

Way back in November 2000, Woolly, who at the time worked for the Tishomingo Police Department, also shot and killed 36-year-old Jeff Wayne Baxter, who he claimed had attacked him. “Facts came out in the lawsuit and Brice Woolly’s account of the murder didn’t correspond with the dash cam footage. The City of Tishomingo settled that lawsuit in the murder of Jeff Baxter,” an article at TheFreeThoughtProject.com claims.

“During the lawsuit proceedings, it was discovered officer Brice Woolly failed multiple psychological exams required to be a police officer. At some point, Woolly was allowed to join the ranks.”

Badges. Extra rights awarded with the wearing of.

Sometimes you're not paranoid, they really are out to get you.

Leaked Homeland Security documents obtained by Infowars reveal details of a joint DHS/FEMA national exercise set to take place this week, one of the components of which revolves around an effort to counter online dissent by a group called “Free Americans Against Socialist Tyranny,” which is disgruntled at the imposition of martial law after an earthquake in Alaska.

The rest is at InfoWars.

The document again underscores the federal government’s obsession with characterizing libertarians and conservatives as some kind of extremist radical threat.

Before and After

I have tried for as many years as I have had a gun safe to find an inexpensive way to store handguns and other things on the "free" space on the door.

I tried  holsters held by velcro which made the carpet like covering sag, I thought about rubber coated hooks but didn't want the holes and a few other things.

 The one thing I tried for several years was a canvas type shoe holder that hangs on the back of a door.

This wound up  being a catch all for all sorts of junk, loose ammo, magazines, flashlights, you name it. And as you can see the larger pistols were not well supported at all.

So finally, last week, I ordered a safe door organizer. In one way it does not hold near as much (the JUNK!)

but it is a much better solution I think.

I did have to make sure that the top row of pistols were all autos or small revolvers, my 357's or model 57 Smiths are too fat and hit the shelf in the safe.

It was expensive, for me. Theres probably less than $20 worth of materials in it, DUH, and a markup of x3 would seem reasonable, but it was about x7 that much. But all in all I suppose I'm happier with it now.

Where Have All The Men Gone?

Dateline Portland Oregon (tells you something right there!)

A "crazed" cat with a "history of violence" attacked a family and held them hostage in a bedroom to the point that the male of the house called 911.

http://www.foxcarolina.com/story/24936455/crazed-kitty-attacks-baby-forces-family-to-call-911

Seriously? That would have been one dead cat! Who puts up with a mean cat, especially with an infant in the house? My daughter heard this on the radio as we got home from school today. She grinned at me and said that she KNEW I would have shot the animal. Maybe. There would probably be a certain amount of desire to beat the living crap out of the cat before snapping its neck.

I'm sorry, this country, as a whole, is toast! We may be able to rally the "sensible, decent people" into a few states where common sense will prevail. But the rest of these mewling, whining, candy asses cannot be saved. You cannot teach grown men to be MEN!

Sleepy Today, Up late last night

Last night I spent some time with one of my non firearm toys. Last summer I purchased a used 12" Dobsonian Telescope. This is a Newtonian style telescope which looks like a bucket with a "primary" concave shaped mirror at the bottom of the bucket and an elliptical  "secondary" mirror near the top of the bucket to direct the light out the side where you use an eyepiece to further magnify the image.

This is a picture of the brand and size I have.

I haven't had much chance to use it yet. Since buying it we had record rainfall around here, apparently Mr Murphy followed me from Tn back home when I got it! Then there was hunting season and then I spent some time sorting out a medical issue that had me in the hospital for awhile.

Because of a bright moon, last night was not a really good night for "deep sky objects," the catch all term for things beyond our solar system. But I was able to spend some good time looking at Jupiter which is currently the bright "star" nearest the moon directly overhead at around 9 or 10pm eastern. Mars was just rising around 10 so I had to wait until 2am to get a decent look at him. It is best to view objects as close to straight up as this the shortest path through the atmosphere with the least distortion.

The deep sky objects I looked at were mostly Open Clusters which often give the appearance of Jewels on a dark cloth.

M48:

M67:

The M in the names is for Charles Messier, a french astronomer of the 18th century who was a comet hunter. These objects appeared to Messier in his telescope as little fuzzy spots, which is what comets look like when first spotted. So M. Messier made a list of "fuzzies" to avoid. Now his list is the quintessential starting point for amateur astronomers with their binoculars and or telescopes.

