Why the dearth of blogging this summer? Backpacking and Camping!

And other assorted journeys.

June:  Upper Loch Leven in the Sierra Nevada, Northern California.  2 days, 1 night - 5 mile round-trip hike

Early July: Cliff Lake, Sky Lakes Wilderness, Southern Oregon.  5 days, 4 nights - 11.5 mile round-trip hike

Late July: Lake Helen and Bumpass Hell.  Lassen National Forest, Northern California.  1 Day - 3 mile round-trip hike.

Early August: Porcupine Lake, Shasta-Trinity National Forest, Northern California.  4 days, 3 nights - 3 mile round-trip hike, along with a 20 mile round-trip drive along a treacherous dirt road to reach the parking area.

That about sums things up.  Now I am again ready to blog about education and politics (and the intersection of the two).  Seeing as how this year, I will be saddled with International Baccalaureate/Middle Years Program, Common Core Standards, Equity and Access, and Safe and Civil Schools requirements, I am sure I will have plenty to bitch about!

See you in the trenches.

The Battle of Gettysburg - 150 Years ago today: Day 3

On this day 150 years ago, July 3, 1863, the grand and horrific finale of the Battle of Gettysburg would take place during the early afternoon.

After almost collapsing the flanks of the Union Army during the previous day's fighting, Confederate General Lee was convinced that reinforcement of the Union flanks had most likely left vulnerable the center of their defensive line.  Lee instructed his subordinate, General James Longstreet, to plan an attack on the Union center.  Longstreet chose a prolific copse of trees as the focal point of the planned assault, and determined that because the attacking infantry troops would be required to march almost a mile across an open exposed field on the way to the Union lines, a significant artillery barrage would be necessary to soften up the Union position prior to sending in the infantry.

At or about 1 in the afternoon, over 150 Confederate cannons opened up on the Union center, and would continue their rate of fire for almost 2 hours.  The cannonade was easily the largest of the war, and could be heard in Washington D.C., 80 miles away.  Unfortunately, the Confederates could not see that many of their shots were flying over the heads of the Union infantry, and were often exploding behind them.

At or about 3 in the afternoon, the Confederate artillery barrage ceased, and emerging from the woods on Seminary Ridge as if on parade were between 12,000 and 15,000 Confederate soldiers.  The front of their lines of attack extended almost a mile from north to south.  As the smoke of the Confederate cannonade blew away, it acted as a drawn curtain, revealing to the waiting Union troops a sight that was at once both magnificent and absolutely terrifying.

The Confederate troops began their march - known today as Pickett's Charge - across the almost mile-wide open field toward the Union center, and when they were within range, began to be mowed down by long-range shot and shell from Union cannons that had been largely untouched by the 2-hour Confederate cannonade.  When the Confederates were within 300 yards, the Union infantry rose from behind a low stone wall and began pouring volley after volley of musket fire into the Confederate ranks.  When the the Confederates were within 200 to 100 yards, the Union artillery opened up with canister rounds, which turn the cannons into giant shotguns.  When these were fired, a Union soldier reported a massive, collective groan emanating from the Confederate ranks, along with a roiling cloud of dust from which flew knapsacks, limbs, and heads.

Finally, about 300 Virginians under the command of Brigadier General Lewis Armistead made it to the Union  stone wall, but every one of them was either killed (including Armistead) or captured.  The rest of the Confederate participants of Pickett's Charge walked, limped, or crawled back to their position on Seminary Ridge.

General Lee, upon observing the assault's failure, told anyone who would listen, "This is all my fault!"

The casualty figures commonly accepted for the Battle of Gettysburg were:

Union: 23,000 casualties, including 3,155 killed
Confederate: 28,000 casualties, including 4,708 killed

Recent research has found that those numbers of killed merely represented the number of dead on the battlefield.  What was never taken into account were the thousands of wounded who made it off the battlefield but died shortly after, along with many of those designated as "missing" who were actually killed in the battle.

When these additional deaths are taken into account, the actual number of Union soldiers killed at the Battle of Gettyburg is closer to 5,300, and the Confederate dead was more likely upwards of 5,800.

The Confederate Army of Northern Virginia under General Robert E. Lee was badly mauled at the Batle of Gettyburg, but they were by no means knocked out of the War... not by a longshot.  The War would go on for almost 2 more bloody years, and the Army of Northern Virginia would continue to engage the Union Army at such places as The Wilderness, Spotsylvania Courthouse, Cold Harbor, and Petersburg.

The Battle of Gettysburg - 150 Years ago today: Day 2

On this day 150 years ago, July 2, 1863, the battle that everyone expected to happen was slow to get going.  Neither side had been prepared for the battle to happen at Gettysburg, so much of July 2nd was spent getting soldiers into position - especially for the Confederates, who intended to attack the Union line to their east.

Finally, at around 4:30 in the afternoon, a massive assault began, as the Confederates essentially attacked the entire Union line all at once, with the heaviest fighting taking place on the Union left, which was the southern end of the battlefield.  This day would immortalize such places as Little Round Top, Devil's Den, The Wheat Field, The Peach Orchard, and the Valley of Death, along with such names as Joshua Chamberlain, Daniel Sickles, and James Longstreet.

At Little Round Top, the 20th Maine Regiment under the command of Colonel Joshua Chamberlain would hold off charge after charge of Confederates as these Maine fishermen and lumberjacks would fight until they ran out of ammunition, necessitating a bayonet charge that sent the attacking Confederates running and saving the extreme left flank of the Union line.  Closer to the center of the Union line, a Confederate brigade (about 3,000 men) broke through, and the only Union men available to stop them from bisecting the Union army were the 262 men of the 1st Minnesota Regiment.  When the 1st Minnesota's delaying action was complete, only 47 of them walked away from the engagement.

