Actually That's True

During The American Revolution it was, in fact, illegal for a common citizen to own cannon.

It was forbade them by English law (with narrowly tailored exceptions for ship-owners).

It's also a contributing factor in there being a revolution and the fact that we are no longer English.

It makes one wonder what country does Joe think he's president of.

Update: Even if it was somewhat legal via militia association to have a cannon of your own in the militia's armory: once the revolution started it was DEFINITELY against English law to have one.  Which is the point of my poorly researched, snarky, post.  We chucked the government which put restrictions on such things.

Woah Canada

So called assault weapon buy backs and ending transfers of handguns?

I think we're going to see how uncompliant our neighbors beyond Damnyankeeland can be.

I wonder if revolutionarily non-compliant will happen.

RCMP has been particularly jack-booted of late, dunno how this will sit with the gun-owners.

We'll see.

Wrenching To Distraction

With the death of Dingus, I've been looking to distract myself from thinking about him.

For the record, it appears to have been aggressive pancreatic cancer.

Nothing we could have done and the apparent symptoms are nothing then everything.

We're devastated.  It's been a shitty year so far.

So I decided to clear the pile of parts I'd bought for The Beast starting with the strut mounts on Saturday with assistance from JT and Marv.

It solved, to my amazement, a steering wheel vibration from 60-75.  I was braced for no changes at all and got the problem cured.  It's obvious that every single joint on the front needs to be replaced before too long.  Lots of cracked boots but no looseness... yet.  Happily, no single part is too expensive or hard to replace.

The first mount took us about an hour and a half.  The second just half an hour.

Experience matters?

Sunday I decided to install the upgraded "silver box" I'd bought from Australia months ago.

 

This took four and a half hours to get done all by my lonesome.  The decision to put it in was the result of a wild hare up my ass.

It took longer because I was frequently consulting the service manual and taking breaks from the 90+ degree heat with decently sticky humidity.

My radio has gone from an AM/FM with CD to AM/FM, CD, Bluetooth, and (very dated) Nav with USB and 3.5mm Aux input.  The Bluetooth means I can make calls hands free and stream music from the phone, perhaps even XM.  The USB means I can plug in my long neglected iPod Classic.  The 3.5mm aux means I can play anything that uses headphones; the downside is I have to run it from the device and not from the head unit.

One unexpected feature is the ability to store up to 15 CD's onboard the silverbox.  They have to be CD-Audio formatted, and they take forever to load, but it's kind of a neat feature.  Not sure what I'll put there because all of my music fits on that iPod.

Part of the disassembly process was removing the shift knob.  The plastic was worn smooth, and the factory part is unavailable and rare.  A nice leather knob is available for a Pontiac G8 that drops right in, so I did!  Huzzah!  A bit of style and comfort is added for little money!

One feature that is absent is XM.  I plugged in an antenna to the appropriately colored antenna plug and no XM options appeared on screen.  Not unexpected, considering there's no XM down-under, but hopes were dashed.

The new box has provision for a back-up camera.  I have not yet decided where I want to put the camera I've bought, so I haven't routed the wires yet.  Soon?

Maverick

Marv and I went and saw Top Gun: Maverick.

It's really well done.

Worth the big screen.

For The Fallen

 

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children, England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.


Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.


They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.


They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.


They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.


But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;


As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,

To the end, to the end, they remain.

-- Laurence Binyon

Today is not about sales. It is not about summer starting. It is not about grandma.

It's is about those who served and have passed beyond the vale.

I want them all back.

To:

Bernie Canniff (Korea, in a car club together).

Carol LeFon aka Neptunus Lex (patiently explained both real world and flight sim military aviation to this tanker).

Davy McGuire (COB USS Whale, originally a friend of my Dad's, later me).

Fred Gabow (we served together, his wife hired someone to murder him).

Ian Gates (Comrade in arms to Willard).

Jerry Pournelle (you do read, don't you? Willing to be wrong and listened to my correction!).

Kevin O'Brian aka Hognose (our beloved Weaponsman).

Rabbi (Uncle Ben, another friend of Dad who got me a ride in an F-14A).

Rich Sickels (brother of my Father in law).

Robert Smith (uncle by marriage to Mom's sister).

Standing Bear aka William Dawkins (WW2 and Korea, who taught me gaming).

The world is better that you were in it and worse that you have left.

Lost Kitty

Derpy Dingus McGee, the Grayness, has passed on.

He was a great cat, taken too soon.

Not As Much As You'd Hope

Crew survivability is a major thing among Western tank designs, but...

The main gun ammo is not always as separated from the crew as you'd think or hope.

The best tank at keeping the two apart is the M1 series.  Almost all the ammo is in the rear of the turret behind blast doors with blow-off panels in the roof to vent the effects of the ammo cooking off.

On the 120mm models, what few rounds (six) that are in the hull are likewise behind a blast door with venting provisions.

This is a LOT better than the M60A1 and A3 it replaced.  Ammo was everywhere.  Some in the rear of the turret, some under the gun, some on the floor along the wall of the turret basket, some on either side of the driver...

Yet, the M60 isn't famous for ammo fires.  Nor is its predecessor, the M48.

The Leopard 2 has ammunition storage in the back of the turret, like the Abrams, but just on the loader's side.  The rest of the stowage is in the hull to the left of the driver.  Turkey had a couple of catastrophic ammo fires from this.  Despite this, the Leo 2 doesn't have a reputation for burning to the ground.

Challenger 2, same deal.

What really cures the Western tanks from burning to the ground was changing hydraulic fluids.

The T-55 and T-62 stow ammo in much the same manner as the contemporaneous M48 and M60.  They weren't regarded as particularly prone to burning, and Israel sure tested that!

It's the Soviet/Russian tanks with the auto-loader that give Russian designs a reputation for lighting up.

At a glance the ammo placement seems ideal.  Deep in the hull, where it should be best protected by thick armor and intervening equipment (like road wheels).

I think what we're seeing with them isn't poor placement, but where they're being struck.  The armor on the turret roof is thin and there's not much else above ammo but a couple layers of very thin sheet metal.  The things that come through the roof are normally very hot, and readily light fires.  Oh, and the autoloader is a mess of hydraulic lines with the attendant fire risks from aerosolized oils.

Western designs penetrated this way would have a bad day for the crew, but the ammo isn't almost guaranteed to be hit like it is in a T-64/72/80.  The same holds true for the earlier Soviet designs.  The ammo tends to be clustered around the perimeter of the turret rather than right under the middle.

Everything Everywhere All At Once

Michelle Yeoh is wonderful.  It's good to see her starring again.

The movie is fun, clever and I had a great time.

The "aside" scenes are a great hoot!

You should go see it using your method of choice.

Meat Grinding

I've read, and seen nothing to contradict it much, that the Russians are slowly grinding it out and advancing.  Though not near as ambitiously as it started.

While a war of attrition is not the preferred means of victory, it's a proven one if you have the stamina and resources to let it run its course.

Such victories, though, are often of the Pyrrhic type; that's why they are not the preferred way to do it.

Recovery

I've seen a lot of footage of knocked out Russian armor filmed by Ukrainians and I don't think I've seen something really important about that mentioned.

There's a knocked out tank where there are Ukrainians filming it.

Not a tank recovered by the Russians.

Tanks are actually kind of hard to kill permanently.  It's quite astonishing what can be repaired and returned to service.

It's one of the reasons that Kursk was so devastating to Nazi-Germany.  The Soviet Union held the ground at the end and Zee Germans weren't able recover and repair their salvageable tanks.

What this really means is the Ukrainians are recovering the hulks and salvaging what's useful from them.

Something else which is apparent from some of this footage is Soviet/Russian tanks (this includes Ukrainian tanks which are the same designs) are shockingly easier to kill permanently than Western designs.

Lots of crispy rusted shells from catastrophic ammo fires.

It's been interesting for my ex-tanker ass to watch explosive reactive armor actually work and seeing that you can saturate the active defenses that Russia was saying made their tanks impervious to anti-tank missiles.

Measure / Counter-Measure.  The pendulum swings.

