While the President Was Working On National Security....

Folks,

John C. Bystrom is a visitor to this blog and I thought I'd return the favor. The illustration above is from there, and this Wolverine has some great, and very on-point, observations about our present situation (more about that in my next post). But for now, read what John was doing while President Obama was working on national security. (Note: CIDG stands for "Civilian Irregular Defense Group," a term first coined in South Vietnam and not a bad one for where we find ourselves today.)

Thursday, January 22, 2009
While the President Was Working On National Security....
I was too....

While President Obama was signing an executive order to end the detention of 245 enemy combatants at Guantanamo Bay Cuba......

......I was treading by snowshoe on a lunch hour patrol at the Verona State Game Area in Huron County Michigan. I routinely trek public and private land in order to stay in shape, and to understand my neighborhood and places of refuge, for myself and family if The End of the World as We Know It should come.

While President Obama, was issuing an executive order to prevent brave, rough men from using certain interviewing methods to obtain information from our enemies......

I stopped by the local sporting goods store and bought 150 more rounds of .357 magnum. I am now at my minimum ammo inventory for my Winchester 94AE Trapper.

While President Obama signed executive orders closing CIA facilites where over 100 enemies of the United States are detained......

I cooked brats outside the door of my toolshed, and had a beer with three CIDG brothers. We watch what President Obama has done, think out loud about when we'll need to defend ourselves and communities, since it appears that some of the policies that have kept our country relatively secure are being undone with the stroke of a pen.

Since the United States Government is dismantling our security processes, as it relates to Islamic terrorism, we may be required to defend ourselves and deal with the emergencies that President Obama is creating. I ask you, what are you doing to protect yourself, your family and your community? Are you going to an Appleseed? Are you forming a CIDG? Are you considering the KISSATA model for a CIDG? Are you stocking up on essentials, are you prepared?

"The Weapons Cache Case": How the Finns Faced Down the Soviets

Flag of the Military Forces of the Republic of Finland.

My thanks to Ranger Rick for bringing this to my attention.

In the late 1940s, Finland stood on the cusp of hardline Soviet domination. Finland had always lived a perilous existence between the the European powers. It was attacked by the Soviets in 1940, but although it lost territory, it successfully defended itself, in what became known as The Winter War. Between 1940 and Jume 1941 when the Germans invaded Russia, the Finns sought to maintain neutrality. In the end, they joined the Germans in reclaiming their territory in what the Finns called "The Continuation War," but were unenthusiastic about helping them in their blitzkrieg of "Mother Russia." The Finns had always just wanted to be left alone. Indeed, had they entered into the June 1941 campaign more enthusiastically, Leningrad might have fallen early. It was one of the many might-have-beens for the Germans, along with their own failure to take Moscow in 1941 and Stalingrad in 1942.

The Russians, if they were grateful, did not show it. By 1944, the war had swept past Finland (after their awful bloody nose in 1940, the Soviets had learned a healthy respect for Finnish will and Finnish marksmanship). The war ended for Finland with the signing of the Moscow Armistice on September 19, 1944

The Finns lost huge areas of land, forcing them to resettle 1/8 of their population to avoid Soviet tyranny. They also had to pay the most reparations of any other nation beaten by the Soviets. They also were required to drive the Germans from its territory, especially in Lapland. The final peace treaty between Finland and the Soviet Union was signed in Paris in 1947.

However, they did retain their independence and a western-style constitution. The Soviets forced Finland to reject Marshall Plan aid, but the United States shipped secret development aid as well as aid to the non-communist political parties in hopes of saving Finland's independence.

The cruel Russian terms forced the Finns to transform their country from one that had been primarily agricultural to an industrial power. This did not stop the Soviets from using communist subversion to try to turn Finland into another client state along the lines of Poland, Latvia, Lithuania or Estonia. The Cold War was fought within Finland by Finns, and it was out of a desperate desire by Finns to remain free that the Weapons Cache Case developed.

The Weapons Cache Case concerned a secret military operation following the Continuation War, when a large number of Finnish Army weapons and equipment were
hidden away around the country.

Says Wikipedia:

Following the Moscow Armistice, two officers in Finnish Military HQ, Colonel Valo Nihtilä and Lieutenant Colonel Usko Haahti, started planning countermeasures against a possible Soviet occupation of the country. They came up with the idea of decentralized storing of light infantry weapons, so that in case of occupation, an immediate guerilla war could be launched.

During the demobilization, an organization responsible for hiding the equipment was created and war material was given for safekeeping. A total of 5000-10000 people participated in the operation. It was planned that they would hide material for 8000 men, but the participants worked so eagerly that it is supposed they hid material for 35000 soldiers.

The case started to unravel in the spring of 1945, when one man, who had stolen foodstuffs from the cache and sold it on the Black Market, for fear of reprisal from his comrades, divulged the existence of the caches to the Allied Control Commission (ACC). Initially the ACC was eager to follow the case, but after written orders from Nihtilä and Haahti surfaced, they left the investigation to Valpo, the Communist-controlled secret police of Finland at the time.

Valpo interrogated more than 5000 people but failed to completely crack the case and find all the weapons. Most of the weapons were silently returned to army depots, and some were destroyed, but even today when old buildings are demolished, caches turn up every year. The investigators failed to find out how many people participated in the operation, as the participants tended to be reluctant to divulge meaningful information. In the end, 1488 people were convicted, most of them receiving 1-4 months in prison.