With the darkness came the end of fighting on that second day of the Battle of Gettysburg.  The Confederate assault had come thisclose to breaking the Union line, but at the end of the day, the battlefield arrangement was essentially the same as it had been at the beginning of the day.  With General Robert E. Lee noting that the attacks on the Union flanks were unsuccessful, he was convinced that attacking the center of the Union line the next day could decide the battle in favor of his Confederate Army of Northern Virginia.  Lee's July 3rd attempt to take the Union center would set up what many believe to be the defining moment of the War for Southern Independence, better known as the U.S. Civil War.

The Battle of Gettysburg - 150 Years ago today: Day 1

On this day 150 years ago, July 1, 1863, the battle intensified throughout the day as corps after corps of Confederate troops poured into the area north and northwest of the town as they took on a cavalry division led by Union General John Buford; soon to be reinforced by two Union infantry corps.  Such battle landmarks as the Railroad Cut and McPherson's Woods became famous on this day.

As the day wore on, the Union troops began to lose ground, and in the late afternoon, were forced to retreat
through the town of Gettysburg and take up defensive positions south of the town.  The Union army anchored the right of their line on Culp's Hill, then the line extended just over two miles along Cemetery Ridge to the base of a small hill called Little Round Top.  The Confederates under General Lee took up a position along Seminary Ridge, which paralleled Cemetery Ridge about a mile to the west.

During the evening and throughout the night, thousands Union and Confederate soldiers converged on the ground south of Gettysburg as they prepared for what they knew would be a huge fight the next day.

69 Years ago today

I usually post a photo of the Normandy beach landings.  This year, I thought I would post a thoughtful montage of scenes from the Airborne drop over Normandy that happened hours before the beach landings.

The footage is from the incredible 2001 HBO miniseries, Band of Brothers.



Thank God that our country produced men such as these.

Amen.

Memorial Day: My thanks have turned to sorrow

A few minutes ago, I was lying in bed, wide awake, listening to the rain patter on my roof, while my wife slept soundly beside me.  I lay there wondering to myself why I did not post some sort of Memorial Day tribute on my blog.  I know my blogging has been rather sparse as of late - I guess I have been on the "quality, not quantity" kick - but on Memorial Day, I at least always post a photo of military headstones at a U.S. war cemetery or of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, or some other meaningful visual.  But not today.

Why?

Lying there in bed, I came to the conclusion that my view of Memorial Day has changed.  All my life, I thought and was taught that Memorial Day was the day of the year that we are to be thankful to those members of our military who have given the ultimate sacrifice in order to keep us free; to ensure the security of this country.  Instead of thankfulness, I instead feel sorrow; sorrow that these men and women died for this country. Because, more and more, I keep asking myself:  What country?

In the 20th century alone, the United States lost approximately 650,000 American servicemen killed fighting in the Philippines, the Caribbean, World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and the Middle East.  If those war dead could see what our country has become, do you think even half of those men and women would say, "Boy, I'm sure glad I died so the United States could become the country it is today!"

Are we even close to being the same United States of America for which these men and women fought and died?  Look at the level of government dependency, debauchery, immorality, illegitimacy, slovenliness, apathy, cynicism, timidity, and learned helplessness that has overtaken this nation.  Look at the caliber of elected and unelected officials who populate our federal, state, and local governments.  As morally and fiscally corrupt as these people might be, never forget that it was that population I just described that put those elected officials in place, and continue to vote to keep them there - all in an effort to use the coercive force of government to transfer the wealth of the rapidly-shrinking productive sector of society to the rapidly-expanding non-productive and parasitical sector of society.

I teach 8th grade at a school populated by students who have almost no clue about the historical and cultural background of the United States, and most of them couldn't care less.  They have no interest in learning about the shared cultural markers that make this country what it is (or was, actually).  Markers such as MEMORIAL DAY, Independence Day (beyond the fun of shooting off fireworks), the ideas of liberty and individual freedom, and limited government as taught in the Declaration of Independence.  Many of these students are first-generation citizens of the United States whose loyalties still lie with their parents' home country, and they have no interest in breaking those cultural and emotional ties with their home country.  Or these students have a family heritage in America that goes back many more generations than my own, but fail to identify themselves as being part of the American family.  They see the United States as nothing more than a meaningless and ahistorical chunk of land from which to extract a living - often at the hands of Joe and Jane Taxpayer.  Otherwise, these students and their families see the United States as an oppressive, racist, hateful country that does not deserve their loyalty... even though they continue to live here and are happy to cash those welfare checks and eat that school-provided, taxpayer-subsidized breakfast and lunch.

When I have voiced my concerns about the current generation I am attempting to teach, this is when I am often told that my students are only in the 8th grade, and they simply haven't been taught these things yet, and it is up to me to teach them.  Well guess what folks:  8th graders used to already know these things!  They were taught them from birth by their parents long before they passed through a schoolhouse door.  Again, our country used to have a common shared culture, that was uniquely American, where practically everyone knew the same songs, poems, presidents, war heroes, and symbols.  Not so much anymore.  Not only are these symbols often not known, but when they are, they are often dismissed as being jingoistic, imperialistic, fascist, right-wing... you know the deal.  It's not an uncommon situation in many demographics.  If you have time, watch the results of this man-on-the-street interview of people on the question of the purpose of Memorial Day.

This is also when I am often told that not everyone is that way; there are still places in America where there is still love of country, and patriotism, and Mom and apple pie.  Yes, there are still "places."  Not the entire country - just places.  Demography is destiny, and for the last few decades, the people who remember and participated in the Old United States are themselves getting old and dying off.  Replacing them are the current generation personified by the students I teach.  The places where the Old United States still exists will continue to dwindle as the demographics of our population change over the next few decades.

