Colorado Politics

As of today, it looks like Sen Udall will be removed from the Senate, no representitaves will lose their jobs, and for Governor, depending on which poll you like, Bob Beauprez is up by 2-5 points. Certainly at this point Republicans have mailed in ballots faster than the Dems by a margin of about 4:3. Hickenlooper was supposed to have a comfortable shuffle to a second term, but somehow it's not working out. Here's some music to listen to on that topic:


The way it's shaping up it's going to take a major troop lift to get enough undocumented Democrats to the polls to save this one, but the Dems are nothing if not well organized.

Armageddon It

Yes, Armageddon it!

Political Illiteracy

Here's an idea that takes advantage of your constituent's ignorance. We have a candidate for state Treasurer who promised to stand up for women's reproductive rights. Not that the treasurers job has anything to do with that, but it's a powerful buzzword that resonates with low information voters.

Now we have a candidate for the State House who is running on a platform of protecting the Social Security and Medicare rights of seniors. Both of those are Federal programs and are not affected by dancing monkeys in any state legislature. Unless, of course, the state legislator is running a successful campaign for a Federal office which this one is not.

Why .22 Is So Hard To Find - Continued

When last we left our hero, his .22 had been misdelivered or something. FedEx had admitted to losing the shipment, and Target Sports is replacing it, signature required this time. Good customer service there.

For a bit, they even had the 1400 round buckets of .22 although that wasn't the best bargain on a $/rd basis. Keep checking.

Hillary Disqualifies Herself

Anyone who knows this little about basic economics is disqualified from ever holding elective office.

Election Humor

Like everyone else I get humor of various sorts on a regular basis, most of which falls under the category of "funny once". Occationally I get one that appeals to me more deeply. This is one of those:

  Fred was in the fertilized egg business. He had several hundred young ‘pullets,' and ten roosters to fertilize the eggs. He kept records, and any rooster not performing went into the soup pot and was replaced.

 

This took a lot of time, so he bought some tiny bells and attached them to his roosters.

 

Each bell had a different tone, so he could tell from a distance, which rooster was performing.

 

Now, he could sit on the porch and fill out an efficiency report by just listening to the bells.

 

Fred's favorite rooster, old Butch, was a very fine specimen, but this morning he noticed old Butch's bell hadn't rung at all!

 

When he went to investigate, he saw the other roosters were busy chasing pullets, bells-a-ringing, but the pullets, hearing the roosters coming, would run for cover.

 

To Fred's amazement, old Butch had his bell in his beak, so it couldn't ring. He'd sneak up on a pullet, do his job and walk on to the next one.

 

Fred was so proud of old Butch, he entered him in the Brisbane City Show and he became an overnight sensation among the judges. The result was the judges not only awarded old Butch the "No Bell Piece Prize," but they also awarded him the "Pulletsurprise" as well.

 

Clearly old Butch was a politician in the making. Who else but a politician could figure out how to win two of the most coveted awards on our planet by being the best at sneaking up on the unsuspecting populace and screwing them when they weren't paying attention.

 

Vote carefully in the next election, you can't always hear the bells.

Bidenizing Chicago Voting

Voting is hard. You need to know the candidates, the issues, the questions, and the unintended consequences of everything on the ballot.

1 In an effort to make it easier, in Chicago, the voting machines have been Bidenized. Thus a voter can pound away at the touch screen and when ready, hits the "cast Vote" button, and all his mistakes are automatically corrected and the straight Dem ticket is selected.

No one told the president so he's still having trouble with it.

Losing Your Religion

The city of Coeur d'Aline, Idaho has an ordinance that seems to require anyone practicing any religion to remember that the first commandment refers to the official state religion of Secular Humanism or something. The ordinance requires anyone performing a marriage, for example, to perform whatever type of marriage the customers demand. Some seem to think this is an overreach on the part of the city council, no matter how exalted they may think themselves, but I thing there's an opportunity here.

