Thursday, December 17, 2009

The Economics of Ammunition

If you are a regular shooter, you already know that ammunition supplies are low relative to demand, resulting in scarcity and high prices. Over at the National Association for Gun Rights Blog, M.L. McPherson has written a piece on the economics of the current situation.

Unfortunately, Mr. McPherson places the blame entirely too much on the election of Barack Obama. It is true that His Peacefulness's elevation to the throne office of POTUS did send people scurrying to gun shops in record numbers: at the time, I worked part-time in a gun shop and witnessed the phenomenon at first hand. The coronation of Emperor Barack I actually began the third phase of our ammo woes.

Phase I was caused by increased industrialization, particularly in China and India, which increased demand for industrial commodities like lead, copper, and tin. I recommend Hot Commodities by Jim Rogers if you want the full picture of of the commodities shortage (BTW, food supplies also are at record lows). Ammo was readily available; we just had to pay more for it.

Phase II began with Dubya's Grand South Asian Conquest. Ammo disappeared from store shelves as the manufacturers switched over production to satisfy the feral federal government's demands. Police departments were forced to cancel firearms training and qualification due to uncertain ammo supply. Prices increased sharply.

Phase III, of course, began the day after the 2008 federal elections. Prices skyrocketed, and still stores and ranges had to resort to rationing ammunition sales.

The market has normalized a bit, with the reduction in industrial demand resulting from the global recession and the reduction in military demand resulting from the downsizing of military operations in Mesopotamia. I predict a new round of market disruption next spring, as O-BOMB-A! attempts to play Alexander to Dubya's Philip. "I am Yeswecanias, King of Kings! Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and tremble!" Stock up while you can.

Monday, November 30, 2009

Hustle the East

Now it is not good for the Christian's health to hustle the Aryan brown,
For the Christian riles, and the Aryan smiles and he weareth the Christian down;
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white with the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear: "A Fool lies here who tried to hustle the East."


~ Rudyard Kipling, The Naulahka

Monday, July 06, 2009

Nothing like this ever happened before guns were invented

New York Daily News columnist Mike Lupica lays the blame for Steve McNair's death squarely where it belongs: with America's gun culture.

Meanwhile, the benighted sorts over at Taki's Magazine insist that McNair's death had something to do with his decision to carry on an extramarital affair with an emotionally unstable 20-year old woman. Someone needs to bring these people into the 21st century!

Mr. Lupica also wisely reminds us that America's gun collectors, hunters, target shooters, and self-defense practitioners collectively murdered Yetunde Price, the half-sister of tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams. Pay no attention to the reprobates who would say that Ms. Price's death might have been the result of her decision to choose, as her new boyfriend, a known gang member just out of prison on charges of assault with a deadly weapon and illegal firearms possession, and of the boyfriend's decision not to get Ms. Price to a hospital promptly after she caught a bullet intended for him.

Mr. Lupica noted that the pistol used to kill Mr. McNair was a semiautomatic. Perhaps, in a future column, he will tell us the type and caliber of gun used to kill Julius Caesar.

Friday, July 03, 2009

Somehow, it's just not the same

Audie Murphy and 50 Cent share the distinction of having suffered more gunshot wounds than any other film actors.

Chump change you can believe in

Obama continues spending like a drunken Congressman. What depression recession?

Monday, June 29, 2009

Ahmadinejad: Neda's death is 'suspicious' - CNN.com

"CIA spokesman George Little responded, 'Any suggestion that the CIA was responsible for the death of this young woman is wrong, absurd and offensive.'"

Nah, they'd never do anything like that!

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Stars and Stripes accuses U.S. military of censorship in Iraq - CNN.com

From the story:
CNN has been denied embed requests on occasion but never because of the past conduct of individual journalists.
Indeed. It is difficult to imagine an organization more servile to the regime than CNN.

Tuesday, June 02, 2009

Navy Vet Who Foiled Israeli Attack Honored

42 years later, the cover-up of the attempted massacre of USS Liberty continues. The truth is slowly leaking out.

Monday, May 25, 2009

Dulce et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of disappointed shells that dropped behind.

GAS! Gas! Quick, boys!-- An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And floundering like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.

Wilfred Owen (18 March 1893 - 4 November 1918)

Monday, May 18, 2009

Rapper Dolla contracts lead poisoning, dies

Our cultural firmament is made darker by the extinguishing of this potty-mouthed idiot bright young star.

