Category: Uncategorized

OUTSTANDING!

Woman wins national rifle championship

Shooting her M-16A2, Spc. Liana Bombardier, a U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit service rifle shooter, won the Service Rifle National Long Range Rifle Championship at Camp Perry, Ohio. Bombardier garnered the Billy C. Atkins Trophy as the highest scoring service rifle shooter in the National Highpower Rifle Long Range Championships Aug. 15 – 18.

The 21-year-old soldier is the first woman in the 100-year history of the matches to win the trophy awarded to the service rifle (now a M-1, M-14 or M-16) shooter with the highest aggregate score over the entire championships.

“The Atkins Trophy is a hard trophy to win and I was thrilled to find out I had won it,” Bombardier said. “I was behind by 5 points going into the last day of competition. I shot well that last day and came up ahead. I never thought I was going to win it.”

Bombardier also fired her M-16A2 in matches at 600, 800, 900 and 1,000 yards, and won the Service Rifle Category in the Palma Individual Trophy Match and the High Master Category in the Porter Trophy Match. She also won the Annie Oakley Trophy for being the best female shooter in this year’s Interservice Championships at Quantico, Va.

That is one tough competition. Hat’s off to her. Read the whole story.

I Sometimes Wish I Stayed Up Later

Ravenwood has a collection of one-liners about the upcoming recall election in California that have been the meat of late-nite monologs. My favorite:

There was also talk of bringing Al Gore to California to help out, but there was concern that Gray Davis and Al Gore in the same state would cause some kind of rolling personality blackout. — Jay Leno

Oh Yeah, THESE Guys Have a Grip On Reality

This Austrailian report on the Bali bombers contains this wonderful quotation:

Ironically, from a terrorist accused not only of the Bali bombing but of church bombings and the bombing of an ambassador’s residence in Jakarta, Sawad claimed he had a message of peace for the world.

“For all human beings to stop now in this world, destroy all of the destructive weapons . . . if there were no weapons then peace can be created,” he said.

Right. Let’s just roll everything back to when human beings were all peaceful agrarians who never had any conflicts.

Except that “reality” never was.

Then people were ruled by large men with swords. And the guy who has the most sword-wielders wins. Before that, it was large men with clubs. Check your history. It has never been peaceful. And the further back you go the less power the individual had. They were the fodder and the victims of nearly endless conflict through being directly overrun by battle, starved and diseased by the effects of war, or taxed into oblivion to support war.

Thank you very much, but I’ll take the present – with “all of the destructive weapons” and everything that goes with them. As weapons technology has advanced, the power of the lowly individual has too. As the French learned to their discomfort at Agincourt, British peons with bows were superior to armored noblemen on horseback. It doesn’t take a lifetime of training to be useful with a rifle, and as the Samurai discovered during the Meiji Restoration, peasants with rifles are superior to noblemen with swords and bows. And as the Battle of Athens proved, arms in the hands of citizens can defeat corrupt government even in modern times.

When only government holds the sword, the people can either submit, or perish – and government will never put down its sword.

Chris Muir Hits the Nail on the Head – Again

Day by Day

“Ugly Americans” Superceded by Brits and Germans

According to this BBC report Germans are the most obnoxious tourists, followed by the British. Americans and the French are tied for third place, just squeeking out the Italians.

Dammit, we’re falling behind again.

D’you think the Beeb “sexed up” the report?

The Al Qaeda Employee Handbook – a Short Film

This is hilarious.

Dept. of Our Collapsing Schools

Larry Wright of the Detroit News weighs in:

Of course, this doesn’t help either:

by Jeff Stahler of the Cincinnati Post.

Apparently Bruce Plante of the Chattanooga Times Free Press has met my sister:

Dick Wright of the Columbus Dispatch seems to have his finger on the pulse of the problem:

Though there are worse alternatives:

Brian Gable, Toronto Globe & Mail.

Oooooh! A CHALLENGE!

Over on Emperor Misha’s blog an apparent über-moonbat is defending the righteousness (lefteousness?) of the Democratic Underground in a comment thread. “Barney Grumble” of the redundantly named “Media Whores Online Watch Watch Watch Watch” (I think I have the right number of “watch”es there) wrote:

DU is not a shouting board.

While I’m not certain exactly what he meant, I responded:

Barney:

I was kicked off DU (Sep-03-02) after a little over 1800 posts and several months – for something I wrote on another site. Not only that, I was booted by Skinner himself – and this is what he said:

“This is a message board for liberals. We don’t expect people to vote straight-ticket Democratic, but we do expect our members to be generally supportive of liberal priorities. If that guy is a liberal, I will eat my firstborn.”

This was less than a week (Aug-27-02) after a moderator wrote to me in a post:

“Don’t shut up. I wildly disagree with most of your positions on this subject, but you are a damn fine advocate. And you make me think. And that is important.”