Many years later, Arvo Tuominen, a former Finnish Communist leader, claimed that the weapons cache case was the tipping point which transferred the power within the Finnish Communist movement from the revolutionary to the parliamentary wing, as the communists feared armed resistance against revolutionary takeover.

The Finns maintained their independence, exploiting the Soviets' nightmare memories of The Winter War by caching what, to the then mighty Soviet Empire, was a piddling amount of weapons. But when they found out about the weapons, they were checked in their ambitions because they KNEW the Finns had the will to use them.

There's a lesson there, for anyone smart enough to see it. Are you paying attention, Nancy Pelosi?

There are Lists, and then there are LISTS.

Folks,

I'd like to highlight two comments from over at WRSA on "The Quote of the Week" overheard at a gun show on the subject of lists.

The first is from Anonymous:

Quantity has a quality all its own.

How many people have lists? 1? 100? 10,000? 100,000? Only they, themselves, know. But the larger the number, the bigger the problem that the people with one list and limited manpower have.

Let's hope that the more intelligent among the leadership class understand AND RESPECT that, so that no one needs to refer to their list for anything other than entertainment purposes.

Then ebd10 left this pertinent observation:

The other thing they overlook is that some of us work right next to them...

Indeed, there are lists, and then there are LISTS. Better to not go there.

Praxis: Home-Made Bandoleers From Home Depot Nail Aprons.

Many thanks to ChuckAtPodunkOutpost for directing me to TCM's excellent post here.

Home-Made Bandoleers (or Bandoliers, if you prefer...)

Sorry to be late getting this post up. I've been indescribably swamped at work since mid-December and it's only now easing up enough for me to do things like sleep and post.

Those who know Fûze fairly well know that he's the crowned king of DIY (Do It Yourself). I'm not sure there are many "sweat equity" production projects he's not willing to attempt: AK building, brewing, reloading, tanning, butchering, etc. He's not afraid of tools nor reckless experimentation. Fûze doesn't undertake these efforts to save money so much as to acquire the skills/knowledge they require. And if my fawning over his aptitude in this regard doesn't make it obvious, I'm horribly jealous. Being the perfectionist that I am, I'm less willing to tolerate failure and, thus, less likely to experiment. But I have my moments.

There has been some discussion of late on various rifleman websites concerning the dearth of mil-surp bandoleers, specifically those for 5-round 7.62 NATO stripper clips. I have a few of the Aussie bandoleers for this application and they are indeed nice. But I like my SKSs and AKs, too, and I wanted something to hold 10-round 7.62x39 stripper clips. Having solved this for myself a few years back, I thought I'd discuss my DIY solution with you folks -- our four dedicated readers.

I started out with a mess of these:


That's a Home Depot two-pocket nail pouch. They're heavy cotton and have two narrow tie straps at each end. The cost was a whopping 77¢ each. I ripped-out the middle (double) stitching -- which took no small amount of time -- and turned each one inside-out to hide the violently orange HD logo. Then I had three vertical stitches run, making four pockets. Like this:


Not wanting the end result to be white, I picked up some fabric dye in "earth tone" colors. In this case, green, brown, and black. The original project involved 36 pouches so I dyed 12 in each of the three colors. Using a stainless steel kitchen sink, I submersed each batch of 12 pouches in the (very hot!) water-and-dye mix and let them marinate for about a 1/2-hour, stirring occasionally. I then rinsed each batch several times and ran them thru the washer-n-dryer to remove what dye was remaining and to shrink them to their final size. (I washed each batch separately to prevent color bleeding.) I ended up with this:


The lighting made the colors a little weird; they're darker than what's in the pic. Trust me, they're green, brown, and black! (OK, maybe not black, but definitely charcoal...)

Each of the four pouch pockets will easily hold three 10-round 7.62x39 stripper clips, for a total of 120 rounds:


Doing the (simple) math, that's enough to fully recharge four 30-round AK mags or prep your SKS barrel for heat treating!

Just as an experiment, I took one of the pouches and applied some sew-on hook-n-loop (aka, Velcro) tabs to the top of each pocket. I thought this might offer some additional "retention security". It did, marginally, but I didn't think the ROI justified the effort and I didn't bother to "upgrade" any of the other pouches.

So, since this post was initially prompted by blogs addressing 7.62 NATO pouches, I wanted to see how mine worked with those 5-round stripper clips. The result was this:


I can get six charged stripper clips into each pocket. They seem to be retained well enough, but only a "march thru the boonies" experiment would tell. I can say that due to the depth of the pocket, the bottom three clips are kinda' tricky to retrieve. Not impossible, but I'd hate to be fussing with it while dodging incoming fire. (YMMV...) If someone wanted to apply these bandoleers specifically to 7.62 NATO stripper clips, they could simply cut each pouch in half horizontally and restitch the bottom.

And just to see what else we can stick in these pockets I tried these 30-round mags:


As far as I'm concerned, the AK mags are a "no-go". Too top heavy and they'd likely rattle. The AR mags would work in a pinch. They're not held very securely, though the pouches would probably work well with 20-round'ers. Then again, showing up at a firefight with 20-round AR mags is akin to showing up at a firefight with an AR. (Did I say that??...) The pockets will not hold M14, FAL, or HK-91 mags, though I suspect sewing the pouches for three pockets would do that nicely. Obviously, there's plenty of room in each pocket for M1 Garand en blocs, though they don't occupy the space optimally.