PS: I've been looking for a definitive answer about the footage of Russia transporting a shit-ton of T-62M's by rail and where those tanks were going.  Most people posting it are claiming it's near the Ukrainian border, a few are saying it's a shipment to Syria.  I don't KNOW.  But if the former is true, that's bad for the Russian war effort.  Update: A quick look around shows some of the same painted markings on Syrian T-62M as are seen on the train.  If that's a shipment ID, then it's old footage being used as propaganda.  If that's a repair batch number then it's meaningless to the tank's destination.

I have read that the tanks being transported were earmarked for Syria and are being diverted, that could explain the matching numbers.  Or not.  I admit, I don't know.

Pyrrhus wept.

NIJ And GURPS

 Link to the National Institute of Justice pdf about the level criteria.

The GURPS standard for penetration is based on the average roll of a six sided die, or 3.5 points.

That means that something that is proof against 2d will have DR 7.  That also means that 2d can penetrate it on a good die roll.

This is GURPS and not the real world, but we're going to try to get things to pass a reality check and still conform to the game assumptions.

What they're supposed to stop:

Type IIA: 9mm and .40 S&W

Type II: 9mm and .357 Magnum

Type IIIA: .357 SIG and .44 Magnum

Type III: Rifles 7.62x51mm M80 ball from an M14 is what's spec'd.

Type IV: Armor piercing rifles .30-06 M2 AP from an M1 is what's spec'd.

The standards specify bullet weight and velocity.

IIA: 2d+2 pi and 2d pi+ --> DR 9

II: 3d pi --> DR 10

IIIA: 3d-1 pi and 3d+2 pi+ --> DR 12

III: 7d pi --> DR 25

IV: 5d(2) pi- --> DR 35

Quite simple, really.

Good Guy With A Gun

The only corpse is the would-be murderer.

Good shooting and heroic response from a bystander with a carry permit.

Fail At This Station

Ever give someone enough rope to hang themselves?

Aesop is hanging.

I explained something and he did not understand, proving that he didn't know what he was talking about in the first place with his response.

Stop considering him knowledgeable about anything military.

Stop now, do not trust his opinion further.

I phrased what I was saying in a particular way to see if he really grasped what he was talking about, and he does not.

He focused hard on the time on target, as he was meant to if he was as ignorant as I suspected.

Trap sprung and I feel oh so clever at winning a battle of wits... not really.

It's depressing to have to do it.

But I'm sick of listening to him and having others tell me about him.  Y'all can stop telling me about his blather now, I'm done. 

UPDATE: Another reason to distrust his assessments is he's perfectly willing to edit out his mistakes and take the position that it never happened.  That's why I stopped linking to his errors way back before we all died from Ebola.

Typical

Our good buddy, Chuck, refusing to let a crisis go to waste, is championing a bill that has nothing to do with what happened in Texas the other day, nor would it have prevented it in any way.

The good news is that it thwarted Rick Scott's almost as bad bill from hitting the floor.

Lurch is no good when it comes to school shootings and what to do about it.

While the bill he likes is apparently innocuous, when everything is either forbidden or mandatory such a clearinghouse of information becomes the tool making the forbidden/mandatory decision universally rather than situationally.

Neither side is respecting Federalism.

No Goodfellas Sequel

Ray Liotta has shuffled off.

No mention of cause in the article.

Irrelevant

Just as the anti-gunners are quick to blame racist white gun owners for mass shootings...

Conservative media blames lax law enforcement.

Except that the majority of the criminals readily and handily passed a background check.

The entire core of the pro-gun objection to increased background checking is the futility of it.

Because a mass shooter is typically committing their last crime, as well as their last act, there's no deterrence in any after the fact punishment.  Not when they get to see their name in lights!

The failure to punish felons for unrelated crime has nothing to do with them.

But if we want to try something new, let's not give them the time of day after they shoot someplace up and murder innocents.

Hey, Media, you are the ones offering the incentive and reward for doing these heinous acts.

Asking you to shut up isn't an infringement of your 1st Amendment rights.  I'm asking you to not report on it, not forcing you with laws.

I know that a one time reporting of facts with a distant follow-up will prevent you from attempting to advance your hobby political goals, but hey, "if it saves even one life," right?

Something Else That Doesn't Work

The cops spend far too much time during an active shooter event doing...

I don't know what, but it's not assaulting the perpetrator.

Upwards of 40 minutes after the shooter in Texas had stopped shooting and barricaded itself into classroom before some Border Patrol agents got their shit together and began an attack.

So, basically nothing has changed from Stoneman-Douglas?

While the cops are playing perimeter security, children are stuck in a gun-free victim zone being slaughtered.

By the way, I care WAY more for those kids lives than the life of any individual officer.

If you're going to dare to assume the mantle of hero, then those lives will matter to you more than your own as well.  Save the kids or die trying, but don't stand around doing nothing until the shooter has stopped on their own.

AGAIN!

When will we learn?

Not Going Well

A tanker group I'm a member of on Facebook posted pics of Russia moving up T-62M's to the Ukrainian border.

Here's an article about it.

This would be equivalent to the US sending M60A3 (TTS) tanks.

The M has been extensively upgraded, but it's still not their front line tank.

Most likely these tanks are replacing more modern examples in the units they're headed for and the modern tanks will be sent to replace losses.

That kind of undermines the narrative that Western anti-tank missiles aren't doing what they're made to do.

Things are not going well for Russia even if they are winning.

Pyrrhic is the word that keeps coming to mind.

This does not mean that Ukraine is winning, but their victory condition is different from Russia.  All they have to do to win is to keep existing as an independent nation to win.

But they have to do that until Russia decides to quit, and that's probably going to mean territorial loss, which is also a loss for Ukraine.

This Is Potentially Very Interesting

I don't follow this channel, but it was suggested by YouTube for me to watch.

Perhaps something will happen this time.  Something in our favor.

Surprised It Needs To Be Said

Any disease which can spread from the exchange of fluids is probably readily a sexually transmitted disease.

Case in point.

Bonus round!  Finally a disease that was actually spread by "teh gheys" after so many ills have been wrongly blamed on them over the decades.

Happily, it appears that if the infected can just keep it in their pants for a few weeks this should blow over.

Sadly, that's atypical behavior for the kind of person who does sex tourism trips to raves in Europe.

Time On Target

I get this message, "What are these guys on about?"

Apparently Filthie and a certain Greek Poet are in a pissing match about how successful or not Ukraine is against Russia.

I'm still of the opinion that it's a pity both sides can't lose, but every day the war lasts gives me new hope that they can!

But checking the link to Aesop actually hit on something I DO know something about.

Artillery.  The so-called "king of battle" to armor's queen.  (What happens in the tank stays in the tank).

The Ukranians have not invented a new strategy with dispersed batteries to evade counter fires.

The fucking French invented that.  As far back as World War One.

The French did not actually DO it.  The key is communications and they didn't have a good means of getting the proper coordination much farther than you could with yelling.

We Goddamned Yankees were the first to employ the idea in the field.  In World War Two.

The Germans intensely disliked it.

We'd spread the tubes all over the map and fire them individually in a timed manner that made the target appear as if they'd been fired all at once from the same place.  This is called "time on target" (the hit all at once, not the dispersing; the Brits figured out ToT).  We even cheated and tossed some mortar fire in with the howitzers.

Should the Germans have figured out where the rounds were coming from, they didn't figure out where ALL of the rounds were coming from.  Let alone kill more than a tube or two.

And just to put it out there, in case the Ukranians get credited for inventing it, our redlegs also developed shoot and scoot doctrines where the tube is moving before the round gets to the top of its arc AND single-tube time on target.

And we did it all with normal radios, paper maps, and analog gear.

GPS and computers makes it easy.

Because We Forget

If we're going to make any damn progress we have to notice and remember who wasn't on our side when it mattered.

Even if they were solidly on our side for years and years before that.

Because once they stop doing the heavy lifting we need to get them gone so we can remember them fondly instead of resenting their abandoning us.

Marion Hammer did a lot of good work.

Decades ago.

She's not done much for us lately and has actively opposed us at least four times since 2011.

She should have trained her replacement and retired a long while ago.

I guess it's hard to give up that paycheck with all the people who'll carry water for her.

