Executive Orders

Preparing for some unspecified national calamity, the president has issued an executive order, which carries the weight of statute law without having to go through a bickering legislature.

Sec. 102. Policy. The United States must have an industrial and technological base capable of meeting national defense requirements and capable of contributing to the technological superiority of its national defense equipment in peacetime and in times of national emergency. The domestic industrial and technological base is the foundation for national defense preparedness. The authorities provided in the Act shall be used to strengthen this base and to ensure it is capable of responding to the national defense needs of the United States.

Sec. 103. General Functions. Executive departments and agencies (agencies) responsible for plans and programs relating to national defense (as defined in section 801(j) of this order), or for resources and services needed to support such plans and programs, shall:

(a) identify requirements for the full spectrum of emergencies, including essential military and civilian demand;

(b) assess on an ongoing basis the capability of the domestic industrial and technological base to satisfy requirements in peacetime and times of national emergency, specifically evaluating the availability of the most critical resource and production sources, including subcontractors and suppliers, materials, skilled labor, and professional and technical personnel;

(c) be prepared, in the event of a potential threat to the security of the United States, to take actions necessary to ensure the availability of adequate resources and production capability, including services and critical technology, for national defense requirements;

So in time of peace, or declared national emergency, or declared potential  threat, the various secretaries of the various agencies are authorized  to essentially nationalize anything they want, divvy up the spoils  between them, and institute a draft of both executives and workers into  such available slots, military and civilian, as may be required.  Getting drafted to be the CEO of the newly nationalized Ford Motor  Company would certainly be a plum assignment for someone closely  connected to the administration.  Sounds like O'Bummer is getting ready to fight WWII using the same  strategies and tactics as FDR. Isn't there supposed to be some  congressional oversight over this?

I read the whole thing so you don't have to, but let me tell you the whole thing is a scary, far-reaching power grab. All these actions can be implemented on any excuse or none at all. RTWT and ask yourself if there's anything he can't do under any circumstances at all.

Update: Apparently this is a boilerplate update to an E.O. first issued in 1939, which explains the part about getting ready for WWII nicely. This thing has been around that long and has been updated by every president since. Issueing the thing on Friday at 5:00 PM when bad news is usually set out in order to avoid media attention has the exact opposite effect. You'd think they would have figured it out by now, but I guess not.

Going Shooting, Point Blank

Or at least trying to. Yesterday I was complertely prepared to participate in the club Rimfire Steel Dogs shoot but instead had to spend Saturday morning buying a new battery for the truck. Bummer.

The Steel Dog Shoot involves steel cutouts of prairie dogs set up at distances starting at 35 yards, and every 15 yards out to 150 yards. As I understand it you shoot this course 3 times, near to far, far to near, and near to far. You cannot shoot the next dog until you've hit the last one, and each course is timed. There may be more, I haven't been out to one yet.

150 yards is a bit of a reach for a .22, but not impossible by any means, and to do well, you must know your rifle. How do you adjust your sights, and what will give you the best results? I use a program called Point Blank which is available free here. My version was older, and I haven't tried the new one yet, but it's said that the new one is much better than the old one. Good.

You enter data from your gun (ideally) or from the ammo box, enter some physical data like the distance from the bore of the gun to the center line of the sight, and the ballistic coefficient of the bullets, along with the distance you plan to zero your sights at, and the program will print out a chart of the expected arc of your bullet, along with suggested windage corrections for any range you think you can reach.

So what's the ballistic coefficient, I hear you ask? It's the relationship your bullet has with the air its passing through. The number varies from about .1 to about .4 and the higher the BC, the flatter your bullet will fly. At shorter ranges, the effect is modest, but as you get out there over 200 yards, it becomes a significant factor.

For the .22 I was planning to use, the bullet box said the expected muzzle velocity would be 1280 fps, and convieniently also mentioned that the bullet would be making 1100 fps at 100 yards. Point Blank has an app in it that takes these 2 numbers and the caliber of your bullet, and gives the BC for the bullet. For this .22 ammo, the answer was .11.

Point blank, which probably ought to be points blank, is the two distances at which your bullet crosses your line of sight, first going up close in, and second going down, further out. If you're shooting at several ranges, you want your sights adjusted so that the rise up close is approximately equal to the drop at the extreme range. This minimizes the corrections you have to make to get the hit, and keeps the numbers you have to remember to a minimum. Less math is good.

Tell the program you will be setting your sights for 125 yards, and the program will tell you that you will be hitting 4.9" high at 70 yards, and 5.7 inches low at 150. Ask for the results to be in 10 yard intervals, and you find you're 2" high at 35 yards and between 4 and 4-3/4" high from 50 to 95, 2" high at 110, spot on at 125, and 5.5" low at 150. A prairie dog is about 8" tall, so aim for his navel up close, his feet out to 95, his navel again at 110, spot on at 125, and about an inch over his head at 150.

There's even a column for suggested windage allowances, and for light bullets like the .22, a 10 mph wind will put you nearly a foot off at 150 yards, considerably more than the bullet drop.