So, there's a weekend DIY project for ya'. Not a lot of moving parts and it can be done while catching your favorite "athletic entertainment programming" on the talkin' picture box.

Ciao!!
TCM

MBV: Of course, you'll want to sew attachment points (D-rings, for example) and a shoulder strap. Still, GREAT improvisation.

And you thought this was a comedy? -- "El Guapo" & "El Jefe" Ride Again with Guns, Democracy and the "Insurrectionist Idea."

Folks,
Some of you may remember my last piece on Josh "El Guapo" Horwitz and Casey "El Jefe" Anderson's theory that the people should not have enough firearms to seriously challenge the government, "Monopoly (or, Slouching toward 'nut cuttin' time')" on Chris Horton's Mindful Musings blog, 11 May 2008. I was reminded of this by Kurt "45 superman" Hoffman's email to me below, which informed me that El Guapo amd El Jefe are mounting up to ride again, seeking to plunder our natural and God-given right to arms.

Hi Mike,

I was knocking around Chris Horton's place last evening, and stumbled upon your "Monopoly (or, Slouching toward 'nut cuttin' time')" piece. I had read it before, but have yet to come across anything of yours not worthy of a second reading--so I read it again. In it, you refer to the CSGV's Josh Horwitz, and the book he was working on, which at the time was supposed to come out some time last year, under the title Freedom Under Fire, examining the relationship between guns and democracy. Now it seems that the release date has been pushed back to May 28th of this year, and that the title has been changed to Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea (and "El Jefe," Casey Anderson, is being credited as co-author). Here's Amazon's description (excerpt):

The NRA steadfastly maintains that the 30,000 gun-related deaths and 300,000 assaults with firearms in the United States every year are a small price to pay to guarantee freedom. As former NRA President Charlton Heston put it, "freedom isn't free."

And when gun enthusiasts talk about Constitutional liberties guaranteed by the Second Amendment, they are referring to freedom in a general sense, but they also have something more specific in mind---freedom from government oppression. They argue that the only way to keep federal authority in check is to arm individual citizens who can, if necessary, defend themselves from an aggressive government.

In the past decade, this view of the proper relationship between government and individual rights and the insistence on a role for private violence in a democracy has been co-opted by the conservative movement. As a result, it has spread beyond extreme "militia" groups to influence state and national policy.

In Guns, Democracy, and the Insurrectionist Idea, Josh Horwitz and Casey Anderson reveal that the proponents of this view base their argument on a deliberate misreading of history. The Insurrectionist myth has been forged by twisting the facts of the American Revolution and the founding of the United States, the denial of civil rights to African-Americans after the Civil War, and the rise of the Third Reich under Adolf Hitler. Here, Horwitz and Anderson set the record straight. Then, challenging the proposition that more guns equal more freedom, they expose Insurrectionism---not government oppression---as the true threat to freedom in the U.S. today.

It occurs to me that one of the "Pragmatics'" objection to the "3pers" is that all of us who talk about such things are full of shit and internet bravado, and that no one takes the idea of armed resistance to the U.S. government seriously. It seems to me that someone clearly takes it seriously enough to consider it a real threat to "Democracy."

Just struck me as interesting--hope it's not a waste of your time.

By the way, speaking of books--I can't remember where I saw you mention Robert Churchill's To Shake Their Guns in the Tyrant's Face: Libertarian Political Violence and the Origins of the Militia Movement, but that sounds like a book I'll need to buy when it comes out. As for Horwitz's book, I'll be damned if I send him any money, but I am curious enough about what he has to say about us bad old insurrectionists that I'll have to see if my local library can get the book when it comes out.

III

Take care,
Kurt "45superman" Hofmann


The article that originally drew my attention to El Guapo and El Jefe was published at The Huffington Post on 6 May 2008, and it advanced the theory first expressed by their fellow bandido of gun control, CSGV's Ladd Everitt:

“The government must have a monopoly on force.”

El Guapo and Jefe were concerned that the then undecided Heller case might overturn their gun control cart for good and all. Scratch a liberal, get a fascist:

In its decision, the Court of Appeals asserted a broad range of purposes for the Second Amendment, including hunting, self-defense and, most notably, to defend against the "depredations of a tyrannical government." After the ruling was successfully appealed to the Supreme Court by the District of Columbia, the National Rifle Association made a similar argument in their brief to the Court, affirming that the "very existence of an armed citizenry will tend to discourage would-be tyrants from attempting to use paid troops to 'pacify' the populace." Such "insurrectionist" philosophy is common among a small but vocal group of gun rights supporters. Insurrectionists assert that unrestricted access to guns of every kind is an essential element of freedom. Government is seen as a likely enemy, and gun regulation is viewed as a plot to monitor gun ownership and, ultimately, to confiscate all private firearms. If this insurrectionist logic were to be embraced by the Supreme Court, however, our democracy would be severely degraded.

As I observed in "Monopoly, "Ah, democracy, sweet democracy. El Guapo and Jefe are right you know. Democracy IS 'severely degraded' by constitutional restrictions. AND THAT'S JUST THE WAY THE FOUNDERS WANTED IT."