Just stab the "Marion" tag and be reminded that she stopped being on our side a while back.

Six Point Eight

If you are diabetic, there are special conditions before a surgeon will do "elective" surgery.

If you aren't going to die from what ails you, it's elective.

The Lovely Harvey's shoulder is elective.

I related her options here.

Guess who got her A1C down to an amazingly low level!

Because I'm the cook around here, I'm going to take some credit, but...

She's been doing much better at following her primary doc's instructions and taking her meds.

She's on a one-two punch combination that's fully covered by insurance and appears to be doing the job where metformin by itself wasn't.

She's down from over 10 to 6.8 and the threshold for surgery is 7 or lower!

We're going to try and get her in for a shoulder replacement ASAP.

Quality of life, don't you know.

Feel Good Story Of The Day

Finns are buying guns because they're inspired by Simo Hayha.

While the US might have a rifle behind every blade of grass, Finland is looking to put one behind every tree.

Finland is still heavily forested...

But Of Course

Don Hume finally makes my favorite pocket holster for my favorite pocket gun...

And it's backordered 6-8 weeks.

C'est la vie.

I've put up with the nylon DeSantis this long, I guess I can wait a couple more months.

A Modest Proposal

Any mass shooting or murder which occurs in a gun free zone by law shall ignored.

It is the fault of the legislators and executive that signed the law, and not the shooter, so we should blame them for creating an attractive nuisance.

GURPS v GURPS

Nearly all of the time GURPS stats here will be for 4th Edition.

Because 4th is an evolutionary development of 3rd Edition (Revised) most conclusions are unaffected by the edition change.

The logic of using an M16A2 over an FAL still stands.

The nomenclature changes a bit.

3e(R) doesn't have piercing damage.  Bullets did crushing damage with special rules which add up to what 4e calls piercing damage.

Something that appears to have gotten lost in my pontificating / proselytizing for GURPS is some basic conventions.  I explained this in a comment, but I'll repeat it here too.

GURPS only uses common every day cube dice like what you can get with Yahtzee.  You can buy dice for GURPS any place that sells a deck of cards.  This was intentional of the designers.

If you've played any other TTRPG you're waiting for the damage dice to say 2d6 instead of 2d.  GURPS doesn't need to specify what die when d6 are all there are.

Bullet damage is a combination of caliber and penetration.  Douglas Cole generated a formula to allow one to plug in several real world numbers and get out dice for 3e(R), and it still works in 4e.

If you click on the GURPS tab in the right sidebar --> you will find explanations and examples of lots of the rules.

Gaming Rifles

What rifle for your character is a bit stickier than the handguns.

Most games do give noticeably more damage to full power rounds than intermediate ones.

Though Top Secret has rifles and rules for them, it didn't come up all that often.

Getting into any kind of gun fight was a mission fail and normally led to character generation in short order.

Twilight: 2000 is where we started paying attention to rifles.

5.56x45mm and 5.45x39mm do Dam: 2.  7.62x39mm and 7.62x51mm both do Dam 4.

But that doesn't mean that the thirty caliber guns do twice as much damage.

The Dam number is a multiplier based on range.

Close range is 4d6 + (4 x dam).  So an M16A2 does an average of 22 at close range while an FAL or AKM does 30.  36% more...  x51's close range is longer than x39's too.

A "shot" in T2K is actually about 3 rounds.

So the M16 AK-74 and AK get 10 shots and the FAL just 7.  That brings damage for a whole magazine to 220 for an M16 and AK-74 and just 210 for an FAL (4.5% less).  300 for an AKM!

Mass gets into the act here.  That M16 is a mere 3.5 kg loaded, AK-74 is 4.5 kg,  AKM is 5 kg and the FAL is 5.75 kg.

Plus the basic loads... 6 spare mags for the M16, 4 each for the AK-74, AKM and FAL...

6.5 kg (70 'shots') for the M16, 6.5 kg (50 'shots') for the AK-74, 9 kg (50 'shots') for the AKM and 8.75 kg (35 'shots') for the FAL.

That drags our average damage (at close range) for a basic load to 1,540 for the M16, 1,100 for the AK-74, 1,500 for the AKM and 1,050 for the FAL.  The AKM appears to be winning until the math conscious players added five more magazines to their M16's load to tare with the AKM.  120 'shots' from the M16 gives an average of 2,640!

Bringing the AK-74 up to 9 kg only gets to 100 shots and 2,200 average damage.

And that's how we all ended up packing a 5.56 rifle in T2K.

Still with me?

GURPS does things differently.  First off, every cartridge is counted separately.

5.56x45 from an M16A2 will do 5d pi, 5.45x39mm from an AK-74 does 4d+2 pi, 7.62x39 from an AKM does 5d+1 pi and 7.62x51mm from an FAL does 7d pi.

This gives an average shot 17.5, 16, 18.5 and 24.5 points respectively.

Weights are M16A2: 8.9/1, AK-74: 9.1/1.2, AKM: 8.7/1.8, FAL:11/1.7

Totals for basic load come to 14.9 lb. (210 shots), 13.9 lb. (150 shots), 15.9 lb. (150 shots), and 17.8 lb. (100 shots).

Average damage for a basic load comes to: 3,675 for the M16A2, 2,400 for the AK-74, 2,775 for the AKM and 2,450 for the FAL.

50% more damage and 16% less weight?  That's how we all ended up packing a 20" M16A2...

For the record an M4 does the same 4d+2 pi as the AK-74 but does it lighter at 7.3/1 lb.  That brings the basic load to 13.3 lb. for 3,360 points of damage on average.  The +1 to Guns/TL8 - Rifle red-dot scope is a pound so 14.3 lb basic load; still better than the same weight AK-74 because you're more likely to hit!

And that's how we all ended up packing an M4A1 with a red-dot...

Do You Like Tomatoes

The Lovely Harvey and I are fond of tomatoes, so she decided to try our hand at growing our own.

Lack of choice at Home Depot led to her getting two Biltmore tomato plants.

One is doing OK, the other is dying.

But we've gotten a crop from the good one!

With more on the way.

They are not large tomatoes, between 2" and 3" in diameter; but they are very flavorful!

GURPS Again

This is mostly a repeat.  I know I've yapped about this before.

I've mostly never been in the "caliber must start with a 4" camp.

I say that even though .45 ACP was my only pistol cartridge for quite a spell.

The silly reason I never bought into the caliber wars was gaming.

In most games there's not enough difference between 9mm, .40 S&W or .45 ACP damage to bother.

What you often got with 9mm was a lot more shots.

That's why I "bought" a Hi-Power so often.  Having 13 shots was better than having 8.

TSR's Top Secret is my first Hi-Power.

The Beretta M9 was my preferred Twilight: 2000 pistol.  It would have been a Glock 17 except I got a price break for buying my nation's issue gun.  Before I knew what a shit-show the L85A1 was, if I was playing a Brit I was packing an L9 (Hi-Power again).

Even Traveller was using 9mm handguns.  The automatic pistol from LBB:1 is obviously a 9x19 wonder-nine.

It's EVERYWHERE!

Then there's GURPS.  A full sized 9x19 does 2d+2 pi.  A .45 does 2d pi+.

They're mathematically almost identical for damage.  9x19 will average 9 points per shot, .45 will do 10.5.  Moving to hollow points shifts that to 13.5 and 14 respectively.

Notice something there?

The bigger is better contingent in the real world goes all the way back to when hollow-points were exotic and unreliable in pistols; both in the gun functioning and in the round expanding.  And in ball, the .45 does about 17% more damage.

I am sure you've seen the ballistics gel picture where 9mm and .45 are cutting nearly identical tracks with modern HP ammo...  13.5 and 14 reflect this reality.

The amazing thing is that GURPS predates a lot of this analysis being readily available.

I think they got lucky with the proxies they used to generate damage, but a constant refrain from Mr Jackson himself back when GURPS was fresh and new was that a reality test trumped game balance.

GURPS was kind of revolutionary in using real units for everything at the time.

You could reverse engineer things!

And we did.

And it rapidly boiled back to "if the damage is the same, why not have more shots?"

It also became really obvious that we very rarely used the pistol we had listed on our character sheet.

