WHAT MADNESS IS THIS?

I have been overhearing conversation by talking heads about a possible Obama veto that would somehow be employed by him if a majority of the Senate voted no about whatever kind of surrender document he signed with Iran. I don't understand what these idiots are talking about. There's a bunch of them talking about it right now on the Diane Reims Show and each of them says that if the majority vote no then the President will simply override the will of the majority with a veto. They seem to think that he can do that safely because somehow, in this weird universe, if the Senate votes no and the President stamps it with a veto, it all adds up to yes. But it doesn't!

How the hell does that work? He can veto a bill but that only means one thing. It means the bill does not become a law. Is the Kerry surrender document a treaty which requires the consent of the Senate? It doesn't sound like it because they're talking about the House voting too and their advice and consent is neither sought nor required for Treaties which, when APPROVED by the Senate become the law of the land.

Have I gone mad? What are these people talking about?

THE PLANETARY SOCIETY

It's a nice place. Interesting things happen there.

SOME FLAG LURVING

M. Williamson has some fun with the social justice bullies at his place.

My favorites:

NEVER LEARN ON STEROIDS

The Greeks got it nailed. From Thucydides:

Having learned nothing after 2450 years, the Greeks bear up under the load of a debt they don't mean to pay and stole from other countries in the first place. It does make one wonder why the Germans haven't figured out a way to manufacture a glacier that will remorselessly slide all the Greeks of Hellas into the sea and leave it for the goats. Such a glacier would solve two problems the Germans don't want to deal with. You know how Germans deal with little problems like that.

SUPERCOOL

From the daily time waster person.

ORGAN LEGGERS

When Larry Niven wrote about them I thought they were creatures of the future. We are now living in the progressive future where they will kill, rend and sell human body parts to buyers and suffer no remorse and, it goes without saying, any legal sanction from the law. It is the ones that question the legalism of the socialist regime that suffer from the law.

If only there was some way to aim the jihadis at our common enemy. I assure you that right at this moment there are thousands of government workers laboring mightily to do just that thing. Unfortunately, all of them consider us the enemy. S'OK.

The burn from the white hot grease has fled now. I took a minute tonight to peruse the Instapundit and earlier, Maggies Farm. I kind of regret it except for the pictures from USS NEW HORIZONS as it made closest approach to Pluto. I am looking forward to the hi-res photography. I started out with a 1200 baud modem. I imagine the guys at JPL are tearing their hair out about now. Still, they're the most patient men and women in the world.

If you are interested, there was a good book.

It was today that my girl learned that I blog. I wonder how long it will take the new computer enabled girl to find us.

REGISTER TO VOTE IN EVERY PRIMARY

I used to live (for 30 years) in the western most continental state and hated that by the time the damned primary vote came to our state, the idiots in the moron states had managed to eliminate all the good candidates and left us only people like McCain and Kerry to vote for on our ballots.

What? I asked, is wrong with long distance voting in all the primaries as they roll across the country so that when it is 'my turn' I can still choose the candidate that I favored before he dropped out of the race after losing Iowa or Vermont?

Probably nothing at all.

Can't you see it now, 65,000% of eligible voters in Vermont voted in the next primary.

My kind of voter literacy.

POST AMERICA

We lost to the Edict of Nantes. I am not surprised. None of the Ruling Class like us.

Alexander Ciccolo, 23, of Adams, Mass., was taken into custody on gun charges after buying two pistols and two rifles from an undercover FBI confidential informant, federal officials said. In a search of his apartment, officials reported they found it loaded with possible bomb-making equipment including a pressure cooker, a variety of chemicals, an alarm clock, along with “attack planning papers” and “jihad” paperwork. FBI agents said he used the name Abu Ali al-Amriki and neighbors said he was a recent convert to Islam.

I wonder.

It, oddly enough, is not against the law to buy pistols and rifles from Federal Fire Arm people such as the actual FBI. Possible bomb making equipment ought not to include common household items such as an actual "pressure cooker" or those evil statist bastards would make them as hard to sell as crack or meth. (anybody can do that!)

