… and the Democrats turn on one of the founders of their party …
When Conspiracy Theories Become Spoiler Alerts …
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Category Archives: Politics
Finally, Some Transparency
The Committee on House Administration Subcommittee on Oversight has announced that United States Capitol Police video footage from 6 January, 2021 will be made available to the public through two methods, a new online viewing room and in person at the subcommittee’s offices in Washington, D.C.
The public will be able to access the footage via an online public view room on the Committee on House Administration’s website. As an example, here’s a random screenshot from the video file 0126USCS01UpperWestTerrace_2021-01-06_15h29min53s277ms_1.mp4
If, in fact, there are over 44,000 hours of video, it’s gonna take a while to screen everything. However, it won’t be long before the coverage of certain times and places has been reviewed.
Quote of the Day
The mob is the mother of tyrants.
—Diogenes
Don’t Know Much About …
… firearms or the history of firearms.
I saw this on X (TSMPFKAT)—
This tweet is false. Whether through ignorance or purposeful lying, it’s false.
There’s no such thing as an AR-15 chambered for the .308 Winchester (or 7.62x51mm NATO) cartridge shown above. Neither the rifle’s chamber nor the magazine well are long enough to accept the cartridge.
In the mid ’50s, Eugene Stoner designed a rifle chambered for the 7.62 NATO round while he was working for a company called Armalite. The AR-10 (Armalite Rifle 10) was adopted by a few countries, but it was not as well received as the FN FAL and H+K G3 rifles.
One of the problems with the 7.62 NATO cartridge is that it is too powerful for use in full automatic fire from an infantry rifle. Real world experience showed that automatic rifles using medium power cartridges, such as the StG 44 and AK-47, were more practical infantry weapons. This led Stoner to design a second rifle chambered in the less powerful .223 Remington. That rifle was the AR-15 which the U.S. military adopted as the M16.
One of the problems with .223 Remington is that it’s on the low end of the medium-power cartridge scale, so it is often not considered powerful enough for humane one-shot kills of game as large as deer. Thus, many of us who served with M16s and are familiar with the AR platform have chosen AR-10 family rifles chambered in .308 Winchester or related cartridges for hunting. I haven’t. My go-to deer guns are a bolt action rifle in .270 Winchester or an AR-15 chambered for the round used in the AK-47. That’s 762X39mm not 7.62X51mm.
Assault rifle is a military term of art with a specific definition.
An assault rifle is a select fire rifle that uses an intermediate-rifle cartridge and a detachable box magazine.
Select fire means being capable of full automatic fire, i.e., being used as a machine gun.
The Lewiston shooter apparently used a semiautomatic Ruger rifle derived from the AR-10 that is legal for deer hunting in Maine. The rifle he used wasn’t a machine gun. It wasn’t an assault rifle.
Quote of the Day
Wer aber nur ein Mal in das brechende Auge eines sterbenden Kriegers auf dem Schlachtfeld geblickt hat, der besinnt sich, bevor er einen Krieg anfängt. But anyone who has once looked into the glassy eyes of a dying warrior on the battle-field would think twice before beginning a war.
—Otto von Bismark
The Search for a Speaker Slogs Onward
There’s no requirement that the Speaker of the House must be an elected representative. I suppose they can look for an outsider if all else fails.
I wish to state the following for the record: If nominated, I will not run, and if elected, I will not server. I have more productive things to do.
Quote of the Day
Blessed are the young for they shall inherit the national debt.
—Herbert Hoover
Tonight’s Postmortem
Well, a significant amount time was wasted by panelists talking over one another.
Burgum was straightforward in pointing out that some things aren’t the business of the federal government. Christie talked about how to use federal assets within constitutional limits, but even he suggested the need for at least one federal law to address a non-federal problem.
The South Carolinians did not come off well. Tim Scott’s lack of executive experience showed in his answers. Nikki Haley stuck me as abrasive.
Mike Pence is past his sell-by date.
Ramaswamy seems to have a lot of good ideas that aren’t well integrated politically. As Bismarck noted, politics is the art of the possible. Some of the things Ramaswamy wants to do aren’t doable, at least in the short run.
I don’t think DeSantis hurt himself, but I also don’t think he helped himself either.
So who won? Burgum seemed to be the adult in the room. Christie talked a game that would be good if he can get the voters to trust him. DeSantis didn’t move the needle one way or the other.
Given that the debate was in California, maybe the winner was Gavin Newsom.
Tonight’s Panel Discussion
Some of the candidates for the 2024 Republican nomination for President are getting together at the Reagan Library for a panel discussion masquerading as a debate. I plan to watch it, but rather than soberblogging* as it goes, I’ll present a postmortem afterwards.
Stay tuned.
* Vodkapundit does plan to engage in drunkblogging. His running commentary is often more interesting than the event itself.
Quote of the Day
Better to be disliked than pitied.
—Abba Eban
What Do Eagles and Big Cat’s Have in Common?
Wind farms are not their friends.
We’ve known for decades that wind farm are deadly for birds, and their effects on jaguars and pumas has been in the news of late. This is from the Wall Street Journal (bypasses paywall)—
Jaguars and pumas are facing extinction in the Caatinga, Brazil’s northeastern shrublands, as Europe and China pour investment into wind farms, puncturing the land with vast turbines that are scaring the animals away from the region’s scant water sources.
Particularly sensitive to changes to their habitat, the jaguars and pumas abandon their lairs as soon as construction work on the wind farms begins, said Claudia Bueno de Campos, a biologist who helped found the group Friends of the Jaguars and has tracked the region’s vanishing feline population. They then roam vast distances across the dusty plains in search of new streams and rivers.
