Harry's Out

So I'm going to Ye Olde Gun Shoppe today to trade in my Taurus .357 Magnum Snubbed Nose Revolver in favor of something else. Another .357, more than likely. I'll just pass on the snubbed nose this time.

Other stuff on my list as I build my "Oh, shit!" st0ckpile:

• 1 box 12 gauge 3" OO buckshot
• 1 box 12 gauge 3" slug
• 1 box .22 cal standard
• 1 box 7.62mm x 39
• Ruger 10/22 Rimfire rear sight (to repair my step-Dad's rifle)
• 2 lbs dried green lentil beans
• 2 sets earplugs

My kids live with me during the school year and visit their Mom every other weekend. During the summer they live with her and visit me every other weekend. Anyway, the next time they're with me for the weekend we're going to go out to Barboursville and shoot a bit. This will be their first time ever holding a real gun.

I'm going to break them in on the same Ruger 10/22 Rimfire my step-Dad used to let us shoot. It's a little .22 cal rifle that's a great intro gun for those who have never shot a gun before. It has a 10 shot magazine, is light weight and has just about zero kick.

I'll also teach them the same strict gun safety that my Dad taught me. It's pretty simple, really:

• Never, ever, ever point a weapon at someone you don't intend to kill.
• When there's a man down range keep your weapon trained on the sky.
• Never look down the barrel of a gun unless that gun is disassembled. (Sad that such a rule must be stated, yes, but a whole bunch of people are killed in such accidents every year)
• If you are not shooting, the safety on your weapon will be engaged.
• If no one is down range and you are not shooting, your weapon will be trained on the ground, slightly ahead of you, and down range.
• When holding your weapon and not firing it, your finger is not to rest on the trigger regardless of the state of the safety on that weapon.
• No goofing off of any kind for any reason. None whatsoever. No excuses. No second chances.

As A Ray of Hope...

Not to sound too corny, but my kids and the young people coming into the political process do tend to give me some hope.

Why? Well, in terms of my kids I would say that they have it much better than I ever did - at least in the ways that truly count. I love my Dad, don't get me wrong, but I think I'm doing a better job raising my kids than he ever did. We both have the same genetically predisposed temper, but I think I must have realized it earlier on in life and figured out how to control it earlier.

I believe they've lead a much less stressful childhood and had all the right values passed to them: hard work, loyalty to family, critical thinking, and a healthy skepticism in regards to authority.

And when I talk about the new wave of young people I see getting involved in the system I actually have a bit of pride on that point. As a trailing member of the punker generation I like to think that the counter-culture that my generation helped establish laid the groundwork for some of the political common sense that is evident in the 20-somethings who are just now tuning in.

Where the baby-boomer hippy generation failed is in the spirit of their counter-culture. It was too dreamy and Utopian. Such fanciful nonsense never succeeds.

Free love? Pashaw! The contradictions against human nature involved in the free love concept are far too numerous to detail here.

"We stopped the war, man!" Whatever, hippy. Vietnam went on for 13 years. Yeah, you really brought that to a screeching halt, didn't you?

Where punk differed was in it's core philosophy and the spirit of the movement. It was political at its core. It was angry and aggressive. It didn't back down from the pigs and it looked certain truths square in the eye:

• The world is not, and never will be, some Utopian paradise
• People are naturally corrupted by power at the same time that we all seek it
• Power speaks to Power. It's the only language understood by the powerful.
• The entire world is on a collision course with Doom (politically, environmentally, socially)
• People are people - with all the good and bad that comes with that truth. We are all essentially the same.
• Fear is your enemy
• Love does not always conquer all - life is full of tragedy

These punkish principles and the counter-culture developed around them have laid the groundwork for a new generation of politically skeptical (and thereby more aware) voters who inherently do not trust their leadership.

There is nothing more American than a healthy mistrust for those in power. It is one of the cornerstones that the Founding Fathers counted on when building the framework for our nation - the Bill of Rights and the Constitution. They counted on the People to be suspicious of their government.

Fascists blindly follow authority (usually to their demise). They do not question and they do not inform themselves.

I take heart at the fact that a rising percentage of young voters are informing themselves. I am encouraged by the fact that many, many more of them are getting off their asses and voting. 22 million more people were signed up just in the Democratic primary.

I quote that figure not because I am necessarily a Democrat, but because I am not hearing of the Republicans signing many new people up. I also quote that figure because now that we are in the general election season we will undoubtedly see more people signing up. Many of these potential voters stood on the sidelines waiting for the general to begin.

Don't listen to the pundits. They have been wrong over and over again this season. They want you to think this is going to be a close election. It isn't. Don't believe the hype. The new voters coming in are going to skew every poll they've run so hard that they will all be statistically irrelevant.