I also spent a little while viewing some binary star systems like Zeta Cancri where, in this case  4 stars, or more!, are orbiting each other. 

Its nice to get out like this, the air was cool and the surroundings quiet and the sky makes for good company.

Haven't posted much lately

I've had ideas in my head but outside factors..............

Ever have someone you must deal with on a daily basis that is N E V E R willing to compromise. No matter the situation, no matter the problem. ZERO compromise. Even if by "compromising" they get everything they want just at a little different time, and I'm not talking something that is time sensitive.
Once they have staked out their position they are unmovable, possibly because that might mean weakness, I do not know.
I realize that only one side of the story is presented here, but I am a tired man. I work around the clock. My situation is much like dealing with Obama. You can plainly see what he is doing, but he calls it something completely different and insists YOU are the scoundrel, idiot, uncaring boob, whatever. You also know that reform is beyond the possible, you are just waiting out the term.

Thats me, waiting out the term. I suppose I could leave "the country" but there's other citizens involved, teammates, if you will. So I stay in the game, hoping I still have my sanity, wondering if I can still call myself a man on the next inauguration day. Looking forward to the day that the office is cleared out.

BTW, this past Monday was my wedding anniversary, 26 years. Thats a long time.

A little bit of reading for history/war buffs

Especially WW2.

I found this after "surfing" the interwebs, 1 link led to another then another.

79 volumes, gonna take awhile to read. Sorry I cannot figure out how to post a pic of the homepage

  US Army in WW2 Series

http://www.history.army.mil/html/bookshelves/collect/usaww2.html

Ukraine protests......I've looked hard at these pics, can NOT see a single keyboard commando, like myself and others here in USSA.

Cross post from WRSA.

If you are not keeping up with whats happening in Ukraine, maybe you should. These people are setting an example for an apathetic society that is always bitching about their tyrannical  government, I have my hand raised, me too, guilty as charged.

These people are staring the devil (Putin) in the face and refuse to let their chains set lightly upon them.

This is from a post at Free NC,  "Punishing Sherman's Vandals."

This is an excerpt from that post which is itself an excerpt from a letter written by a soldier in the War of Northern Aggression;

"“A passage from a letter written by Enoch John, one of Shannon’s Scouts, on December 18, 1864, reveals the hard nature of the war waged by these men.

“I have enjoyed myself on this trip but think, sometimes, I am getting hard-hearted,” he wrote.  “But I notice the tears of a lady always
bring tears to me eyes and the smoke and flames of a dwelling prevents the prayers of the Yankees for their lives, even when on their
knees, being heard, and steadies my nerves to kill them all . . . I have a brace of pistols that never snap.”"

Can anyone else foresee feeling this way in the coming counter revolution?

Walmart,........and *&^%$%^& ammo sales

I really hate stupidity. I figure I'm about as dumb as anybody really needs to be and when someone starts shooting for lower than that, well...........
First of all, if I am working somewhere, let's say a fish market- even if I don't want to work there, I'm am going to at least make a little effort to learn something about.....wait for it.......FISH! Especially the fish I am dealing with. That said.

I stop at my most local walmart this morning. I needed diesel and some stuff that no other grocer sells in town. So while there I cruise the ammo case, you know you do it too. The had gotten some russian 223 in.
I bought my 3 boxes easy peasy and go about my business.

Later on I am in another town on business and can easily go by that walmart, so I do. Nothing for me there. BUT, I overhear the cashier asking for ID, from a grandpa so no age thing, on an ammo sale. I asked why.

"The ATF was in here just 2 days ago and said it MUST be done" she said.

I related how I had only 2 hours before bought at a WM 30 minutes away and was not required.

The lady very enthusiastically replied that "They can be fined $10,000!"

I knew this was baloney. I keep abreast of anything as big as this from the ATF thugs, but just in case, I checked, and NOOOO. It ain't happened,......... yet.

Now, did some doofus stooge ATFer really say that or is some WM weiner going about weiner-ing things up? My money is on the later. But the question is, is this a 1 store weiner or do they have several stores?

Maybe this is like "those" emails, the ones with all the bogus urban legend stuff that go around every so many years just like the cyclic locusts and it's just time for the local WM's to be foolish.

Age Of Heroes, A fair movie

It took me three nights but I just finished watching Age of Heroes. A team of Brit Commandos in WW2 go into occupied Norway to sabotage a German radar station. The movie came out in 2011 but I only heard about it the other day on maxvelocitytactical.com.

Its on Netflix.