The weakest perish along the way. Others venture closer to villages, where locals have started laying traps to protect their small herds of goats and sheep, often their only form of survival in this impoverished region.
The wind power industry has doubled its capacity in Brazil since 2018, setting the country up to be the world’s fourth-biggest producer by 2027 behind China, the U.S. and Germany, according to the Brazilian Wind Power Association, an industry body.
But by helping to solve one problem—climate change—the wind industry risks creating others, warn conservationists.
. . .
While the big cats are still plentiful in the Amazon and Brazil’s Pantanal wetlands, those in the Caatinga are unique, having adapted to cope with the intense heat. Jaguars have yellowish fur with black spots and are stockier than pumas, which feature a single brown to gray color. Jaguars are more sensitive to changes in their environment, biologists say.
The disappearance of the felines would throw the region’s ecosystem out of whack, leading to a proliferation of animals that serve as prey, such as wild boar, deer and armadillos, said Felipe Melo, a researcher at the Federal University of Pernambuco who has studied the impact of the wind power industry in the Caatinga.
Read the whole thing.
Contempt of Court?
New Mexico Governor Grisham is following the traditional Democrat playbook and engaging in massive resistance to the federal court’s injunction prohibiting her from enforcing or attempting to enforce her facially unconstitutional ban on the carrying of firearms in Albuquerque and Bernadillo County. She announced that she is amending her executive order so that is only applies to parks and playgrounds.
However, the judge’s order states—
In addition, Defendants are ENJOINED from applying, enforcing, or attempting to enforce, either criminally or civilly, Section (4) of the New Mexico Department of Health’s ‘Public Health Emergency Order Imposing Temporary Firearm Restrictions, Drug Monitoring and Other Public Safety Measures’ to the extent it imposes additional restrictions on the carrying or possession of firearms that were not already in place prior to its issuance.
Because the ban on carrying in parks and playground did not exist prior to the issuance of the executive order, reinstating it appears to be an explicit violation of the injunction.
Quote of the Day
The presidency has many problems, but boredom is the least of them.
—Richard M. Nixon
Quote of the Day
There might be some serious fun in politics.
—Hunter S. Thompson
In Re Those Indictments
I’ve been subjected to both frivolous civil civil suits and false criminal charges myself, so the Gentle Reader should not be surprised that I oppose what is being done to Donald Trump. However, my being opposed to illegal and unconstitutional acts by a set of politicians should not be seen as support for Trump’s reelection.
Watched the Show Tonight
I fired up Rumble and watched the panel discuss masquerading as a debate.
Here’s my hot take.
Hutchinson came in dead last from my point of view, but he was only slightly behind Burgum. Neither of the candidates from South Caroline (Scott and Haley) nor Pence convinced me they understood that nature of the fundamental changes that must be imposed to reign in the bureaucracy. Christie surprised me by doing as well as he did, but there’s something about him I don’t trust. Ramaswamy seems to be trying to understand the core nature and causes of the nation’s problems, but while he’s identified problems to be solved, I’m not sure he’s headed toward practical, realizable solutions.
That leaves DeSantis. I like what DeSantis has actually achieved in Florida, but I I’m not sure he has the skills to sell his campaign to enough purple state voters to beat the margin of fraud in 2024.
I suppose I’d like to see someone with DeSantis’ record and Reagan’s campaign skills.
Is it 2025 yet?
UPDATE—I voted against Hillary Clinton in 2016 and against Joe Biden in 2020. I had to vote for Donald Trump in order to do so. Trump has never been my candidate of choice in any primary or general election.
I’m Not Making This Up, You Know
Don’t Know Much About History
George III was unavailable for comment.
Quote of the Day
When you say you agree to a thing in principle you mean that you have not the slightest intention of carrying it out in practice.
—Otto von Bismarck
The Power To Destroy
I’ve read through the latest Trump indictment, and I generally concur with Jonathan Turley’s analysis—
If you take a red pen to all of the material presumptively protected by the First Amendment, you can reduce much of the indictment to haiku …
There’s no there there.
Donald Trump did not drain The Swamp after winning the 2016 election. He left too many of its denizens in place, and they were better prepared for 2020.
Trump’s real crime against the Deep State was winning in 2016. They intend to destroy him for that, and they will do it out in the open for all to see—pour encourager les autres.
The object of power is power.
They’re Missing Something
None of the indictments against Donald Trump include mopery with intent to lurk.
Quote of the Day
The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits.
—Plutarch
The Gathering Storm
My podcasting partner Stacy McCain has a post up about one of our former codefendant’s take on the coming Republican primary season. Stacy notes in a post titled If Trump Has Lost Ace of Spades …
I don’t know, but maybe some of Trump’s more outspoken supporters should think about their toning down their rhetoric just a wee bit, because they appear to be in danger of violating Rule Number One: Never piss off Ace of Spades.
Ace has very good instincts about who is or is not Down For The Agenda. If he ever starts taking shots at somebody, you can bet that sooner or later that person will prove himself to be an unprincipled quisling.
Like Stacy, I’m more-or-less agnostic about who should be the Republican nominee for 2024—in my case so long as the nominee meets William F. Buckley’s criterion of the most conservative candidate who can win. I doubt that Donald Trump is that person because I doubt that he can win another general election.
The next few months are going to be interesting, but not necessarily in a good way,
All The News That’s Fit To Print
That is—all the news that fits The Narrative.
Yep, that the most recent searchable story in the New York Times related to “FD-1023.”
Quote of the Day
The best weapon against an enemy is another enemy.
—Friedrich Nietzsche