When you snip a bunch of flowers that are growing strong and pure in the ground and put them in a vase, the flowers continue to look strong and pure... for awhile.  But as the days pass, no matter what kind of water or powdered fertilizer you use to stop the inevitable, the flowers begin to wilt, and then die.  Finally, the fetid water in the vase is dumped down the sink, and the flowers are thrown in the garbage.  The charade of the snipped flowers looking fresh in the vase worked for a little while, but they were doomed the moment they were snipped and removed from their roots which had been firmly planted in the soil.

If you don't yet see where I am going with this, the United States is the bouquet of flowers that has been in the vase for quite some time now.  Through deficit spending, and overtaxing, and living off the wealth and infrastructure created decades ago, we have been keeping up the charade of prosperity and stability all this time, but the stems and leaves are beginning to wilt, and the petals are beginning to fall, and the water is beginning to develop a rather pungent odor.

And unfortunately, through it all, the 650,000 American servicemen who were killed in the 20th Century, along with the approximately 6,500 killed in the 21st Century, and the 810,000-or-so who were killed in the 18th and 19th centuries were unable to stop the decay that has brought us to the irresistible and seemingly unstoppable downward slide in which we find ourselves today.  When I talk to my own children about the United States, instead of telling them about how great the country is, more often than not, I find myself telling them about how great the country used to be.

So as we observed Memorial Day 2013 (that is, actually observed it, and not just had a barbecue and went shopping), I couldn't stop asking myself if it has all been worth it?  For what have these servicemen died?  Should I give thanks for their sacrifice, or feel sorry for the seeming waste of their sacrifice?  I don't get the chance to talk to the dwindling number of surviving World War II veterans, but I wonder what the consensus would be from them, and also veterans of Korea, Vietnam, and even today's wars in Iraq and Afghanistan:  Knowing what you know today; seeing what you see in our country today; was it all worth it?

Dare I ask, was it all in vain?

Moronic statists blame this week's Oklahoma tornado on "global warming" and "climate change"

I am mostly pretty good at keeping an even emotional keel when discussing politics with someone with whom I disagree.

But there are a few topics that make it darn near impossible for me to contain my anger, and one of them is when someone tries to blame some weather event on what they used to always call global warming, but now more often call climate change.  The switch of course has come in the wake of the fact that over the last decade and a half, those pesky average global temperatures kept going down, as there has been no global warming since 1998.

In the wake of the terrible F5, 200mph tornado that ripped through the Oklahoma City suburb of Moore, Oklahoma and killed dozens of people, we already have the more devout members of the Church of Global Warming coming out from under their slimy rocks to attribute the forces of nature to our seeming ability to control the weather like some kind of medieval alchemist. That's right, they are blaming human-caused global warming/climate change on a powerful tornado that struck... Oklahoma... in May. How unusual.

First was a tweet from lefty Politico reporter Glenn Thrush who said:

It is striking that Oklahoma's senators are 1) a federal spending skeptic and 2) global warming denier 

My obvious question is what does being a skeptic of federal spending and a global warming denier have to do with a tornado that struck... Oklahoma... in May? But we all know what Herr Thrush is hinting at, don't we?

Next, we go to two great minds (snort, snicker) in the U.S. Senate; both members of the Social Democrat Party: Sheldon Whitehouse (yes, that is really his name) of Rhode Island, and our own hometown girl, Barbara Boxer of the late, great, state of California. Each of these brain trusts stepped onto the Senate floor yesterday and voiced their opinions as to who and what is responsible for this tornado and what should be done about it. First, Sheldon Whitehouse:

“So, you may have a question for me: Why do you care? Why do you, Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat of Rhode Island, care if we Republicans run off the climate cliff like a bunch of proverbial lemmings and disgrace ourselves? I’ll tell you why. We’re stuck in this together. We are stuck in this together. When cyclones tear up Oklahoma and hurricanes swamp Alabama and wildfires scorch Texas, you come to us, the rest of the country, for billions of dollars to recover. And the damage that your polluters and deniers are doing doesn’t just hit Oklahoma and Alabama and Texas. It hits Rhode Island with floods and storms. It hits Oregon with acidified seas, it hits Montana with dying forests. So, like it or not, we’re in this together... “You drag America with you to your fate, so, I want this future: I want a Republican Party that has returned to its senses and is strong and a worthy adversary in a strong America that has done right by its people and the world. That’s what I want. I don’t want this future. I don’t want a Republican Party disgraced, that let its extremists run off the cliff, and an America suffering from grave economic and environmental and diplomatic damage because we failed, because we didn’t wake up and do our duty to our people, and because we didn’t lead the world. I do not want that future. But that’s where we’re headed. So I will keep reaching out and calling out, ever hopeful that you will wake up before it is too late.”

Whitehouse later apologized for the "timing" of these remarks, but not the substance. Now the wisdom of Barbara Boxer, who is in the running with Washington state's Patty Murray as being the dumbest member of the U.S. Senate:

“This is climate change. This is climate change. [If she says it twice, then it has to be true] We were warned about extreme weather: Not just hot weather, but extreme weather. When I had my hearings, when I had the gavel years ago — it’s been a while — the scientists all agreed that what we’d start to see was extreme weather.” “Carbon could cost us the planet.  The least we could do is put a little charge on it so people move to clean energy."

Yeah, just a "little" charge on it. Can you see me rolling my eyes?  Not surprisingly, Boxer has a carbon tax bill that she is currently pimping in the Senate.

