My Happy New Year! will start off with a trip to Medical City, Dallas to see a new to me doctor. This one specializes in vein and artery repair. That's Wednesday, the 2nd. Then on the 14th Linda Lou gets her other knee rebuilt.
The new Doc will be looking at the reason my circulation is almost nil in my right foot. The answer is actually simple, that's the injury that changed my plan of a military career. Seems those Docs back then didn't do such a good job. Oh well, maybe the civilian docs might repair enough damage to let me keep that foot. If not, ARRR! I'll be a real hit on Talk Like a Pirate Day!
So, I may be out of pocket a lot over the next few weeks. More likely though, I'll be sitting even more than usual. We'll see.
Monday, December 31, 2012
Thursday, December 27, 2012
Christmas Call From An Old Friend
I got a surprise phone call from one of my oldest friends on Christmas day. We have little or nothing in common anymore but memories of the days that we were each our Momma's extra kid. He's a high school teacher in an unnamed Blue State, just retired from the national board of a major "peace group". And I, well, I'm me, still thinking that the United States Military is the single greatest force for world peace.
Our self-selected brotherhood overcomes that, though. Anyhow,after the Christmas greetings came the talk of the horrific Newtown mess. Now my old friend is an excellent shot, or was fifty years ago and he has no qualms about using force in defense of self or others. As we spoke he mentioned that he is thinking of a smaller gun than his six shot .357 Magnum. The last time he was here in Resume Speed, Texas he commented on how much stiffer the actions on our little five shot revolvers is than his six shot.
Anyhow, this peacenik is looking at some of the smaller firearms to carry to his teaching job.
I am sure his blue state legislature would never countenance such a thing but he's probably going to do it anyway.
Dear Antigunners: If you have lost the peace movement high school teacher(s), perhaps you have lost the argument. The only thing to stop the bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. My friend, my brother, is a good guy.
Our self-selected brotherhood overcomes that, though. Anyhow,after the Christmas greetings came the talk of the horrific Newtown mess. Now my old friend is an excellent shot, or was fifty years ago and he has no qualms about using force in defense of self or others. As we spoke he mentioned that he is thinking of a smaller gun than his six shot .357 Magnum. The last time he was here in Resume Speed, Texas he commented on how much stiffer the actions on our little five shot revolvers is than his six shot.
Anyhow, this peacenik is looking at some of the smaller firearms to carry to his teaching job.
I am sure his blue state legislature would never countenance such a thing but he's probably going to do it anyway.
Dear Antigunners: If you have lost the peace movement high school teacher(s), perhaps you have lost the argument. The only thing to stop the bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. My friend, my brother, is a good guy.
Saturday, December 22, 2012
Dear Andrew
So I look in The Puppyblender's site and notice that New York Governor Andrew Cuomo finally admits out loud that gun confiscation "could be the answer". Well, it's like this, Andy: When those bodyguards of yours give up all their guns, my kids will give up theirs. Oh, you say, "I'm a public figure, I need protection." Foo, far more ordinary people are murdered every day than cheap politicos. You, Andy, are no more important than my daughter.
I've noticed, Andy, that all you politicians and important (to whom?) actors have bodyguards. The New York Time, thundering about "high capacity ammunition" (idiots) has armed guards at the door. I'll tell you who doesn't have a taxpayer funded armed guard, Andy: my wife. She's on a walker, far more helpless than you, or would Be if you didn't have those guys with evil semiautomatic pistols and "assault rifles" handy. Oh, I forgot. Your bodyguards are active duty cops, they have access to real assault rifles, don't they?
Here's the deal, Andy. This is not some stinkin' foreign place with royalty. My people came to get away from them. You, Andy, and all your lefty pals, are no more important than my grandchildren. Since neither the taxpayers or big media pays anyone to hang around with guns, just to protect them in the odd chance that a nut will show up, like you and your pals, we have guns.
Andy, we'll give our guns, right after you set the example. Until you do, we'll keep wandering through life, protecting our owns best we can.