Just think, if this were a federal statute, I could go to the Grand Islamic Mufti of the United States* and demand he perform a Jewish wedding between myself and a pig. And not just any pig, but a big hairy boar. If he refuses I could then sue in Federal court, have him jailed for 10 years or so, and demand title to his Mosque and its treasury. By the time he got out, the former mosque (now al-Porquis) would be nationally famous as the home of the best pork Barbeque in the country, kicking off with my jilted fiance.

Just thinking out loud.

*The only person in the U.S. who regularly makes pronouncements as to what or whom is or is not Islamic has been the President. Someone needs to remind him that if you're going to denounce someone, ISIS say, as un-islamic, this needs to be accompanied with a fatwa calling for some appropriate punishment, say massive carpet bombing or something.

National Politics

Drudge has seen tomorrows NYT:
NYT SUNDAY: Confidential memo from Obama pollster predicts 'crushing Dem losses' if blacks not engaged in election... Developing...

I bet the story will be fascinating. Now if only someone with some stature in the black community would stand up and point out the emperors lack of clothing....

Update: Or if someone were to point out that the emperor plans to introduce a whole lot more competition for those jobs the perennially unemployed have been hoping for. 

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services plans to seek a vendor to produce as many as 34 million blank work permits and 'green cards' – the paperwork that authorizes illegal immigrants to live and work in the United States – as the White House prepares to issue an executive order after the Nov. 4 midterm elections. 

Colorado Politics

Heard from Ryan Call head of the Colorado Republican Committee this morning. He was positive sounding on Gardner and Coffman but less so on Beauprez, suggesting that unseating a sitting governor in this state would probably require an angry mob or an act of God. OTOH he expects all the races to be very close and decided by only a handful of votes so if the Republicans turn out in large numbers, it could happen. Of note was his mention of the amount of money the national Republicans had dropped and continue to drop on the Governors race. If they didn't think it would pay off they wouldn't be spending it. This in contrast to the Udall and Romanoff campaigns which have been effectively abandoned by the national Dems.

He was cautiously optimistic about the State Senate as we only need to flip one seat and not lose any of the existing ones, but somewhat less so about the House which would require flipping a lot of seats. That said then, it looks like we're stuck with all the gun laws, election fraud, and anti-business climate the Dems stuck us with last year at least for another 2 years.

In all the contested cases he expected the races to be very close.

Update: Colorado Peak Politics is reporting that Hick has suddenly remembered that he didn't like Obamacare very much. (Beauprez' odds just went up I bet.)

Econ 101

Capitalism is where free men freely exchange goods, services, or information with one another to the benefit of all.

Rent seeking is where a third party steps in and demands a percentage of the transaction in return for something that may or may not be of any benefit to the others. In a good case this may be  a mandatory quality standard that must be met. In a bad case it might just be a required insurance payment against accidental breakage of your kneecaps.

Crony capitalism is when the government mandates the bad case above. The law in question, proposed by the National Automobile Dealers Association would affect Elio as well as Tesla i Michigan. While it is acceptable for the states to act pretty much as they please unless the Fed.Gov objects and threatens to not give their tax monies back, this looks a lot like interference with interstate commerce and as such would be unconstitutional.

Gov. Snyder would do well to veto this.

Vote Fraud

By a 6-3 last-minute vote the US Supreme court has decided that the voter ID laws in Texas will be in full effect for the upcoming election. The vote was unofficial, but the 3 dissidents went so far as to release their dissents.

Justice Ruth went so far as to say:

"The greatest threat to public confidence in elections in this case is the prospect of enforcing a purposefully discriminatory law, one that likely imposes an unconstitutional poll tax and risks denying the right to vote to hundreds of thousands of eligible voters," Ginsburg wrote in dissent.

Near as anyone can actually tell, most of the disfranchised are among those with disabilities, the most common of which is a lack of metabolism. Disembodied spirits are also significantly affected.

Battleground State

Got our ballots late last evening, filled them out this morning, and had them dropped off by noon. Now, all you pols can quit calling me begging for my vote. You either got it or not.

I suppose the ones begging for money will quit eventually. Like whenever they get their campaign debts completely paid off. Of course by then it'll be time to start raising money for the next campaign.