The logical question here would be to ask if there have ever been severe tornadoes in the past; before the whole global warming/climate change cult popped up.  OF COURSE THERE HAVE!

How about in 1925, when an enormous tornado that lasted over 3 hours churned through three different states and killed almost 700 people?  Was that an "extreme" weather event caused by people's SUVs and factory smokestacks?

Or how about the outbreak of 150 tornadoes in 1974 that killed 300 people?  Newsweek magazine blamed that on global cooling!  I was just a little kid in the 1970s, but I remember the news reports talking about the coming ice age.


This all makes perfect sense, you know.  Think of the ancient cultures of old who thought that the gods controlled the weather, and to gain their mercy, the people of those ancient cultures would perform rituals, offer up animal and human sacrifices, burnt offerings, and whatever else would gain the favor of the gods.

Nowadays, these disciples of the Church of Global Warming think of humans themselves as being as gods.  After all, Marxists dream of people being capable of bringing heaven onto earth.  So, WE, the human race, are responsible for the climate and weather in the twisted fantasy world of these disturbed people.  And as usual, they wish to use the power of government to drag - I'm using Sheldon's word - us all into their twisted fantasy world through the implementation of carbon taxes, "green" energy subsidies, and environmental totalitarianism.

All this to stop a powerful tornado... in Oklahoma... in May.

Lighten up, Francisco

I'm 8 days late and a Peso short on this topic, but I only discovered this article tonight.

Apparently, some Mexican college activists here in the United States are/were unhappy about how some people celebrate the semi-faux holiday of Cinco de Mayo:

Drinking tequila shots, eating tacos, and wearing sombreros do not commemorate Mexican culture; on the contrary, that offends, marginalizes, and isolates many of our friends, classmates, and community members, and casts our entire community in poor light...

Hmmm, no mention from them about the fun and ridiculous things that people do on St. Patrick's Day. Having a mucho amount of Irish blood in me, I could get all indignant about some of the potentially offensive sights I see on St. Paddy's Day (including calling it St. Paddy's Day). Instead of tequila, it's whiskey or Killian's Irish Red beer. Instead of tacos, it's corned beef. Instead of sombreros, it's those little green bowler hats that leprechauns wear. The difference is that I could give a shit less that people are making light of the Irish culture. Apparently, these Mexican activists are, like many professional activists out there, looking for something - anything - about which to be aggrieved and offended.

On this traditional communist holiday, President Obama declares Loyalty Day!

Out of 365 potential days of the year, our Dear Leader decided on today, May 1st, to declare as Loyalty Day in the United States.  Yes, Loyalty Day.

You know about May Day, right?  It has been used as a day of celebration by many different cultures, but in our day and age, the secular communists/Marxists out there use it as a day to parade their missiles and tanks down the street and call for socialist solidarity.

And President Obama just happened to pick this particular day as the day when we Americans should renew our allegiance to the U.S. government.

I'm not kidding - read his proclamation for yourself at the White House website, and check out some of the money quotes right here:

We have held fast to the principles at our country's core: service and citizenship; courage and the common good; liberty, equality, and justice for all... [The very first thing he mentions is "service"? Maybe I wasn't paying attention, but please show me where any of our founders talked about "the common good."]

We look back to Americans who did the same, from generation to generation -- citizens who strengthened our democracy, organizers who made it broader, service members who gave everything to protect it. These patriots and pioneers remind us that while our path to a more perfect Union is unending, with hope and hard work, we can move forward together... [Notice how he gives a shoutout to community organizers, and what is with this obsession of his of using the word "together"?]

I have a big problem with some of the language our government uses nowadays. For instance, I have never been comfortable with the use of the term "homeland," as in the Department of Homeland Security. And here is another one: Loyalty. Don't get me wrong, there is nothing untoward about the word itself. But when a government run by such people as Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, John Boehner, Dianne Feinstein, and Charles Schumer start trying to tell me where my loyalties should lie, I begin to perspire.

Just a couple questions about the Boston Marathon bombing and its aftermath

First and foremost, when and why did our police forces in this country transition from this:

to this:

My father was a police officer at the municipal, county, and state level from 1963 until 1991.  He has lamented to me on numerous occasions about how when he first began working as a police officer, he was considered a "peace officer" who was much like the men in the top photo, whereas by the end of his career in the early 1990s, "peace officers" were now "law enforcement officers" who were much more likely to dress and act like the men in the bottom photo.

For some Americans, footage of the house-by-house searches conducted by Boston Pollice dressed like the law enforcement officers in the bottom photo was their initial introduction to the radical change in police weapons, uniforms, and tactics that has taken place over the last few decades.  Oh sure, people know on some sort of level that this shift has taken place, but even I, being very aware of the excesses of our current federal and state governments, was quite shocked by the news and blogger footage of the house-to-house searches and the Orwellian justifications given for those searches that took place in and around Boston in the aftermath of the two bombs being set off at the Boston Marathon on April 15th.

Watch this minute-and-a-half report from a local Boston news station.  It is tragically enlightening beyond belief.  You see the strong arm Gestapo tactics - complete with menacing them with barking German Shepherds - being used against innocent homeowners; a compliant news reporter using Orwellian language such as his description of these homeowners, "being rescued at the point of a gun," and worst of all, the sheep-like interviewees who had no problem having a police officer stick a gun in their face all in the name of keeping them safe.  This is in Boston, Massachusetts, mind you - the birthplace of the American Revolution.  If the militia farmers from the Concord Bridge could see this news report, they would puke:



A blogger named Bob Owens, who writes for PJ Media (see my blogroll) and is much more eloquent and succinct than I, explained this phenomenon best:

When you arm, armor, and equip peace officers like combat infantrymen, but don’t give them the training, don’t be remotely surprised when they sling lead like a bunch of scared recruits just out of basic training. If you want cops to act like peace officers, force them to act like peace officers, not make-believe adjuncts to Seal Team 6.

