Depleted uranium butt.

Everybody has a dream: Run a marathon, skydive, climb Mount Everest, ride from San Diego to Jacksonville to Key West to San Diego to Prudhoe Bay to San Diego on a 250 Ninja...

Sigh. I miss Happy Happy Funbike.

Cold War part deux.

Remember the good old days of '00, when the clever CIA outwitted the dastardly Chinese using the magic of computers and modems?

Yeah, those were the days...


(H/T to Insty...)

The book of Shibboleth.

Everyone who's ever attended a gun show knows that you are guaranteed to find at least one table (and probably several) of genuine whackos: Neo-Nazis, conspiranoiacs, people who think space aliens assassinated Elvis with fluoridated water, that sort of thing. It's just the eddies in the stream where the First and Second Amendments flow together. Frankly, a gun show without Nazis to mock would be like a gun show without beef jerky.

Every now and again, some lefty discovers this and recoils in horror, completely ignoring the fact that their side of the political fence has its own equally charming equivalents (It ain't bible-thumping conservatives smashing store windows and playing slap-tickle with the riot cops every time the WTO comes to town...)

Something that I got a giggle out of in the latest bout of the vapors over Knob Creek is the mention of The Anarchist's Cookbook as a (and I quote) "soldier of fortune training manual":

highly secret “soldier of fortune” training manuals (”Militiaman’s Handbook”, “How to Change Your Identity and Erase Bad Credit”, “The Anarchist’s Cookbook”, “The Hit Man’s Guide to Assassination” . . .)

I am going to go out on a limb and state that these correspondents have never read said Cookbook. I can state this with reasonable certainty, because if there is a less right-wing, "soldier of fortune" book than The Anarchist's Cookbook, I am not aware of it. The book in question is a charming counterculture relic from the days when Baby Boomers sat around crash pads with flat stomachs and full heads of hair (or heads full of Hair) and planned The Revolution. For heaven's sake, it has recipes for hallucinogenic drugs (which you shouldn't follow, by the way) and instructions on how The People can rise up against The Man to stop the Vietnam War. By "Anarchist", it means Kropotkin, not Kazynski.


(H/T again to Unc.)

First down.

The RKBA ball has been moved up the field here in Tennessee with the passage of HB0962, which allows CCW in restaurants that serve alcohol.

Although it's progress, the bill is loaded with weasel words: "age-restricted venues" are a no-go, and a "curfew" amendment was added, stating that if you're packing heat, you have to get out by 11PM, no matter how good of a time you're having. Apparently 2300 hours is when the mischief starts; I'm not sure whether they pulled that time out of a hat or what. Still, it's progress.

FWIW, my new home state of Indiana allows folks to carry in "age-restricted venues" after 11PM, and they can even have a beer or two while doing so, and for some reason blood keeps not flowing in the aisles at the Broad Ripple Brew Pub. Go figure.

(H/T to Unc.)

Oh. Em. Gee.

The Barack action figure: The further down you scroll, the harder you laugh. I completely lost it about halfway down.


(H/T to Larry Correia.)

There's always one that doesn't get the word.

In the wake of Columbine, the law enforcement community did a lot of soul-searching and arguing and seminar-convening over the proper response to an "Active Shooter" scenario. The general consensus that emerged seemed to be that when innocent lives are at stake, first responders should saddle up and roll in on the psycho, hopefully putting him on the defensive and thereby minimizing the body count. Mark Steyn points out that maybe that memo didn't get circulated as widely as it should.

Let me get this straight: You don't want me to be able to bust caps to save myself, but you're not going to do it for me, either? Thanks so much for the concern. What am I paying y'all to do, again, exactly? As Marko is so fond of pointing out, the only thing that stops a spree killer is a gun. The body count is determined by whether the gun is already on the scene or needs to be carried there in the holster of a cop.

Video Perfessers:

Carteach0 talks about shotguns.

Caleb shoots and moves and shoots.

They'll obviously never be Elite Team Fighters, since they talk about boring stuff like skills and practice and safety instead of cool stuff like gear.

That hope which springs eternal...

What a beautiful Opening Day.

Derek Lowe pitched eight innings of two-hit shutout ball; a performance of almost Madduxian proportions against the defending World Series champs. McCann crushed one into the upper deck on his first at-bat and Francouer drilled the first pitch he saw into the left-field seats. Best of all was watching the Braves' rookie center fielder hit a homer to the deepest part of center field in his first Major League plate appearance. He looked all of thirteen years old as he jogged around the bases, so excited that I was a-feared he might pee himself.

ATL 4, PHI 1.

Granted it's only one down and 161 to go, but for the next 14 hours or so, the Braves have the best record in baseball.

Subversive couture.

Liberty Girl is showing off the spring line of awesome Simon Jester apparel. Get you some.

Hating the player, and not grokking the game.