This has to please the Founding Fathers. Not because it is the Dems are likely to win, but because they believe that a periodic ballot box revolution was a prerequisite for a healthy democracy. Don't forget - our Founding Fathers were revolutionaries. They were the Che Guevaras of their day, striking terror into the royalty of Europe.

Their revolutionary fervor did spread, too. It was a very short time before the revolutionary spirit spread to France and the heads of the powerful rolled... literally. The longest sitting royal dynasty in Europe at the time had been unseated. One of the few royal houses that still enjoyed absolute power had been defeated by the masses.

In 2000 we had a good economy, good standing in the world, a budgetary surplus, a military that stood ready to defend us from any enemy, and strong global alliances. We took a chance on the guy we'd like to have a beer with. We took a chance that leaned towards the right - a conservative promising to be a "uniter, not a divider."

Maybe it's time to take a chance towards the left? Let's risk it on another new face to Washington promising to work across the aisle and change the way Washington works. You might has well get on the bandwagon. Do you think these new, young voters - 22 million and growing in strength - are going to break in favor of McCain? If you do, please share that awesome crack you're smoking.

All Good Things...

I'm generally not a fan of bumper stickers. I kind of hate them, as a matter of fact. They're meant to be condensed "wisdom" applied to the backside of an automobile (just above and to the right of our polluting tailpipes).

I did see one the other day that actually struck me. Very few ideas worth considering are boiled down to a single, short statement.

Some classic nuggets of such short and sweet wisdom would be:

• Life is too short for [insert stupid b.s. here]...
• It's a small world.
• Treat others as you want to be treated.
• All things must come to an end.

... and maybe a few others, but that's basically it. This bumper sticker adds another nugget to this elite list:

• These are the good old days...

Think about that for a second. Sometime in the not-too-distant future they'll look back at us like Roman nobility, with a culture all gluttonous and over-sexed. They'll analyze our hip-hop videos with half-naked women, our Girls Gone Wild, our porn, our idiotic leadership, our divided culture, our illnesses (diabetes, gout, heart disease, obesity, autism, cancer of everything), our militant nation-states, our moronic political process, and the blind way we stumbled through life and they'll wonder:

"How the hell did they make it as long as they did?"

I was reflecting on these notions last night as we had Father's Day dinner at my house. I had prepared these awesome Cuban style pork tacos and for desert my wife made a great strawberry peach shortcake with homemade whipped cream and homemade shortcake. I looked over at my four year old daughter, who had some silly sunglasses on, a feather boa, and some Disney princess dress. I watched as my eldest finished up his chores and immediately picked up his Nintendo DS to play some Pokemon game.

I thought to myself, as I sipped my expensive local microbrew, "Not too long ago, only royalty and the very wealthy lived like this."

And then it occurred to me that not even nobility would have had the benefit of air conditioning like I do. Not even nobility could travel miles in mere minutes on a whim in a personal motor coach like I can. No matter how rich you were you couldn't communicate with a friend or family member on the other side of the planet instantaneously. I can.

Then I realized that people have never lived this well. Never. I mean there are many, many problems with modern industrial society but comfort is not one of them. I have of course had this thought before, but the idea that - these are the good old days - really sunk in. It may never be this easy again. We may never again lay in the lap of such luxury.

I don't know if that's a bad thing. There are so many times when I just can't stand the idea of working for lesser men, of toiling towards goals that are so abstract. I spend all day away from those I love to go work in some terrible building under flourescent lights for a paycheck that is usually spoken for the instant it arrives.

Why? I'm really not sure why. Because that's what people do? I guess that's as good a reason as I can muster. Maybe because I'm addicted to this soft life that I simultaneously hate in many ways. I like my blog and my internet and my MMORPG and my easy access to food and clean water.

I like functions like security and fire fighting being left to the professionals. I like my HOA which comes by and cuts the grass and fixes my roof and siding.

And I hate it. I hate it all. I hate this stupid waste of time I'm engaged in right now. The internet is 80% stupidity, 10% porn, 9% storefronts, and 1% useful information. Really you could throw the porn in with the storefront category. They're just selling sex.

My gaming is a waste of time. It's an idle way to piss away the precious few moments I have to be on this Earth.

I hate the stupid, meddling emails I get from the HOA. I'm actually on the board. I thought I'd be the voice of reason for these jackasses.

Nope. These petty tyrants can't be beaten by words - that's where they rule. Make them actually do something themselves and that's where they fail. But with the complicated machinations of law and society and management companies to back them up it's guaranteed they'll never lift a finger.

Meh.