So now we are going to have a book length treatment of why the government must have a "monopoly of force." And it will arrive, presumably, just in time to serve as an intellectual predicate for the Obamanoids' latest gun control bills.

You know, Bill Clinton's rules of engagement for the Serbs are looking more attractive by the minute. El Guapo and Jefe, meet the final shootout of The Magnificent Seven.


And you thought this was a comedy?

WRSA's Quote of the Week

In case you didn't get over to Pete's Western Rifle Shooters Association to to see this.

"The Feds? Make me laugh. How come they think they're the only ones with a list?"

-- Overheard at a gun show this weekend

Praxis: Scavenging as a Guerrilla Art Form

Dumpster diving is the practice of sifting through commercial or residential trash to find items that have been discarded by their owners, but which may be useful to the Dumpster diver. The practice of Dumpster diving is also known variously as urban foraging, binning, alley surfing, aggressive recycling, Curbing, D-mart, Dumpstering, garbaging, garbage picking, garbage gleaning, dumpster-raiding, dumpstering, dump-weaseling, tatting, skally-wagging, skipping, or trashing. -- Wikipedia

OK, first of all I'd like to apologize to anyone who lost their morning coffee all over their keyboard and screen for that illustration. Sorry, I couldn't resist.

Anyone who has read much of my Praxis stuff knows that I am a big believer in scavenging. I get this compulsion from my early training at the knee of my mother's father, Lewis Nace, who, after being injured in an industrial accident at Clark Equipment, supplemented his disability by trash hauling. He would put an ad in the newspaper and offer to clean out basements and attics and carry off unwanted items to the dump. Boy, did he make out like a bandit. Hey, he even carried off firearms and ammunition (unfortunately this was many years before I was allowed access to firearms). He would recycle scrap metal, fix broken furniture, sort clothes, you name it. When he had a load, he would go down to the great flea markets and auctions just below the Michigan-Indiana line. My earliest memories of him include wheeling and dealing at the Shipshewana Auction and Flea Market, in the heart of Amish country.

I used to make a good living myself diving the dumpsters of the Ohio National Guard on 161 outside Linworth, back before everybody got so paranoid about property books and terrorism. I did my best gleaning for manuals, discarded load bearing equipment, even brass, links, bandoleers, rations and pyrotechnics. Ah, the good old days.

But once an urban forager, always an urban forager. Take my latest trip to the range. The brass had already been policed before we got there, so there was little on the ground. But, oh, the trash cans. Most people hate to dig around in trash cans, mostly because there's trash in there, some of it organic and a fair percentage of that objectionable from an olfactory point of view. But here's my take from three trash cans:

4 SKS stripper clips
234 pieces of brass, various
4 brand new factory loaded rounds, Remington .243 still in box.
1 8mm Mauser bandoleer.
1 .22 pistol magazine, uncertain progeny.
24 empty cardboard ammo boxes, some useful as bandoleer sleeves, others to be used to contain .45ACP, 7.62 NATO and 5.56 NATO reloads.

(The pistol mag was apparently discarded for being dirty. I brought it home, stripped it, cleaned it, reassembled it and it seems perfect. No damaged feed lips, spring strong, no rust, holds .22 rounds no problem. Now if I can just figure out what it fits.)

And this was a slow day.

In the past, from the same cans I have retrieved a .22 rifle scope that was found adjusted all the way to the right and up, indicating that the guy had a problem with his base needing shimmed. I put it on one of mine, adjusted it and it works perfectly; a half dozen Australian 7.62 NATO bandoleers, complete with discarded stripper clips and guides; a pair of binoculars with one lens fogged (I stripped it, cleaned it and resealed it and it works fine.); an M-1 carbine 15 round magazine with a dent that obstructed the follower (I used a vise and a homemade fixture to straighten out the dent and it works fine now.); and, most importantly untold hundreds of boxes and thousands of pieces of brass that people just throw away.

Not to mention uncounted coins, three cell phones (one still had minutes on it) and a twenty dollar bill. The list could go on and on. Trash is the gift that keeps on giving.

Don't forget thrift stores either. I once got a medium kevlar PASGT helmet from the toy shelves marked, like all the other bike helmets, for $1.98. I have twenty-two five gallons icing buckets, each packed with two GI wool blankets, picked up at the thrift stores or garage sales for as little as 50 cents or as much as $4.98. What will I do with the wool blankets? Well, you never can tell who might need them. Besides, in the end they were free. I found three brand new 1943 Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot blankets that I sold to WWII collectors and re-enactors for a total of $135.00. That paid for the rest of them.

Anyway, I'll be interested to see if any of you have guerrilla scavenging stories. Oh, yeah, and sorry again about the picture.

Praxis: Ruger 10-22 Magazine Maintenance

We have this by way of Dr. Enigma and SayUncle:

Something for your "Praxis" column. I found the link on "Say Uncle", so credit them. The important thing for me is to get the information out.

Many folks use the venerable Ruger 10-22 rifle with standard 10 round rotary magazines for their "survival" rifle. It's a great rifle, very accurate, easy to maintain, and fun to shoot.