I've noticed, Andy, that all you politicians and important (to whom?) actors have bodyguards. The New York Time, thundering about "high capacity ammunition" (idiots) has armed guards at the door. I'll tell you who doesn't have a taxpayer funded armed guard, Andy: my wife. She's on a walker, far more helpless than you, or would Be if you didn't have those guys with evil semiautomatic pistols and "assault rifles" handy. Oh, I forgot. Your bodyguards are active duty cops, they have access to real assault rifles, don't they?
Here's the deal, Andy. This is not some stinkin' foreign place with royalty. My people came to get away from them. You, Andy, and all your lefty pals, are no more important than my grandchildren. Since neither the taxpayers or big media pays anyone to hang around with guns, just to protect them in the odd chance that a nut will show up, like you and your pals, we have guns.
Andy, we'll give our guns, right after you set the example. Until you do, we'll keep wandering through life, protecting our owns best we can.
Thursday, December 20, 2012
What Changed?
I've kept quiet about the Newtown massacre while I tried to figure out what happened. Meanwhile the usual suspects have been howling about guns. There have been hundreds of people spouting off about killing the NRA President and members. Aside from this not being particularly nonviolent I would posit that threatening armed people might just be a mistake.
I have found a couple of strange things about this most recent massacre, one is that the Congress and the President have let a couple of school safety programs lapse, one funding police in schools.
Another odd thing about Newtown is that it took twenty minutes for police to show up from the first calls of shooting inside that school.
Twenty minutes. That is a pretty good response time for police to show up for a theft report, suspect gone. It might be a pretty fair response time for a deputy sheriff in rural northwest Texas. It is not a good response time for a city police responding to a shooting inside a grade school. Someone should be asking what those police were doing. The average citizen won't like the answer.The day of the first officer on the scene running to the sound of the gunfire is long over. Today we "establish a perimeter." We set up a chain of command. We establish a line of communication. We gather intelligence. We then wait for the heavily armored SWAT types to go in and only then does the shooter kill himself.
I admit, I've never been to Newtown and have no idea of the terrain. I will say that it is damned well impossible to believe that the nearest patrol car was twenty minutes away.
One of the reasons these killing sprees happen is that police no longer have commanders, they have administrators. Their key philosophy is to make sure that no blame redounds to themselves.And an ijured or killed police officer is a real drain on the municipal budget whereas a dead child does not financially affect the city.
An important question: How many police have been killed or injured during one of these killing sprees since Columbine? Hint: More police have been killed or injured protecting government motorcades. Police administrators have forgot the addage of shedding blood to take the King's shilling. We spend a lot of money on officer safety, as we should. In reponse, the officers go into dangerous situations. Still, it seems the more we spend on officer safety the longer it takes said officers to actually do something useful when there is shooting going on. This is not the fault of the officers but is the fault of the administrators.
Please note that I am not calling for a bloodbath in police work. I am saying that many lives would be saved by having those first officers go in and cause the shooter to kill himself, as almost always happens. I am further saying that the person who goes into policing to be safe had better apply, instead, to city road repair. The life of an officer is not worth more than that of a child. Again, no officers have been killed in all these school massacres since and including Columbine.
It is, of course, more than poor administration of our police. I grew up in an era where we had a high school rifle team. Kids in Jr. ROTC got to fire fully automatic Browning Automatic Rifles. Many high school principals had large closets where the kids could pack their hunting rifles and shotguns during the seasons.
A kid with money could write off to one of the advertisors in The American Rifleman and get a lot of really fine rifles, revolvers and pistols. There were 1903 Springfield rifles for around fortty bucks. German Mausers were even cheaper and at the bottom of the barrel were the Japanese 6.5 and 7.7 mm and those Italian 6.5 and 7.7s. There were M1 rifles and M 1 Carbines, both .30 caliber but the M 1 fired the full sized .30-06 and the Carbine a hot pistol-type thing with a lighter bullet. As I recall, that was the round Charles Whitman used, mostly, in the Texas Tower massacre. There were thousand of the old British .303 let go, tons of .45 auto M1911 pitols, Webley revolvers in both .455 Brit and .38 S&W were cheap, along with bazillions of Colt and S&W .38s both .38 Special and .38 S&W.
