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¡Muy Ocupado!

Sorry, all. Didn’t post much over the weekend. I ran my monthly IHMSA match on Saturday, and got to meet one of my readers who was at the range for Hunter Safety class. Sunday we had a picnic to celebrate my daughter’s 25th birthday. Yesterday I did a day trip to Nacozari, Mexico. We left at 5:00AM and got back at 5:45 PM.

I didn’t feel much like posting last night.

I see I got a few hits from my entry into this week’s Best of Me Symphony. Interestingly, my entry, Bias? What Bias? from last August is again topical, since Glenn Reynolds, Steven Den Beste, and James Rummel (among others, I’m sure) have current pieces up on media bias.

I must be prescient. I sent my entry in early last week.

Anyway, I’m ¡muy occupado! (very busy) and won’t be posting again until this evening, but first, a little gun pr0n:

My next purchase:

That’s the Smith & Wesson Performance Center Model 25 Mountain Gun in .45 Long Colt. The specs are:

Capacity: 6 Rounds
Barrel Length: 4″ Tapered
Front Sight: Black Ramp
Rear Sight: Adjustable Black
Grip: Cocobolo
Trigger: .312″
Hammer: .400″
External Safety: N/A
Frame: Large
Finish: Blue
Overall length: 9 1/2″
Material: Carbon Steel
Weight Empty: 39.5 ounces

There’s an excellent review (with more pictures) here. (Via Boone Country.)

I’ve had a serious jones for a model 25 in .45LC for a long time. Many years ago, Lew Horton Distributing had S&W make a special run of model 25-5’s with a 5″ tapered barrel. Lew Horton has done many short-run custom order S&W’s, like the more recent M24-3, 3″ barreled Model 24 in .44 Special from 1983, but the 5″ barreled Model 25 always struck me as the most beautiful revolver I’d ever seen or shot. Five inches is, IMHO the optimum barrel length for a big-bore revolver for handiness and velocity, and the .45LC is a cartridge that should be loaded with lead and not jacketed bullets. Well, I can’t find a 5″ model 25, but this short Performance Center run of 4″ guns is a damned close second.

I had planned to order one a couple of weeks ago. We’ve paid off our bills and we had some surplus. I was sure I could convince the wife that we could afford the nearly $700 price tag.

Unfortunately, when I came home that very afternoon, I found a bill in the mail from the IRS. Seems that when I did our taxes in 2002 I managed to miss a 1099 we got from a local casino when my wife won $2,500. I remember her win. I certainly forgot the 1099.

The bill was $711.

Damn!

Saving my pennies now.

That piece will be mine!

Another Important Piece

Not written by me. While I essentially take the weekend off for personal reasons, the Geek with a .45 – now happily established in Freedom House in Pennsylvania, having escaped New Jersey – has penned an important piece. In some ways it’s an adjunct to Bill Whittle’s, referenced immediately below.

Some excerpts:

Make no mistake. The presidential election of 2004 is not like any other presidential election, at least in my lifetime. It is a coming watershed. I do not believe it to be hyperbole to state that the future shape of Liberty and the Republic will be decided THIS YEAR.

Unfortunately, the stakes are asymmetrical, and I don’t believe that this dynamic is well understood by all of our community.

While a Bush victory will not open the glorious floodgates of a much longed for Constitutional Restoration, a Kerry victory will put that out of reach for at least a generation.

Two full, consecutive generations who are strangers to undiluted Liberty establish a precedent that will be unbreakable, absent a miracle.

—

Here is what CAN happen, without violating any axioms of electoral dynamics:

We can get back to the business of being Americans.

In order to do that, we have to finally and fully exit from our Great Digression to the Left. America has harvested every gainful thing to be had from that field; the rest is all weeds and skunk cabbage.

We can defeat Kerry.

If we defeat Kerry, we deal the Leftist infestation of the Democratic Party a great blow, and perhaps even sweep the leftists off the national stage. The Democrats will then have the opportunity to go into a healing remission, hopefully to return as something recognizable as American. It might take more than defeating Kerry to do this, but it’s not going to happen without a Kerry defeat.

—

We know what the end goal is. 200 years ago, some really smart guys, leveraged the rock solid political philosophy of Locke to hammer out a structure that leaves room for everyone to pursue their lives, liberty, and happiness.

It’s based on libertarian principles of limited and enumerated powers granted to government, with all other rights, privileges, and immunities reserved. With the rotting corpse of slavery dripping all over everything, it’s never really been properly implemented, but by God, it’s worth doing, or die trying. It is the work of a lifetime, of generations; it is our Pyramid; our gift to humanity. It remains to be the best and brightest hope for everyone, and we owe it to all that is or will ever be to give it our very best shot.

There’s a lot of work to do, and no particular map to follow:

-The statists must be defeated, or all is lost and stillborn

-The judiciary must be reigned in and reformed, judicial doctrines foreign to the text of the Constitution must be repudiated and replaced with the Presumption of Liberty

-The electorate must be reintroduced to American civic virtues and principles, to do that, we must recapture public education from the collectivists.

