Friday, January 30, 2015

Relative Safety

Here is an article describing the relative danger of driving certain cars. Specifically the 10 most dangerous in that they have the higest death rate per million. I'm altering this chart a bit to show the death rate per 100,000 for better comparison:
1. Kia Rio four-door, 14.9
2. Nissan Versa, 13.0
3. Hyundai Accent four-door, 12.0
4. Chevrolet Aveo, 9.9
5. Hyundai Accent two-door, 8.6
6. Chevrolet Camaro, 8.0
7. Chevrolet Silverado 1500 Crew, 7.9
8. Honda Civic two-door, 7.6
9. Nissan Versa hatchback, 7.1
10. Ford Focus, 7.0

O.K. now compare this to your chances (per 100,000) of being murdered while simply living in say
Detroit    58.6
New Orleans   53.0
Newark       34
St Louis 35.5
Baltimore 34.9
Oakland 31.8
Stockton 23.7
Kansas City 22.6
Philly  21.5
Memphis 22.2

More if you want it below in the Whittle video.

New York*  7.5

Denver*      7.5

So drive your Rio secure in the knowledge that you're more likely to get shot by a thug than killed in an accident. In some towns anyway.


*Last I looked. New York's numbers surprised me. Say what you will about the blue meanies in New York, whatever they're doing, it seems to work.

Thursday, January 29, 2015

QOTD

Sent to me by a friend:
"As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and complete narcissistic moron."

- H.L. Mencken, the Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920
And to think it took less than 100 years.

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Disappointment

The civilization-ending blizzard scheduled for New York has been downgraded from 3 feet to 6 inches.

I was so looking forward to reports of stranded New Yorkers reduced to eating their family pets.

Of course a toy poodle in upper Manhattan won't sustain you as long as a Pit Bull over in Brooklyn...

Monday, January 26, 2015

Full Frontal Nerdity

Deflategate is if nothing else, a sent-from-heaven excuse for the MSM to quit reporting actual news. That being the case, who am I to pass up the opportunity.

Detailed and necessary information is in short supply, but never let a lack of facts hold up a good story. Firse I've only heard one second-hand report of what the actual pressure in the balls was at the time of the infraction. That was reported to me as 11.5 psi so we'll go with that. Also the minimum required starting pressure which is 12.5-13.5 psi. We'll assume 12.5 just to make it easy for us.

Let's start with a football at 0 psi. That's 0 psig which means the pressure inside is the same as the pressure outside. The ball looks like a ball, but would be easily squashed nearly flat. The actual inside pressure would be 14.6 psia, same as outside. We also assume that the balls were filled indoors at 72F, then taken out to the field where they were played at 45 deg F.

Two formulas apply here: The ideal gas law, PV = nRT, and Gay-Lussec which states that P1/T1 = P2/T2 and describes the change in pressure due to heating or cooling of a fixed quantity of a gas. Run G-L initially assuming 12.5 psig and 27 deg F temp drop (using psia and degrees Kelvin of course, and you get a final pressure of 11.8 psig.

Gay-Lussec is the wrong formula to be using to start as it does not account for adding extra gas. If PV = nRT, and V and R are constants*, then kP = NT. K=12.39 for an initial shot with V=1liter (why not), T = 72F (295 deg K), and n turns out to be .042 moles initially. Change n to .075 moles and P goes up to 1.8 atm (12.5 psia). Solve for temp and it only goes up about 2 degrees C or 3 deg F.
One could tweak this to add the temp rise into the formula which would result in fewer moles added.

NOW use Guy-Lussec and the temp shift is 30 degrees instead of 27 and the pressure drop is from 12.5 to 11.7 instead of 11.8. Not much difference, but closer to 11.5.  Gage calibration could easily account for the rest. Detailed proof is left as an exercise for the student. I've done enough heavy lifting for one day.

Nerds Rule!

I am reminded of the talk radio station I sometimes listen to on the way to work. Any day now I expect to hear: "Nuclear weapon detonated in Washington, Lower Manhatten in flames. This and more after our in-depth interview with Peyton Manning about the Broncos roster shakeup."

*Yes I know the ball swells a bit when inflated. Measure that yourself. R is a constant.

Sunday, January 25, 2015

Transportation - Elio Slips Again

Right up front let me repeat that I'm a big fan of the Elio vehicle having built something similar about 20 years ago. If they were on a dealers lot right now, there would be one in my driveway. That said I'm finding it a bit discouraging to see the scheduled release date keep moving out every 6 months or so.