Kipling post incorrect, but may have found the real one.

It has been brought to my attention that the poem posted as Kipling is not by him. Figures, I've seldom read a Kipling poem that I easily understood. My apologies if anyone passed it along. In the future I promise due diligence. . BTW, if this post looks odd, it is being typed on my phone ETA; The poem may be a reworded or "plagiarized" version of "The Beginnings" http://www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/kipling/beginning.html It was not part of their blood, It came to them very late With long arrears to make good, When the English began to hate. They were not easily moved, They were icy-willing to wait Till every count should be proved, Ere the English began to hate. Their voices were even and low, Their eyes were level and straight. There was neither sign nor show, When the English began to hate. It was not preached to the crowd, It was not taught by the State. No man spoke it aloud, When the English began to hate. It was not suddenly bred, It will not swiftly abate, Through the chill years ahead, When Time shall count from the date That the English began to hate. Prescient, or history rhyming.

Remember When?

Kipling.......Probably not actually.

from WRSA

Kipling’s “The Wrath Of The Awakened Saxon”

THE WRATH OF THE AWAKENED SAXON

by Rudyard Kipling

It was not part of their blood,

It came to them very late,

With long arrears to make good,

When the Saxon began to hate.

They were not easily moved,

They were icy — willing to wait

Till every count should be proved,

Ere the Saxon began to hate.

Their voices were even and low.

Their eyes were level and straight.

There was neither sign nor show

When the Saxon began to hate.

It was not preached to the crowd.

It was not taught by the state.

No man spoke it aloud

When the Saxon began to hate.

It was not suddently bred.

It will not swiftly abate.

Through the chilled years ahead,

When Time shall count from the date

That the Saxon began to hate.

Can you tell the difference between Dems and Republicans?

AMERICANS HAVE THE IMPRESSION THAT CONSERVATIVES AND PROGRESSIVES ARE OPPOSITES. IF THIS WAS EVER TRUE, IT NO LONGER IS. TODAY, BOTH SIDES WANT THE SAME THING - MORE POWER IN THE HANDS OF THE STATE.

From American Daily Herald

Excerpts;

"The Bill of Rights: In their desire to have The State control the personal activities of other people, the conservatives have been as ignorant as the Progressives on what Freedom of Speech, assembly and religious neutrality really mean. Both have begged "The State to grasp even more power. While the Progressives want to control “hate speech” the conservatives want to control any speech that does not reflect their religious values. Both sides are grasping for control of the government schools, but the end result is the same; more power to The State."

"Both groups eviscerate all of the Bill of Rights but excuse it as necessary for the "National Interest." If anyone protests, they are accused of being not just unpatriotic but traitors deserving of immediate hanging."

h/t to Free North Carolina

AR 15 magazines

A couple of months back a blog friend mentioned BudK. They sell all manner of things, knives, swords, wire saws and on and on.
I was looking at their site and noticed a deal for 2 Tapco "composite" magazines for $14.99.
All of my AR magazines are aluminum and I have them numbered. The reason they are numbered is so that I can identify the ones with bent lips or whatever the problem is that makes them make the gun not go bang.
Curious, I ordered a few of the magazines. They did take a few days to get here, of course Amazon has me spoiled rotten as far as shipping times.

The magazines are thickly made with waffle pattern reinforcement, the base plate is also thick and less likely to be damaged being dropped during a mag change.

In this second picture (apologies for quality or lack of!) you can see the base plate just under the spring behind the follower. The base has a long slot with which you can use a field knife or screwdriver to disassemble the mag for cleaning. The spring is SS, and the  anti tilt follower has relief cuts around it to allow debris to pass through into the mag body instead up jamming your rifle.

You can see that 3 of the mags fit well inside a GI 3 mag holster.

The one problem I did have is with this Tactical Tailor mag holder.

The magazine on the left fit OK, the one on the right was very snug, the one in the center will go in no farther at all. Gi aluminum mags fit fine in this panel. I believe that the problem is the panel itself. First because the mags fit my old Alice holster fine. Secondly, this TT vest with accessories was bought used but has never seen dirt yet. It had tape all over it, but I'm sure it hasn't been outside, not in anger at least.

Ok, so how did they shoot? I only shot with 2 of them. One reason is the weather, the other was the price of ammo.  I shot 60 rnds from 1 and 40 from a second.I never had a single malfunction at all.

In a few weeks I will go to a "class" where these mags will get a decent workout, if they fail I will let you know.