Bumper Sticker Logic (Cooler War Ammo)

So many people will only grasp and retain "knowledge" if the idea or piece of "knowledge" can fit on a bumper sticker. A classic example of this is the pro-Bush, pro-Iraq, pro-Cowboy Diplomacy argument that goes:

"Well, if Bush is such an idiot then why haven't we been attacked again?"

You could also substitute in "If Iraq isn't a part of the War on Terror then why haven't we been attacked again?" It's essentially the same "argument" (throw in exaggerated air quotes around argument).

Here's the way you respond next time a hawk drops that on you at the water cooler:

1. Make sure they prepare themselves mentally for a response that will take longer than 10 seconds to explain. ("Now you know I'm going to have to talk for longer than ten seconds to explain this to you. Do you think you can handle that without screaming Clinton got a blowjob?")
2. Then tell them that Osama binLaden was a mujahadeen back during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. You may have to explain to them what a mujahadeen is.
3. Next explain that the Afghani mujahadeen bled the Soviets dry economically in Afghanistan, eventually causing the Soviet Union to collapse.
4. Then, go on to explain that 9/11 was a provocation, more or less. binLaden wanted to provoke America into a Middle Eastern war (in Afghanistan). Around this war he could declare another jihad and try to bleed America dry in the same way the Soviets were bled.
5. Unfortunately, the attack was much more successful than he could have imagined. It horrified the world and everyone united behind America. It appeared that his plan had backfired. America, with the aid and backing of the world, would invade Afghanistan. It would not be possible to bleed America dry when calls of jihad would be largely ignored by a horrified Muslim world. In addition to the lack of support binLaden would be getting, America would be assisted by everyone and wouldn't bear the burden of pacifying and rebuilding Afghanistan alone. There was no way the Taliban could protect al Qaeda now.
6. Then, Bush granted a wish binLaden could never have hoped for: he derailed the Afghanistan train and diverted America's resources to Iraq which not only allowed binLaden to evade capture in Afghanistan (a la Tora Bora), but squandered the goodwill of the Muslim world engendered by the horrors of 9/11. It also served to isolate America from her European allies. America would have to go it alone in Iraq.
7. Now America could be bled out in a protracted struggle against a low grade insurgency in Iraq... just like the Soviets were in the 80's in Afghanistan and just like the French were in the 50's and 60's in Algeria.

That's only seven points and it basically sums up the entire case against staying in Iraq. We fell for an old ploy which has destroyed other Western nations in the past.

We cannot afford Iraq. Period. Whatever your ideology we cannot afford it. No matter what you believe or don't believe about this war the simple fact is that we cannot sustain these expenditures much longer. It doesn't matter if you believe the seven points above, either.

Our. Sagging. Economy. Cannot. Afford. This. War.

If we do not begin withdrawing in short order our nation will sink into an economic depression like we've never seen before.

That's my ray of sunshine for the day.

Preparing for the Squeeze

It's all going to hell and probably faster than even I would like to consider. I'm the kind of guy with his eyes open, too. I just don't see anything encouraging.

The fundamentals are all screwed. We're mismanaging the land, our water, global warming, our national defense, our infrastructure, our education, and our economic base.

Every place I've ever worked has featured multiple (not just one, but multiple) managers with college degrees that were barely literate. These guys made much more money than I did and they wrote unintelligible emails. Emails that my ten year old daughter would have been embarrassed to send.

I'm not talking about a misspelling here and there. Hell, we all do that (although with spell checking I can't imagine why). I mean that these guys wrote emails that featured strings of alphanumeric characters which bore no resemblance to complete thoughts, let alone sentences. These are managers! Managers! They are supposedly our leaders and examples.

I don't need to get into the environmental stuff. At this point if you aren't on board with this notion you're an imbecile or you're on Chevron's payroll.

Everyone remembers the bridge that collapsed out of the blue in Minnesota and the tunnel collapse in Boston. Now there are cranes collapsing in New York. I read this Popular Mechanics article that made my toes curl. Popular Mechanics tries to look at this crisis in the best light possible, citing technology as our possible savior. I have to say that it takes will and people and dollars to apply technology. Where is the will and where are the dollars that will bring the people who will apply the technology?

I don't see them.

A staggering statistic from that article:

"One-quarter of the 599,893 bridges in the United States have structural problems or outdated designs."

That's 149,973 bridges in need of replacement or repairs. I could tick off three in my hometown alone that make me nervous. And that's just the ones I've noticed casually passing them by.

On national defense - every source from within the military will tell you our military is at its lowest state of readiness since before WW II (back when we basically had no military). Regardless of where you stand on why we got into Iraq or if we should have or if the public was lied to in the lead up there is one fact that stands undeniable:

Our military and our nation are being bled dry in Iraq. We are losing the lives of our valiant men and women in uniform and for what? For freedom and democracy in Iraq? Don't make me laugh. An altruistic invasion to spread democracy at bayonet-point? Really?