Our range has backstops every 25 yards out to 100, and every 100 yards out to 300. To sight the gun in without doing a lot of walking, use the 50 yard backstop, and put two dots on a paper plate with a fat marker, one near the bottom, and one 4-3/8" above it. If you aim at the bottom dot and hit the upper one, you're spot on for 125 yds.

The above data is true for my rifle, which has a scope mounted 1.5" above the barrel. If your scope is higher, or if your iron sights are lower, the results will be significantly different, so get the program and run it for your gun. At this point, you will know more about your gun than 90% of the folks out on the range, and will be making those long shots the others just dream about.

Why Santorum Can't Win

His latest pronouncement is that he opposes Internet porn.

As it happens, one of my pet causes in obscenity. Like Tom Lehrer, I'm for it.

Living On The Plantation

Life on a plantation as a slave is good. You do what you're told, and in return you get free housing, food, clothing, medical care (subject to the limitations ordained by a benefits panel), and you don't have to pay taxes, all provided at the expense of Ol' Massa.

Half the population of the country lives that well now, but it's considered NPC to mention it. Case in point is a 13 year-old girl in Rochester who wrote an essay on Fredrick Douglass and seemed to get rather a bit more out of it than the school was quite prepared for:

Coming across the famous passage in which Douglass quotes the slavemaster Auld, Miss Williams was startled by the words: “If you teach that nigger (speaking of myself) how to read, there will be no keeping him. It will forever unfit him to be a slave. He would at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his master.” The situation seemed to her familiar, and her essay was a blistering indictment of the failures of the largely white faculty of her school: “When I find myself sitting in a crowded classroom where no real instruction is taking place I can say history does repeat itself.”

This seems to be grounds for having your grades reduced, and getting drummed out of school. It summs up most succinctly the problem with unionized teachers in the K-12 schools in a large part of the country.

The above quote is from an article by Kevin Williamson at the National Review. Click the link and RTWT. Williamson calls for tar and feathers for the school superintendent for letting this go as far as it did. The super says that now that this has come to his attention (and Glenn Beck's) he's looking into the problem and will do something about it.

Censorship

The government in Australia is proposing a ministry to control the part of the media they don't already "own", that being the Internet part of it including Twitter and Facebook:

Under proposals published last week, the new regulator would have the power to oversee all ''news internet sites'' that get more than 15,000 hits a year, or roughly 40 a day.

The proposed New Media Council would have to keep an eye on possibly hundreds of thousands of accounts, which the loyal opposition suggests might well prove to be unworkable.

Keep in mind that when a bad idea like this is put into effect, workability is a secondary concern. If something doesn't work, the standard government reaction is to try again only harder, and with a bigger budget. Taxpayers, after all, grow on trees.

As an aside, I must wonder what the NMC thinks they're going to do about opposition sites based overseas. This one, for example, meets the threshold requirements, and actually has viewers Down Under. Perhaps I'm beneath their notice until I get 40 views a day from Australia, in which case they have nothing to worry about for a while.

Or I could cause trouble by advocating that the Aussies add a copy of Iowa's latest constitutional bid to their own constitution.

• Section 1- Amendment to Article 1 of the Iowa Constitution
  • “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
• Section 2- Referral and Publication
  • The Rights listed below are considered fundamental and shall not be infringed or denied: acquire, keep, possess, transport, carry, transfer, use arms to defend life and liberty, all other legitimate purposes
  • The following is prohibited: licensing, registration and special taxation
• Courts shall use strict scrutiny when reviewing any restrictions on this right
  • To pass strict scrutiny a law must meet three standards.
    • Compelling government interest
    • Narrowly tailored
    • Least restrictive means

Bomb thrower? Moi?

Star Wars - The Real Thing

Having worked on bits and pieces of it in the 80's and early 90's, I like to see the work being carried forward. Back then the Dems were opposed to it, but not wishing to be seen as weak on defense, would vote R&D money to whatever part they thought would have the least chance of succeeding.

We engineers took this as a challenge. I believe the average elapsed time between a feasibility study start and having a prototype demonstrating success in testing was about 8 months. A successful test was usually a death knell as the Dems would denounce it as "provocative" and cut off funding, lest their friends the Russkies find themselves outgunned.

Israel has moved ahead with miniscule funding on parts of this and is having some success with what they call "Iron Dome" which turns out to be a pretty good anti-missile system covering a modest area. The statistics can be a bit confusing, but it seems that of 135+ rockets fired into Israel from Gaza, some 46 or so were fired on and 37 of those were hit. Video and all the details here.

I understand they are also experimenting with lasers which turn out to be very accurate, very fast, very expensive, very bulky, and rather short-range. Next year they will be better, I'm sure.

QOTD

A citizen may not be required to offer a "good and substantial reason" why he should be permitted to exercise his rights. The right's existence is all the reason he needs.
U.S. District Judge Benson E. Legg

From his decision overturning Maryland's "May Issue" concealed-carry permit system.

Much as I admire the decision, I can't help but be reminded of other distinctive names like Foghorn Leghorn and Phineas T Phogbound in spite of a complete lack of connection, philosophical or any other.

Global Warming: I'm For It!