I'm too broken up to continue. Please excuse me.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Government-Run Health Care

Somehow, I'm supposed to be thrilled with the prospect of a similar system to this for me and my family.

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Monday, April 20, 2009

From My Cold, Dead Hands

Obama, Calderón: Assault-gun ban could curb border violence





I don't own one of these and I don't know anyone who does, but drop me a line if you know where I can get one cheap before these two buffoons heads of state get their way and ban them. My wife and I will have to park both our cars on the street to get it in the carport, but if it saves one life, it's worth it.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Proposition 1D

I have no interest in California's Proposition 1D, a falling-out among thieves over shares of the loot. But Andrea Urton's letter (Proposition 1D bad for young children, San Jose Mercury News, April 12, 2009) struck a responsive chord with me.

California's budget is in deep, deep trouble. Proposition 1D would divert tobacco tax money from its "for the children" pretext commitment to the state's General Fund. California's off-highway vehicle (OHV) community will be familiar with this phenomenon, as their OHV registration (Green Sticker) fees have for years been used for every purpose but that for which they are legally and exclusively earmarked -- the construction and maintenance of OHV recreation areas.

Ms. Urton is Associate Director of EMQ FamiliesFirst in Campbell. No, I don't know why "FamiliesFirst" is run together like that; probably someone thought it was trendy. Her organization is 91% tax-funded, so she has a vested interest in the Prop. 1D squabble. I don't know if she has ever protested the persistent raiding of the Green Sticker fund.

Ms. Urton wants to know "What is wrong with our society that we would even consider disrupting... the values of investing in our children, keeping them safe and facilitating family strength come before anything else?"

Ms. Urton apparently hasn't noticed, but we've been doing just that for decades. Welfare, no-fault divorce, mandatory public "education", Section 8 housing subsidies, glorification of unwed maternity, a tax code that all but forces mothers into the workforce (for their own "liberation," of course), and a host of other intrusions into personal and family life, all work to undermine the very values Ms. Urton extols.

Sunday, April 05, 2009

The Audacity of Nope

NATO refuses Lyndon Baines Obama's request for combat troops.

Is it possible that someone finally checked a map and realized that the North Atlantic is some distance from South Asia? Or are the bureaucrats of this long-obsolete organization hoping to shake down the Avatar of Change™ for additional consideration somewhere down the line? I'd feel a lot more comfortable if NATO, on this their Historic™ 60th anniversary, had voted to disband.

Friday, March 27, 2009

For those who think limiting guns to government employees will keep them out of the hands of criminals

Killer freed by jail guard

Anita Kay Vestal, a 32-year old married mother of four recently hired by the Swain County, NC, Sheriff's Office as a detention officer, decided to indulge her romantic fantasies by helping an accused killer of two escape from jail.

The futility of the government's wars

Fugitive U.S. marshal found dead in Mexico

Deputy U.S. Marshal Vincent Bustamante was found dead in Juarez. He was shot multiple times in the head, in what is being called an execution-style slaying. Bustamante was on administrative leave from the Marshal's Service following his arrest for stealing Marshal's Service firearms and other government property. A bench warrant was issued for Bustamante's arrest after he failed to appear for a court hearing last week. A 17-year veteran of the Marshal's Service, and a former El Paso Police officer, Bustamante leaves behind a wife and two children.

Prohibition corrupts. In 1924, corrupt Prohibition Agent Wiley Lynn murdered the Marshal of Cromwell, Oklahoma, the legendary Western lawman Bill Tilghman. In 1932, Lynn attempted to assassinate Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation agent Crockett Long. In the exchange of gunfire that followed, both men and an innocent boy were mortally wounded.

Prohibition breeds violence. The violence today in Juarez is the violence of Chicago in the 1920s.

While the gun-grabbers gleefully blame gun-rights advocates for the recent massacre in Oakland, they ignore the fact that Lovelle Mixon legally could not own or possess a firearm. They blame a non-existent "gun show loophole," while they ignore the fact that corrupt government employees with access to guns -- law enforcement officers and military personnel -- have always been prime sources of weapons for criminals, even in the unregulated time prior to the National Firearms Act of 1934 and the Gun Control Act of 1968.