Most any gamer in modern or future settings intestinally Groks that a pistol is for fighting your way to your rifle or only for use when your rifle isn't available for what ever reason.

I've have more use of a bayonet than a sidearm in gaming.

But I still buy that handgun and list it on the sheet.

Just in case...

Like the real world when I'm carrying.

Just in case... 

Also Also

With the realization that I've become a S&W dude, is noticing the proliferation of 9x19mm in the collection.

INCLUDING buying a 9mm S&W just to have an example of a particular model.

It all started with a Browning too.

I'd gone a long time without any 9mm's in the safe.

Then I got that Hi-Power, because I'd "owned" so many on a character sheet.

Then nostalgia kicked in and I replaced my Glock 17.

Then I needed to get an M&P 9 to standardize on what Harvey and Marv were toting so as to not cause supply problems if there was a hurricane looting situation.

Then nostalgia, then carry then, "hey shiny" and then... 

I guess the good news is the Glock 21 isn't the only .45 I own anymore either.

No Longer Cheap

Willard pointed out something profound yesterday.

Those cheap .32 revolvers my Grampa was counting on to defend his business from criminals who, thankfully, never materialized cannot be made cheaply today.

The skills, processes, and situation that allowed them to be made cheaply and in quantity simply no longer exist.

The cost of labor is up dramatically compared to the turn of the 19th to 20th century, when they were designed.

If you can't automate the process, you have to pay someone to do it and that's expensive if you can't offshore it.  Sometimes even if you can.

Some things are worth paying the labor, but cheap revolvers aren't one of those things.  Especially when there's no shortage of originals out there for less than $100.

Ravenclaw Eric Speaks

 Call a Deer a Horse, and bake me a cake BIGOT!

Eric and I have known each other for decades, and he's penned a decent one here.

Social Costs

I realized last week that I'd been missing the social activity of hot-rodding where we'd all gather and thrash on each other's cars to complete a project.

I think it's why I am stalling over mechanically simple tasks.

I want company and camaraderie.

About Time

Back when I was pocket toting my SIG P238, I used a Don Hume 001 pocket holster.

Like this one (Image stolen from Don Hume's store page):

I liked it a lot, and have been disappointed that it wasn't made for the M&P Shield series.

Tonight I checked again, and it was listed!

I guess Don finally admitted that the Shield series was going to stick, huh?

Three Million

Some time the day before yesterday this blog passed three million views!

Only took slightly less than 17 years to do it too!

Yay me!

Together Time

The Home Team, The Bolts, have just won the second round of the playoffs.

The Lovely Harvey has tasked herself with learning Hockey so as to have something to do with me!

She's a quick study and is yelling obscenities with the best of them now!

Obsolete Cartridges

There's a lot of "obsolete" rounds out there in common use.

.45-70 and .30-30 are still widely used.

Judging by how much easier it'd been to find .300 Savage (at least before the Biden ammo panic™ ©2020-2022) I'd say that people were dusting off old Model 99's and heading out to the woods with them again.

.30-06 is obsolete because it's a military cartridge that's no longer in front-line military use.  This also applies to .45-70.

But you'll find any of these rounds in use where it's legal to use them every hunting season.

They're, nominally, not even that hard to find at the local gun shop.

Obsolescence hits handgun rounds much harder than rifle rounds.  Even so, guns and ammo are readily available, you just won't see them in the field so much (or at all if conceal carried).

Speaking Of .45-70

An AR in .45-70?

Boo! Yeah!

Longmire Murder Capitol Of America

I'm not the first person to comment on how many murders per capita happen in this show, but that's not what I'm here to comment about.

Someone else was complaining that a character on the show said, one of the murders was done with a .45-70 round and "45/70.... That's a dead cartridge. The only thing your gonna find that shoots that is an antique sharps."

Nope.

The gun you're gonna find will still be obsolete, but you can most definitely buy a brand-new one!  Marlin, for example.

.45-70 isn't dead, it's in production and still has a following.  As does .30-30 and .300 Savage.

As long as the guns are out there and in use, especially if new ones are still being made, a round isn't dead.

Hell, a round isn't dead even if there's no factory ammo!

Correction and update:  The person complaining was quoting a character on the show who'd said that .45-70 was a dead cartridge.

Appearances

Harvey has been a mite testy with her shoulder injury and all.

She's been on a short fuse, and we understand.

One thing she threw at me for being there and doing the stuff I've been doing was, "You just want to look like a dutiful husband to everyone!"

That stung, but she was just lashing out because the source of her frustration is beyond her reach.

Later, when she wasn't angry and depressed, I replied with, "Honey, I am being a dutiful husband, looks will take care of themselves."

That got a laugh.

Admin Note

Sorry for the lack of free ice cream lately.

Blogging is a spare time sort of deal and there's been a bit of a shortage of that of late.

Hoping to get back into the swing soon.

Posts tend to come in a flurry, so...

Oldest Gun

 

My oldest gun is a Harrington and Richardson Automatic Top-Break 2nd Model 1st Variation. (top)

In the obsolete .32 H&R.

.32 H&R is very similar to .32 S&W Long dimensionally, and I've fired S&W Long from it without getting hurt.

Near as I've been able to determine it was made in 1891 and really shouldn't be firing smokeless rounds anyways.

This was the gun that Grampa kept in the tool-box at the gas station.

Because it was Grampa's, I cherish it beyond it's sale value.

My oldest firearm (bottom), because the H&R is pre-1898, is the gun Grampa kept under the counter of the gas station; it a Iver Johnson Safety Hammer Automatic 3rd Model in .32 S&W from 1911.  It's probably safe for smokeless rounds.

It carries the same sentimental value as the H&R.

Payback Time Bitches

The Lovely Harvey has the annual deductible paid.  She's $250 from paying the 10% of the first $5,000 90/10 deal.

That means we're $250 from the health insurance paying for everything and us paying $20 per visit copays until the end of the year.  Much like insurance was before Romneycare 2.*Obama* kicked in.

That gigantic deductible is why she didn't seek a lot of care.

Well, now that we're forced to pay it, it's paid and we're going to peg the meter getting her cared for.

Armed Forces Day

Today is the day you celebrate those still in uniform.

Not veterans.

Not the fallen.

For every branch; Army, Navy (including their Marine contingent), Air Force (grudgingly), Space Force (feels weird don't it), Coast Guard, Lighthouse Service (really, look it up), and Coastal Artillery.

The Camera Gods Laugh

We're getting some rain, finally, here!

While the clouds were rolling in, they were doing some interesting stuff, so I thought I'd take some pictures.

While getting the camera out, they stopped doing interesting stuff.  They were being really dynamic!

We're under the approach for St Pete/Clearwater International, so hearing a plane is nothing unusual, but I always look anyways.  Aside: As dynamic as the clouds were being, that had to have been an unpleasant approach today.

An Allegient Airbus is just at the bottom of the cloud deck and I could see them only intermittenly... AND I HAVE MY CAMERA OUT!!!

Line up the shot, focus, "PLEASE REPLACE BATTERY".

AUGH!

Because of that I missed a picture of the wake the plane made in the clouds.

Whether The Space Force

When I exited the Army, I was no longer in the military.

The Air Force exited the Army...  So...

But now The Space Force has exited the Air Force!

Have they become military by wit of double negative?

I am so confused.

How Did This Happen

There was once a time when I didn't own anything made by Smith and Wesson.

Now there's five guns which can be called M&P.

Where did it all go wrong?

And this isn't even the extent of it!  This is about all that my workbench will hold for picture taking.

I used to be the "Colt Guy" or the "Glock Guy"... now look at me!

That's An Odd Feeling

As of this year, there are people who can legally drink in the US who were NOT born last century.

Transfers

The normally reliable pawn shop that I have my internet gun purchases delivered to has decided that they need $35 plus tax to do a transfer instead of the $20 it's been for years.

A nearby pawn shop has changed from $25 plus tax for up to ten to $25 plus tax for EACH.

All that said, it's still cheaper to order from Bud's and pay the fee than to buy from most of the places that carry new guns.

LGBFJB

PS: With 1972 being the cut-off date for C&R, I've been noticing that my wants don't need a third party all that much.  My wants don't miraculously create the money to buy them, but if it did... they would be delivered straight to my house.

