Here We Go!

John Fritchey and LaShawn Ford, two of the idiots currently serving as State representatives in Illinois, have asked the Governor to call out the National Guard to deal with the violence in Chicago.

Two state representatives called on Gov. Pat Quinn Sunday to deploy the Illinois National Guard to safeguard Chicago's streets.

Chicago Democrats John Fritchey and LaShawn Ford said they want Quinn, Mayor Richard Daley and Chicago Police Supt. Jody Weis to allow guardsmen to patrol streets and help quell violence. Weis said he did not support the idea because the military and police operate under different rules.

They deny they want tanks rolling in the streets but, last time I looked, the National Guard is an extension of the US Army and the army is a "broadsword, not a scalpel". (Major General William Devereaux played by Bruce Willis in "The Siege"). Perhaps that is a small exaggeration but only by a little.

As crime rates in other, freer, jurisdictions have shown, this problem arises whenever people are denied the means of exercising their basic right of self defense. Soon the citizens of Chicago may be seeing this:

Because their duly elected government will not allow then to own and carry this:


This is not such an aberration. The history of the 20th century demonstrated the willingness of those who claim to be the rulers to slaughter those they claim to rule. This is just another example of a governments preferring to use massive force rather than allow the citizens to use reasonable force.

H/T to Denninger

Everybody Draw Mohammed Day, Redux

I'm not much of a cartoonist but I do know how to use The Gimp. At least for simple stuff...

 

Everybody Draw Mohammed Day

Mark your calenders. In response to Comedy Central's craven submission to threats aimed at the creators of South Park, Dan Savage at The Stranger has declared May 20 as the first annual "Everybody Draw Mohammed Day".

Other links:
Gate of Vienna
Newser
Reason Online

My poor contribution

Yard Work Weirdness

I was cutting weeds along the back fence this morning and some fellow with a pretty think accent (India? Pakistan?) walked up on the opposite side of the fence. When I shut down the mower he said something about dry grass and matches -- it was kind of hard to make it out with the ear plugs in. In retrospect I guess I should have taken time to get a better description JIC he was threatening to set fire to the place but that didn't occur to me at the time.

Ave Atque Vale

Original here

Tuskegee Airman Spann Watson Dead At 93

by Richard Cooper April 21, 2010

Retired US Air Force Colonel Spann Watson died April 15th of complications from pneumonia.  He was one of the original complement of World War II African-American pilots known as the Tuskegee Airmen, which actually formed  the 99th Fighter Squadron based in North Africa and the 322nd Fighter Group based in Italy.  The Tuskegee Airmen were trained by the Division of Aeronautics of Tuskegee Institute, which had been founded by Booker T. Washington. Watson himself flew missions over North Africa, Sicily, Italy and Southern Europe.  Spann Watson remained in the newly created Air Force, retiring with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in 1965.  He joined the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Army Air Corps of their day was segregated by race as were the entire American Armed Forces. 

For 48 years, he was a resident of the Village of Westbury which is why I encountered him twice.  I live in the hamlet of Salisbury and we share the Westbury post office.  In 2001, I attended the Central Westbury Civic Association scholarship fundraising luncheon honoring Colonel Watson.  The Association was then led by the late Mannie Sweat, whom  I knew in my then capacity as Libertarian Party of New York State Chair.   It was a very nice event with singing of "Lift Every Voice & Sing" and "America The Beautiful."

Colonel Watson mentioned the TV movie about the Tuskegee Airmen starring Laurence Fishburne.  He didn't think too highly of it, saying something to the effect that they weren't spending their time fornicating and carrying on.  If I recall correctly, he said something like "We were flyboys, not playboys."

On another occasion I attended a Central Westbury Civic Association meeting.  There were complaints about motorcyclists terrorizing the block.  Someone said they were afraid to talk to the police in case word went back to the troublemakers.  Colonel Watson noted that he was a gunowner with a shotgun and wasn't afraid of riffraff.  He took his First and Second Amendments seriously, I guess.

He was quite a character with an interesting life.  I am glad I encountered him.

Concealed Weapons Permits in Oz

Interesting to see this idea floated here

Despite governments putting more and more police on the street in the CBD of melbourne and getting "tough" on crime, violence is still on the rise. Being under Common Law, Australians' rights are spelled out in the Magna Carta. One of the rights in the Magna Carta is self defense. In the U.S., carry concealed weapons permits have been successful in deterring criminal behaviour, and reducing crimes since potential victims are now able to defend themselves. Criminals think twice. The Liberals party should look at allowing law-abiding adults, with no criminal records the ability to carry concealed weapons in an effort to deter criminal behaviour.

Judging from the comments and my, admittedly incomplete, knowledge of Australian culture, I seriously doubt this will ever happen. The Government and criminal class in Australia have the citizens just about where they want them. I suspect that the crime victim in near future Australia will be forced to follow after his English brethren:  Reduced to hiding his head under the seat cushions in the hope the bad guys will mistake his ass for a bean bag chair.