The War on Poverty has brought us generations of dependent, entitlement-minded layabouts who supposedly don't have money for their own food, shelter, education, medical care, out-of-wedlock children, etc., but who (like the unemployed Lovelle Mixon) nonetheless have money for tattoos, bling, flashy chrome rims, and gazillion-watt car stereos to blare the latest profanity-laced, bass-driven rap opus into every home, school, church, and hospital they pass. The Vietnam War was, in a way, nearly as destructive to this country as it was to Vietnam, a country that never attacked or threatened the United States. Our wars of choice in Iraq and Afghanistan (yes, even Afghanistan is done on pretext) already have spent us into penury, yet no end is in sight.

No more war.

Sunday, March 22, 2009

"Heckuva Job, Timmy!"

Geithner is on his way out at Treasury, as evidenced by Obama's vehement denials.

Next up: Larry Summers

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Thought for the Day

"Among individuals, as among nations, respect for the rights of others is peace." Benito Juarez (March 21, 1806 - July 18, 1872)

Friday, March 20, 2009

Trouble At Treasury

President Obama is having difficulty filling Assistant Secretary positions at the Treasury Department. I nominate a couple of candidates here.

Friday, March 13, 2009

Can you say, "Spousal Immunity?"

I knew you could.

Closing the Books on Another Communist Atrocity




DNA proves Bolsheviks killed all of Russian czar's children. DNA evidence confirms scientists' 2008 findings that skeletal remains unearthed in 2007 are those of the two missing children of Czar Nicholas II: 13-year-old Crown Prince Alexei, the emperor's only son and heir to the throne, and his sister Grand Duchess Maria, about 19.

The Black Book of Communism really does belong on every thinking person's bookshelf. Amazingly, even as we continue to track down the lowliest Nazi concentration camp guards, Communist butchers continue to get a free pass.

Astonishing New Discovery!

Saws cut!

A Maryland woman was seriously injured when her partner used a reciprocating saw as a sex toy.

Maybe I can get a federal grant to study this previously unknown phenomenon.

Monday, March 09, 2009

Candidate for Surgeon General

Celebrity doctor Sanjay Gupta has withdrawn from consideration for the post of Surgeon General. President Obama apparently hoped that the 39-year old neurosurgeon and CNN commentator would bring "star power" and "recognition" to the Cabinet post, which has gone largely unnoticed since the days of C. Everett Koop (the clownish Joycelyn Elders having been mercifully forgotten).

In keeping with the Administration's themes of Hope(TM), Change(TM), and Historicalness(TM), I nominate Keith Richards for Surgeon General:
  • Historic -- the US has never had a British rock guitarist as Surgeon General. Another barrier would fall. Oprah would weep;
  • Change -- after decades of relentless nagging about what we put in our bodies, we would have a Surgeon General who would (and has) put put anything and everything in his;
  • Hope -- Richards is still alive; he must know something.

Keith Richards for Surgeon General. If not him, who? If not now, when?

Saturday, March 07, 2009

FS: High-Rise Office Building, Close to Recreation

Former New York governor Eliot Spitzer has purchased a 13-story office complex in D.C., just one block from the Mayflower Hotel where he cavorted with a high-priced call girl.

Speaking of his time in public office, as New York's attorney general (where he made his name shutting down prostitution operations -- eliminating competition for the ones he patronized -- and blackmailing innocent businessmen into doing the "right" thing by threatening them with frivolous prosecutions) and governor, Spitzer said, "Obviously it brought great joy for a great period of time." Obviously.

Since Spitzer was a tax-funded parasite and a Democrat, there were no Congressional inquisitions into his executive salary and perks. Contrast the treatment given him by the ruling elite with their spleen vented on private sector CEOs.

Friday, March 06, 2009

Maybe Obama Can Find a Cabinet Post for Bernie Madoff

The reliably evil Senator Christopher Dodd (D - Hell) is pushing a bill to let the FDIC borrow up to $500 Billion from the US Treasury. Round up the usual suspects: Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, and FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair are Dodd's co-conspirators.