Just WTF is a variety of chemicals? Clorox? spice? Tide? non-lickable postage stamps? (the world needs to know if jail is the only option should the FBI or law enforcement investigate your home chemicals.) I know a potential terrorist in Ypsilante and I'll name her as such if they promise me full custody of 'the kid'. (DO YOU EVEN SENSE THE FULL EVIL OF THAT SENTENCE?)

HOLY SHIT!"
"THAT MAN HAS AN ALARM CLOCK!!"
"KILL HIM!!!"
"That evil mofo has an ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA!!!!"
"He's a Terrorist!!!!!"

First I think they condition us with global warming and announce the death of the world and then they build down and announce that pressure cookers are nothing but terrorist bombs and yet,
they think we accept their stupidity and total charades like border enforcement and the TSA as our 'defense' in the war on terrorism.

DISCLOSURES

I once bought a crockpot for my x wife. I will gladly give the feds her current address. We failed to actually own a pressure cooker whatever that is.

I bought guns from people with a Federal Fire Arms License. Should I be afraid that DOJ and FBI scumbag communists will take that as a threat? After all, they sold them to me with full 'ruling legal authority' at the time. Wait, isn't it legal to buy fire arms from the FBI of all people? Yeah, we know about the 'walking' scandal where ATF and like Agencies sold government guns and machine guns to Mexican drug cartels. That was totally legal just like everything Obama did is legal.

I spent the last 2 days flying coach in America. It was brutal.

Seriously, a man owns an alarm clock and the FBI guns up and invades his castle. I wonder, is there a setting on such things for 'wake up! the FBI will bash down the door and conduct a home invasion in a week?' For the record, I don't actually own any sort of alarm clock. NONE AT ALL. Srsly, why get up for the NSA or HLS?

When my aged parents discarded their entire Encyclopedia Brittanica dating back to 1950, I opted out. They gave it to my little sister. It contains all kinds of crap the modern FBI and TSA find frightening. I am sure it actually has stuff on it about Yawheh and other religious persons. Sure am glad that sort of information isn't available online.

Oh. For the record, this is like the first time HLS have ever done their actual job. It was probably part of their routine investigation of white law enforcement officers because they're noted terrorists.

Congratulations HLS! You actually caught a real live terrorist. I admit to being a tad bit surprised that he isn't a 79 year old wheel chair bound woman with an oxygen tank keeping her alive. That's usually your speed.

Bad news. He's a friend of Hillary Clinton and he'll get off with a warning and an endowed chair as professor at some elite American university like Obama's Chicago friends and neighborhood bomber/murderers.

FOX NEW

I'm on the airline roads and I had plenty of time to observe Fox News. I remember the old one from 10 years ago when I had it on in my office and the OPS office for the morning. We were still hard at war back then. Before that I lived in a place with cable of my choosing and Fox was available.

I watched for the first time in 4 years and decided it had turned into MSNBC.

I won't watch it again. Unlike the horrible BBC, it isn't news anymore.

It sucks and is among the most biased 'ne s ' I've ever seen and not in a good way.

You heard it here, "FOX NEWS SUCKS."

WE WORKED

We didn't work at fine jobs but we worked to make money since that was our only choice if we wanted money. We had girl friends and cars that needed gasoline. After a full day of schooling we went to work in order to be free on the weekends to go and water ski or sail or take someone to the movie.

I have reached the age where one simply admires the young who work at those jobs.

We were not physicists or advance teams for the democratic party. We held the most humble jobs as forerunners to the future when we could get real jobs. We knew that. Unlike our peers, we did not think that that job was the bomb. I needed money to make the car go, the girls agreeable and je ne sais quoi. I was a janitor, a sailing instructor, marina operator, a dishwasher and a cook. That last one still frightens my daughter who claims I cannot cook.

I am amazed at my nephews and I have a bunch. They have never worked at all. Their parents give them money. One of the lot sent me an email today asking me to write a letter of endorsement for him to be an eagle scout. He specified that I should use my title and rank  and said I should be sure to mention that I was worthy.

I am tempted to sign it Osama bin Laden.

I probably won't.

SABBATICAL

Sabbatical started when I got underway on Saturday and proceeded independently to pick up girl in the name of love. I'll be on sabbatical until July 26th. I will post when I have time and am too outraged, (next post in about 12 minutes).