However, 99.5% of all people who own one do not ever take apar their magazines and clean them. It's not because they're lazy (well, ok, some are, but most aren't), it's because there's not been any credible information available to teach someone how to do it without ruining the magazine. Up until recently, maybe it wasn't necessary as the mags were so cheap it wasn't worth attemping. Well, that's not the case any longer as most people can attest, so here's the answer:

http://www.heypete.com/pete/shooting/rugermag.html

This link has complete information along with pictures and exploded drawings to show you exactly how your little 10-22 rotary 10 round magazines come apart and go together!

This needs to be printed and put in the reference material of everyone who owns one of these fine little plinkers!

The squawling you hear is another Three Percenter blog being born.

Amish Tom's from Texas here. I always said what the blogosphere needed was more Texicans. Welcome to the ether, Tom. You'll regret it.

Praxis: More on The Hunter Theme

My good friend Pete at WRSA reminds me of this
post from a little over a year ago.

Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Scoped Hunting Rifles as Long-Range Rifles


From someone who knows his a** from his elbow, and more:

In case folks haven't figured it out by now I'm pretty interested in long range shooting. I'm just not all that interested in playing rifle platoon games with active duty rifle platoons. I think it's something that just kind of happens when you're a combat veteran and 40 years old. You just want to stay the hell away from all that drama.

Here's a technique that folks might find of use -- nothing I invented but on the other hand something that isn't taught much anymore. Just the simple use of scope zeroing to get you out past the effective range of the average troops ability to hit well with his rifle. The best part about it is almost any decent hunting rifle/scope combo will have you getting pretty effective hits out to 600 yards.

This technique has it's roots way back when sniping with optics and smokeless powder cartridges was in it's infancy, probably sometime during WWI since Herbert McBride mentions long range zeros in "A Rifleman Went To War". It was allot more important in those days than now though, they didn't have the very nice LR optics that we are blessed with, sporting repeatable external knobs side focus etc. The scopes were low powered, dark, fragile and lacked any kind of repeatable means for compensating for elevation (some early attempts were fielded but scope technology wasn't up to the task yet), let alone windage.

Yet even those things being true, the rifleman of the day jumped right on the early optics and did a bang up job. There is probably a lesson here somewhere. It shouldn't be lost on folks that knowledgeable rifleman, in the days long range iron sight shooting was taught, could see the benefit of optics even when they sucked. Simo Hayha killed over 500 Russians, mostly during the harsh Finnish Winter. Lyudmila Pavlichenko (Russian college chick) killed over 300 Germans with her SVT40. Mathias Hetzenauer was awarded the First Class Iron Cross for his efforts whittling down Russians. These folks averaged several hundred kills each and certainly there was a host of "unknowns" doing the same thing.

While there was an eclectic variety of rifles used everything from sporters to the latest in semi-autos, to include the first forward mounted telescope to see issue, they all had one thing in common. Not many of them had as good an optic or a rifle that was any more accurate that the average off the shelf hunting rifle that we take for granted now. I've had opportunity to mess with several vintage sniping rifles, M1D's, Springfield 1903-A4s, Enfields, Mosin Nagants, Mausers including the Swede and German rifles. None of them had anything over a generic Remington ADL and a Leupold 3X9 VXII. The reason these rifleman (and chicks) did so well in combat had to do with what they had between their ears and not in their hands.

Something else you come to realize when you start studying the subject is that most sniper casualties are inflicted from 300 to 500 yards, shorter distances being the exception in MOUT operations and of course the proverbial 1ooo-yard shots in the desert wars. The fact remains that under practical conditions (that includes current efforts) the shots are in the 300 to 500 yard slot. The reason being is simple - it's not that the rifles lack precision or the rifleman lack the skill. It's simply the fact that folks don't make themselves easy targets in combat theaters.

I could keep going, as this is a pet subject, but I'm going to stop and hope I've made a case for the "why". Now to the meat of things with the "how". Pretty simple really: just jock the rifle's zero to take advantage of the distances shot the most With a 500 yard zero you can use simple on target hold offs to compensate for the range and since a picture is worth a thousand words, I have included a picture of a chart from a vintage training manual.

The hardest part about the whole deal is getting the good 500 yard zero. What I do is zero the scope at 500 yards and them mark the adjustment turret under the cap and then return the zero to a more manageable 200 yard zero for hunting. Any decent hunting scope is repeatable enough to make this work, I haven't had any problems even with "friction" adjustments on an old Leupold. Then of course you need to practice and tune things up for you.

Folks that have followed the "Mil-dots vs. Ballistic-Plex" will recognize right off the bat how useful the bargain priced Ballistic-Plex reticle could be if you needed to draft your hunting rifle into active duty.

Food for thought....

Codrea: Holder Clutches at Gun Rights

Here's David Codrea's latest take on Holder. It is important, so go and read. It is also important to visit his Examiner column daily. 'Nuff said.

Praxis: Training Elmer Fudd? Maybe he should train you.

This is Elmer Fudd, the Warner Brothers cartoon character.


This is a modern-day hunter.

Before we get into our subject matter, troops, I have a mea culpa. I have referred to hunters who exhibit no interest in defending their Second Amendment rights and who are willing to throw MY right to own military pattern rifles under the bus as "Elmer Fudds." Many of us Three Percenters do. It is understandable to resent folks who you believe are totally without a clue when the threat to you seems so real, so imminent.