Henry Porter, a Limey columnist with that Moody Loner look that suggests he's only a pair of sunglasses and a hoodie away from typing manifestos in a tar paper shack, feels that the benevolent governments of the world should, while they're binding the mouths of the financial industry kine, look into regulating that soul-destroying internet thing too.

People's Enemy Number One in Porter's eyes is, ironically, the "Don't Be Evil" company itself, Google.

Now, personally, I'm no huge fan or detractor of the company, finding them no eviller or gooder than most other tech firms, but the thing that gave me the gasping giggles was his portrayal of Google as some eternal, thuggish, robber-baron monopoly that has taken over the internet, rather than simply the current top dog until someone comes along with a better mousetrap. I mean, wasn't it just a few years ago that sclerotic industry giant Microsoft owned the intertubes because they bundled Explorer with Windows? Now less than a third of VFTP readers browse this page with Microsoft's browser while over half use some version or another of Firefox. In an industry where empires rise and fall in less time than it takes to earn a Bachelor's in Computer Science, panicky cries of "Monopoly!" always strike me as a little, well, clueless.

DET 1, ATL 3.

I watched my first televised Braves game in about a year. Granted, it was an exhibition game, but the real deal starts Sunday.

It appears that Francouer has remembered what he's supposed to do with that stick he's holding.

That Traitor Smoltz is still wearing the wrong uniform.

The Joy of (re)Discovery.

You would think that a principle as simple and obvious as the Law of Supply and Demand would be assimilated along with mother's milk, and yet some people seem to rediscover the damned thing every fifteen minutes.

This headline cracked me up...

Gang of villagers chase away Google car

Why do I get a mental picture of a bunch of villagers waving pitchforks and torches at a moaning green car with big silver bolts sticking out of its fenders, played by Boris Karloff?

So, what's the legal precedent here? As far as I'm aware, taking pictures from a public thoroughfare is perfectly legal here in the USofA, but I'm not clear on the situation in the place where Great Britain used to be. Do you control the photons bouncing off your house?

My reflexive answer is "Pull up your big girl pants and deal with it."

Besides, you'd think that Englishmen would be pretty inured to lenses these days. Lord knows that your average Londoner has more cameras pointed at them than Britney Spears leaving an OB/GYN office.

Hot Plans For The Day:

Today I will be cleaning .22 revolvers, while hanging out at my old stomping grounds at Coal Creek Armory.

Both my Model 34 and my K-22 Combat Masterpiece have sent enough lead downrange that it's time for the complete-taking-apart and bathing. The Kit Gun is so fouled that the cylinder is getting hard to turn.

It's tough to get a centerfire gun that dirty, at least when you're poor like me.

Gooood morning, Knoxville!

I got into town yesterday about 4:30.

Boy, the drive south was like driving four weeks (and 20 degrees Fahrenheit) into the future. Back in Indy, the trees have just started getting the faintest fuzz of green buds on their branches, but dropping down into the valley here was a treat for the eyes.


The only thing of note on the otherwise uneventful drive was the odd roadkill I spotted (or hallucinated) on the shoulder of I-275 just before crossing the Ohio river; either y'all have some weird, spotted, shaggy, long-necked deer up there, or somebody's missing their llama.

"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

In a comment by "mac" over at The Munchkin Wrangler, we read:

They’re not removing themselves from the gene pool, just their children.

Um... yeah. See...

Er...

Aw, I just don't have the heart.

Things are tough all over.

The North Koreans are looking to get into the ICBM business...

Mount Redoubt is smoking away...

Rioters are smashing bank windows in London...

Fargo is flooding...

...and OH MY GOD THERE ARE PHTHALATES IN MY PILATES EQUIPMENT!

(Inspector Green needs to be introduced to his cousin, Soylent, tout de suite.)


(H/T to the Atomic Nerds.)

A candle on the cupcake.

Frank W. James' blog, "Corn, beans, spent brass, an empty page and a deadline..." turns one today.

Being a writer and a very introspective dude, Frank shares his thoughts on blogs and blogging.

Rumor central...

...notes that Knoxville mayor, former gran frommage at Pilot Oil, and Tennessee gubernatorial candidate Bill Haslam is no longer listed on that tool Bloomberg's "Mayors Against The 2nd Amendment" website.

At least fleas and ticks don't make fun of dogs.

A battered effigy of a banker in a bowler's hat hung on a traffic light near the Bank of England as protesters waved signs saying: "Resistance is Fertile," and "Make Love not Leverage."

Bankers have been lambasted as being greedy and blamed for the recession that is making jobless ranks soar. Other banners read "Banks are evil" and "Eat the bankers," and "0 percent interest in others."

Seeing as how it was the middle of the business day, any bets on what percentage of the protesters were on the dole? Which meant that the art supplies for their protests and the very food in their tummies had been paid for by...? Anyone? Bueller?

That's right, those icky bankers with their jobs, paying taxes. I'll take "Isn't is ironic?" for $500, Alex.

Pull the wagon, Kulaks! Pull it faster!