Cleaned

Got the compact M&P 9 and the P220 cleaned after their outing to the range.

While not strictly necessary, I am sure, with modern, noncorrosive, ammo I feel better when I can clean my guns after a range trip.

The compact M&P needs a holster.

Because The Beast offers a lot more room in the waist area, IWB carry is possible again where it wasn't in The Precious (RIP).

Midway claims to be having a clearance sale on a couple of designs that I've used with other guns... until you get them in the cart; then they revert to full retail price.  The clearance price is what enticed me to buy, not the make and model!

I'll keep searching.

I've been fond of the Galco Summer Comfort model with several other guns, and will likely end up with another for the 9C.  Or the Don Hume equivalent.

Because It's New

Breitbart has a headline saying that America is more interested in the Johnny Depp defamation trial than in the topic of Abortion.

Probably because we haven't been talking about Johnny Depp and Amber Heard for decades and being assaulted non-stop by their most strident and tiresome supporters the entire time.

Does this mean the topic of abortion is without merit?

No.

It means that people are sick of hearing about it and welcome the change of topic.

Honestly, we know what any given outlet is going to say about abortion and we know if we agree or not already, so there's really no need to bother watching or reading about it at those outlets.

It would take an extraordinary argument to change anyone's mind about this too.

I'm not saying the argument doesn't exist, I'm just saying that nobody's made it yet.  You can tell because there's still a debate.

Spaceship Design

I always drew up deckplans and external profiles of the ships I designed in Traveller.

Ships that would never touch atmosphere got fins.

When asked why I replied that they looked cool.

This often got responses along the lines of, "nobody would really do that."

Sir, I have been to far too many car shows and seen the automotive equivalent of fins on a spaceship to ever think that nobody would ever do that.

That WHO Treaty

While it's dangerous that Brandon is going to sign a treaty that hands our healthcare over to the China dominated World Health Organization; I seriously doubt there's 2/3 of the senate who will sign off on the ratification.

People are already pissed about healthcare in this country.

I don't think a lot of senators are willing to fan that flame.

Range Time

OK, I'm rusty and need to get out more.

First up!

The M&P 9 M2.0 Compact fired 50 rounds and now considered reliable for all time!

50 rounds of this:

I've never bought or shot any Syntech ammo before.

I guess it shoots OK.  Not my normal fodder.

This is just my second trip to the range since my accident and the first with my new glasses.  I'm shooting low and left and I don't know why.

The hammer assembly replacement and new stocks on the P220 worked out well.

Bottom left is a mag dump!  If nine rounds can be considered a proper mag dump.

Still low and left, but the group gets tighter as I go.  Several groups, and the last round, started double action.

The P220 sure is earning that Rcl -3 stat, but I'm doing OK with it.

.45 sure is big after loading up 9mm too.

That Word You Keep Using...

Democrats keep saying that "democracy" is at risk when X happens.

Normally when a majority of people demand and get their way.

You know, when democracy happens to them.

Considering that the US was supposed to be a Constitutional Republic using democratic means to operate; but specifically rejected actual democracy during its creation...

Democracy IS the risk, not the risk of losing it.

I've been fond of saying, "words mean something," but I fear the truth is, "words meant something."

There Is No Worse Feeling

Nothing sucks quite so much as watching a loved one be in pain and being unable to do anything to make it better.

Harvey spoke to the ortho doc about her shoulder today.

The options are:

1. Physical therapy and see what we get for lost motion and strength.

2. Plates and screws.  Because she smokes, bone necropathy is a thing?

3. Complete replacement of the joint.

For both surgeries, her diabetes comes into play and she has to get her A1C down to an amazingly low level.

This got her to burst into tears because after the insurance pays, the meds that actually work to keep her glucose levels in check comes to $700 a month.

Metformin, which is essentially free, doesn't do a good job with her blood sugar.

We're super pissed that the attending at the emergency room didn't do more than an x-ray and send her home with a sling.  We're convinced that had they done a CT scan that night they'd have done surgery immediately and emergency surgery doesn't demand a low A1C.  Emergency surgery is also covered by our insurance better. 

To say that she is bummed out is a gargantuan understatement.

Can I borrow someone's "make it all better" magic wand?

Familiarity

Playing with the new compact and doing some dry fire and I notice that something feels a bit familiar.

Then it hit me, the grip length!

That's near as never mind identical to the old Browning Hi-Power!

The grip is much narrower, though.

It's a good grip length, I think.

I Totally Could

 

Now that I've slogged through a few, skimmed a few and read what others have said about many...

I am now convinced that I can write a manifesto.

I'm good at spelling things wrong, messing up punctuation, going off on tangents and being generally incoherent and unreadable.

Hell, you're reading this and have probably noticed.

Since I'm fun to laugh at, you keep coming back.

I think what I really lack is the deep seated hatred of a particular group of people (real OR imaginary) to focus my poorly edited diatribe elegantly argued manifesto on.

Oh well.

Just going to have to keep blogging without a core mission statement.

More 9 v 45

Marv and my liking of the balance of the M&P 45C led us to consider the M&P 9 compact.

That led me to keep an eye out for deals.

ARFcom mentioned such a deal the other day and we pounced!

Bud's Gun Shop has the M&P 9 M2.0 Compact marked down a LOT.  $150 off on the model with the safety and more than $200 for the one without a manual safety.

It's just a bit smaller than the 45C in every dimension, most prominently in length.

 It's not going to be replacing the Shield Plus in my pocket though:

The bonus to holdout offsets the extra five rounds under most conditions.

The magazine is a shorter version of the old M&P 9 with two fewer rounds.

That means that the 17-rounders will work in the compact, they just stick out a bit:

If that bothers you, S&W included some spacer sleeves to fill the gap.

Looking a little Glock 45 here, huh?

I know you were worried, so I checked:  Yes, the M&P 9 M2.0 Compact has a place to hook a lanyard!

It tips the scales at 2 lb. dead even loaded with 8.9 oz. per loaded magazine (2/0.6 in GURPS terms).

Next stop, The Range!

Going Lunar

 Had a lunar eclipse last night (still happening at the time of posting).

By The Way DO NOT WANT

The preceding post is about what might happen, not me masturbating in wait of the day when I can go "weapons free" on the local hoodlums.

It would be much better if we made the small course corrections in law enforcement that are presently needed.

What needs to be done to make those corrections is to defang the "everything is -ism" industry.  ("Everything is -ism" is sung to the tune of "Everything is Awesome"  by the way.)

I have a dream, as it were.

Criminals need to be punished without regard to race, gender, sexual orientation or religious beliefs.

Even if that means a particular race goes to jail more often.  Perhaps especially if...

Something that would help a ton would be eliminating all of the Karen laws.

Yes, people are going to destroy their lives without those laws, but who are we to stop them with the power of The State?  I don't think The State is empowered to save you from yourself, only to keep you from hurting others.

If it does no material or physical harm it shouldn't be illegal.  You might convince a civil court and jury to award damages, but there shouldn't be arrests and jail time.

The main problem with Karen laws is they're very nearly unenforceable.  The corrosive effect on society and law enforcement has been visible in my lifetime.

We can take steps to fix it before vigilance and small enclaves become the norm.

Before vendetta is the rule.

But that would mean removing favored treatment of some small groups in favor of society as a whole.

Actually implementing equality under the law instead of just mouthing it while tipping the scales.

Being Civilized

I keep thinking about what happens when the cops are truly gone and won't be coming back.

Something that I keep considering is how our legal system goes so very light on first offenders.

The punishments aren't deterrents to potential criminals and a record is a rite of passage for some.

This assumes that the police can even be bothered to come for relatively minor crimes.

However, the law abiding citizen is deterred by the threat of punishment for resuming the police role presently delegated to the cops.

But what if the cops aren't there and aren't coming back?

Suddenly there's no light punishments for first offenders.

The home owner doesn't call the cops who will not arrive before the thief can leave with what they've stolen from the home owner's car.  The home owner shoots the thief.

Home owners don't make suspicious persons calls, they just kill those who don't belong in their neighborhood.

They band together and get to know each other better for mutual benefit.