Yet we boys settled our differences with fists. And that is a big difference. Today a kid fistfight is pretty much beyond the pale. And THAT is a big difference. Somehow we have allowed education to be feminized. Recesses are almost gone, with none of the physical games boys of my day played. Today a child with normal boyish energy is medicated. He's no longer a boy but is hyperactive or has A.D.D. So, today they sit around, numb and playing games on their mobile phones. Or texting.
I live where cell phone coverage is very spotty. The largest man made lake inside Texas is a half mile away by the trail kids (or adults) can walk. It teems with catfish and bass. It is a small game hunter's paradise. Our back roads are great for bicycles, we have lots of horses. Yet when I drive home after school hours I see kids standing around, in the spots where they can get coverage, with cell phones in both hands, not even looking up as cars go by. What do these boys do with their energy? And our "betters" blame the fast food industry.
My own grandsons aren't allowed to roam. Kids are on such short leashes today and it's a crying shame.
Most, if not all, of the people doing these spree shootings were on some sort of psychotropic drug. Something is really wrong and it ain't the guns. We've always had guns. We've had high capacity semioauto guns since the 1903 Winchester .32 and 35 self loading cartridges. Then in 1907 we got the more capable .351 and in 1910 the .401 Winchester SL. These stubby little carbines had short magazines from the factory although when I was a boy I knew an old bluesuit who had a .401 with a long mag he'd either cobbled together or bought. Of course far more LEOs had lever action carbines in .44 WCF and .38WCF. Few carried the longer .30WCF (.30-30) or .32 Special. Many carried 92 Winchesters converted to .38 Special and .357 Mag.
My own Marlin .357, made in the mid 1970s spent some ten years in a county cruiser, far more useful in the country than a patrol shotgun. But, that's another story. It's just we've always had guns. And if we ban certain guns criminals and madmen will just use another form of gun. Suppose there was some kind of magic spell to remove all semi auto handguns? And it would take a magic spell, there are far too many for a law to get rid of them. After all, tell me again how people get heroin andcocaine wheen there are draconian laws about them.
Still, without those dread semiautos, what could the Newtown killer do? Well, he could have shot his way in with one or two revolvers and then used gasoline bombs. How many one quart molotov cocktails can fit in a backpack?
It ain't the guns, folks. We're doing things seriously wrong today and we're looking at the wrong things for solutions.
I have found a couple of strange things about this most recent massacre, one is that the Congress and the President have let a couple of school safety programs lapse, one funding police in schools.
Another odd thing about Newtown is that it took twenty minutes for police to show up from the first calls of shooting inside that school.
Twenty minutes. That is a pretty good response time for police to show up for a theft report, suspect gone. It might be a pretty fair response time for a deputy sheriff in rural northwest Texas. It is not a good response time for a city police responding to a shooting inside a grade school. Someone should be asking what those police were doing. The average citizen won't like the answer.The day of the first officer on the scene running to the sound of the gunfire is long over. Today we "establish a perimeter." We set up a chain of command. We establish a line of communication. We gather intelligence. We then wait for the heavily armored SWAT types to go in and only then does the shooter kill himself.
I admit, I've never been to Newtown and have no idea of the terrain. I will say that it is damned well impossible to believe that the nearest patrol car was twenty minutes away.
One of the reasons these killing sprees happen is that police no longer have commanders, they have administrators. Their key philosophy is to make sure that no blame redounds to themselves.And an ijured or killed police officer is a real drain on the municipal budget whereas a dead child does not financially affect the city.
An important question: How many police have been killed or injured during one of these killing sprees since Columbine? Hint: More police have been killed or injured protecting government motorcades. Police administrators have forgot the addage of shedding blood to take the King's shilling. We spend a lot of money on officer safety, as we should. In reponse, the officers go into dangerous situations. Still, it seems the more we spend on officer safety the longer it takes said officers to actually do something useful when there is shooting going on. This is not the fault of the officers but is the fault of the administrators.