Heinlein said once that voting is a serious responsibility if you live in a society that allows it. To be a good citizen you should research the candidates and the questions thoroughly so as to make an informed decision. Alternatively you could find a well-meaning fool, ask how he or she intends to vote, and vote the opposite.

The problem with that approach is that the definition of "well-meaning fool" all too often just means someone from the other party. My advice to the politically befuddled is to vote against all the incumbents, vote to oust all the judges, and vote no on all the questions. You may find you've cast a few votes that you regret, but frankly not very many.

What could be a QOTD was spoken on the radio one morning last week by someone I can't identify. His suggestion viz questions was that any question that starts out with "Shall taxes be raised..." automatically disqualifies itself from a yes vote. Giving guns or money to the criminally irresponsible is always a bad idea, and the government certainly qualifies on that score.

Alox

I've never used Alox before although I'm told it makes shooting hard lead bullets a lot less messy in terms of lead fouling. I decided to give it a try so I bought a small bottle of the stuff, brought it home, and read the directions. Yes, I know it takes all the fun out of a process, but I'm willing to do it once before abandoning them.

It calls for putting a "small amount" on an indeterminate number of bullets, shaking them gently in a plastic container to distribute the stuff, then letting the bullets dry overnight on wax paper. Small amount is your call and plastic container is suggested to be an ice cream box. This means I get to make things up as I go along with just nebulous guidelines to work from. Just like real life.

In my version I put some 250-350 bullets (92 gr, 9mm) in a peanut butter container (3" high, 4" dia) along with enough Alox that if it had been toothpaste, I could have brushed my teeth 2-3 times. How's that for an accurate measurement? In lieu of shaking I put the jar, which has a screw-on lid, into my tumbler along with the walnut shell media and ran it for about 5 minutes. NOTE 1: I have a rotary tumbler. This trick may not work as well in a vibratory model. Then again it might if you leave a generous load of relatively soft media in to dampen the shaking. NOTE 2: Media on the outside, bullets on the inside of the jar.

Result: A big load of sticky bullets. I'm guessing that half the amount of Alox would have sufficed. OTOH the fellow who sold me the stuff suggested that the 4 oz bottle would be good for 1000 bullets. At this rate I'm guessing it will be good for closer to 10,000. Nice even coating too.

Observation: They call this stuff "liquid". It has nearly the same consistency as light bearing grease.

Next stop is the range with the chroney.

QOTD - Academia

Of course since everyone reads the blogfather daily, everyone has already seen this and has probably stopped nodding their heads by now. Still, when the administration seems to get a good deal of inspiration from the antics of a handful of whackadoodles, it's good to keep in mind that almost nobody grows a complete brain before the age of 25 and a notable percentage of the population never do.

Tip: When students go on about social justice, the proper response is to tell them you don’t care what they think, because they don’t know enough to have an intelligent opinion yet. If universities were run on this principle, the 3% of students responsible for 98% of the idiocy would no longer have their destructive impact. Also, it’s true: They don’t know enough to have an intelligent opinion, as demonstrated by the opinions they do have.
                                                                         Glenn Reynolds

Gun Bling

Black Dog Machine has a muzzle break for .223 caliber EBR's that is sculpted like a dragons head. Looks very spiff.

Makes you think about what other gargoyles might look good/imposing on the end of your heater. Somehow that picture of Al Gore

inspires me to see his head on the end of an AR. Which might be an improvement over seeing it on the end of a pike but it's a close call.

Maybe a yellow rubber ducky head or the wild woodpecker

The possibilities are endless.

You Might Live In A Battleground State If...

Your phone rings every 15 minutes with calls from Washington, Virginia, Michigan (?), points unknown, or even Colorado with numbers like 000-000-0000 calling you.

I have a pretty good caller I.D. box, and I don't answer calls from people like that.

The story here is that the DNCC has pulled funding from both Sen Udall and wannabe Rep Romanoff. The implication is that their own internal polling suggests that the money would be better spent on a race they have a shot at winning although hope always springs eternal. We have a brand new vote fraud institutionalization law which the Dems are expected to take full advantage of next month. Read the gory details here, but at this point it's their only hope.