H/T to David Codrea

On The Recent Glance Directly At Me, From The Death-Star

Latest from Billy Beck

Yes: of course I am aware that I was paraphrased in a speech given last week by an ex-United States president. The e-mail notes have been furious, and still trail in almost a week later. You can read the speech here. That's a .PDF, and the passage at hand is in the first paragraph of page eleven. Everyone who has paid attention to me knows that he mangled my line, but that it is without question my line.

Here are some facts: the speech refers to "...these 'hatriot' groups, the Oath Keepers, the Three Percenters, the others..." (Bottom of page ten.)

Mike Vanderboegh has run the line that I wrote on his weblog almost since the day that I wrote it.

Here is my conjecture: the ex-president either briefly eyeballed that blog himself, or accepted a memo from one of his flunkies which included the line that I wrote.

I have made up my mind that I would be no more interested in hearing his apology than I am offended by his presumption. It is simply a matter of note that The Lying Bastard of The Ozark Long March knows nothing of which he speaks, amid his insinuations that I advocate violence in this poor country's current straits.

Here is a word for that despicable person: I am "a Southerner", too, you strutting ignoramus. I was born in Little Rock, and my mother graduated Central High School six years before Eisenhower finally saw fit to roll out the National Guard. Don't even try to hand me your threadbare sanctimony about "paying" for the Civil War. For many reasons which I will not attempt to relate to you, I am quite beyond your ex cathedra pose in the matter. You have nothing to say to me. Sit down and shut your insipid mouth.

To the rest of you reading this, let me try to explain something to you. Pay close attention:

"If we discard morality and substitute for it the Collectivist doctrine of unlimited majority rule, if we accept the idea that a majority may do anything it pleases, and that anything done by the majority is right because it is done by the majority (this being the only standard of right and wrong) -- how are men to apply this in practice to their actual lives? In relation to each particular man, all other men are potential members of that majority which may destroy him at its pleasure at any moment. Then each man and all men become enemies: each has to fear and suspect all; each must try to rob and murder first, before he is robbed and murdered."

Now, I am not going to attribute that quote for you. I have good reasons for that. I will point out to you that the basic principles on display in that passage are now a matter of the public consciousness: it is an accepted maxim now that, in politics, "either you are at the table or you are on the menu". I will point out to you that America has never before sounded more like a bar-fight than it does now. All of this is because of what Frederick Bastiat put his finger on, one hundred sixty-two years ago, when he wrote: "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."

We now live under The Sucker State. There will be no voting our way out of this, and that is as it should be, in at least one aspect: free people do not supplicate to government. They become manifest in their actions. In any case, however, whole generations have gone down under the rampant delusion that the sources of life spring from everything but individual human productivity: they believe that government can steal for them forever.

The hideous noise that you hear all around you in this culture, now, is only the beginning intimation of how wrong they are. It is the sound of savages scrambling around the lip of the government cannibal-pot, into which all values must eventually be collected by force and from which they will be dispensed under heavy guard. If you are capable of one moment's sense and are not a goddamned deliberate liar -- like an ex-president -- then you can see where this is all going.

There is only one more thing to say, here: every sane person had better hope and pray against violence. This goes for you, Mike, and everyone like you. I understand your efforts and I know why you prepare. This thing could blow-out at any seam, at any moment, and it is only prudent to be ready if that happens.

I, for one, would have far, far greater esteem for anyone ready -- like me -- to present themselves for imprisonment in order to demonstrate to the whole world just what this regime appears to be ready to destroy. No honest person could ever mistake the moral probity of a move like that, and even if it failed, the issue would be unmistakably clear to all -- this battle with a force dedicated to destroying freedom (the word that fell from The Lying Bastard's lips, last Friday) -- and the final and terrible resort to violence would yet be available.

I beg you all to keep cool in this matter.

Just in case you don't already know, the quote is from Ayn Rand. Textbook of Americanism (PDF)

Teacher Terrified by Finger.

What the hell kind of people get hired to be teachers these days? Maybe this article yields some insight into the answer:

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- A 13-year-old girl was suspended from school after she was accused of threatening her teacher. Her family says it's a misunderstanding under a zero tolerance policy.

Bleyl Middle School student Taylor Trostle and her parents say it's a classroom game that got her kicked out of school, and now has her labeled as a "terrorist."

"I was shocked because it just seems ludicrous and appalling," Bleyl Middle School student Taylor Trostle's mother, Kristin Trostle, said.

When Kristin Trostle and her fiancee got a phone call from the principal's office at her daughter's school, they knew something was wrong. But the story they got blew them away.

"I mean, terroristic threat, to me that's a serious statement," Kristin Trostle said. "That's one of the most serious things you could say to somebody."