The best price I have found on P mags, which are by all accounts the gold medal standard, used by our troops in bad places, is about $12 from Midway. I think for just $3 more, for 2, I am going be ordering some more of these.

I am in no way connected to Midway, Budk, or Tapco. 

BTW, thanks Harry Flashman, with out seeing Budk on your site, I would have never known.

Rich people should get more votes?

Tom Perkins, the venture capitalist that recently compared the attacks on wealthy people to Nazi persecution of the Jews, came up with another "supposedly" outrageous idea a few days ago.

The article is here.

His new idea, proposed in the interest of keeping his name "in the news" I feel, is to allow the wealthy to vote more often. If a person pays $1 million in taxes, they should get 1 million votes. 

 I don't agree totally with this idea because it wouldn't take much more for George Soros to be running this country even MORE so than he is now.

But I do agree, and have for a long time, with a statement he makes early in the article; 

 "The Tom Perkins system is: You don't get to vote unless you pay a dollar of taxes," Perkins said.

Of course this will never happen due to the tender sensibilities of liberals, both those self identified and the ones that call themselves republicans, who brainwash and bribe their voters to remain inside The Matrix.

How fair is it, and by fair consider that the fed.gov courts proudly allow illegal aliens to vote by refusing EVERY voter id law, to allow people that have never known anything but the govt tit vote on whether or not to pull them off the tit and send them out to work?

Nobody that receives more in welfare than they pay in taxes should be allowed to vote in any election that has a bearing on how much welfare they get.

And as a bonus, a 10 question test of the government being voted for should be required. For example, fed.gov = how many branches of gov, what is a bicameral legislature, does the constitution declare all men are created equal, etc etc.

Of course there would be quite a few people that vote against the libs that would be excluded after such tests.

Also from Ninety Miles

I don't intend to post pictures like this here, my daughter might be reading one day, not that this picture is bad per se. Also, I'm not a "safety nazi" about pictures, hopefully they are STAGED renderings of imagination. That said, this pic reminds me of a gun show I went to a few years ago.

 I had a 41 mag Blackhawk that I wanted some new grips for. Approaching the table to safe my piece I drew the hammer back to half cock, opened the loading gate and held the revolver by its barrel.

 I handed it to a local police woman involved in a conversation on her cell phone. She took the gun by the grip, put her finger on the trigger and turned it toward her nose and looked down the barrel/cylinder to see if it was loaded........... with the hammer back.

BTW, just because they put a ty-wrap on the gun at the door doesn't mean the gun cannot be put into action by some idiot. Keep your head on a swivel.

from Ninety Miles From Tyranny

Happy Valentines Day

From WRSA

California onerous CCW laws Unconstitutional, but WHY?

I read something a few weeks ago that made a lot of sense and unfortunately can not remember where I read it. The idea being that the recent victories of Second Amendment supporters in many courts are just pacifiers handed out to Libertarians and Right Wingers to do what pacifiers do, get us to shut up!

 I mean, consider what fed.gov is doing now, killing US subjects without benefit of trial with drone strikes, the guy living in White House public housing using the constitution to wipe his islamo marxist keester every day (with a big shite eatting grin, no doubt,) the irs goons suppressing those that want out of "The Matrix," the irs, social security and even dept of education et al  buying enough ammo to kill every Amerikan subject several times over, the TSA molesting our wives, daughters, sisters, etc when they are not assaulting our disabled veterans and the infirm or ill unless of course the person looks arabic in which case they breeze effortlessly through security, the list goes on and on and on, DNA swabs at checkpoints, OH and don't forget the N. S. A, cue ominous music, which should have been cued a long time ago.

Are the "courts" or are they really "Star Chambers" just throwing us mindless bumpkins a bone? Do they figure that we are finally so afraid of standing up to their tyrannical ways that it doesn't matter what "rights" the GIVE us. And make no mistake they are GIVING us the right not recognizing it.

A couple years ago I took my kids to DC. It was my first trip there as well. The very first time we "SAW" the city was coming off the METRO on the mall. You get off the tube and walk over to some steps. Upon reaching the top of the steps, BAM! you are standing on The Mall.
 At first I was awestruck, thinking of the history surrounding me, the pride inside me, but as we toured, the nagging feeling of big brother shone through my sunny mood.
 I went to the Archives alone, the wife and kids mutinied on me late in the week, tired of trying to see so much in just a week. As I stood there in the dark room, looking at the Declaration and Constitution, etc, I was struck with the fact (and thought) that they are fading. The ink has faded so much on the documents that if not backlit they would be mostly unreadable. I wept, for who we were, who we are and who we are becoming.