Now I'll be the first to acknowledge that bringing a brand new production line out is not a small project. I'm not told how the project got to where it is now, but owning a facility big enough to supply the U.S. with say small Hyundai's seems a bit optimistic for an initial start. OTOH they now have nearly 40,000 paid pre-orders in their pockets right now. Sub-assembly lines should be going in right now and who knows, maybe they are. So far though the plant looks like this:
It would give me a warmer fuzzier feeling to see some welding fixtures or other assembly jigs behind the car.

I also signed up for their marketing releases and I get two a week on a regular basis. These are worth reading in detail as they contain such gems as this:
As soon as one of these options comes through, Elio Motors will be able to communicate a more specific date for the vehicle launch, which is targeted for the first half of 2016.
First half of 2016 used to be September of 2015 which gave me hope for driving one to work next winter. At this point the odds of me actually having work next winter look a bit thin so the availability of the vehicle may be pretty problematic anyway. Additionally I'd probably have to wait for the 40K folks in front of me to get theirs anyway.

I may well be stuck with the Pretentious British Car for a while longer.

The Definitive Counter Argument - Pro Gun

Bill Whittle of course, who can flatten anyone with a one-liner or crush an onrushing hoarde with a three-minute oration:

Another aspect of what fun statistics can be. Some of the information seems to have come from Page Nine which in turn seems to have gotten some data from an older source which I seem to have misplaced. I took the older data and compared it to newer stuff and discovered that while gun ownership seems to be going up world wide, national murder rates seem to be creeping downward.

Note the cluster of ownership dots creeping upward and the murder rates creeping leftward. The extreme right dot in both cases is Russia which shows a commendable drop in homicide for a modest increase in ownership rates.

Saturday, January 24, 2015

Happy Birthday

Today is my birthday. I'm 39.

It's also Tamara's birthday so happy birthday Tam. I believe she's 29.

Good News If It's True

In the middle east anything can show up in the news and frequently does. There are people over there who could wallpaper their homes with copies of their obituaries. OTOH, sometimes they're true, in which case the top slot at ISIS just opened up and Islamic whackjobs from Africa to Pakistan now have to be prepared to take another oath of undying fealty to whomever replaces Abu Bakr al Baghdad.

High profile jobs like that are not known for longevity even when you aren't being sought by half a dozen different air wings.

A Day At The Range

That was the original plan with adjustments for breakfast with blogger buddies for me and with wifes family for Shooting Buddy followed by meetup at the Mart up north and carpool out.

I got to the Mart first and found traffic backed up for a block in all directions. I was informed that there was a Union convention on and parking which is normally free is now $5. Talked my way past the collector of baksheesh and got in without a ticket on my dash.

Called Shooting buddy and warned him of the delay at the mart. He called back and informed me that he was stuck in the scheduled shutdown of a freeway which he didn't know about so we cancelled the whole thing. Bummer. Maybe next week.

Probably just as well. Without the dash ticket I probably would have returned to find my tires slashed, my doors keyed, and the car towed to a union impound lot. Technically I'm a union member. You can withdraw, but your name never leaves the rolls. I left unimpressed with the setup.

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

The Future of Surveillance

This isn't exactly late-breaking news, but the cops now have a hand-held doppler radar gun that can make out individuals inside a house. If this bothers you, I recommend you get a big piece of cardboard and attach to it the tinfoil cutout image of something the cops might find entertaining. An orgy for example. Cover the other side with something more socially acceptable like flowered upholstery or wallpaper, and place the construction against your street-facing interior wall with the wallpaper on the inside.

Done right, the guffaws of laughter from the outside will give the game away long enough for you to hide in the basement until they leave.

Monday, January 19, 2015

Unemployment

If you are hearing the continuous drumbeat from the press about how the unemployment rate is going down, but you're still having trouble finding a job or seem to know a lot of people who are, check this:
Found here along with the complete story. Notice that the only place where unemployment is dropping due to people finding work is D.C. In the rest of the country it's due to people dropping out of the work force.

If all you people who can't find work or can only find part-time work would just give up and go on the dole, the unemployment rate would drop to zero!

Sunday, January 18, 2015

Tech Stuff

Got up this morning to find my old reliable modem had shuffled off the mortal coil. A XyXEL p-600 it had worked reliably since 2006. O.K. things break and wear out.

Trotted out and got a Netgear DM111PSP which cost about 3 times what the old modem did. Followed the easy to follow directions and hooked it up. So now I'm back on line but at about 1/4-1/3 of the speed I used to get. Could be just a slow night, but I'm already suspicious. And not happy.