However, adopting this attitude across-the-board, that is, by looking at all politically non-involved hunters as "Elmer Fudds" is not only wrong, it is counter-productive. My thinking has changed thanks to several conversations I have had with folks over the last few months which finally crystalized for me this week. It began with a request from a newly politicized hunter.

"I read your article on packaging, but I have a scoped bolt action rifle (a Winchester Model 70). What can I do to pack my ammo any better than in the boxes it came in so I can transport it and use it quickly?"

There are, of course, many open-looped ammo belts of the type first invented by the US Cavalry officer Anson Mills. Here is an example:



However, my hunter friend's question was one of packaging and storage, as much as tactical utility. What I came up with is, I think, a good compromise. It uses as its principal component the plastic insert that comes in Federal and other rifle ammunition boxes. Here is a sample:



Note that these ten round inserts come with belt loops, enabling them to be worn on a standard pants belt. The loops are just a bit less than two inches internal width. Of course the colors of these inserts are hardly tactical, usually being red or white as in the illustration above.

My solution was to spray prime them with Rust-Oleum Plastic Primer and then spray paint them OD. I have some 1.75" OD thin webbing on a roll that I picked up cheap somewhere in the Clintonista era and so I cut an appropriate length of material, threaded it through four 10 round carriers (scavenged from the trash barrels at the range), and secured the two ends by threading them through some 2" plastic slides that I scavenged off packs, duffle bags and purses bought at the thrift store. (For an average of $.79 each, I get a fair number of slides, d-rings and fastex buckles off each one. Can't buy them that cheap in WalMart or a sewing shop.)

Four bandoleers will fit in an M19A1 "thirty cal" ammo can, giving a hundred and sixty rounds per can. Voila! Tactical storage that can be used in the field. The plastic carriers actually grip the rounds more tightly than the average modern Mills-type belt, no matter what it is made of.

When it is used up, it can be discarded at little expense, or reloaded from bulk boxes. This is my contribution to making deer hunters tactical.

Over the years, many volunteers have come up to me saying, apologetically, that they don't have a military pattern rifle (AR, AK, etc.) they JUST have their bolt action deer rifle. Previously, I usually said something like "That's OK, it'll do until you can get something better."

Now, I'm not so sure that a military pattern rifle IS better all the time. For one thing, a man who has used a deer rifle all his life knows that rifle inside and out. He KNOWS what it can do, and what he can hit. He knows other things too.

This subject came up not long ago when I was speaking with a young man who wondered how we would train all the "Fudds" in military tactics and battle rifle marksmanship when they did rally to to us.

That many hunters will rally I have do doubt, even given their political inactivity now. Events have always been our greatest recruiter. In some peoples' minds, it just isn't that bad yet. They don't keep track of the bills in the hopper, or the internet websites devoted to firearms rights. They work, they read the paper, they watch TV, hence they have no definite word of how ominous the threat really is.

I told my young friend that maybe they wouldn't need that much training. Look at what a real hunter knows:

He knows how to live in the woods, how to move quietly, to stalk game and how to dress it.

Because he uses a bolt-action rifle he is free from the burst-happy sickness of spray and pray. You cannot bump fire a bolt action rifle. The hunter picks his target, and his aim point, carefully, and if he is good it is one shot, one kill.

His marksmanship is almost always better than the paper-punchers down at the range. This was brought home to me by a hunter who just bore-sighted his .300 WinMag rifle and came to the range on Friday to fine tune it. He did it, with TWO ROUNDS.

And also unlike those non-veteran paper-punchers, the hunter knows what it is like to kill. Oh, there's a jump to be sure from taking four-legged game to killing two-legged predators, but not as much as for someone who has killed nothing bigger than a cockroach with his shoe.

In a military situation, the hunter armed with a bolt-action rifle need not get so close to engage his target and he is unlikely to stay too long (an important point in 4th Generation warfare).

To take that bolt-action rifle out of the hands of someone who has been using it all his life and hand him a semi-automatic military pattern rifle is like asking a Samurai swordsman to chop brush. It can be done, but it is a waste of resources.

Better would be to figure out how to use hunters as designated marksmen in your larger organization. Food for thought toward the day when many hunters rally to us. For they will, whether they fit the description of "Elmer Fudd" now or not.

For all you fellows up to no good, working hard in those garage machine shops (and I KNOW you're out there).

Making a rifle barrel on a lathe.

A H/T to Clell for forwarding this. It is entitled:

TOOLS EXPLAINED

DRILL PRESS: A tall upright machine useful for suddenly snatching
flat metal bar stock out of your hands so that it smacks you in the
chest and flings your beer across the room, denting the
freshly-painted project which you had carefully set in the corner
where nothing could get to it.

WIRE WHEEL: Cleans paint off bolts and then throws them somewhere
under the workbench with the speed of light. Also removes
fingerprints and hard-earned calluses from fingers in about the time it

takes you to say, 'Oh sh -- '

ELECTRIC HAND DRILL: Normally used for spinning pop rivets in their
holes until you die of old age.

SKILL SAW: A portable cutting tool used to make studs too short.

PLIERS: Used to round off bolt heads. Sometimes used in the creation
of blood-blisters.

BELT SANDER: An electric sanding tool commonly used to convert minor
touch-up jobs into major refinishing jobs.

HACKSAW: One of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board
principle. It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable
motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more
dismal your future becomes.