Spring is creeping up on us here, and in spite of the likelihood of one or two more big snowstorms between now and the 4th of July, let me put in a good word for the bit of global warming we've gotten here.
Here's the remnants of the glacier that sets in every fall and attempts to remain as long as possible into the spring. I've been breaking it up in hopes of finding frozen prehistoric stuff and:
In the center of the picture, are my car keys, lost there Feb 3. I credit finding them 20 days early to global warming.

The Saber-tooth Squirrel is probably under the other pile, down the driveway a bit.

Attention Gunnies! Big Sale!

The Jefferson county Sheriffs office is announcing a 27.5% reduction in the fees charged for a CHP along with extended hours for application.

Additionally there's a 20% reduction in the renewal fee.

Act now! Operators are waiting to take your call! (O.K. you have to do this in person, but it sounds good, no?)

At the same time, the Centennial Gun Store has a coupon out for 50% off the required CCW course, good till April 15th.

In my county, the process costs $152.50, plus the course, Applications must be submitted in person between 9AM and 3PM, 3 days a week only at the sheriffs office and may take up to 90 days to process.

In Colorado, if a "reasonable person" would believe that carrying a gun would be a good idea, then carry is permitted without a permit. In spite of this doctrine, one of the most reasonable situations I can think of, selling crack on East Colfax Ave, somehow does not seem to qualify. Go figure.

A bill to allow "constitutional carry" in Colorado easily passed the state House, but died in the Dem-controlled Senate. If the Republicans can overcome voter inertia over a lackluster presidential candidate, the down-list races should break favorably this fall, and we could well join the ranks of permitless carry states.

Who Ya Gonna Believe?

Unemployment numbers for February came out today with two sources only a day apart. Today the Fed Gov reported that the U-3 unemployment rate held steady at 8.3% with the U-6 number at 14.9%.

Yesterday, Gallup reported that the U-3 rate was 9.1%, a .7% increase, and the U-6 number was 19.1%, 4.2% higher.

U-3 is what most people think of as being out of work and collecting unemployment. U-6 includes people who have become discouraged and quit looking as well as people working at part-time or jobs they are otherwise overqualified for.

I heard today that no sitting president since Roosevelt has ever been re-elected with an unemployment rate over 7.2%, so look for the official figure to ease down over the next 8 months, and check with Gallup to find out what's really going on.

Oil Supply

You would think that a regular supply of oil from a friendly country through a virtually uninterruptable supply chain would be a good idea. The U.S. house thought so, and voted to provide permissions and the like to the Keystone project.

Even up in the Senate where only 1/3 of the members have to worry about getting reelected this year some 11 Democrats sided with Republicans to vote for the project. I'd guess all 11 are up for election this year.

Also noted is that Colorado's senators, Obama's most loyal toadies, both voted against the measure. Neither one is up for election this year, and they probably assume that the voters will have forgotten their vote along with the experience of filling a tank without taking out a mortgage by 2014.

High-Speed Robots

Some worry that when 2 or 4-legged robots move at speeds up to or even over 50 mph, we puny humans could be in trouble.

You have to look at the opportunity here. Just think, these things could pull my rickshaw up and down the freeway to and from work at real freeway speeds. Just think, here's something that could get you more attention than a Bugatti as you pull out and pass some hapless dweeb in a Prius.

Nike will need to be developing a more robust running shoe for this application as well.

Conspiracy!

I love a good conspiracy theory and the more elaborate the better.

A number of places are now reporting that Bin Ladin's body was not buried at sea, but was brought back to the U.S. This would be handy to trot out if the other conspiracy theorists began suggesting that he wasn't actually dead to inspire his followers.

So where do you store dead terrorists?

You know that life-sized wax figure at Madame Tussauds?

It ain't wax.

More Gun Fun

OK the first e-postal match of the year is up at Mr.Completely's. He's using the infamous "Fly Shooter" target,

and to win you have to put 25 holes in the paper, inside the outline square, without actually hitting the flies. This is much like the windvane shooting in "Five Card Stud" in which you claim to have been aiming between the windvane blades. If you hit a fly, you have to stop so only one dead fly per target.

DISTANCE : 25 feet, or Ten yards, which ever is available at your range.

SHOOTING POSITION: Standing, un-supported, off-hand, one or two hands on gun permitted.

This sort of thing penalizes the large-bore constituency as it's much harder to miss with a big bullet.

Distance is 25 ft. Back in the day, I believe I could have cut one of the flies out of the target without touching it using my Daisy BB gun with iron sights. The older I get, the better I was, by golly.

Health Care Debate

In a textbook socialist society, all other organizations are subservient to the government. In China, for example, the government appoints bishops and archbishops. In the U.S. it will be necessary for certain religions to amend their doctrine to conform to the latest government positions.

To that end, the administration is taking the position that the Catholic church really wants women to die without health care in the form of contraception. They publish phoney "permission slips" that they assure us the Republicans will allow Catholic employers to issue to enforce church doctrine over non-Catholics:

Cute. Just imagine what would happen if your boss turned out to be a Christian Scientist.

H/T to business Insider for this one. Read the whole article.