Do your homework.

So there's been a lot of nattering on the gunblogs about the Department of Education's purchase of 14" Remington 870s, complete with wild speculations about their intended use.

The Dept. of Education, like all the other federal agencies that pour the slop into the trough, dispenses squillions of dollars of loot. Wherever there is federal loot, there is fraud and corruption and, like all federal agencies, the Dept. of Education carries out fraud investigations on its own patch. This means it serves warrants, and when it serves warrants, it brings its own cops and, like all federal agencies, they come loaded for bear. The 14" Remington is pretty much the standard entry gun across the entire broad spectrum of federal law enforcement, since it's a lot easier to get in and out of vehicles and through doorways with the shorter tube.

Now, my objections to the very existence of a federal department of education aside, the proliferation of raid teams in every federal agency is not as much alarming as it is ridiculous. It's empire-building, plain and simple. If the guys at the DEA get a SWAT team, then ATF wants one, and if ATF has one, then the Bureau of Land Management wants one, and so on down the line. Once upon a time, even the FBI served mostly investigative functions and relied on local authorities for muscle; now the Department of Education has its own in-house door kickers, its own slice of FLETC pie.

Don't we have a Marshal's Service? To say nothing of a bewildering variety of state and local agencies, some of whose SWAT teams are so unneeded that they're being used for low-level narcotics arrests? How about letting them do the heavy lifting for the Department of Education when it comes time to go through the door? It'd save me the cost of 27 shotguns, for starters.

Wow.

Your daily dose of Dada.




(H/T to Breda.)

"There's nothing we can't do."

Hey, remember when liberals were so all-fired “concerned” about illegitimate rule by Executive Order, circumventing the usual legislative process in favor of despotic mandates from On High? Nah, me neither.

Like fishing? Tough.

Dislike bland food? Tough.

This is the Unconstrained Vision in action.

Caution: Contents Perishable.

I'm a moderately active pistol shooter. In the last two years I've taken two three-day handgun courses, one with Todd Jarrett at Blackwater and one with Louis Awerbuck here in Indiana. Over that time I've participated in maybe as many as a dozen bowling pin matches. I get to the range once a week and, given the confines of the range rules, attempt to maintain proficiency with basic skills, such as strong- and weak-hand only drills, reloads, and suchlike.

However, this stuff needs to stay current. Due to a confluence of events, I only hit the range once between the middle of January and last weekend's range trip with Caleb. It showed. Especially on the draw; you can practice the motions of the drawstroke "dry" 'til the cows come home (and I do need to get more use out of my blue gun...) but it's not the same as shooting from leather with live ammo, which I hadn't done since the Awerbuck course last summer. Time spent with .22 trainers is valuable for sight alignment and trigger control, but it doesn't simulate recoil control with the full-size pistol, which is a major component of rapid-fire shooting.

I seriously need to make a point of trying to get out to Wildcat Valley with Shootin' Buddy at least once a month, or else get a membership at MCF&G here in town. Or both.

Standing in a booth in an indoor shooting range is training for a pistol fight the way sitting in your garage and moving your car's shift lever around with the engine off is training for Le Mans.

Major victory for ironclad airport security!

Haisong Jiang, a PhD candidate who moved to America from China, perhaps to get away from a paranoid, control-freak government, has plead guilty to "Defiant Trespass" for stepping under a velvet rope at an airport and setting off a Keystone Kops carnival of terminal closings and flight delays.

Jiang will have to pay a $500 fine and court fees and costs of $158, as part of a plea deal reached with prosecutors, Bruce said. He also will have to perform 100 hours of community service.

Which would indicate that "Defiant Trespass" rates somewhere between jaywalking and passing a stopped school bus at 10 miles-per over the limit, the latter offense of which will score you Double Secret Probation in many states.

To whom it may concern:

If the authorities are reading this, I want them to know that I am not at all disgruntled. I am as gruntled as gruntled can be. If ever I feel my gruntle ebbing, even the slightest little bit, I promise I will seek help and not act out, okay?



(Okay, look, if somebody's obviously gearing up to take their lunch hour atop a clock tower, it may be a good idea to keep an eye on them. But there had better be more meat to this story than "He was fired and he owned guns," because if that was all it took, they could throw half of Elkhart, Indiana in the back of a paddy wagon.)

Rooneymags.

The EMA Tactical CountDown mag: If I've got time to look at my magazine and check its little gas gauge, I'm thinking I've probably got time to just prophylactically reload.

The Cammenga EasyMag: Because I was looking at my magazines the other day and thinking "What these things really need are more moving parts."

'Ware the First.

With all eyes on McDonald v. Chicago and its implications for our Second Amendment rights, it's interesting to note that the Supremes have just granted cert to Snyder v. Phelps, a case with equally important overtones for the First: To wit, does the right to free speech extend only to nice speech? Can you say unpopular things as well as popular ones? Is there a right to not be offended?

As much as I loathe Phred Phelps, and would probably drink a toast were he to choke on his last cookie tonight, he has the right to be as big a rude, annoying jerk as he wants to be so long as he keeps his hands to himself and minds the No Trespassing signs, just like every other rude and annoying jerk in America.

If he can't say "God Hates Fags" on his signs, then how long before I can't say "I Hate Jeezo Nazis" on my blog?

Was Thor's hammer really less than a third of an inch across?

The Department of Fish & Game won't let you shoot Bambi with full metal jacketed 7.62x51mm M80 ball because it would be inhumane.

The Hague Accords won't let you use .308 Winchester 150gr. Ballistic Silvertips on enemy personnel because it would be inhumane.