So ask yourself, considering all that this govt is up to, when are they so suddenly, "giving" us our rights?

Calif. concealed weapon law tossed by fed appeals court

Published February 13, 2014

Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO –  A divided federal appeals court has struck down California's concealed weapons rules, saying they violate the Second Amendment right to bear arms.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said Thursday that California is wrong to require applicants to show good cause to receive a permit to carry a concealed weapon. The court ruled that all law-abiding citizens are entitled to carry concealed weapons outside the home for self-defense purposes. 

The rest is at the evil Fox News website.

Happy Birthday!

My youngest son is 13 today. We will have to celebrate over the weekend as the Great Global Warming Southern Blizzard of Feb 2014 has kept his mother at work since yesterday morning and I'm finishing up 7 days straight on 12hr shifts. But his sister did make him a chocolate cake today.

He doesn't read blogs so this is a record for me, maybe he will see it later.

A true blessing he is seldom, if ever, down. Even with the stomach flu just a few weeks ago he wanted to know why he had to miss school, not that he enjoys learning, few kids do at 13. The rest of us miserable, he would run outside or to the bathroom, take care of business and be right back to his bouncy, happy self. Every situation is ALWAYS looked at with energy and enthusiasm.
He has a quick mind and remembers most anything he hears or sees, he enjoys movies very much, and I'd have to bet he will likely be involved in the creative production of them one day.
He is by far the most loving child of mine (4) and it probably will hurt very much the day he leaves my home.

I love you son. Happy Birthday.

From Free North Carolina

The Regime Celebrates its Birthday

Via Michael 

 

As Clyde Wilson once pointed out, the symbol of America started out as “George Washington on his white horse” but is now “a corporate lawyer/lobbyist in an armchair.”  The latter refers to the Lincoln Memorial, which is not so much the symbol of “America” but of the governmental regimein Washington, D.C.  That is why Lincoln must be idolized, worshipped, and compared to Jesus Christ (“He died on Good Friday and died for America’s sins just as Christ died for the world’s sins” his idolaters and cultists have been saying for generations), and referred to as “Father Abraham.”

Lincoln did not create “a new birth of freedom” but a new birth of mercantilism, crony capitalism, and centralized government monopoly of the sort the American colonists had fought a revolution against.  A real statesman would have followed the British example (and the French, Danes, Dutch, Spanish, and Swedish), and the example of all the Northern states in the U.S., and found a way to end slavery peacefully through some kind of compensated emancipation (See Jim Powell, Greatest Emancipations: How the West Ended Slavery).  Instead, the ending of slavery eventually became associated with a war that, according to the most recent research, resulted in as many as 850,000 deaths (the old death count was 620,000).

More @ LRC

The column is at  Lew Rockwell

This is a good point from the column, one among several.

"As the twentieth-century literary critic Edmund Wilson once wrote, it was Lincoln, Lenin and Bismarck who did more than any other individuals in their respective countries to introduce highly centralized governmental bureaucracies.  Lincoln did this in America by destroying the system of states’ rights and federalism that was created by the founding fathers by destroying the rights of secession and nullification.  He destroyed the original American union and replaced it with a Soviet-style coerced union held together by mass murdering literally hundreds of thousands of fellow citizens for simply asserting the truth of the founders that the original union was voluntary, as described in Article 7 of the U.S. Constitution."

DIY gas checks?

Do any of my many, many (lol!) readers have any experience, or know anyone, using a Freechex or a Checkmaker homemade gas check maker?

This is an area of my preps I'm lacking in. I've probably got enough lead to last for more than a few years of shooting nothing but Pb. Store bought checks are outrageous so I'm looking to get some of these punches. So far everything I've read or seen on youtube has been positive.


This is the Freechex, the Checkmaker is basically the same.

This is the same guy shooting a K31 with his homemade checks.

I need 30, 30r, 8mm, 38, 41, 44, and 45. I'm debating getting a 22. If the country goes totally fubar, I don't see me casting bullets in the swap a la Mel Gibson in The Patriot. But there is the "chance" (haha!) of encroaching  bureaucratic nonsense culling the unprepared from the ranks of shooters and in that case I'll be saving my factory 22's for fubar and hunting, etc with the rest.

 I will not go quietly, fubar or encroached.

So have you or a friend used one? I'm' mainly interested in your dislikes.