RNS Quote of the Day: Trouble in Reno Edition

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Phil Kadath

Mr. C and KeeWee finally made it home from the GBR yesterday after some trouble with the airline.

Best quote from the tale:

It seems that TSA has trouble differentiating between fudge from Scheel’s and C4.

Mr. Completely

Really. I have never seen C4 with walnuts. Where do they find those people?

I too have had a little difficulty resulting from the adventure: The Silver Legacy Hotel charge me not once, not twice, but three times for priviledge of staying in one for their rooms. I was within six hours of bouncing my monthly payment for Bull the Silver Bullet (recently ignored by the po-po in four states).

Four phone calls and a visit to my bank later, all is well. But that’ll teach me to use a debit card in an attempt to stay credit card interest.

Posted in Life in the Atomic Age | 3 Comments

Mainstreaming Low Expectations

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Phil Kadath

This is not how you raise your percentage of students who graduate

Seattle public school students may be able to graduate with a D average if a change in policy is approved by the school board.

Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson is recommending the board do away with a nearly decade-old requirement that all students earn a C average to graduate. The proposed policy change would also eliminate the requirement that athletes maintain a C average to play on school teams.

The high school diploma is already worth less than the paper it is printed on. The school district should be raising the policy standard, not lowering it. Their next step will be to hand a diploma to anyone who showed up 50% of the time.

Posted in Academia and Other Nonsense | 1 Comment

Trying to keep themselves relevant

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Phil Kadath

The BATFE and FBI are acting like step brothers

Agents of the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives are feuding over bomb investigations — racing each other to crime scenes, failing to share information and refusing to train together, according to a draft report obtained by The Associated Press.

The report says Justice Department bosses have repeatedly failed to fix the problem.

The Justice Department’s Inspector General, Glenn Fine, has drafted a preliminary report on the two agencies’ repeated squabbles to claim jurisdiction in investigations of explosives incidents across the country — from Times Square in New York City to Arizona and the West Coast.

The most recent documented spat came last December when the FBI protested a local prosecutor’s request to use the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives to investigate a blast that killed a local bomb technician in Woodburn, Ore.

While I am loathe to encourage any onerous federal agency, I would like to give a boost to the Fibbies on this one. The past and current actions of the  BATFElchers show that they cannot be trusted in the future and need to be immediately disbanded and fall straight into the dustbin of American history. Any BATFE agents who’d like to not be out of work had better get their resumes and proof of a clean civil rights record off to the Hoover Building, post haste.

Posted in Useful Idiots | 1 Comment

They shouldn’t discount polls

Posted on September 17, 2009 by Phil Kadath

In relation to this post pointing to a poll showing the American citizenry’s dissatisfaction with unions, it appears that some intelligent Boeing machinists have decided that ditching their’s might be advantageous.

Boeing Co. workers in North Charleston voted overwhelmingly to disband their union in a move that could give the region an edge in landing an aircraft plant the company is looking to build.

Of the 267 ballots cast, 199 were in favor of decertifying the election that made them members of the International Association of Machinists. The company was pleased; the union was disappointed.

The local plant makes rear fuselage sections for Boeing’s 787, a new fast-selling lightweight jet that has been delayed by snags with suppliers and an eight-week strike last year by the IAM.

I might live in the Seattle area, but I’m rooting for North Charleston!

Posted in Heroes, Comrades and Brothers | Leave a comment

“…killed six million people and called it social improvement….”

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Alaska

Morgan and Webb take it to the Chief:

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment

LuckyGunner

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Alaska

I had the opportunity at the Rendezvous for an extended conversation with Brian of LuckyGunner. He’s an impressive gent and very committed to the cause of firearms rights, as befits an online ammunition retailer. He also saved the Soldiers’ Angels raffle. As you may know, LuckyGunner’s policy is that if the ammo’s on their website, it’s in stock, which is pretty darned cool. Check them out; LuckyGunner.com‘s been added to the RNS Firearms Links at right.

Posted in Have Gun, Will Travel, Heroes, Comrades and Brothers, Kewel! | 1 Comment

“Sheeps in the Fields”

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Alaska

No, not Zorro (although that was one of the funniest movie lines I’ve ever heard, in an otherwise completely forgettable film), i’m talkin’ ’bout Zero Hedge’s use of Google Earth and a database to show the world’s shipping fleet idled (red = dead ship; green = going someplace):

The “Ghost Fleet” off Singapore above. Britain below:

Here’s the Chinese coast: note the clear channel, presumably for ships to go into port.

It was noted in the thread that since nobody’s done this before, there’s no baseline data for comparison. Still, combine this with the article and you’ve got some pretty clear evidence that world trade has collapsed.

Got something for your SHTF preps you’ve been putting off buying? Something you’d find in a retail store? Buy it now; restocking may take a lot longer than we’re all used to.

Posted in Armageddon, By Ourselves, For Ourselves | 2 Comments

RNS Quote of the Day: 09/16/09

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Phil Kadath

A fool and his mind are soon parted.

Still it did strike me as noteworthy that your basic tea party crowd isn’t the sort of crowd in which a Confederate flag is unwelcome. I feel like if you’d tried to bring this to a health care rally, folks would have gotten upset. But the tea parties, like a lot of big time conservative events, are a very racism friendly environment. This guy, for example, clearly isn’t so much the type to march with a racist shirt on as he is the kind of guy who’d march with a shirt ridiculing the idea of anti-racism:
Matthew Yglesias

Matthew Yglesias saw this picture at the 9/12 rally. The above quote was his caption for this photo.

diversity.jpg

I’m sure all you who own this shirt knew you were anti-anti-racists when you bought it and didn’t need Mr. Yglesias to point it out to you. But I’m also sure he’s glad to have done the pointing.

Posted in Quote of the Day | 1 Comment

What say ye?

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Phil Kadath

During his extended stay in the Reno area, Derek took advantage of the Nevada Non-Resident CCW course offered by the folks at Armed and Safe.

He and Mr. C put their heads together and banged around the idea of offering this course as one of the featured events for next year’s GBR. The A&S course instructors are also qualified to sign off on the Utah and Florida Non-Resident CCW form for the near ultimate in nationwide reciprocity.

Derek is asking for feedback on the idea at the above link.

I’m already onboard, as my WA CPL is puny in the reciprocity department, and I felt a slightly nekkid wandering around Reno with just my clip knife. Give Derek some measurable feedback so we can get this going.

Otherwise, you’ll be classified as hating fun.

Posted in Kewel! | 2 Comments

Highlight

Posted on September 16, 2009 by Phil Kadath

One of the things David and I did during show and tell was to show off the artwork from Glenn of RifleArt.Net.

We each brought our respective purchases to show and I’m happy to say that they were received very well by those in attendance.

Here is mine

9.jpg

And here is David’s

7.jpg

I’m hoping that a few more sales will enable Glenn to finally get the gallery showing he deserves. It was mentioned by one of the attendees that central Idaho has a number of art galleries whose Hoplophobia isn’t so obnoxious as those on this side of the Cascades, and I’ll be mentioning that to him today when I stop by the rifle range where he is the rangemaster.

As I’ve said before, if you’re a gunny with an empty spot on the wall that needs filled, you simply cannot go wrong with some Rifle Art. And if you don’t have an empty spot, you should make one.

Posted in Kewel! | Leave a comment