Today was a perfect day to go kayaking on the Potomac because it was raining just a little bit but instead, we went shopping until we bought her her first actual laptop. She had a Leapster, a DS2 and an iPod but for some odd reason we are forced to conclude that this computer is her first.

I'm OK with that. Tonight we watched Jumper. I knew what it was but she didn't. I suspect that she still thinks that somewhere, there is an Easter Bunny and a pony. It's long after midnight but I have no doubt that upstairs in this house she is applying 6 different programming languages to write apps that will make millions. I also gave her the first iteration of the Captain K speech. We'll see how it goes. Right now it hangs in the balance. One needs to learn early to conceal one's distaste for the ruling class or lose out on all opportunity in society. It's a lesson her mother never learned. In truth, it wasn't a lesson that woman ever heard of.

NO NO, NOT THE PURSE!

One occasionally sees the girl avec purse. A slim, no nonsense looking thing that might contain cash but little else but most of us are more familiar with the purse of the essential bricks of life and the idea that one could, in a moment of life and depth, reach into said purse to pull out a gun.....no no. Unless it was the giant .44 magnum, no way would you find it before being well ventilated.

De Caro’s presence threw the suspect, and Russell took advantage of the confusion by feigning a search for valuables in her purse. She then handed her purse to her husband, who pulled the gun out from it and was able to shoot and kill the alleged assailant, but not before being shot three times himself.

That guy was lucky he only got shot 3 to 5 times. My God! Have you seen inside a women's purse?

MINIONS

We saw it tonight. We laughed out loud and so did the other 20 people in our private theatre. With an audience that small I was kind of surprised when they all got up and left the theatre without watching the closing credits. I would have thought they were savvy enough to know that there are always out -takes in the closing credits and, let's be honest, ranglers.

THE LONG SHIPS PASSING

It is a book about fire. Wooden ships can burn to the waterline and sink in 12 minutes. I used to write that in my night orders. There was a record of ships exactly like ours that burned to the waterline and sank in 12 minutes. I wanted my men to be alive to the danger. Fires that killed started in the engine rooms.

This book is a little older than me (lots older). It talks about fire claiming ships in the Great Lakes like Mud Island talks about the burnings, explosions and loss of paddle wheel steamers on the Mississippi River.

Like the great but little known books on things navigational, this one is authentic. I will quote:

Steamboat commerce to Chicago was inaugurated in the summer of 1832, when with the outbreak of Black Hawk's War the United States Army chartered four vessels to transport troops and supplies from Buffalo to Fort Dearborn. That proved to be a sorry inauguration, though a flood tide of commerce quickly followed it. 

Two of those four transports never reached their destination. When the Henry Clay came up Lake Erie to Detroit with 370 soldiers, she brought a terrifying malady with them. Behind her in Buffalo cholera had broken out and was sweeping the town. Before they reached Detroit a number of the troops had been taken violently ill and when one of them died the vessel was ordered away from the public wharf. Shunned as a pest ship with her sick list growing, the Henry Clay proceeded up the St. Clair River to Fort Gratiot, just above the town of Port Huron. There the sick were carried ashore, and the terrified men not yet stricken fled the ship. They scattered through the fields and woods and some lay down in the streets and on the shore and died. A hundred and fifty of them made their way back to Detroit where they were taken in by Andrew Mack, proprietor of of the Mansion House. In a short time two hundred Detroit citizens were stricken with the disease.  

Another troop ship, the Sheldon Thompson, sailed past Detroit but put into Mackinac Island for fuel wood. While the steamer fueled several stricken soldiers were taken ashore. They died soon after the vessel had resumed her course. Two fur traders who left Mackinac the next day fell ill before they had traveled twenty miles. They struggled on, not knowing the nature of their malady, until their bodies were fired with fever and their shaking hands turned purple before their eyes. They died with the wilderness around them. But the disease did not spread in that latitude with its sparse settlement.

Meanwhile the Sheldon Thompson arrived outside the Chicago River (then undredged and fordable at its mouth?. She anchored there with the doom spreading through her cabins. Sixteen of her troops were already dead and buried in Lake Michigan. During the next five days eighty-eight more bodies slipped into the water. When word reached a fleet of schooners anchored along the shore they made sail frantically and scattered like gulls over the lake. Within a few weeks cholera broke out in St Louis and New Orleans. 