Saturday, January 17, 2015

Gun Law - Colorado

As long as the Dems hold one of the three legislative bodies, and they currently hold two, their attitude is unchanged in that they feel they don't need to listen to Republicans at all. HB15-049 (business use of deadly force), HB15-009 (repeal the magazine ban), HB15-086 (CBI NFA certificate), and HB15-050 (repeal the background check) bills are all in the house kill committee and are not expected to survive so bad gun law holds firm in Colorado.

There is a bill coming up to reform the gerrymandering redistricting process here which actually seems to have some bipartisan support. Cynical me expects the bipartisan part to evaporate as soon as someone points out to the Dem leadership that statistically Colorado is a red state by a modest margin and a fair election would result in a Republican trifecta at the state level.

On a possibly related note, Magpul, who moved part of it's operations out of Colorado after the last batch of gun bills were passed, has announced that it will produce a 60 round magazine for AR-pattern rifles this year in drum format. In a flash, Extreme Gear Labs, located in Colorado Springs, which produces bags and pouches for the tactically inclined, has announced that it will be producing a hook-and-loop pouch to hold two of the D60 magazines to your Bat Belt.

It's called the EGL Hickenloop Pouch named for our spineless governor who signed the bills.

Last Election - Late Breaking

Heard from the county party people that the last election was in fact fairly clean. Except for the part when attempts to access the Secretary of State's website to confirm voter registration resulted in a redirect to a website run by Tom Steyer. This resulted in the State site being taken down briefly and moved to a more secure server.

Didn't take long, but this sort of thing is a federal crime. No word as yet as to who might be behind the action or what might be being done about it. I'm sure Mr. Holder's people are right on it. This reportedly happened in other states notably those with Republican Secretaries of State.

Republicans turned out in greater numbers than Dems, for whatever good it did us, so next time, when it's a presidential election, we need to work harder on the turnout end.

Photo Ticketing - PSA

A bill has been introduced in the Colorado legislature to ban the use of cameras to enhance municipal revenues hand out tickets. Leftie* or rightie, you should support this.

Dear Rep. -----
Please support Rep. Stephen Humphrey with his bill to outlaw photo ticketing in Colorado. 10 other states have already done this and we would be well advised to join them.

Wails of anguish from municipalities that would see the gravy train miss their station can be safely ignored as the total population of Mayors and councilmen in Colorado is less than the grateful population of your own district.

*Unless you're an elected municipal politician of the sort who never saw a constituent problem that couldn't be turned into a revenue source without fixing it. That would be most of them to my observation.

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Frontiers in Medicine

Research is now suggesting that ones gut bacteria bay have far more influence over our health than had been previously suspected. Arthritis, for example seems to be influenced by one or more of the several thousand bugs living in your gut.

Then there's this:
Yes, I'd like some water. Better than that, maybe a beer.

Do You Still Beat Your Wife?

The U.S. Senate is increasingly resembling a grade school playground with one set of bullies monopolizing the sandbox and another playing silly name games.

The XL pipeline issue is under debate right now and unlike Harry Reed, Mitch McConnell is actually allowing debate and the offer of amendments. True to form, the Dems are acting like small children with Bernie Sanders (S-Vt) offering this diversion:
The Sanders measure asks whether lawmakers agree with the overwhelming consensus of scientists who say climate change is impacting the planet and is worsened by human-caused greenhouse gas emissions.
The overwhelming consensus is well under 40% and the driving force behind supporting AGW nonsense is the prospect of large research grants to those who come up with the right answers. That and denial of tenure to those who get the wrong answer.

Tuesday, January 13, 2015

To Silence An Italian

As the joke goes, you simply tie his hands behind his back.

To silence a Liberal I suppose you give him a big dose of truth serum.

Monday, January 12, 2015

Battlespace Preparation - 2016

Today Paul Ryan, finance whiz of the Republican party announced that he definately was not going to run for president. Same day Mitt Romney is up there schmoozing him no doubt for an endorsement before Ryans governor, Scott Walker could ask him for the same thing.

Likewise before the other RINO, Bush could get to him. Ryans endorsement will carry a lot of weight as far as convincing people that any one candidate knows more about economics than the others. The big reason for the quick endorsement move is that the RINOs see that a conservative candidate could pull the electoral rug out from under them so it is of great importance to suck all that oxygen out of the room before the primaries begin in earnest.

At one time or another I believe both Bush and Romney have been endorsed by the New York Times which in my mind disqualifies both of them. To coin a phrase:"The friend of my enemy is also my enemy."