Vote early, vote ofter, and vote other peoples ballots if you should find them lying about, say on the "not my mail" table in a large apartment building. A word of warning on that one: This year mail-in ballots will have the signature on the outside compared to the signature on file with the SOS with the registration of the person in question. The comparison is done by computer so no one knows how good the comparison needs to be to pass. I know my signature has a fair amount of variation to it from day to day.

It is legal to drop off up to 10 ballots at one of the drop boxes the counties will be providing as you are expected to be helpful to your family and neighbors avoiding the $.65 postage otherwise required. No one checks anything, just drive by and toss the envelopes. If the signature doesn't pass muster, well, no one will know who dropped it off.

The good news is that the counties keep track of who voted so when you turn in your ballot and it gets accepted, your name gets taken off the list of registered voters and added to the list of those who have voted and you stop getting nagging phone calls.

Just remember, since voters are sorted by party, in order to make sure you are recognized with the correct party, Republicans and unaffiliated voters should sign their ballot "First, MI, Last" and Democrats should sign their ballots LAST NAME FIRST to avoid confusion.

Maker Faire, PRC Edition

Some of this stuff is more professionally done than others, but they all show a good deal on inventiveness.

The person who says it cannot be done should not interrupt the person doing it - Chinese Proverb

 This one is my personal favorite, closely edging out the cannons (six of them!) one fellow made to prevent the local government from visiting "urban renewal" on his house. The Chinese knockoffs of the Elio are already in pre-production

Science Marches Onward - Guns

When the thing gets too high tech, it's no longer Steampunk no matter how many gages and displays it has.

Go here to see more pics and a link to turning on the power.

Alas, so far no evidence that it actually shoots anything although it was suggested that it's set up for 7.62. There's a backpack that goes with it which looks to be the magazine.

The Next Gun Control Martyr

"Shotgun" Joe Biden says we need a new James Brady to energise the anti-gun movement. Since Gabby Giffords doesn't seem to be carrying the day, may I suggest that Mr. Biden go on a "fact-finding" walk through Furgeson, MO this Saturday night, without the Secret Service or his usual entourage.

I bet we'd have us a new poster boy by Sunday morning.

The End Of Days

Must surely be here. The local birdcage liner, Pravda On The Platte has actually endorsed a Republican in a closely contested race (Udall D-incumbent v Gardner R). This is something I've never seen the Pest do. Their usual MO is to endorse all the Dems in all races, contested or not, and endorse Republicans only if they are running unopposed. This allows them to claim to be bipartisan and not simply a tool of the DNC.

Along those lines, Udall says energy is his passion while staunchly opposing Keystone XL, and says jobs are important while endorsing another hike to the minimum wage. The Pest may have noticed that no one seems to be fooled by this and the polls are trending the wrong way for Udall whose only hope at this point is the Vote Fraud Act of 2013 and a 100+% turnout from the Denver-Boulder Axis of Evil.

Milwaukee Vote Turnout 102%

Investigation ensues. Voter I.D. law passes. SCOTUS  rejects.

The election in question was in 2004 so the process has presumably been massaged in the interim. No word on the turnout rates on subsequent election has been released however and with no changes to the local election laws, I fully expect turnout to reach 105% this year.

Here in Colorado, many of the same features that Milwaukee enjoys have been incorporated into our election law so we'll see how well the local pols can get their people trained on short notice to take advantage of this.

H/T to IOTW for the story where you'll also find links to the police report.

Why .22 Is So Hard To Find

I found some, only moderately overpriced via Firearms Blog and ordered some. O.K. So Far, so good.

Wait with baited breath as FedEx ships from NJ (of all places!) to CO, then on Friday while I'm packing the truck to head out to Maker Faire:

10/03/2014 - Friday
11:59 am	Delivered		Littleton, CO
	Left at front door. Signature Service not requested.
7:09 am	On FedEx vehicle for delivery		DENVER, CO
4:08 am	At local FedEx facility		DENVER, CO

The only problem was that it wasn't MY door the box got left at. FedEx says they're looking into this.