-Public spending must be brought under real control: the government must get out of the retirement planning and health insurance business.

-The hydra of the IRS must be brought to heel.

-Our foreign enemies must be soundly defeated, in the case of Jihadist Islam, and held at bay, as in the case of China.

-The UN must be neutralized, marginalized, and preferably dismantled.

The list is daunting and mighty, but if Kerry wins, there’s no chance of ANY of that happening.

Give it a read. It’s not as long as Strength, but it’s as critical to understand the importance of the upcoming election as it is to understand the importance of our war against Wahabist Islam.

I Step Away from the Computer for a Few Minutes…

And Bill Whittle posts his latest magnum opus: STRENGTH.

I have printed out all 30 pages so that I may sit and absorb it as it should be.

Now, Mr. Whittle, if you’d be so kind as to get Silent America published so I can get my Christmas shopping done early this year?

(Edited to add:)

Son. Of. A. Bitch.

I just sat and read the piece. About four pages into it I felt the need to read it out loud.

It demands to be read out loud.

On television. On radio. On street corners.

In auditoriums on college campuses and in high schools.

In Madison Square Garden before a capacity crowd.

In Carnegie Hall.

Before Parliament, by Tony Blair.

Before a joint session of Congress. By the author.

And it needs to be translated into the languages of the Middle East and read over loudspeakers there, instead of the call to prayer.

Bill Whittle goes to eleven.

Dept. of Our Collapsing Schools: Unintended Consequences Div.

(Via Connie)

Teachers Helped Students Cheat on Standardized Tests in California

LOS ANGELES (AP) – At least 75 California teachers helped students cheat on standardized exams since a new testing program began five years ago, according to a newspaper report citing state documents.

Incidents include teachers who gave hints by drawing on the blackboard or leaving posters on the wall, told students the right answers and changed the students’ responses themselves, the Los Angeles Times reported, referring to documents obtained through a Public Records Act request.

Hmm. The LA Dogtrainer.

Well, I guess it’s possible that even after holding Gray Davis’s skirts and slinging mud at Arnold “The Actor” Schwarzenegger, they might still have one or two investigative reporters who actually understand the job. It is, after all, possible that they could find their own asses without a map.

The teachers were among more than 200 investigated in California for possible cheating since a statewide exam program began five years ago.

State education officials say the numbers of proven cases are small in a state with more than 200,000 teachers.

Yes, the number of proven cases. But what’s the criteria under which “cheating” is established?

Some educators said temptation to cheat soared under the federal No Child Left Behind Act, which can take away funding or reassign teachers in schools with consistently low test scores.

Yes, the Law of Unintended Consequences again raises its ugly head.

And, of course, it’s all Bush’s fault.

Except the investigations began five years ago, after a STATE exam program began. “No Child Left Behind” was signed on January 8, 2002, just over two years ago.

And anyway, Kerry says NCLB is failing because, like every other government social program, it’s “underfunded.”

So far the state has intervened at 56 schools with poor scores, shaking up staffs. The federal government has warned 11 California campuses that they could lose funding or face other sanctions.

“Some people feel that they need to boost test scores by hook or by crook,” said Larry Ward of the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, a watchdog group that has criticized many standardized tests. “The more pressure, the more some people take the unethical option.”

After all, what are “ethics?” Who’s to say one morality is superior to another? What matters is how the teachers feeeeeel, right? And if they’re OK with it, how dare we judge? We might affect their self-esteem!

Union officials said cases of possible cheating soared after the statewide testing began. Since 1999, the California Teachers Association has defended more than 100 teachers accused of cheating, compared to one or two a year before that, chief counsel Beverly Tucker said.

In some cases, the teachers were allowed to stay; others were fired or resigned, the newspaper said.

California allows districts to determine punishments, and most districts, citing privacy, do not disclose those decisions. State officials say they can’t afford to do much checking up on districts.

What do you want to bet they get reassigned to other schools in the district, or are shuffled off to other districts with a glowing recommendation?

Where they get to remain bad teachers.

UPDATE, 5/23: Tom of Center Digit posted yesterday a link to the original LA Times piece on the scandal minor blip on the radar screen. Money quotes:

One cheater whispered answers in students’ ears as they took the exam. Another photocopied test booklets so students would know vocabulary words in advance. Another erased score sheets marked with the wrong answers and substituted correct ones.

—

“It’s serious,” (Beverly Tucker, California Teachers Assn. chief counsel for 16 years) said. “And I can understand there might be cases where dismissal is warranted because of a blatant violation…. Teachers really are supposed to model appropriate behavior for children.”

(Gee, ya THINK?)

In 2001, the state flagged test results for five Bakersfield classrooms with a lot of erasures. District officials concluded that three teachers had coached students to change answers.

Marvin Jones, director of research and evaluation for the district, said the teachers’ explanations included not understanding the rules, “everybody does it” and “I was trying to help the students do what I knew the students can do.”

The teachers were not fired — partly because “we have unions to deal with,” he said.

Deer. Bad. Need To Shoot.