Sunday, January 11, 2015

Gun Stuff - Barrel Lapping

I had such good luck the last time I tried this I've decided to try it again. The lapping bullets I used last time from Dave Tubb are not available so I decided to go with a lapping kit from Midway:
Following the directions, I put a very small amount of grit on a hard steel surface, in this case a big industrial hacksaw blade, with a drop of oil, smoothed it all out, and rolled the bullets in the oily grit, bearing down so as to embed the grit into the copper plating. It came out a bit uneven, but the instructions call for 10 rounds at each grit so it should all even out.

The bar in the background is the part I used to roll the bullets.

Someday the water around here will resume a liquid state and I'll shoot these and report the difference. Last time I picked up quite a bit of muzzle velocity and cleaning got a lot easier. 3 1-oz tubs of grit seem to be enough for several hundred guns.

Was There Ever Any Doubt

Which side the current administration is on?
“I will stand with them should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.”
                                                    B.H.O.

Early Poll - Lock Up Your Firearms First

Worst case scenario: The two biggest Rockefeller Republicans are the leaders in the polls and you have to pick one. What will it be: Krang or Kodos?

Additional stipulation: Suicide in the voting booth is not allowed. If it makes you feel any better, imagine the voting machine dispenses a voucher good for free drinks the rest of the day when you pull the lever. Get your moneys worth, vote early. Poll ends tomorrow at midnight.

Of course there's a flip side to that. Who would you rather see on the other side? Hilldabeest or Fauxcahontis?

Rich's suggestion of Walker/Paul in the previous post sounds near perfect.

Winter

O.K. in all fairness it is January in Colorado so if I'm really jonseing for some sunshine and warmth, I probably need to be further south. Still:
Found here at Chuckle-a-Duck. I'm in complete sympathy with that penguin.

CCW

You've got to love this:
French Jewish leaders say President Francois Hollande told them Jewish schools and synagogues will be protected “if necessary” by the French army, while a European Jewish leader says he has reached out to European ministers to request gun permits for Jews.
"If necessary" you say. Well I suppose it could be necessary although relying on a government to provide you with protection that has a long enough history of being on the other side might prove to be an iffy proposition.

Rabbi Menachem Margolin has the more practical approach in asking European leaders to make getting gun permits easier for Jews. After all, when things go bad, you are the first responder.

I imagine that getting a CCW in Europe would be a hodge-podge of local law varying from EU down to town levels and unlikely to be anything like the shall-issue laws we have in most of the U.S. It isd described as "more restrictive" than the U.S.
Source: Wiki.

Additionally some Australians are now suggesting that the country's draconian gun laws might be in need of revision in light of an uptick in "Sudden Jihadi Syndrome".

Saturday, January 10, 2015

The New Order

I know it's early yet and things could turn out different but Tinsly has a pretty good take on the way to bet:
What's missing is someone to apologize to the Dems in case anything they propose actually gets enacted.

On the bright side, Scott Walker is making the obligatory rounds in Iowa. While I'll be the first to say the Iowans certainly know how to produce farm subsidies food, I have to wonder who ever thought those hayseeds knew anything about picking politicians.

Wednesday, January 7, 2015

QOTD - Islam

"The future must not belong to those who insult slander* the prophet of Islam."
                                                            B.H. Obama
He must be serious.

*Posted before I had finished my first cuppa. Germany's Merkel has banned the YouTube video of the attack, preferring to position Germany with its head in the sand.

Monday, January 5, 2015

Talking To Liberals

Done wrong, this is an exercise in masochism. Done right it can be rewarding and entertaining if you don't mind the risk of driving your liberal friend to the hospital with symptoms of a stroke.

Anonymous Conservative has not just a piece, but a whole blog covering the topic and investigates the r/K theory of societal development as it relates to the way individuals develop their thought processes. The whole thing is thought provoking, and indeed explains fairly well why it is that liberals and conservatives more often talk past each other than to each other.

Warning: This goes on at great length and may require re-reading a time or two to pick up all the details. There are 7 posts beginning here, and a preface here which you would do well to read first.

In discussions with my friends, details come up like these:
1. deliver comments without emotion.
http://www.anonymousconservative.com/blog/touching-the-raw-amygdala-part-iv-the-presentation/

When Lawrence Summers upset Teresa Hopkins, and when Colonel Connell savaged Mike Wallace, an essential part of their delivery was their absence of emotion. 

Observation. This is important. It's like the saying about arguing with idiots: They'll drag you down where they are then beat you with experience.Liberals are all about emotion and feelings and are pretty much immune to facts and figures.