So the great epidemic of the 1830's passed through America's waterways. It had begun in central India, and was carried, by way of Tehran, to Moscow. In the spring of 1831 it took thousands of lives in Warsaw and that autumn it ravaged Hamburg. A trading vessel carried it to England in October. In June of 1832 a British ship arrived in the St. Lawrence with a list of 145 immigrants, of whom forty-two had died of cholera during the passage. In the next four months it spread from Buffalo up the the Great Lakes and down the Mississippi. Disease traveled the trade routes of the New World. 

During the summer the dread of plague lingered over the little town of Chicago. The Indians heard of the scourge and sought the immunity that came from the powerful 'English milk' that gurgled out of oaken barrels. A Potawatomi chief appeared at the Agency house, observing in his own tongue that he was a good man, a very good man and a loyal friend of the the Long Knives. Could he not then have a dram of whisky? The agent replied that he never gave whisky to good men; good men never asked for whisky or liked to drink it. Before he had finished that brief homily the Indian spoke in English.
"Me dam rascal."

I like and prefer old history. I stopped reading history books written after the passing of Charles Oman. I can't stand revisionists. Go to primary sources, secondary sources and eschew made up fictional history.

HOW SCARY?

I know a frightening number of people who will vote for her even though they don't trust her at all.

I don't understand how people can be that stupid. On the other hand, the left only has the lying Clinton, Bernie the communist and perhaps noted author J. Webb as candidates for president. I've met Webb and he isn't a raving nutcase. He is sure to come in 4th place in the democratic primary. The actual Green party, the PETA party and Al Gore will all get more votes than poor Webb. 

Kind of makes you wonder now though doesn't it? Why isn't that hack Kerry throwing his head in the ring again? He was a senator too and has all that rich experience as Secretary of State gained by thoroughly disemboweling the remains of the State Department and selling Obama's enemies down the nuclear river. Perhaps he feels over qualified.

On the gripping hand, somebody who knows him should poke him and see if he's still alive or if Clinton somehow had him turned into a zombie.

THE NEW PRINCE OF DARKNESS

Our evil overlord and his dimbulb EPA enforcers have set their tiny little minds to shutting down power, light and industry in the United States. These guys really are the most sanguinary evil bunch to come down the pike since communism and they are ready, able, willing and empowered to screw us all in the name of global warming. Some people elect to believe the great lies like communism and others merely pay lip service to those beliefs for the graft, corruption, money and power it will bring them. Isn't it funny how it all started here in America with that phony charlatan Al Gore.

Prince of Darkness*

Lord of the Flies

*I know, many people confuse the Prince of Darkness with Satan or Lucas electric systems.

MUBAREK MILITARY CITY AND ME

I served on the staff of JTF A in Cairo West and one day I flew up to Mubarek Military City in a Huey. We flew up the river for a while before heading out over the desert and landed without incident. While I was there I met a young Army captain ( I was a young LCDR at the time) and I asked what the hell happened to him because he was covered in scalp wounds and scrapes. He told me that he had gone to the head at 0330 and a platoon sergeant punched him down the stair well for daring to appear without every single aspect of a soldier's uniform, kit, weapon, including MOPP gear.

I was curious. The guys from the 24th ID up at MMC had weapons so I asked him, "did you shoot the son of a bitch?"

He explained as how that was not the Army way.

It was mo debinately not the Navy way.

For a long time, nobody, and I mean nobody, ever gave hand weapons to sailors because we were/are so dangerous. I can still remember the building commander telling the Admiral after 9/11 that while the Marines are free to park an M60 tank at the entrance he had no plans to arm any sailors under his command. I spent the next 18 years working with the armed sailors of our mobile expeditionary forces. They did pretty much what the admirals suspected but the minor thing to keep in mind is that so too did the Army and the Marines.