Unbillable Hours has a funny-as-hell accounting of an “Informed Landowner’s Meeting” he recently attended. Just a taste:

The population of deer in New Jersey is something like 200+ deer per square mile, which is particularly bad if they happen to live in your square mile. Deer, to some, are nice and pretty and such, but to me they’re nothing more than long-legged rodents with good PR. In that regard, they’re not that different from Kate Moss. However, if you’ve hit a deer while driving – say, hypothetically, of course, a 1998 Mercury Sable at 75 miles per hour – down Route 520 at 11:00 at night, you look at deer as a serious, oh-my-god-an-antler-almost-went-through-my-head problem. And you’ll be filled with hate, which, as we all know, is good.

Read The Whole Thing. It’s a classic.

AAAAAGGGHH! My EYES! My EYES!

Damn you, puppyblender!

Finally, Someone Explained it so I can Understand!

There are a lot of folks who can’t understand how we came to have an oil shortage here in America. Well, there’s a very simple answer….

Nobody bothered to check the oil. We just didn’t know we were getting low.

The reason for that is purely geographical.

All our oil is in Alaska, Texas, California, and

Oklahoma….

All our dipsticks are in Washington, DC.

Who? Him? He’s Harmless.

TheHighRoad.org contributor Jim March applied to be on ComedyCentral’s upcoming program The Debate Show. Probably not a bright idea, but I appreciate his effort. His application is public, and available here. Well written.

He was accepted. He completed taping yesterday. He wasn’t the only gun rights supporter “used,” apparently:

This was a total SHAM!!! This is from the person that I know who went, I feel for him and Jim.

I thought the Debate Show (MTV Tv Production – I was interviewed and selected as a knowledgeable member of the gun community) would be an opportunity for me to support our side in protecting the Second Amendment. But, instead I was a set up for a comedy routine. I spent most of the day preparing. They stood me in the audience as if I were an audience member and asked me “what do you find interesting about shooting?”. I answered that it is a zenish experience, timing the release of the trigger with the aiming of the firearm, that its fun and isnt an olympic sport for nothing. One of the panelists was an a**wipe commedian and proceeded to show how i proved guns were just an extension of guys penis’s. He had a penis pump that he brought out and asked one of the panelists if he’d agree to give up his guns in exchange for the penis pump. He reduced our gun rights to a penis pump.

Basically i was the set up for HIS joke. I spent all f***king day prepping for this opportunity to debate about gun control and they reduced it to a joke. I walked off the set and demanded a car to take me home. that, or have the balls to put me back on. they didn’t – i left…

f**kers all. hollywood can suck my barrel!…. they consider themselves so liberal, so passionate, yet they are a bunch of money hungry, dishonest sh**s!

Pass along that the “Debate Show” is a bunch of liberal sh**ts setting up honest gun owners for their own comedic purposes. Dont be shy, they weren’t. They tried to humiliate a member of our community. F’her the little lying biatch.

(Emphasis mine, otherwise unedited.)

Here’s what Jim had to say:

I just finally got home by train, walked in the door 20 minutes ago.

I am absolutely furious. It was far worse than what 50 Shooter posted already.

I’m working on a full report right now. First I have to start googling the clowns that were on this turd.

Another thing: this was NEVER presented to me as destined for Comedy Central. This thread is literally the first time I’ve heard that. Which explains one HELL of a lot.

Oh MAN have they screwed with the wrong dude here.

Grrrrrr.

—

The single biggest idiot was this…well, obviously professional actor, who supposedly had a psychology degree and was involved in “treating” people with “gun afflictions” by dealing with their underlying “sexuality issues”. Ya. I knew things had gone WAY south once I realized this bizarre gadget he’d just handed me was something I’d vaguely heard of but never seen. A penis pump. Swear to God.

Anyways. This same moron was also a “hunting advocate”. ‘Cept he didn’t like guns. So he advocated “manly hunting”. With rocks. Cut to video of three morons in camo wandering through the woods annoying various furred/feathered critters with thrown rocks.

Ok, so by the end of this bizarre crap as the closing credits are rolling, he pulls out a fairly big rock and holds it in a throwing position, growling and snarling at me, and making pathetic throwing motions.

I came *this* close to pulling a knife on his dumbass. Had my hand all the way in my pocket. Paused there, thought better of it.

Read the whole HighRoad thread.

I find it FASCINATING that gun-haters consider gun owners to be dangerous borderline homicidal maniacs, but have no fear that ridiculing and provoking a gun-rights supporter in this way will result in a “postal experience” with blood painting the walls. Their blood.

Even going so far as to (jokingly) threaten to attack one with a rock, after provoking him.

No, they are perfectly safe goading us, and they know it.

But I’d vote to acquit.

The Next Big Stupid Lie

Clayton Cramer has the scoop: Apparently Bush is responsible for keeping the Air Force grounded on 9/11 so they were unable to intercept the four airliners.

Reynolds Aluminum must be working overtime making foil for the moonbats.

(Use the Heavy Duty foil, shiny side out, three layers. It works best if you wrap your entire head and seal it at the neck with duct tape.)

Sheesh.