Let's see if I have this straight:
  • In the middle of a banking collapse, in order to encourage depositors to leave their money in insolvent institutions, the Congress votes to raise the FDIC deposit insurance limit from $100,000 to $250,000;
  • The FDIC says it needs to borrow money from the Treasury because more banks are failing than FDIC's present assets can cover;
  • The US Treasury, itself bankrupt (approx. $14 - $20 trillion in debt), loans one-half trillion dollars it doesn't have to FDIC;
  • Everyone lives happily ever after.
Excuse me, but isn't this the sort of financial trickery we're sending Bernie Madoff to jail for?

Thursday, March 05, 2009

Harvey Milk Day

So Sean Penn and Mark Leno think San Francisco should have a Harvey Milk Day. I think this is an excellent idea, but I would like to take it one step further.

San Francisco already has the Moscone Convention Center, named after the martyred mayor. Yet no one, to my knowledge, has proposed any official remembrance for the man who helped both men to power and whom they, in turn, rewarded with the money, prestige, and patronage that made his own grand project possible: the Reverend Jim Jones. I believe he merits, at the very least, a statue in front of City Hall. Justice demands it.

Daniel Flynn has concisely and elegantly recapped the S.F. Left's love affair with the evangelical Communist Jones. It's well worth a read. Don't miss the link to Harvey Milk's letter to then-President Carter, a mere nine months before the Jonestown Massacre, demanding that Jones's critics be silenced.

Wednesday, March 04, 2009

Heir or Parent?



President Barack Obama's Treasury secretary says the administration has inherited "the worst fiscal situation in American history."

Inherited? I'd say Obama & Co. were instrumental in bringing about the current mess.

The root of the economic disaster is the inflationary regime of fiat money brought about by the creation of the Federal Reserve and FDR's creation (by confiscating all of the monetary gold in private hands and nullifying all contracts, public and private, for payment in gold) of a federal monopoly over money. Geithner was head of the New York Federal Reserve for fifteen years, which means he has been wrong about everything for at least that long.

The Democrats, Obama included, did nothing to reign in Bush's mad imperial ambitions. Sure, they made the obligatory opposition noises but, in action, they gave Bush everything he wanted. Now, in the aftermath of this crime against humanity, the Democrats, including Obama and his oh-so-ethical Attorney General, say that no one will be brought to justice.

Ah, but what about the greedy banks that knowingly made loans to uncreditworthy people? Excuse me, but didn't Obama and ACORN, among others, use the Community Reinvestment Act to browbeat "racist" banks into making the very loans the "community organizers" are now denouncing the "greedy" banks for having made?

Obama didn't inherit this mess; it's his bastard child.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

The Swiss Stand Up



The Swiss have been suffering from a huge case of Battered Woman Syndrome. Pilloried for years, for their refusal to participate in the two great slaughters of the last century, by "respectable" members of the international community, the Swiss lately have been seeking respectability by eroding many of their traditional liberties, including gun rights and financial privacy.

There are signs, though, that the sons of William Tell may have located their temporarily misplaced manhood. UBS is standing up to the Empire, telling D.C. that it is subject to Swiss, not American, law. Although UBS on Wednesday agreed to pay a $780 million fine and disclose the names of about 250 American clients, the bank is defying the Injustice Department's demand for the names of all the bank's American clients' -- a list which runs in the thousands.

Meanwhile, the Swiss People's Party is demanding that the government take punitive action against the U.S.

This is an encouraging trend.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

The Empire Strikes Back

U.S. sues UBS seeking Swiss account customer names

Note the sanctimonious indignation of Acting Assistant Attorney General for Taxation John DiCicco, who plays the class warfare card (as any good commissar must) and tries to pretend that refusing to fund the government's aggressive wars and handouts to special interest groups is why, "millions of Americans are losing their jobs, their homes and their health care." Creeps like this make me want to puke!

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Obama the Hypocrite

Obama talks Green. Obama chastises CEOs of bankrupt corporations for their lavish salaries, personal jets and other perks.

So Mr. Obama, CEO of a corporation presently $20 trillion in debt, does what? Why, he loads his entourage into his personal 747, flies to Denver, gets into heavily-armored (and therefore more-than-normally gas guzzling) SUVs delivered by his personal military transport aircraft, and drives to a photo op where he signs an inflationary "stimulus" bill that puts his corporation another $787 billion in debt. The bill was passed by the corporation's board of directors (Congress) whose offices are within walking distance of Mr. Obama's mansion in the District of Columbia.

As Monty Python pointed out: It's good to be King!