2 out-grouping the Liberal.
http://www.anonymousconservative.com/blog/touching-the-raw-amygdala-part-v-distilling-the-stimuli/

First there must be a group of observers. Out-grouping is vastly less affecting in a private, one on one debate. Then one must design the argument to portray Liberal ideals as deviant, compared to the mores and values of the group.

Observation. Having observers helps in that the target has more trouble denying that the defeat actually happened. Certainly some of them will deny an event even in the presence of video. The lemming will have doubts installed in his mind. The true believer will deny that it's his head on the platter. (Visualize a nice book illustration.)


3. humiliation in defeat.
http://www.anonymousconservative.com/blog/touching-the-raw-amygdala-part-vi-additional-stimuli/

Emphasize any clear defeat, no matter how minor, and you will trigger the Narcissist’s (and the Liberal’s) amygdala. Disregard of the Narcissist’s misfortune is another amygdala triggering stimuli. The Stare. Steve Jobs was reputed to periodically unnerve people he didn’t want to deal with   by using direct eye contact, delivering a wide-eyed, emotionally blank stare which he had carefully developed through hours of looking at himself in the mirror. The rise of the mob. I suspect aggressive
Narcissism will often accompany a fear of the mob turning upon the individual.

Observation. This is like training puppies. You get quicker results with a stern voice and a rolled up newspaper than you do with just a stern voice. The left goes to this early in the argument. Ex: You suggest that Social Security has insoluble problems and needs major overhaul. The liberal immediately goes to reducto ad absurdum and suggests you want to immediately cancel the program and shut off all benefits, pushing granny's wheelchair out on to the freeway. Everybody understands that you are the logical one and are expected to come up with a logical rebuttal which will make you look silly. Double down. Agree with him. Suggest we have special on ramps built (shovel ready) to push the wheelchairs down to streamline the process. Suggest a prize of a huge government grant to implement any ideas that would result in granny flying further when struck. Like an HMO (High Mass Only) lane, minimum vehicle weight = 10,000lb.

The example in part V in which a suggested rebuke of an anti-gun position led me to think that most liberal positions are based on simple envy. The thinking goes that if I can't do something, then you who are doing it must be punished for being able to do it and/or forced to do it for me. Examples would include making a living or defending yourself or your family. Recognize this and the rest falls in to place.


Salon just published a piece that right up front recognizes that liberals and conservatives think differently but then attempts to prove the superiority of liberal thinking through the use of classical Greek. Liberals, you see base their thinking on the logos or logic of a narrative, while conservatives base theirs on the mythos of their positions. Nice try. We've heard this before as the Reality Based Party has tried to sell us global warming, gun control, smart diplomacy, leading from behind and other bottles of snake oil.


An immensely interesting topic which I'm sure I'll be returning to as it has lots of interesting implications for both elective battle space preparation and actual campaign efforts.

Saturday, January 3, 2015

Gone. Fishing.

Yeah, I've heard this one before and there's a cautionary note here for the Indian coast guard. When someone hands you a stick of dynamite with a short burning fuse, you drop it overboard. Don't argue about the relative merits or legality of the fishing technique. You can do that later.

Friday, January 2, 2015

Watershed Year?

This year could be a watershed year politically as several factors make themselves apparent and the voters take notice. Even though it's not an election year so maybe because it's not, the actions of the elected will figure more prominently in the news.

The effects of gerrymandering will be felt as states that voted majority Republican will be saddled with Dem governments which the voters tried to reject last year. In Colorado there were some 120,000 more votes cast for Republicans than for Democrats. We got a 1 seat majority in the Senate and a Dem house and governor. Cram as many Republicans into their own districts as possible, and distribute the remainder into Dem-majority districts, and Voila! a permanent Dem government.

Iowa has a state law requiring districts to be compact and contiguous. We all need this.

Meantime the Republicans are working hard to purge those pesky conservatives from the party ranks to smooth the way for the establishment pols. When they 're done, several of them may find themselves standing in an empty room wondering where everyone went. Remember the Whigs? They went from majority party to zero in one election cycle. Today the Republicans could do the same in 2 years. I suppose the Tea Party or whatever springs up could magnanimously offer to let the remaining Republicans caucus with them. Now would be the time to start that ball rolling.

Thursday, January 1, 2015

Working Things Out

There are now reports that ISIS recruiting efforts worldwide are bringing fighters to Iraq from around the world including some places from which you really don't want any immigrants. Seems there are outbreaks of Ebola in Basra and Mosul.

Reminds me of a strip from the Wizard of Id in which the king was faced with two crises: In the first the peasants were dying of thirst due to a drought. In the second, he was notified that the monsters in his castle moat were starving. The king observed that sometimes things have a way of working themselves out.

Happy New Year!