Mr. Owens was writing these words not only in response to the Gestapo-like tactics used by these officers as they forced homeowners out of their houses at gunpoint in clear violation of the 4th Amendment, but also to the ventilation with their AR-15 and M-4 rifles of the boat in which surviving Marathon bomber Dzhokar Tsarnaev was hiding. This brings me to my next question. Initial reports said that Boston Police engaged in a 1-hour shootout with Tsarnaev as he hid in that boat. Then all of a sudden, it was reported that Tsarnaev wasn't even armed when he was finally taken down and arrested. So did the 1-hour firefight take place or did it not? Did the cops shoot at that boat for a whole hour without the the unarmed Tsarnaev shooting back, and if they did shoot at the boat for a whole hour, how in the world is Tsarnaev still possibly alive?

My time is limited, but I have more questions to ask in the near future.

2nd Amendment right to self-defense survives a U.S. Senate vote, but is circling the drain in California

It was a busy last two days in the fight to retain our God-given rights to defend ourselves, our families, our states, and our country.

Yesterday, a slew of disgusting, horrific, treasonous anti-self defense bills passed through their respective committees in the Democrat-controlled California state Senate.  Here are what some of the seven bills that passed committee propose to do:

SB 47 - PASSED 5-2. expands the definition of “assault weapons” to BAN the future sale of rifles that have been designed/sold and are equipped to use the “bullet button” or similar device, requires NEW “assault weapon” registration, requires registration of ALL those semi-auto rifles that are currently possessed to retain legal possession 

SB 108 - PASSED 5-2 requires mandatory locked storage of firearms within a locked house regardless of whether anyone is present. 

SB 53 - PASSED 5-2 requires persons to buy an annual ammunition purchase permit, requires the registration and thumbprint of the purchaser for each ammunition purchase, and bans online and mail order sales of ammunition to Californians. 

 SB 396 - PASSED 5-2 BANS the POSSESSION of any magazine with a capacity to accept more than ten cartridges, including currently legally possessed "grandfathered" large capacity magazines. 

SB 567 - PASSED 5-2 changes the technical definition of a shotgun, which would turn all handguns into short-barrel shotguns that are illegal to own. 

SB 374 - PASSED 5-2 Requires gun owners to register every semi-automatic rifle, including rimfire. Requires gun owners of existing semi-auto rifles to submit fingerprints and forms to DOJ, which will be tracked in a government database. 

SB 755 - PASSED 5-2 provides that any person who has been convicted of certain misdemeanors may not, within 10 years of the conviction, own, purchase, receive, possess, or have under his or her custody or control, any firearm. Violation of this prohibition is punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not exceeding one year or in the state prison, by a fine not exceeding $1,000, or by both that imprisonment and fine. This bill would add to the list of misdemeanors, the conviction for which is subject to those prohibitions, misdemeanor offenses of threatening a peace officer, removing a weapon from the person of a peace officer, hazing, transferring a firearm without completing the transaction through a licensed firearms dealer, furnishing ammunition to a minor, possession of ammunition by a person prohibited from having a firearm, furnishing ammunition to a person prohibited from possessing ammunition, carrying ammunition onto school grounds, carrying a loaded or concealed weapon if the person has been previously convicted of a crime against a person or property, or of a narcotics or dangerous drug violation, or if the firearm is not registered, participation in any criminal street gang, a public offense committed for the benefit of a criminal street gang, disobedience to the terms of an injunction that restrains the activities of a criminal street gang. By changing the definition of a crime, this bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

How dare they? These pieces of slime in our state's Capitol that voted for this garbage are traitors to our state and to our country.  Lord, how I wish my wife and I had the ability to leave this God-forsaken - and I mean that term literally - state of California.

On the other hand, there was a small bit of good news today, as the anti-self defense bills in the U.S. Senate went down in flames... for now.  It bothers me that the votes on the bill and its amendments were in the range of 54-46, 52-48, 52-48, and so on.  That is way too close.  Once upon a time in this country, when we had a love of liberty and a lot more backbone, those votes would have been more like 95-5.  The one vote that wasn't really close, I am very happy to say, was Dianne Feinstein's proposed assault weapons ban.  That one went down by a vote of 40-60!

Later, in the White House Rose Garden, our Dear Leader was not at all happy about the outcome of the vote on his dreams of gun control.  He made it clear in his temper tantrum that his aim and goal is to retain Democrat control of the Senate and gain control of the Republican-led House in the 2014 mid-terms. 

I hate to sound pessimistic, but I believe it will only be a matter of time before these federal anti-self defense laws pass.  Maybe not in 2014; maybe not even in 2020.  But as the demographic makeup of our country continues to change, and we gain more people - both legally and illegally - who are used to the idea of a totalitarian government providing everything for them while telling them how to live their lives, our federal government will grow larger and more totalitarian as a result.

As for California, we are already there.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Blow by Blow: What really happened in Benghazi, Libya on September 11, 2012

I have been meaning to make people aware of uber-columnist Jack Cashill's account of the approximately 9 hour - yes, I said 9 hour - firefight at our embassy in Benghazi, Libya.

It has been hard enough keeping Benghazi in the news cycle, as Obama's lapdog media want nothing more than for the whole affair to go away, much like Operation Fast and Furious and the continuing questions about Obama's birth certificate and Social Security number.