VISE-GRIPS: Generally used after pliers to completely round off bolt
heads. If nothing else is available, they can also be used to
transfer intense welding heat to the palm of your hand.

OXYACETYLENE TORCH: Used almost entirely for lighting various
flammable objects in your shop on fire. Also handy for igniting the
grease inside the wheel hub out of which you want to remove a
bearing race.

TABLE SAW: A large stationary power tool commonly used to launch
wood projectiles for testing wall integrity.

HYDRAULIC FLOOR JACK: Us ed for lowering an automobile to the ground
after you have installed your new brake shoes, trapping the jack
handle firmly under the bumper.

BAND SAW: A large stationary power saw primarily used by most shops
to cut good aluminum sheet into smaller pieces that more easily fit
into the trash can after you cut on the inside of the line instead
of the outside edge.

TWO-TON ENGINE HOIST: A tool for testing the maximum tensile
strength of everything you forgot to disconnect.

PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER: Normally used to stab the vacuum seals under
lids or for opening old-style paper-and-tin oil cans and splashing oil
on your shirt; but can also be used, as the name implies, to strip
out Phillips screw heads.

STRAIGHT SCREWDRIVER: A tool for opening paint cans. Sometimes used
to convert common slotted screws into non-removable screws and
butchering your palms.

PRY BAR: A tool used to crumple the metal surrounding that clip or
bracket you needed to remove in order to replace a 50 cent part.

HOSE CUTTER: A tool used to make hoses too short.

HAMMER: Originally employed as a weapon of war, the hammer nowadays
is used as a kind of divining rod to locate the most expensive
parts adjacent the object we are trying to hit.

UTILITY KNIFE: Used to open and slice through the contents of
cardboard cartons delivered to your front door; works particularly
well on contents such as seats, vinyl records, liquids in plastic
bottles, collector magazines, refund checks, and rubber or plastic
parts. Especially useful for slicing work clothes, but only while
in use.

DAMM-IT TOOL: Any handy tool that you grab and throw across the
garage while yelling 'DAMM-IT' at the top of your lungs. It is also, most
often, the next tool that you will need.

Tea Party

Karl Denninger has a good idea here.

Will it work? It depends on how you quantify success. It will not change their minds, but it might help focus our own people on the fact that they are not helpless in this event -- that they are STILL citizens. I like the fact that it is a threat without being a threat. If we can get some soon-to-be-muzzled talk show hosts to get on board, it is quite possible that the offices of the Mandarins could be inundated with them. After all, it takes little expense and time. Do it in the breaks between the reloading parties and the cache positioning field trips.

The Dweeze, who forwarded me this, has an even better idea. Mark "III" on the tags. David Codrea is going one further and suggests: "We should post a Word doc with the III logo so people can make their own tags."

Read Denninger's idea and see what you think.

TEA PARTY February 1st?

So long as we have an inauguration drawing this sort of crowd and not a protest about our government blowing $700 billion of our dollars so that The Pigmen of Wall Street can continue to rob our nation blind, then saddle us with the bill when their bets go bad, we will see no solution.

I cannot take credit for the idea floated on the forum, but I do like it.
It is time for We The People to send a strong message to Washington DC - no more. No more loading our children and grandchildren with debt. No more bailing out speculators and bankers who made bets they knew were unsafe at the time. No more bailing out people who came to Congress to demand the removal of leverage limits, got what they asked for, then blew themselves up with the very leverage they demanded to be able to use.

No more.

Therefore, on February 1st, which is more than enough time for Barack Obama to be seated in his chair in the West Wing, I am recommending an act of peaceful, lawful and yet unmistakable protest.

That is, to mail President Obama one teabag. Nothing dangerous, nothing illegal - just one teabag.

Send one to your Congressman and one to each Senator.

Later, when the weather is a bit warmer and fountains are running water (rather than frozen!) this sort of protest can be repeated with LOOSE tea in select cities.
But for now, let's start with the symbolism, to be repeated each and every time our government votes or intends to do something similarly stupid - which I presume will include Obama's "stimulus" package.

If we all mail our teabags on February 1st, it will send a strong message to Washington. Include a copy of this Ticker, another Ticker related to the many bailouts (pick one!) or write your own letter condemning the fraud and abuse in our banking and financial system - with the teabag being your symbolic refusal to quietly pay for it.

Pass it around the blogs and email lists - its a bag of tea folks, and the obvious parallel to the Boston Tea Party of old should be instantly obvious to everyone who receives it.

Quote of the Day

Indian Doctor made a point in a response to "One Hundred Heads" that I think deserves repeating:

What really puzzles me is why politicians expect us to risk our lives in the service of our country so that our loved ones may live in a free land yet expect us to be cowardly sheep in our own homes. Most of us who have served have done so voluntarily. Don't those idiots realize that we are even more willing to fight and die on our home turf if need be to keep our loved ones safe and free? They need to realize that we have made our decisions and will act without hesitation when the time comes.

One Hundred Heads

Folks,

You have no idea how humbling the response as been to Absolved and this website. These are serious issues. Issues that, in the fullness of time, could get people killed. Yet what I write apparently resonates with people because God has given me a talent for expressing what they have long believed.

All of my work has been motivated by a desire to avoid conflict over these principles we hold so dear. If I bluntly warn liberal politicians, media types and academics of the folly of their proposals, it is because I don't want my children and grandchildren to have to suffer the ghastly experience of civil war.