Discuss.

Today In History: Great Moments In Real Estate History

On this date in 1804, the French flag was lowered in St. Louis, soon-to-be-MO, and the U.S. flag was raised.

The Spanish lieutenant governor for French northern Louisiana handed the keys over to Amos Stoddard, acting as the proxy for the French government, who then handed them to himself, since he was also the newly-appointed U.S. military commander of the territory.

Napoleonic-era geopolitics were nothing if not interesting. See, France had lost the territory to Spain in a war, but Napoleon got it back in exchange for a promise not to kick Spain's ass. However, the deal was all hush-hush, and so the French left the Spanish administration in place so that nobody would suspect anything. Then they went and sold the house with the renters still in it, so to speak. This led to a business boom for surveyors and an honest-to-Spooner strip of ungoverned No-Man's-Land for the next 20 years, as Madrid and Washington argued about on whose side of the property line the hedge was planted.

Postcards from Babylon...

A bad economy only slightly deterred Americans from flocking to cosmetic procedures last year.

The American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery released figures Tuesday: Almost 10 million cosmetic surgical and nonsurgical procedures were performed in the United States in 2009. Despite the recession, Americans shelled out almost $10.5 billion to get pretty.

Compared with the previous year, there was a 2 percent decrease in the total number of procedures.

...

Fleming said even the unemployed shell out the bucks to get cosmetic procedures.

Because when you're feeling all glum about owing $20k more than your gypsum-board tract home is worth and you're worried about whether Congress is going to extend your unemployment benefits again, what better for a little pick-me-up than raiding the retirement fund for a tummy tuck or some botox injections? I mean, it's important to have our priorities!

Of course, this is the land where television commercials tout all manner of medical alternatives to self-discipline, so I shouldn't act all surprised. "Hmmm... Should I skip dessert and go for a walk around the block, or should I get my guts tied in a sheepshank? Tough call..." Only in America do people spend their entire lives so far up Maslow's pyramid that they have time to ponder such dilemmas.

Pedal power.

Another 5+ miles on the bicycles today, running an errand and grabbing a bite at Panera Bread for lunch. (Riding a bicycle to eat at Panera; does it get more stereotypically Broad Riparian than that?)

Gotta pedal off my winter flab...

More on National ID...

Hypnagogue in comments here:

The problem with biometric ID cards is that they can be forged. Without strong encryption, this is folly. With strong encryption this is tyranny.

The problem is that the .gov acts like there was strong encryption on the Constitution and they don't have the right key to read it.

More on the topic from Anothergunchick.

Are they looking for a hill to die on?

As Frank James points out, biometric National Identification cards are about as sure a way to flip out a plurality of the population as I can think of. From privacy advocates to Left Behind fans, this would just pour kerosene on the opposition fire.

Go 'head, y'all! I think you should push for this one really, really hard.

I'm a Happy Hoosier.

The Supreme Court has repeatedly said that the standard for a Terry frisk is whether the officer reasonably suspects the person is “armed and dangerous.” “Armed” alone shouldn’t be enough...

Shootin' Buddy, sometimes known as "The Rosa Parks of Broad Ripple" for his run-in with the local Five-Oh over the dangerous crime of open-carrying a firearm in a coffee house, is no doubt pleased at this latest ruling from the Indiana Court of Appeals.

If merely having a visible firearm is probable cause to stop, demand papers, and pat down your pockets, then merely driving down the road is probable cause to pull you over, demand your operating license, and look in your trunk. In neither instance is there prima facie evidence of a crime being committed.

Xtreme training!!!1!!one!

One well-known trainer has opined that, with the increasing popularity of "tactical training", it seems like half everybody who's been 'in the sandbox' and has access to some acreage with a berm is going to set up a shooting school. As time goes on, I am increasingly believing this prediction. Exhibit A: Somebody tell me which school this is so that I never make the mistake of attending.

Obviously, somebody is making their money by selling tacticool to wannabes. Speaking as a tactical poser myself, I've both observed and participated in a reasonable amount of training; if I saw any of that happy mall ninja S&M horseplay going on on the line, I would leave without asking for a refund.

Any student that would take that class a second time would probably be happier if the instructors were wearing leather and chains and used riding crops.

Signs that a fad has jumped the shark:

When you can get your tramp stamp in the mall, twenty feet away from the people buying Snuggies and ShamWows, it's a sign that the fad has passed the fat point of the cool curve.

Press on regardless.

I have done some hare-brained things on motorcycles before in my life, many of them at Warp Factor 9, but these guys are lunatics. My palms broke into a sweat just watching the video...



(H/T to Nate.)

Pedal to the metal.

With the mercury flirting with the 60 degree mark today, Roomie and I saddled up the bicycles and took a leisurely ride to the grocery store; about a five mile round trip. My poor bike had spent the last two-plus months gathering cobwebs, so it was pleasant to get out on the road again.

I had forgotten how much I liked my shoot-me vest as a cycling garment; liberally festooned with pockets, I could keep a stupid amount of gear and knickknacks ready to hand without having to toss anything in the basket or carry a messenger bag. It's like a purse you wear!

Bobbi occasionally held the bars with one hand while waving her digicam about with the other, so pictures of one sort or another may get posted. (EDIT: Here are some now.)

Secret Sharer...

I've had the weirdest little hit-and-run troll pop up in my comments section.

I don't get a lot of 'em, but this one's a doozy. Weirdly cyclical, too.

He's a pottymouth, so don't click if you're easily offended: My Pet Troll.

Ain't he cute?