Now that Boston and its iconic Marathon have been hit by a terrorist attack, keeping Benghazi in the news will be even more difficult.  One of the biggest tragedies of this is that I believe too few people realize the heroics that took place in the late night and early morning hours of September 11th and 12th, 2012.

Were you aware that one of the former SEALs-turned-security technicians who was killed that night was all the way across Libya in the city of Tripoli when the firefight started?  By the end of the firefight, he had gotten himself all the way across Libya by hook or by crook in order to assist his brothers-in-arms.  Here is that excerpt from Jack Cashill's narrative:

Meanwhile, in Tripoli, 13 hours away by car, Woods’ old Navy Seal friend Glen Doherty and six colleagues, most of them CIA, commandeered a jet to join the fray. In Benghazi, the Libyan militias reorganized outside the CIA annex and launched an attack there shortly after midnight. The GRS and DSS agents, along with reliable local security, held the attackers off until daybreak. At 5 a.m. Doherty and his crew reached the CIA annex in Benghazi. They quickly took up defensive positions and helped the agents in place fend off a new wave of attackers trying to scale the wall....

Until I read Cashill's article, I had no idea about most of what I read about what had occurred that night. Hollywood is always looking for good stories. This one is begging to be filmed. Don't bet on it, though. Unlike the bin Laden raid, in which Hollywood received more than full cooperation from the Obama administration in making Zero Dark Thirty, I doubt Obama and his minions would be quite as forthcoming about what went down in Benghazi that night. Pity.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be." -Thomas Jefferson

New Jersey dad gets a visit from his state's fascists for the "crime" of posting a photo of his son holding a rifle

The emasculation of America continues as what used to be considered wholesome and normal is now considered creepy and perverse.  Add to that a healthy dollop of attempted violations of the 1st, 4th, and 5th Amendments to the Constitution, and we ourselves a glimpse into the dysfunction that is today's United States.

If you want to read the ins and outs of this tale, go to the link at the The Blaze, but for the shorter version, here it is:

A dad (who is an NRA-certified firearms instructor; not that it matters) posted on his Facebook page a photo of his 11 year-old son holding an AR-type .22 rifle.  Someone reported this apparently horrific crime to local law enforcement, and before you know it, a New Jersey child protective services worker and four local cops show up at the guy's door, and the CPS lady wants to go in the guy's house and inspect his guns.  Yes, really!

In no uncertain terms, the guy said "No."  Then things got even more interesting.  Seriously, click on the link above, and read the whole story.

In the meantime, I can easily up the ante on this one.  Forget a still photo; here is a video of my son shooting my .223/5.56mm Smith and Wesson M&P 15 AR-style rifle a couple weeks ago:



Boys holding and shooting rifles used to be so normal, people didn't even think twice about it. Now people like me have to post videos of such a thing in order to desensitize those who now get the vapors from viewing such a shocking scene.  

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be." -Thomas Jefferson

Feinstein's fascist firearm follies fall in flames... but the fight is far from finished

You might remember I made a two-part video about California Senator Dianne Feinstein's proposal to outlaw what she calls assault weapons, and what I call semi-automatic defensive rifles, or what the United States federal government calls personal defensive weapons (when THEY own them).  In that video, I held up a list of 157 specific makes and models of firearms that Feinstein wants banned, including the AR-rifle that I own.

Well, that haggard, demonic woman's dream of reviving a federal "assault weapons" ban was shot down today by her own fellow Democrats in the U.S. Senate.  The Dems control 55 seats in the Senate, yet Feinstein's bill could only muster 40 total votes - not enough for the simple 51 vote majority, and certainly not enough to overcome a filibuster, which requires 60 votes.

Now, this is where a lot of us liberty-loving folks tend to take a deep collective breath and rest back on our laurels.  DON'T!!!

Keep in mind that there is still a federal gun control bill going to the Senate floor which could still have all kinds of nasty proposals in it, including a universal background check that could easily devolve into universal registration.  Also, Feinstein's proposal may not have made it into the final Democrat gun control bill, but her proposal could still possibly see the light of day again as an amendment to another bill.  This little Frankenfeinstein's monster of a bill needs to be stomped on continuously until it is dead for good.

Not to mention, gun control continues to move forward in too many states.  New York has already gone off the rails with their psychotic governor Cuomo signing their travesty of a bill into law.  California's Democrat supermajority legislature and Governor Moonbeam are currently salivating at the thought of all the gun control laws they can pass without any Republican opposition.  And tomorrow, Colorado's Democrat Governor Hickenlooper is cracking his knuckles and unscrewing his pen as he gets set to sign a slew of bills that will limit ammunition magazines in that state to just 15 rounds.  Gun accessory manufacturer MagPul Industries (maker of the magnificent PMag) is set to begin moving out of Colorado and taking its hundreds of jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue with it as soon as Hickenlooper signs the the bill.

Keep up the pressure, people!  Both at the state and federal level, continue to remind your elected representatives that you have your eye on them, and that you will do everything in your power to make them pay at the ballot box if they so much as hint that they will support additional gun control measures that will do nothing more than disarm the law-abiding, and embolden criminals who have no intention of abiding by any gun control laws in the first place.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Iraq War (Persian Gulf War II): Ten years ago today

Difficult as it may seem to believe, it was March 19, 2003 (March 20 in Iraq's time zone) that the United States launched an all-out assault on Saddam Hussein's Iraq for a second time.  The first time around had gone swimmingly, but when the smoke had settled Saddam Hussein was still in control of Iraq.  We did not make the same mistake twice.

The actual invasion of Iraq and removal of Saddam Hussein from power lasted only about a month-and-a-half; it was all over by early May.  The cost was a relatively low 140 American servicemembers killed.  Little did the American people realize that successfully invading Iraq would be the easy part.  As usual, winning the peace turned out to be exponentially more difficult than winning the peace.