Dems Disappointed In Obama?

So it seems as the president is continually “surprised” at the consequences of his actions.

 It has been said of dogs that while it never ceases to amaze, the variety of tricks they can learn, one must be careful not to set the bar too high. There is a limit, after all to what one should expect from an animal who is surprised by its own farts.

Maker Faire

Back from the NoCo Maker Faire and somehow miraculously still able to walk. It was held in the now-abandoned Agilent manufacturing facility in Loveland so we had several hundred thousand square feet and we used a good deal of it.

What did people make?

There was a nicely finished kit Cobra, 375 hp in a 2200 lb chassis.

In addition, there were 2 electric motorcycles in different stages of completion.

There was a bicycle recycler who had a nice bike with a built-in bar. Should have been a tandem with the picnic food in the other end really, but I guess you work with what you’ve got.

There was a 30 foot tall “robot” with active arms and head which included a light show and fire from the head and hands.

There were 2 distilleries, one making whiskey, vodka, and gin, and one making Absinthe.

The barista mixed the Absinth with sugar and mint. I can see why some people found it addictive. I found it delicious.

There was Epilog Laser, demoing a copier-sized laser cutter.

Several schools were there from Emily Griffith to Colo State U (go Rams!)

The Boulder Kinetics was represented.

Several robot clubs and competitions were being promoted including our own Critter Crunch.

Lots of interactive stuff ranging from music to video games to the DMSC with the “Monkey Hunter” physics demo and the pedal air gun, both of which had lines of kids waiting to take a turn..

Lots of 3-D printers in action, many of them home-built.

Tons more stuff too but being tied to our table, I couldn’t get out to see all of them in detail.  The kids cardboard challenge featured a boat that looked like it would carry about 20 of them to the U.S. from Cuba and a fort big enough to park the Batmobile in.

Here's a Mad Scientist commanding his robotic minion to get out there and exterminate!

All in all, a great time.The kids had a ball and the older kids left contemplating the next project.

NoCo Maker Faire

Since I like to make things, I'm going to be one of many exhibitors at the Northern Colorado Maker Faire:

NoCo Mini Maker Faire - October 4th & 5th, 2014 @ Rocky Mountain Center for Innovation & Technology in Loveland, CO

 

I'll be at the Denver Mad Scientists Club booth where we'll be demoing fighting robots, camera mounts for celestial photography, recumbent bicycles and the ever popular pedal air gun for the kids to try. Jewelry, electronics, crafts, a giant cardboard arena (I'm pretty sure that will be there) and much else.

Back Sunday night with pictures.

Gun Law - Sort of

Via the Colorado RKBA newsletter:

Since You'll Probably See This Elsewhere: Winchester Ammunition, which has manufacturing facilities in Oxford [MS], has won a five-year contract to produce ammunition for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Olin Corp. and its Winchester division have been awarded a contract worth up to $50 million to produce ammunition at its Winchester Centerfire Operations in Oxford for two DHS agencies. “The Department of Homeland Security’s wide-ranging border security and law enforcement missions require a significant amount of firepower, particularly for training. I’m pleased that Mississippi will be able to fill that need,” said Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), who serves on the Senate subcommittee with jurisdiction over the Homeland Security Department. The indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity contract [sic] calls for the procurement of 40 caliber Smith & Wesson training ammunition, with a maximum dollar value of $50 million. The ammunition is intended for use by the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) for field-level training. (As I understand these contracts, they are for “up to” quantities.)

http://msbusiness.com/blog/2014/09/30/winchester-lands-50m-ammunition-contract-homeland-security/

I was unaware that either the DHS or the border patrol had any activities at all ongoing along the U.S. borders. Reports of various governments buying outsized ammo orders go back several years, and no real reason has ever been given for unusual quantities.

Optimistically, all that ammo will be hitting the surplus market in 2017.

Extinction

Just read a piece at Joe Huffman's noting someone decrying the possibly imminent demise of the pubic louse. Takes all kinds I guess.

To put this into perspective, let me note that in the last 40 years, half the human population of the world has died.