Civilization returns on a micro level.  The neighborhood might even pay a few neighbors to do the "shoot the suspicious" job.

That's how vigilance societies progress into being police, by the way.

What's most fascinating about this is the people who are going to need the cops the most once civilization crumbles past a certain point are the ones driving the elimination or hobbling of them the hardest.

The rest of us are only using them because we'd certainly be punished for resuming our rightful police power from a state which has abdicated it.

Ebay Was Down?

For a couple of hours there was no Ebay tonight.

Wow!

I wonder what happened.

In Point Of Fact Their Lives Don't Appear To Matter At All

I was reading this article and came across this quote:

On an average year, 18 unarmed black people and 26 unarmed white people are shot by police. By contrast, roughly 10,000 black people are murdered annually by criminals in their own neighborhoods.

We're having riots over the police shooting 18 people but not a peep over the 10,000 others murdered? 

18 people who always seem to have lengthy criminal records themselves.

If you don't care about the 10k murder victims, then you don't really believe that black lives matter.

I have ideas about how to fix it, but my ideas will get shot down by both sides of the aisle.

Waves At All The Racists

Judging from the passion, a goodly number of you aren't introspective enough to see that you are, in fact, racists.

I've got an old, print, ©1957 dictionary; let's see what it says:

Assumption of inherent racial superiority or the purity and superiority of certain races, and consequent discrimination against other races; also any doctrine or program of racial domination and discrimination based on such an assumption.

Also, less specifically, race hatred and discrimination.

So, yes, white separatists are racists.  I'd been thinking of them more as racist adjacent, but you had to go and make me look it up.  Congratulations.

That means your hero Randy Weaver was a racist as well.

A common, everyday bigot.

Being a bigot did not earn him what happened to him.

But he's not a hero.  He did little to be admired.

He's an example.  A canary in the cage that our government was getting a bit too damn bold.

Ruby Ridge and Branch Davidians have something in common: Government going after the freaks that polite society tends to avoid.  The assumption being that it not make the news in Peoria, or if it does people will shrug and say, "that's what happens when you're freaks!"

That it woke people up to the dangers of what our Federal law-enforcement had become says more about the rest of us than the mores of the victims.

We said, "even bigots and freaks deserve due process!"

We weren't saying... well I wasn't saying, "I support this bigotry!"  It would appear that lots of you readers were.

You should go read something else.  I think Stormfront still has a web page.

Randy Weaver

I'm not going to mourn him too hard.

The man was too close to a racist to admire much even if I had a lot of sympathy for him and antipathy for his foes.

But I am still waiting on MY check from the FBI, because they didn't do anything to me either.

He got a big check for them not doing anything to him after all.  They said so, more than once.

Perhaps Green?

SoftwareJanitor has a go/nogo list of things that decide if a car will be his.

Among the items is "If it's green, it's not mine."

For years we've tried to find a car worth owning the broke all the rules.

There aren't any so far.

But it's got me thinking about painting The Beast in 1971 Chevelle "Lime Green" which is a green paint with large gold metal-flake in it.

Pictures don't do it justice.

Marv has tried to photoshop it and it's not coming out.

But the above effort reminded me there was a Camaro color that I'd dubbed, "Shocking Lizard Underbelly Green".  Chevy insists that it's called Synergy Green.

I'm kinda into it.

All I Know Is This

The M&P 9 M2.0 Compact has a 3.6" barrel and 2d+2 pi starts at 3.6".

With 15+1 shots it definitely slings more hate downrange than the 45C.

The 45C averages 80 or 100 points of damage per magazine with hollow-points.

The 9 Compact averages 180 per magazine.

More beans is better!

Even better, the 9mm appears to be lighter than using the 10-rounders.

I'm a fan of .45 ACP, but the math keeps getting in the way.

Say Again Now

I'm interested in T2K era Polish small arms.

My P.64 and Kbk.88 are prime examples.

 I've had, and let slip through my fingers, a Polish Mosin M44.

I'm always half looking for a decent clone of a Polish AKM, Tokarev and...

P.83 "Wanad".

When I first started this Polish thing, P.83 were running about $220.

Then they were about $450.

Now they are about a grand.

$1,000 for a simple blow-back 9x18 pistol.

Even the older P.64 has gone from $200 to almost $500!

I am not accustomed to this at all.  The P.64 is even C&R eligible.

Looks Like A Win

SAF posts the text of the decision of a 3-judge panel in the 9th Circuit for Jones v Bonta.

I have not finished reading it yet but it appears that outright bans need to pass strict scrutiny.

They said that training requirements for 18-20 year olds only have to pass intermediate scrutiny, which confuses me.  What other right requires training?

Smarter people with more time are going to post about it on their blogs as well.

I expect the status quo to remain while it's appealed and joins a long line of rulings awaiting an en banc hearing in the 9th.

I wonder how this will play out here in the 11th circuit and Florida's ban on 18-20 year olds buying guns.

No Anal Probe For Me

About three years ago, my colonoscopy found some polyps they burned off.

That changed the colonoscopy schedule from a five to a three year interval.

No biggie.

Except:

The VA requires that I have a negative Wu Ping Cough test not more than three days before the procedure now.

They only do four such tests a day at my nearby clinic, by appointment only.

Because you need a negative test for ANY procedure, those appointments are booked for the foreseeable future.

My other options are to drive the fifty miles to the main hospital for the test or to come in two hours early on the day of the procedure.

That fifty mile drive is a two hour drive, by the way.

I'm not allowed to drive myself on the day of, so I've got to find a friend who is willing to sit an extra two hours in the holding area reserved for drivers of patients.

And with all the other "show up early" requirements, puts us getting the test at 0630 for an 1130 procedure.

I just can't.

I don't have a four hour block of time to drive down there for the nose swab, let alone want to expend the fuel and wear and tear on my car.

I don't want to ask a friend to pick me up at 0430 to get me down there and then be stick at Bay Pines until 1500 and get home at 1700.  It's too much to ask.

I am fed up with the VA not giving a crap, and not just not caring but making a profession of not giving a shit and hiding behind "there'snoreasonit'sjustourpolicy".

So I am going to have untreated colon cancer and die, thanks to the VA's inability to schedule realistically.

Rubber Floor For The Win

You don't appreciate the spartan nature of a former cop car until the entire carrier of sodas slides off the center console and onto the floor.

Carpet cleaner?

A towel and wet rag is all I needed.

Same Photographer H&K Used?

 

The NRA is giving away a pistol and 1,000 rounds of ammunition!

The Springfield Professional Light Rail is a 9mm gun and they don't say anywhere that you're getting 1,000 rounds FOR the gun you're winning...

They just say that each of the 12 guns they're giving away comes with 1,000 rounds of ammo.  Maybe even ammo you can use!

And being a typical NRA fundraiser, you can't enter online unless you make a contribution.

I am not giving Wayne any tonsorial assistance now that I've paid for his tailor.

That's Interesting

All of the shitbag racists who want to share their thoughts have their profiles locked out.

Interesting they're ashamed enough to conceal whom they are, but not enough to just be silent.

Moderated For A Reason

A couple of comments about Mr Porretto falling for an old racist con-man can be summed up as:

"That wasn't racism because [racist explanation]."  If you're going to try to convince me you're not racist about this you're going to have to have a better argument than "they're [race] and there's nothing we can do."

All of the racist explanations for the situation fail to account for how the situation didn't exist until created by white people in government.

Specifically racist Democrats and perverse economic incentives to exit American Culture.

But let's just assume that Mr Johnson, and followers, are correct and there's nothing that can be done about black people because they're genetically incapable of being part of our culture.

What now?

Concentration camps and ovens?

Walling them up in their ghettos?

Forced sterilizations? 

Be precise in your answer about what is to be done.

I am NOT advocating we continue as we have been.  Something needs to change with regards to the black "community" and their over representation in criminal activity and general refusal to participate under the rules of Western Civ.

Unlike Mr Johnson and his followers, I think that they're more than capable of learning the rules and following them.  We haven't been enforcing the rules, and I think it's because it builds the racist resentment exhibited in the, deleted, comments.

I'd like to think that my readers are better than falling for the ploy the Liberals are playing fomenting a race war.