The United States would continue to conduct combat operations in Iraq until the middle of 2011.  When all was said and done, the total casualties for the United States in Iraq was just under 4,500 killed and just over 32,000 wounded.  I'm sure you have seen some of the more gravely wounded who will spend the rest of their lives missing some of their limbs, their brain power, or some cases, their sanity.

The natural question many are asking was if it was worth it to invade Iraq.  Just today, Barack Obama's slimy little press secretary, Jay Carney, had no choice but to give credit to George W. Bush for removing Saddam Hussein from power after being pressed on the issue by a reporter.  But what if Saddam Hussein was still in power today?  With all the craziness in the Middle East and North Africa, what with Iran, Libya, Egypt, Syria, and the never-ending showdown between the Palestinian Arabs and the Israelis, would Saddam's Iraq really matter all that much?

I believe that perhaps we should have not gone into Iraq at all, or at least left after Saddam Hussein was removed from power.  Just like we should have gotten the hell out of Afghanistan as soon as we removed the Taliban from power.  The United States has always been very good at winning wars, but our record on nation building is spotty at best.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Boy pushes disabled girl out of a moving school bus, and his punishment is....?

While I admit that all I have to go from on this story is what a local news outlet wrote about it, I have spent enough years as an educator to get the gist of what was going on in this incident, and whatever the finer details of what happened, I was astonished by the very last line of this article.

From New York City comes the story of a disabled 13 year-old girl who was being bullied on a bus.  After being spit upon and having books thrown at her by one male student, she was told by a "matron" (whatever the hell that is) to move away from her tormentor to the back of the bus.  When the girl got to the back of the bus, another bully pushed the girl out the back of the bus, even though the bus was in motion.

The bullied girl suffered a broken collar bone from her fall.

And now to the coup de grace.  The very last line of the article said, "Officials said the boy who pushed her is being disciplined and may be placed on another bus route."

There is so much that is said and unsaid in that simple little sentence.

What about the first boy, whose taunts and torment necessitated the girl's move toward the back of the bus in the first place?  Will he be disciplined?

Why didn't the matron do more to intervene besides telling the victim to move?  Or did she?  The article is a bit short on details.

And most of all, why will the boy who actually pushed the girl out of the bus and broke her collarbone be placed on another bus route?  Would his actions not justify kicking him off the bus for the rest of the year? 

Would the pusher's actions not justify expelling him from the school, let alone the bus route?

If this is a school for the disabled, what kind of disabilities are we talking here?  Physical, emotional, or both?

If the pusher's disability is emotional and that is what is keeping him from being expelled, then I have always thought that it is a travesty that emotionally disturbed students cannot be expelled for their actions.  I see this at my school, where we have general population-type students, but we also have special education (SPED) students both in regular classrooms (RSP) and in self-contained classrooms (SDC).  If an RSP or SDC student exhibits chronically disruptive or violent behavior, that student must have a "manifestation" meeting where big-wigs from the district office confer and decide whether or not the student's behavior is a result of the student's disability, whether it be physical or emotional.  If the manifestation meeting determines that the student is acting that way because of his/her (usually his) disability, then that student cannot be suspended any more, let alone expelled.  The student is free to run roughshod over his fellow teachers and students without the fear of any consequences.  One of my administrators has a name for this select group of students.  He calls them "Untouchables."

Whether or not the pusher in this news story turns out to be an Untouchable, I don't know.  But an educational and legal system that allows this scenario to exist is a broken one indeed.  And people wonder why our educational system has gone to hell in a handbasket.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Vice President Biden transitions from stupid to dangerously stupid

I don't know if statists/Democrats still like to dump on former Vice President Dan Quayle, but it would seem to be a hypocritical maneuver with Crazy Uncle Joe currently holding the VP slot.

Seriously, if Joe Biden were a conservative/Republican, we would never hear the end of it from the Left.  Instead, they ignore or explain away the absolutely absurd actions and statements of this clown.

Biden's greatest hits used to be his infamous goofy gaffes like telling a man in a wheelchair to stand up and emphasizing that three letter word: J-O-B-S... jobs.  Or his latent racism where he praised candidate Obama in 2008 as being articulate and clean, or when he said you can't work in a 7-11 store unless you have a slight Indian accent.

Biden has now topped all of that with his dangerous, illegal, and outrageous advice regarding all things shotgun.

In an effort to downplay the effectiveness of an AR-type defensive rifle, Biden has spent the last couple weeks trying to sell the American people on shotguns.  The problem is that his advice has been something that will get you arrested.

First, Biden told a citizen questioner during an online townhall meeting that the best thing to do for home defense is to get a double-barreled shotgun and fire it into the air.  Just hearing my description of his advice isn't enough; you have to watch and listen to this fool as he dispenses his madness:



The last I checked, discharging a firearm into the air is quite a no-no. Not to mention, what the hell is Slow Joe talking about with his wife having to arm herself? The VP and his family live on the grounds of the U.S. Naval Observatory near Washington D.C. with round-the-clock Secret Service protection. As if Slow Joe hadn't stepped in it badly enough with his fire-the-shotgun-into-the-air comments, he then doubled down and dispensed some more dubious advice. In an interview with Field and Stream magazine, Biden said, "[if] you want to keep someone away from your house, just fire the shotgun through the door."

One of the cardinal rules of gun safety is to know what your target is and what is beyond it. Apparently, Biden doesn't know about this rule, nor, apparently, did South African "blade runner" Oscar Pistorius. He is currently sitting in a South African jail on a murder charge for doing exactly what Biden suggested. Pistorius's girlfriend, who was on the other side of the bathroom door through which he shot was unavailable for comment.