Taylor was wearing an NYPD shirt at school. She says in the last moments of math class, she and some friends were pretending to be police officers.

"I was shooting the markers at the front of the board," Taylor Trostle said. "It was just like this and I was like 'pow pow' and then she just turned around."

Taylor was sent to the principal's office and immediately suspended for three days. Her write up says the finger gun was pointed in the teacher's direction.

"That was considered a terroristic threat because the teacher feared for her life," Kristin Trostle said.

According to Cy-Fair ISD's code of conduct, a terroristic threat is a level four violation, which is on par with assault, public lewdness, or selling alcohol or drugs at school. Any threat to a teacher falls under a 'zero tolerance policy.'

"Now she's got a very serious mark on her record and she's labeled," Kristin Trostle said.

Cy-Fair ISD denied our repeated requests for comment, so did Taylor Trostle's 7th grade math teacher. Now- Taylor Trostle says she's being mocked at school, for a silly game that got her kicked out.

"They all say that I'm gonna kill somebody, and...they know that I wouldn't do that," she said.

Her mother wants the school district to take a hard look at policies because she believes can tarnish the reputation of an honor roll student like Taylor.

"Really and truly make an honest decision -- is this a legitimate threat, do i really feel threatened by what this child just said?" Kristin Trostle said

H/T to David Codrea

Unbelievable. How can someone actually become a putative adult and still be terrified by a pointed finger? Worse yet, how can someone with such a serious psychological problem be allowed to work with children?

I got your finger right here:

What is History?

Is it the same thing over and over again? Or one damned thing after another? Here is a story illustrating both theories:

BOSTON, April 19

- National Guard units seeking to confiscate a cache of recently banned assault weapons were ambushed on April 19th by elements of a para-military extremist faction. Military and law enforcement sources estimated that 72 were killed and more than 20 injured before government forces were compelled to withdraw.

Speaking after the clash, Massachusetts Governor Thomas Gage declared that the extremist faction, which was made up of local citizens, has links to the radical right-wing tax protest movement. Gage blamed the extremists for recent incidents of vandalism directed against internal revenue offices.

The governor, who described the group's organizers as "criminals," issued an executive order authorizing the summary arrest of any individual who has interfered with the government's efforts to secure law and order.

The military raid on the extremist arsenal followed wide-spread refusal by the local citizenry to turn over recently outlawed assault weapons. Gage issued a ban on military-style assault weapons and ammunition earlier in the week. This decision followed a meeting in early April between government and military leaders at which the governor authorized the forcible confiscation of illegal arms. One government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, pointed out that "none of these people would have been killed had the extremists obeyed the law and turned their weapons over voluntarily."

"Government troops initially succeeded in confiscating a large supply of outlawed weapons and ammunition. However, troops attempting to seize arms and ammunition in Lexington met with resistance from heavily-armed extremists who had been tipped off regarding the government's plans.

During a tense standoff in Lexington's town park, National Guard Colonel Francis Smith, commander of the government operation, ordered the armed group to surrender and return to their homes. The impasse was broken by a single shot, which was reportedly fired by one of the right-wing extremists. Eight civilians were killed in the ensuing exchange.

Ironically, the local citizenry blamed government forces rather than the extremists for the civilian deaths. Before order could be restored, armed citizens from surrounding areas had descended upon the guard units. Colonel Smith, finding his forces over-matched by the armed mob, ordered a retreat.

Governor Gage has called upon citizens to support the state/national joint task force in its effort to restore law and order. The governor has also demanded the surrender of those responsible for planning and leading the attack against the government troops. Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, and John Hancock, who have been identified as "ringleaders" of the extremist faction, remain at large.

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
-George Santayana 1863-1952

Courtesy of Big Gay Al's Big Gay (Gun) Blog

Oh My God! They're EVERYWHERE!

Mike Vanderboegh has a suggestion for all the three percent: Get a job

With the IRS.

Nancy Pelosi has given us a great opportunity in the new "Health Care" Law. She's hiring some 16,000 plus new Internal Revenue agents to enforce her tyranny. So, why can't some of those be Three Percenters? I mean, there's a bunch of us out of work, yet we have clean records and skills that would dovetail nicely with those required of an IRS agent. Hey, we would also have the advantage of actually meaning it when they swear us in -- you know, that oath to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic."

Indeed, while the private sector is shrinking, government at most levels is still growing, so the IRS is not the only agency that could benefit from dozens, hundreds, thousands of Ned Broy's.

Read the whole thing here

For those who cannot work for the IRS, get a magic marker, a paint can, make stickers or posters. Let them know "We are Everywhere!"

Come on. Free up a little of your inner tagger. Spit in the eye of authority. Run a red light. Deface a public restroom wall. Carefully, though. We need all of you.