Can you prove me right?

You Got Sucked In

Francis W Porretto over at Liberty's Torch got sucked in by a genuine racist.

Like the best racists, the author that Mr Porretto links to sounds oh so reasonable.

What he says sure makes sense.

He doesn't use CENSORED at all to describe black people.

But read it carefully.

But I've heard of Mr Johnson before.  He's a racist and an anti-semite.

We're better off not quoting him.

Especially since he's very close to the truth, it feels like he's got it correctly figured out.  But he's wrong.

It's not genetics.  It's not skin color.

It's culture and a refusal to make several notable subcultures conform to American culture.

It's something that wasn't a problem until The Great Society™ got going in earnest. 

Force that conformity, or they don't get to leave their little enclaves.

And I know it works.  Chinese, Irish and Italian immigrants did it.  Blacks were well on their way to having done it when LBJ and racist Democrats systematically gutted black family structure which leads us to the situation described in the milk shake thesis.

The situation is not because they are black.  It's because they were singled out to become second class citizens that society expected less of because the racists just knew that blacks couldn't be more than like children.  And with those expectations enshrined in welfare and redline districting...  They adhered to it.  Responded rationally to the feedback they were given.

The solution is not to be more racist.

It will be applying the norms of Western Civ upon everyone the same way, even if they are black rather than not because they are.

What Do They Mean?

"The firearm that was on the bed and ultimately used by Sabrina was registered to Mark."

-- Andrew H Warren's Office of the State Attorney 13th Judical Circuit of Florida.

This is from this article at Bearing Arms about the charges against Sabrina Hendley being dropped. 

It was my understanding that Florida doesn't have such registration and keeping such records was a violation of state law.

Yet I keep seeing the police, county and state officials saying a particular weapon was or was not registered to an individual.

It's starting to piss me off. 

If they mean they traced the gun and he was the last purchaser in the chain via his 4473, then I think we need to start screaming louder about that 4473 being a de facto registration scheme.

According to Fla. Stat. § 790.335(2), "PROHIBITIONS.—No state governmental agency or local government, special district, or other political subdivision or official, agent, or employee of such state or other governmental entity or any other person, public or private, shall knowingly and willfully keep or cause to be kept any list, record, or registry of privately owned firearms or any list, record, or registry of the owners of those firearms."

Not Quite Universal

Unlike so many other full sized service pistols... The P220 does not fit in the nigh universal M7/M9 tanker holster.

It almost fits.  The trigger guard bottoms out before you can get the strap snapped.

Getting it to fit would be a simple job with a knife, but I'm not cutting my holster just for this.

Cement Shoes

 When the 80-1 long shot wins the Kentucky Derby, you know some loan sharks are gong to be sleeping with the fishes tonight.

Unofficial

"Ostende nobis ubera tua!" is the unofficial motto of just about every combat arms regiment ever fielded.

Take note.

Sure sounds more elegant than in English.

Or German... "Zeig uns deine Brüste!" isn't elegant at all.

Politicized

I continually marvel that liberal justices can be reliably predicted in how they will rule and "conservative" justices cannot.

The marvel fades when I see how each side selects judges.

We select them based on their knowledge of the Constitution and law.

The left selects them based on partisan position and adherence to the current narrative.

Thus it's no shock when the liberals adhere to the party line and conservatives rule based on the apparent merit of the case.

We're not selecting for political purity, but the time may yet come.

Something Important

Did you know it was uncommon for a jury to convict under the pre-Roe abortion bans?

That says a lot about how most people felt.

Controversial

The more I observe the phenomenon, the more convinced I am that the current potential Supreme Court ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization isn't really the Pro-Life position winning but the Pro-Choice side overreaching until the average person notices what's going on and deciding to get involved.

The phenomenon is a refusal to accept victory and go home.

It's distinct from a win in an incremental strategy were a positive ruling is one step towards a larger, stated, goal.

The pro-gun movement is doing such an incremental approach in getting laws struck and legislation passed.  The goal is unfettered 2nd Amendment rights and until we get there it's just wins, not victory.  Someday, though, we're going to have to address that that average person doesn't want machine guns to be easily and widely available.

But abortion and gay rights goals were stated and achieved... then they presented new goals and began advancing on those causes.

As the goals get further out of synch with everyday Americans, the less support they have as they accumulate more political power until...

Punctuated equilibrium from the electorate slams them in the face.

The first time I noticed this was with MAAD.  They were going to get real punishments for drinking and driving, did studies, pressed the flesh and made real changes.

One important change was getting "you're too drunk to drive" defined at 0.10% blood alcohol content.  This definition was arrived at through extensive studies of when the average person becomes impaired.  I was a rational standard to adopt.

And it was.

After a round of very public enforcement, the average, rational, person looked at the new severe punishments for drinking too much and driving home then made a rational decision to not drink so much before heading home.

Thus, substantially fewer drunk drivers and this was reflected in a dramatic drop in the police catching and prosecuting them.

Victory, right?

MAAD realized they were now irrelevant.

So a new campaign to move the standard down to 0.08% BAC.  A level that wasn't shown to be associated with impairment for most people.  But it got arrests up again, got their name in the public's mind again and (most importantly) got the donations flowing to the organization again!

Which brings me back to abortion.

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization and the leak has put the debate back into people's living rooms and many people are discovering that there's a much larger overlap in the Venn diagram between Pro-Life and Pro-Choice once they are allowed to talk to each other and explain what they mean.

People are discovering that their position was based on the fringe of the other side and not the everyday person.

The everyday pro-life person didn't really want a full ban, but was hearing the advocates of partial or full birth abortions and saying they would not support that.  The national pro-life organizations are captured by religious organizations who DO support full bans, and are thusly the voice of the pro-life side.

The everyday pro-choice person didn't really want second or third trimester abortions, let alone partial birth and outright opposes full birth.  But the national organizations and national voice does.

Most people, after comparing notes, are realizing that they're OK with abortion being legal with a cut-off date.  There's debate about when that point should be, but it rarely extends past the first trimester.

Both sides appear to be shocked to learn that such a cut-off is in Roe v. Wade!

[D]uring the first trimester, governments could not prohibit abortions at all; during the second trimester, governments could require reasonable health regulations; during the third trimester, abortions could be prohibited entirely so long as the laws contained exceptions for cases when they were necessary to save the life or health of the mother.

- Wikipedia article on Roe v. Wade.

 Most people are content with this.

But the pro-choice fringe wouldn't leave it alone.  Now the fringe from the pro-life side might be getting a big win and taking the momentum to a place that most people don't want.

This whipsaw oscillation between two tyrannies of the minority pisses people off.

LGBT people just wanted to be people, like everyone else.  To not be second class citizens by law because churches had gotten regulatory capture of marriage so long ago it preceded the term.

But their national orgs couldn't let that victory sit.  And they took it all the way to where the religious fundamentalist bigots said the average queer wanted: Pederasty.

The average bent person didn't want that!

And after looking at the utter lack of compassion I've seen from members of a religion founded on the idea of forgiveness towards trans-genders, I totally understand the motive to stick a knife in the eye of a Christian fundamentalist and give it a good twist.  Even if that twist is pederasty.

Again we're trying to make the fringes happy and pissing off the middle.

You think they're on your side because they're not noticing you and thus not opposing you.  But wait.  You will overstep.  Again.

Note: Comments on this post will be moderated much more strictly than normal.

A Near Thing

I have learned an important lesson about bidding on Gunbroker.

Don't do everything but confirm the bid when the cats are in a full-on scamper.

One of them will run across the mouse just as you notice that the suspiciously cheap Garand was built on a CAI reciever and hit the button.

Don't open the bid window unless you are SURE you wanna bid!

Thankfully, someone else wanted it more than Bear, because Bear did not have the $805 bucks I'd entered.

I don't really have it either.  Which is why I was dithering about bidding, stupid as it was to even think about.

A Bit More Detail

The RR door latch which failed to latch...

Latched:

Unlatched:

Complicated guts:

I cannot recreate the failure on the bench.  I also cannot disassemble it further without breaking things to see where the failure must be occurring.

A Day Late

Slightly less famous Jedi, Obi-Juan Kenobi.