As the statist narrative against defensive rifles begins to fall apart, the Obama administration, along with other federal and state totalitarians, are getting more and more unhinged and shrill as they try to sell their execrable position against Constitutionally protected self-defense to the American people.  Few officials are doing a more bang-up job of this than Slow Joe Biden.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Federal government tyranny at Waco: 20 years ago today

It's amazing how time flies.  It was 20 years ago today - February 28, 1993 - that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms conducted their infamous raid on the Branch Davidian community outside Waco, Texas.

The ATF were purportedly there to serve an arrest warrant on Davidian leader, David Koresh, for federal firearms violations.  As a local sheriff stated at the time, if the ATF had wanted to do that, they could have picked up Koresh while he was jogging.  Instead, the ATF attacked the Branch Davidians with almost 100 agents who transported to the Davidians' home in huge horse trailers pulled by pickup trucks.  In the ensuing firefight, six Davidians and and four ATF agents were killed.  That is the part of the story that happened 20 years ago today.  Fifty-one days later, the FBI and U.S. military troops conducted an assault on the 80-or-so Branch Davidians who were still holed up in their facility.  After pumping the building full of highly flammable CS gas, the assault set off a fire that destroyed the Branch Davidian facility and almost everyone in it, including dozens of young children.

It was one of the most shameful episodes of government tyranny in United States history, and no one in the federal or Texas state government paid any kind of penalty for it.  Looking back, the Waco Raid and the ensuing siege and deadly assault can be looked at as a test case for the federal government finding out more precisely what they were able to get away with.  They certainly found that it is imperative that if you successfully demonize your opposition, there is no limit to what the dumb masses out there will tolerate.

I will always remember that the siege was still underway when a quickie TV movie was aired in which the federal agents were lionized and whenever the actor playing Koresh was on the screen, ominous music played in the background.  Again, this TV movie aired BEFORE the April 19th assault and fire took place.  The government and their lapdog media realized how imperative it was that the narrative be set as quickly as possible; and keep in mind, this was before the buzzword "narrative" was really used like it is today.

Were the beliefs of the Branch Davidians weird?  I think so.  Did their beliefs justify what was done to them?  Not even close.  What was especially poignant was that one of the primary justifications that Attorney General Janet Reno gave for what ensued was that there were reports of child molestation within the Branch Davidian community.  So Reno's way of saving these children was to incinerate them?

The summer of 1992 had seen the Ruby Ridge/Randy Weaver fiasco in which FBI agents and U.S. Marshals under the George H.W. Bush administration carried out an assault on one American family in Idaho.  You remember that one right?  Where federal agents shot Randy Weaver's teenage son in the back and then later shot his wife in the head while she held their infant child?  That was one of the first indicators to the American people that some sort of shift was beginning to take place.  But the Weaver Affair was small potatoes compared to the Waco massacre of the following year.

As bad as Waco was, we now have an occupier in the White House who makes Bill Clinton seem moderate and reasonable by comparison.  I shudder to think what Barack Obama is capable of doing if given the right circumstances.  He has already shown himself to be willing to take out children by the bushel with overseas drone strikes.  The current fear is that those drones are soon to be unleashed upon We the People.

If you ever want to watch an informative, riveting, maddening, and heartbreaking account of what took place at Waco during February-April 1993, watch the Academy Award-nominated documentary Waco: The Rules of Engagement.  You can watch it in its entirety on YouTube.  The Congressional hearing footage showing those rats like Chuckie Schumer, John Conyers, and other statist snakes will make your blood boil.  For a comprehensive book on the subject, I suggest The Ashes of Waco by Dick Reavis.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Pro-2nd Amendment Rally this Saturday, .223

For the record, that is:

When:  February 23, 2013 (.223) at High Noon (12pm)

Where: California Veterans Memorial Obelisk
13th and Capitol Streets
Sacramento CA State Capitol Park

Additional Info:  Call 916-764-0708

I plan on trying to make it to this event.  I will be the one with a holster strapped to my hip with a banana in the holster to symbolize our governments' (federal and state) attempts to disarm us.

 "If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson

Out: "To Protect and To Serve" In: "To Intimidate and To Show Power"

As the insanity continues to ramp up regarding the statist control freaks among us, and their attempts to disarm the American people, we were today provided with a little glimpse into the mind of one of those statist control freaks.

Let us begin with a little quote from the Chief of Police of the city of Emeryville, California:

One issue that always boggles my mind is that the idea that a gun is a defensive weapon. That is a myth. A gun is not a defensive weapon. A gun is an offensive weapon used to intimidate and show power....

Wow. I don't quite know what to do with that statement.

First of all, a little geographic context is needed.  Emeryville is in the San Francisco Bay Area.  It is sandwiched in between Berkeley to its north, and Oakland to its south, and is the last community you pass on the I-80 Freeway before beginning your trek across the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.  What other kind of person would you expect to be hired to run the police department of a city with that kind of location?

To shamelessly use a gun metaphor, the Chief's comments are a prime example of what can happen when you speak with your brain half-cocked.  Is the Chief actually saying that his Emeryville police officers are going around intimidating and showing their power to the citizens of that fair city?  Is he saying that is what all armed police officers around our nation are doing?

That comment should easily justify the termination of this man's employment with the city of Emeryville, and woe to any other city who would have the gumption to hire this man as their chief of police.

For the record, it is estimated that guns are used defensively somewhere between 800,000 and 2.5 million times per year.  Apparently, no one thought to mention this to the Chief, or he doesn't want to hear it.

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free... it expects what never was, and never will be."  -Thomas Jefferson