Please note that I am not calling for a bloodbath in police work. I am saying that many lives would be saved by having those first officers go in and cause the shooter to kill himself, as almost always happens. I am further saying that the person who goes into policing to be safe had better apply, instead, to city road repair. The life of an officer is not worth more than that of a child. Again, no officers have been killed in all these school massacres since and including Columbine.
It is, of course, more than poor administration of our police. I grew up in an era where we had a high school rifle team. Kids in Jr. ROTC got to fire fully automatic Browning Automatic Rifles. Many high school principals had large closets where the kids could pack their hunting rifles and shotguns during the seasons.
A kid with money could write off to one of the advertisors in The American Rifleman and get a lot of really fine rifles, revolvers and pistols. There were 1903 Springfield rifles for around fortty bucks. German Mausers were even cheaper and at the bottom of the barrel were the Japanese 6.5 and 7.7 mm and those Italian 6.5 and 7.7s. There were M1 rifles and M 1 Carbines, both .30 caliber but the M 1 fired the full sized .30-06 and the Carbine a hot pistol-type thing with a lighter bullet. As I recall, that was the round Charles Whitman used, mostly, in the Texas Tower massacre. There were thousand of the old British .303 let go, tons of .45 auto M1911 pitols, Webley revolvers in both .455 Brit and .38 S&W were cheap, along with bazillions of Colt and S&W .38s both .38 Special and .38 S&W.
Yet we boys settled our differences with fists. And that is a big difference. Today a kid fistfight is pretty much beyond the pale. And THAT is a big difference. Somehow we have allowed education to be feminized. Recesses are almost gone, with none of the physical games boys of my day played. Today a child with normal boyish energy is medicated. He's no longer a boy but is hyperactive or has A.D.D. So, today they sit around, numb and playing games on their mobile phones. Or texting.
I live where cell phone coverage is very spotty. The largest man made lake inside Texas is a half mile away by the trail kids (or adults) can walk. It teems with catfish and bass. It is a small game hunter's paradise. Our back roads are great for bicycles, we have lots of horses. Yet when I drive home after school hours I see kids standing around, in the spots where they can get coverage, with cell phones in both hands, not even looking up as cars go by. What do these boys do with their energy? And our "betters" blame the fast food industry.
My own grandsons aren't allowed to roam. Kids are on such short leashes today and it's a crying shame.
Most, if not all, of the people doing these spree shootings were on some sort of psychotropic drug. Something is really wrong and it ain't the guns. We've always had guns. We've had high capacity semioauto guns since the 1903 Winchester .32 and 35 self loading cartridges. Then in 1907 we got the more capable .351 and in 1910 the .401 Winchester SL. These stubby little carbines had short magazines from the factory although when I was a boy I knew an old bluesuit who had a .401 with a long mag he'd either cobbled together or bought. Of course far more LEOs had lever action carbines in .44 WCF and .38WCF. Few carried the longer .30WCF (.30-30) or .32 Special. Many carried 92 Winchesters converted to .38 Special and .357 Mag.
My own Marlin .357, made in the mid 1970s spent some ten years in a county cruiser, far more useful in the country than a patrol shotgun. But, that's another story. It's just we've always had guns. And if we ban certain guns criminals and madmen will just use another form of gun. Suppose there was some kind of magic spell to remove all semi auto handguns? And it would take a magic spell, there are far too many for a law to get rid of them. After all, tell me again how people get heroin andcocaine wheen there are draconian laws about them.
Still, without those dread semiautos, what could the Newtown killer do? Well, he could have shot his way in with one or two revolvers and then used gasoline bombs. How many one quart molotov cocktails can fit in a backpack?
It ain't the guns, folks. We're doing things seriously wrong today and we're looking at the wrong things for solutions.
Wednesday, December 12, 2012
Cone Of Shame
Bingo T. Pug has an allergy to flea bites. The flea pills the vet gives (sells) us kills the fleas but only after the flea bites him. Then he chews bloody holes in his hide. So I took him to Pet Smart and bought him a cone of shame.
I haven't had much to say lately, I'll be back in harness soon.
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