An Earful

With the apparent loss of another ship in the Black Sea to an opponent that doesn't even have a navy...

One wonders if a Russian admiral isn't getting earful of 9x18mm today.

It's That Time Of Year

 

Flapping In The Wind

Just before I bought The Beast, the previous owner had to replace the LR door latch.

He cautioned that they were getting hard to find, so when the RR failed to latch once after picking up The Boy I ordered the part to replace it.

Since then, it's been behaving.

Until today when I was 3 hours from the part and the tools dropping of Harvey's aunt at the airport in Sanford!

Darn it!

Luckily, I was able to get it to latch once last time and got home without it hanging open on I-4.

Replaced it as soon as I got home and the old one is CRUSTY inside.

I wonder if I can get it apart and see why it failed intermittently.

Plus, while I was in there, I took the opportunity to connect the inside door handle and lock.

Gallons To The Moon!

Engineering Mode on The Beast give the fuel remaining in liters.

With a full tank it shows 68.5l.

Googling liters to gallons gives imperial gallons as the default...

15.06789 imperial gallons.

The capacity of the tank is supposed to be 19 US Gallons.

But I had not noticed the default choice wasn't US Gallons, so I worried my gas-gauge was reading low.

68.5l is 18.09854 US gallons.  Much closer to the stated fuel capacity in the owner's manual and an exact match for what everyone else says the tank holds.

I feel much better.

Riots

I've said before that if the events on January 6th were a real armed insurrection from my side of the aisle, President Trump would have been sworn in for a second term and there wouldn't be hardly a congress critter present who could still talk after becoming a street lamp decoration.

My side of the aisle isn't the type that initiates violence, so Jan-6 wasn't an insurrection at all.

It wasn't even a riot.

But I'm watching riots from the other side of aisle.

I'm watching these riots succeeding at getting what they're after.

I'm noticing that we don't dare say boo about Islam after some Islamic terrorists went off and murdered a bunch of people.

So I have a question for the left side of the aisle:

Do you think we won't eventually figure out that violence is all you understand and all that works to get our way?

Because you don't want us to draw the conclusion that violence is our only recourse to affect political change.

Why?

Because if we get to that point it will be The Great Reset and the French terrors will be a pale shadow and the world will speak of the horrors in hushed tones for generations about it.

Things have progressed to a point where a reckoning is due and you shouldn't discredit our civility in trying to use civilized means to achieve our goals.  Because we have a clear understanding of how society and civilization should work based on examples that DO work, we're far less afraid of tearing it all down and rebuilding... on a foundation of bone with blood for mortar.

Because Western Civilization has this sort of punctuated equilibrium in its DNA.

Western Civ also has a compassionate streak and shame baked into its DNA.  Its dangerous, literally, to push its members to the point where they lose compassion and no longer care what outsiders think of them.

We'd much rather talk.

Can we talk?

Or would you prefer to take rioting to its logical conclusion?

Enough Foreplay

Look you woke fucks:

If you're going to keep saying you're going to start Civil War 2.0 and/or Revolution II every time you babies don't get your way...

Just get on with it so we can shoot twice and go home and never hear about you again because you're dead.

Otherwise shut your pie holes and vote.

But you're not going to start a revolution because you fucking know there's a dozen old men for each of you who's fed up with dealing with their heart meds and the side effects who are more than willing to shoot back once you start.

That's old men with nothing to live for and no worries about prison but still have the morals enough to not start it.

Good Thing We Consulted With An Expert

The Lovely Harvey went to the orthopedic doc today.

Took an X-Ray

Yup, it's broke.

They want to see a CT scan before they decide if she needs surgery.  It's borderline about if she will or not.

To everyone who voted for Obama:  Die.  Die in a fire.  Die in a fire, screaming.

Before Obamacare, we would not be worried in the slightest about the costs because Harvey has a good job and insurance.

Now...  The deductibles eats you alive.

About That Leak

The leak of a draft Supreme Court opinion on repealing Roe v Wade is an attempt to influence the court by some staffer with access to such drafts.

This person needs to be identified and prosecuted.

For the court to do its job it need to be left alone to do it without undue influence from the shrieking mobs.

Let The Liberal Heads Explode

A not very reliable news source has leaked that The US Supreme Court has the votes to repeal Roe v Wade.

The leak consists of an opinion authored by Justice Alito.

Good! I says.

Roe v Wade is bad law.

It is emanations and penumbras and not a solid case.

It's making shit up, whole cloth, that isn't actually in the Constitution and getting the result desired.

Allowing abortions because a right to privacy?  I'm not finding it in the 4th Amendment.

A better case would have been under 9th or 10th Amendment grounds... mostly 9th after the 14th.

But since all three branches have been actively eroding the 9th and 10th amendments for more than a century, nobody wants to even try to make a landmark case from there.

They should.

The text of The Constitution was supposed to be plain-text.  It does what it says, it says what it does.

The list of things that the Federal government is allowed to do is plainly stated and not very long.  This short list is further restricted by The Bill of Rights.  The 9th and 10th Amendments were supposed to be the most brutally restricting amendments to Federal power.  They're literally, "unless we said you could, you can't," clauses.

The individual state constitutions are supposed to be similarly written and operated.

There's a whole lot of how things are done every day in America that should not be.

That we've been doing it this way for a long time makes me think, "justice delayed is justice denied," rather than saying that "well we've done it so long it will be hard to change..."

So it will be difficult!  Let's get to work!

PS - Pro-Life People: Please be to showing me where the text says Government was empowered to make any laws concerning abortion.  Bearing in mind that you, too, cannot use emanations and penumbras to make your case either.  Especially sticky for you is that 1st Amendment "freedom of religion" thing and Christianity having a religious position on the topic.  As soon as God enters the frame, Government is forbidden to act on it.  You have to sell your position from a secular direction without evoking God or quoting The Bible.  And some of y'all just can't do it.

PPS - That The Court is even, allegedly, talking about it is probably another example of liberals not taking the win and shutting up.  Roe legalized abortions before a certain point in the pregnancy but allowed restrictions later in the term because as the fetus gets further along it gets more baby-like and thus more recognizably human.  The liberals didn't accept the win for where nearly all abortions occur and are now in danger of losing the "right" altogether.  Again.

PPPS - Even with a full ban on abortion, Liberals, you still get a choice.  You can CHOOSE to use an aspirin for birth control and suddenly you're not getting pregnant and thus not needing the procedure.

Harvey Update

Got her in to the primary today.

E-room had put her sling on completely wrong.  Much less painful for her assembled correctly!

Primary issued some painkillers and ordered a consult with an orthopedic doc.

The same one Marv went to!

We go tomorrow and hope to hear that she won't need surgery.

I have to give kudos for The Boy for keeping it together during all of this.

He blames himself for going home and going to bed.  He thinks he could have prevented the fall had he been there.

He did the same thing when his grandma fell back in 2019.

We're having conversations about causality and coincidence now.

Harvey In The Hospital Now With Update

She tripped over a loose rock in the in-laws yard and landed on her right shoulder.

She couldn't move the arm, it's at least dislocated.

Ambulance took her away just a bit ago.

I'm on Boy duty, she has a close friend with her.

Fingers crossed.

UPDATE: She has fractured her right humerus head at the shoulder.  Sent home in a sling, no extra drugs, instructions to call her primary for a follow-up.

The friend who went with her to the hospital says she saw a crack in the x-ray but everything was still attached to each other.

6-10 weeks of slinging it... and she's right handed.  There will be new cuss words.

A Plague Of Tree Frogs

We've had our first real rain of the spring and the tree frogs are, to put it mildly, randy.

Being randy makes them brave and they don't want to travel around obstacles to get to their one true love.

So they find all the little gaps in the screens on the porch and discover that frog-legs are on the kitty menu.

Thankfully we haven't had any poisonous frogs get in to be killed by a cat.

I don't THINK any of the cats has actually managed to do more than kill one.

Most often they don't even manage a kill, but do a catch and release game in the house.

I wish I'd gotten vid of one escaping from Bear to land square on Dingus' head.

Professional bull riders got nothin' on that tree frog while Dingus was bucking to be rid of it!