Saturday, February 14, 2009

South Carolina gets Californicated

Law enforcement officials in SC have taken complete leave of their senses. First, the Michael Phelps witch-hunt; now this.

One of the two geniuses behind this is one of Mr. Phelps' inquisitors. The overpaid and underworked (judging by their priorities) bureaucrats claim to have received their inspiration from the open-air lunatic asylum known as the state of California.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Dont. Just... DON'T!

I won't be responsible for what happens to the next person who tells me how wonderful I must feel today.

It's not even a coherent excuse

Portland mayor admits past relationship with teen

"I lied at the time because I was afraid that people would believe untrue rumors being circulated by an undeclared mayoral opponent that I had broken a law involving sexual relations with a minor. But this is not a good excuse."

Translation: "I didn't tell you the truth because I didn't think you were smart enough to comprehend the number 18." Maybe he doesn't trust anyone who actually would vote for him.

The story notes that Adams, presently in Washington for the Obama coronation, will cut his trip short to issue a public apology in Portland this afternoon. Welcome to the New Age.

Monday, January 19, 2009

Change is coming

Eric Holder - Obama's totalitarian choice for Attorney General

With Bruce Springsteen leading the mass at the Lincoln Temple, expect more of the murderous, totalitarian policies pursued by Obama's hero, Abe the Mad. I'm sure Obama won't hesitate to rely on the Bush administration's legal arguments of untrammeled executive power, as well.

Sunday, January 18, 2009

In Memoriam

January is Military Murders Month.

We've had eight years of putative "conservatives" extolling the glories of war and Empire. Now the avatar of Change(TM) arrives, incessantly invoking Abraham Lincoln while his idolaters summon forth the memory of St. FDR.

Stalin accurately noted that the death of one person is a tragedy, the death of a million is a statistic. Remember, then, the names of these men murdered by Obama's role models:
  • Sgt. William Walker (1864). Sgt. Walker was a member of the 3rd South Carolina Volunteers, a "colored" regiment. He was court-martialed and executed at Hilton Head, SC, for leading a mutiny of Black soldiers who refused to fight unless they were given equal pay to White soldiers. Walker was shot in front of the entire company, as an example to others.
  • Pvt. Edward Donald "Eddie" Slovik (1945). Eddie Slovik was murdered by the US Government for being a runaway slave. FDR lied and manipulated the US into the Second World War, then conscripted vast numbers of men, including Slovik, to kill and be killed, maim and be maimed, in the service of those lies. Slovik didn't want to kill (he asked for hazardous non-combatant duty, such as medic) so he had to die, as an example to others.
Obama is calling for National Sacrifice(TM): it probably will be human sacrifice, if Obama's heroes are any indication.

Yo' Bama!

Barack Obama says I should "join with Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, Michelle Obama" in advancing his agenda. Why not throw in Joe Stalin and Jack the Ripper while you're at it, Barack! Lets have a look:
  • Nancy Pelosi -- Refused to impeach the war criminal Bush and fell all over herself pledging her loyalty to Israeli fascism;
  • Joe Biden -- Wants to raise my taxes and take my guns;
  • Michelle Obama -- You married her, bro'; you deal with her!
In his victory speech, Barack said he wanted to win my trust. So far, he's not off to a great start.

Friday, January 02, 2009

Defending Freedom, 24/7

The Transportation Security Administration is on the job, detaining and questioning people who discuss, uh, airline safety.

In addition to pulling Mr. Irfan and his family off the plane and causing them to miss their flight, the Feds also yanked the plane's crew and 95 passengers off and forced them yet again through the humiliating exercise in submission known as "passenger screening."

FBI agents cleared the family and asked the airline to put them on another flight. AirTran Airways issued a full refund and told the family they could fly on the carrier again, but refused to book them on a later flight so they could get on with their vacation. AirTran did rebook the family on another airline, but complained that one of the party "became irate and made inappropriate comments" when told they would not be allowed to complete their trip on AirTran (think several more days lost while your luggage gets re-routed). Maybe the airline thinks the family needs some time to think about whether or not they want to think about airline safety. The Feds, suddenly remembering the concept of "private property," say the airline acted within its rights in booking the family on another carrier.

Your tax dollars at work. I'd say I feel safer, but I don't want the FBI knocking at my door to ask why I'm discussing safety.