People keep comparing Iraq to Vietnam and I tell them they're wrong. While there are some similarities to America's involvement in Vietnam, our struggle in Iraq is much more like the Soviet Union's struggle in Afghanistan which started in 1979.

The Soviets invaded Afghanistan for murky reasons and ended up running 40 divisions through that meat grinder. This is what defeated the Soviets, not Reagan or Bush the Elder. The Soviets were economically and thus militarily ruined in Afghanistan due to a low grade insurgency like the one we're experiencing in Iraq and the one the French experienced in Algeria in the late 50's and early 60's.

We're bleeding out in Iraq. Our budget has massive defecits and here's the kicker, kids:

We aren't even counting the cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan into the regular budget. They've been entirely funded by emergency supplemental spending which isn't factored into the budget and therefore wouldn't show up in any deficit numbers.

In short, as bad as you think the nation's budgetary crisis is - it is in fact much, much worse.

That is why, no matter what you think about our nation's War on Terror, we must withdrawl from Iraq. We simply cannot afford to continue. Despite what you think about our nation's treasury it is not a limitless treasure trove. If it were only empty there might be some hope.

Sadly our treasury is full to the rafters. It is not full with money or gold or reserves of any kind. No, our treasury is full of debt. Our treasury is, as of this moment, so bankrupt that only the continued denial of this obvious reality on the part of our creditors allows us to keep up our illusions of power and wealth. We are less than poor. We are absolutely destitute.

With no manufacturing base left we stand little hope of reversing this trend. During the Great Depression we were still a mighty manufacturing nation - our factories just stood silent, all full of potential jobs. Now these factories in many cases have literally been packaged up and shipped overseas. They simply aren't present any more.

We can't all work in high end service jobs like information technology. Somebody, somewhere has to actually make something in order for our economy to function. This isn't happening.

The thing that really scares me is this - it may be coming faster than I can prepare for it. I may not be able to complete my preparations for these hard times to come before they arrive.

Harry Doesn't Make the Cut

Man, I hate to say it, but my .357 magnum snub nosed revolver isn't going to make the cut. It is way too inaccurate. I'm a good shot, if I do say so myself, and I couldn't hit a basketball sized target reliably at 40 feet.

That's just not acceptable. I was drilling it with my brother's Glock .45. Oh yeah, baby. Nailing it, so I know it's not my aim that's the problem.

I'll just have to trade it in. I'm pretty sure I want to get another .357 revolver. I'll just avoid the snubbed nose this time. I like the fact that a .357 can fire two types of ammunition (.38 and .357 mag). I like that versatility and I love the reliability of a revolver.

Hike-n-Shoot on the Bearfence Scramble

My brother and a good buddy of mine from work and I went out and did some hiking this weekend. We hiked the Beafence Scramble along the Appalachian Trail along with a short bit of another portion of the trail. It was about 6 miles total and with the heat yesterday that was plenty (105 degrees with the heat index).

I'm by far the fat-ass of the group, so when we got to the portion of the hile that gives the trail the "scramble" portion of its name, I was taking it slow. I didn't think anyone would appreciate having to carry me down the mountain if I broke an ankle. The "scramble" bit in the name "Bearfence Scramble" is due to the fact that you have to scramble over some rocky portions on the trail.

On the top of the mountain there was a rocky outcropping with a stunning vista. Maybe those of you who are used to the Rockies or Swiss Alps may think that a view from the top of a mountain in Virginia can't be all that great. I respectfully disagree ("Strawman, strawman!"). I'll post some photos if my bro comes through and sends me some of the pics he took. I, as usual, forgot my digital camera.

After the hiking bit of the day was done, we drove back to Barboursville. Damn, was it muggy and hot. Just nasty. After getting out of the car and gathering my guns and ammo, we walked maybe thirty yards to the gully in which we'd be shooting. I was sweating like a pig, and not from any sort of exertion, either.

We shot Cletus, of course. We also shot Harry for the first time. I may end up trading Harry in for a model without a snubbed nose in the near future. Harry was very inaccurate. We shot 25 rounds of .38 and about 10-12 rounds of the .357 mag hollow points. The .357 was by far the loudest of all the rounds we shot that day (.38, .357, 12 gauge target, 12 gauge buck, 12 gauge slug).

And I forgot my earplugs. Great.

We must have shot 50 of the 12 gauge target shot, about 15 buckshot, and 15 slugs. I suspected that the buckshot and slugs would kick more than the target shot and oh, boy did they!