We practiced defense and that was a mission area we inherited from some fairly elite close combat sailors who refused to do it anymore for the Navy. I think the first time I heard that was in 1988 when a Special Boat Unit gunner's mate volunteered to help us out with our Mk19s and told us that SPECWAR guys were never ever going to do defense again. They held true to his statement. Over the years I found that the only way to attract the attention of SPECWAR was too classified for this forum.

They're predictable.

A TRIFLING THING

Abortion is indeed of no account in the United States. You have to look at State laws on the sales of beer, wine and hard liquor to discern the founder's intent when it comes to the real meaning of the laboratory of democracy and State's rights. I went to school in Pennsylvania. It is an odd state. It has the most ridiculous liquor laws I've ever seen and these days I live in MetroParkCentralis where a teenager cashier is forced to call for adults to actually physically lay hands on any wine or beer that passes through the cashier's lane, so that's saying something.

I moved here from California where they'll sell anything that doesn't move without any wriggle room at all in the law. They still have counties that won't let you carry a gun legally but you can certainly buy them everywhere.

How do such arcane and arrantly stupid laws remain on the books while the courts loftily overturn State laws on gayness and abortion and other words that weld people to their convictions about what is right and lawful? Even guns, ammo and concealed carry get a more reasoned and rational debate about why one state is allowed to set/make/enforce different laws than other states. Yeah, New York, I'm looking at you.

We have a day to reflect on the meaning of independence before heading back to work. It's certainly worth thinking about. You guys in Pennsylvania and New York might right a letter to your legislators and ask them why they are so stuck on stupid on these topics.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

Independence Day, not quite what it used to be but still well worth celebrating. I'll put up the flag and mow the yard so it looks good as my neighbors walk by on their way to the block party I'm sure we're having. (We reached the point where nobody bothers to announce these things anymore, they just happen 4 times a year on some sort of schedule known to the illuminati.)

I see that once again we are letting certain people recreate hell on earth. It's a good day to take a pause and consider the freedoms that this country once assumed were the common rights of mankind. It took a little refining but all the best ores require some refining.

As you celebrate today, try to imagine others of like mind who decide to take up arms and cast off the outmoded models that are so much the icons of our friends who still elect to see the good in people like Hillary Clinton or Jose Biden Fidel Castro, Ayatollah Khameni or even Bernie Sanders.

A FIELD GUIDE TO ACELA REPUBLICANS

The truth hurts. Enjoy the whole thing at the Federalist

Acela Republicans never get invited to the prom in the general election. No matter how perfectly reasonable Acela Republicans think they’ve been, the Democratic candidate could eat a live baby on national television, proclaim fealty to Cthulhu, and threaten to incinerate Topeka with cleansing nuclear flame and the media will still be in his camp at the end. No matter how corrupt (Clinton), crazy (Sanders), commie (Warren) the Democrat is, they’re getting all the media love in the end.

CLOCKODILES

I aim to turn to you tube. It is clearly the safest bet. 

He was released after six hours of questioning during which police watched videos of him on the Internet showing that he is a theater and television actor, and checked his profile on Wikipedia, which states that he is a Buddhist.

i am of extraspecial interest when i fly. it egets old. i'm tired of it.

BOOKS ARE WHERE YOU FIND THEM

The Hillbrook is a place that features books. It's a very nice place to stay. The room we usually stay in features all of the books by Rudyard Kipling.

FROM HERE TO THERE AND BACK AGAIN

Other than the burn, it was a trellig good vacation. The map below pretty much conveys the journey there and back.  We, as usual, took a cruise across the lake of Champlain because, after all, doesn't every true vacation involve a voyage? We could cruise to Bulgaria you know. But what's the point? Maine is pretty much Bulgaria without the ruins. Nice coastline though.

NEXT TIME

We missed it last time but next time, we are going to walk all the way around. If you go to Vegas, do spend an hour to walk through Desert Passages. In the high desert, you can find a place that doesn't exist anymore. If you've been to the souk, it is so much the better.

Here at home we have both the lightening and the thunder. Very close.

ENDLESS FUN

Do you also find it amusing that our legislators in a city that bans all weapons, is all the time deploying or talking about deploying nuclear weapons, missiles and guns everywhere in the world?

Tra la la Boom da Day, tra la la Boom da Day

I don't think they know what irony is. They probably think it is used to press clothing.