It would appear that making people think is an ejectable offense on Democratic Underground.

I cannot help but wonder why that is.

To which he responded:

Kevin: I don’t believe you.

When I offered to e-mail him the archived threads in question, he responded:

Kevin: It will be adequate to post it to your blog, liar.

He seems defensive, doesn’t he? Well, I tried posting the HTML code from the archived files here on Blogspot but it makes the system puke. Instead, I’ve got screenshots, but they won’t post here in full size, and reduced they’re illegible. You can view them here:

The image entitled “dear pita” is the one where moderator “Cappurr” encourages me to keep posting. Note the date. The image entitled “skinner 1” is where I am “outed” by the SysAdmin, and the image entitled “skinner 2” is where he explains his reasoning – and is the one I quoted. You have to register to see them. Sorry about that.

Interesting. After 1819 posts (none of which were objectionable enough to get me banned) he had to find something off-site to justify booting me – because I was making his poor little liberals think. And I was booted by the SysAdmin himself! I think I should be honored. Or I should have taken a shower immediately afterward.

Offer’s still open “Barney.” I’d be more than happy to send you the entire threads, and all the others I archived. They might make you think.

Our Collapsing Schools Dept. – Humor Bureau

From The Braden Files comes this list that I e-mailed to my schoolteacher sister:

You might be a teacher if…

You believe “shallow gene pool” should have its own box on the report card.

You want to slap the next person who says, “Must be nice to work 8 to 3:20 and have summers free.”

You can tell if it’s a full moon without ever looking outside.

You believe the playground should be equipped with a Ritalin salt lick.

You believe that unspeakable evils will befall you if anyone says, “Boy, the kids sure are mellow today.”

When out in public you feel the urge to snap your fingers at children you do not know and correct their behavior.

You have no social life between September and June.

Marking all A’s on report cards would make your life SO much easier.

You think people should be required to get a government permit before being allowed to reproduce.

You wonder how some parents ever MANAGED to reproduce.

You laugh uncontrollably when people refer to the staff room as the “lounge”.

You encourage an obnoxious parent to check into charter schools or home schooling.

You can’t have children because there’s no name you could give a child that wouldn’t bring on high blood pressure the moment you heard it uttered.

You think caffeine should be available in intravenous form.

You know you are in for a major project when a parent says, “I have a great idea I’d like to discuss. I think it would be such fun.”

Meeting a child’s parent instantly answers the question, “Why is this kid like this?”

Can I get an “AMEN!”?

“This is so wrong that it cannot be an honest mistake.”

Via Ravenwood comes this NY Times article (registration required) on the New York City Coucil’s at least six new gun control measures formulated in response to the death of Coucilperson James E. Davis who was shot in the council chambers last month. Here’s what they’re considering:

The proposals include holding gun makers, dealers and importers liable for damages if their weapons are used to kill or injure people in the city, as well as prohibiting gun dealers from selling more than one firearm to the same person within 90 days. Another proposal would require gun owners in the city to obtain liability insurance.

So the first thing they want to do is place the blame on everybody but the guy behind the trigger (in direct opposition to the bills in Congress that would prohibit such liability.) The second is, unsurprisingly an extension of the “one gun a month” idea to “one gun every THREE months.” Shortly to be followed by “one gun every TWELVE months,” to “Gun? You don’t NEED a gun.”

More quotes:

There was no urgency prior to the shooting,” said Peter Vallone Jr., chairman of the Public Safety Committee, which is holding next month’s hearing.

“But now there is a sense that we all want to move as quickly as possible on these bills in his memory.”

Why? Not one of the ideas presented would have prevented his death. Again, they’re just useless, knee-jerk reactions.

The city’s renewed focus on gun control is also expected to open the door for broader state legislation, in much the same way that the city’s ban on smoking in restaurants and other public places did.

Right, after New Yorkers were told that the increasing legislation against smoking would never result in a ban on it. Just like we’re told that the increasing legislation against gun ownership will never result in a ban on it. Go ahead, pull my other leg.

“I think it would be a good thing if the city did it, and showed the state the way,” said the Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, who represents the Lower East Side.

That’s because you’re a useful idiot, Mr. Silver.

This reminds me of a favorite quote:

“The ruling class doesn’t care about public safety. Having made it very difficult for States and localities to police themselves, having left ordinary citizens with no choice but to protect themselves as best they can, they now try to take our guns away. In fact they blame us and our guns for crime. This is so wrong that it cannot be an honest mistake.” – former U.S. Sen. Malcolm Wallop (R-Wy.)

It also reminds me of Riss v. New York which I covered in “Is the Government Responsible for Your Protection?”

How about the City Council consider a law that would make the City of New York liable for not protecting its citizens? I’d like to see the liability insurance bill for that.