It has always been my belief that if people understood where this is heading, there was a least a chance of avoiding it. As we proceed into the Era of Obama, I am afraid that is becoming more and more a faint hope.

As some of you know from bitter personal experience, taking a stand does not come without cost. There are dangers, even now, to having political opinions. Just ask David Olofson. From time to time, people express concern that I may fall victim to ATF retribution or FBI miscalculation. There is, in fact, little I can do about that, for that move is up to them. Like Luther, here I stand, I cannot do otherwise. There are no free lunches. It is what comes of being a free man. Or as my Grandpa Vanderboegh used to say in an imitation of a cartoon character, "You pays your money and you takes your chances."

But I was reminded this week that no man is an island, entire of itself. On my trip to the post office box, I was rewarded, in addition to statements from Social Security and the power bill, a single anonymous envelope. It was postmarked from somewhere in Oklahoma. It said this in handwritten block letters, spelling and punctuation as written:

Sir,

I have read you on the internet and believe in what your doing. One day the ATF will come to count coup on you & take your head. I promise to take One hundred heads for yours.

Cheyenne 0317/8541

There is a small, delicate ink drawing on the bottom of the sheet, showing what appears to be a coup stick crossed with a tomahawk and over-arched with what I'd guess are eagle feathers. 0317/8541, for the uninitiated, are the current and former MOS numbers for a Marine Scout/Sniper.

One hundred heads. I sat in the car, reading and rereading this piece of paper, touched by its simple sincerity. I have no doubt the man means what he says. I also have no doubt that a Marine scout/sniper has the skills to take a hundred heads if, God forbid, this should come to guns.

I shared this with a friend yesterday, and he had only this comment: "A hundred heads properly targeted could finish this thing." Indeed.

On the assumption that Cheyenne is reading this, I would like to tell him this:

I do not ask you to take those hundred heads, sir, but I appreciate the commitment to our common cause that such a promise implies. I do not know what the future may bring, but if it should be grim I merely ask that you get the right hundred heads.

In liberty, and with gratitude,

Mike Vanderboegh
III

Obama's "Egg of Power" and other Talismans

Talisman (tăl'ĭs-mun)
1. An object marked with magic signs and believed to confer on its bearer supernatural powers or protection.
2. Something that apparently has magic power.

OK, if you haven't heard, this is Barack Obama's "Egg of Power" wooden sculpture that he brought back from a trip to his ancestral home in Kenya in 2006. It now resides in the Oval Office according to these guys who are selling copies for $100.00 a pop. They say:

The wooden sculpture . . . combines African tribal tradition with a poignant message. . . (T)he "Egg of Power" symbolizes the fragility of chiefly power: According to an ancient proverb, power is like an egg; if it's held too tightly, it breaks, and if it's held too loosely, it will slip from grasp. Art has always been an integral part of African life, and wood carvings are expressions of power and ritual in the life of the tribe.

Wood is the most popular material used in native sculpture, since it can be found in abundance. Skilled carvers use simple hand tools to create these stunning works of art -- gouges, chisels, mallets, and pointed instruments. Although no two pieces are ever identical, as carvers meticulously hewn each piece according to the grain and texture of the tree, each is rich in symbolism, conveying a guiding principle of leadership, one that has been embraced by the President.

Offered is an authentic artisan work of art, true to the exquisite wooden sculpture, hand-carved from native woods, on the President's desk. The "hand" is carved from the hardwood of the Monkey Pod tree, with interlocked, wavy grain and colors that range from medium tan to dark brown; the "egg" is lathe-turned from the hardwood of the Coffea Arabica tree, a species that produces the majority of coffee consumed in the world. This remarkable work of art stands 10-inches high and weighs 1 1/2-pounds.

For those of you who may be a little skeptical of the message of the "Egg of Power" how about the She-Who Spiral Goddess Wand, which Hillary would have had on her desk in the Oval Office if she hadn't been whupped by the Lightworker..


According to its maker,

"She Who" is about claiming your power and allowing the magic and uniqueness within you to express itself in the world. Look into yourself and claim the part of yourself that is deep at your core. The part you cover up with defense because you think no one would understand or relate to that part of you. It is the part of you that is your humanity, it is the part of you that everyone would relate to. It is your true self and your humanity, it is where your power resides. Dare to claim that part of yourself and spiral it into the world, and be the strongest, most brilliant, shining you that there is.

The Spiral Goddess stands before a tree, its powerful branches embracing a crystal clear gazing sphere. The tree brings grounding energy to this dynamic Wand that is full of fire and air energy. The tree also represents the element of water as it draws water from the Earth and transforms it into air in the fiery presence of sun light. The bottom of this Wand is ornamented with a waxing Crescent Moon, representing the sacred process of becoming.

The "She Who" Wand is 10 inches long and is made of fine quality lead-free Pewter. The price of this Spiral Goddess Wand is $89.

Another talisman I always enjoy seeing upon my return to the state after a long journey north is this:


This Saturn IB rocket stands at the Alabama Welcome Center on I-65 at Elkmont, Alabama. While it cannot fit in the Oval Office, it does have a powerful message, which was once explained to me by an Elkmont good old boy. When I asked him, "Why the rocket?" He said, "It's to show them Yankees we can make missiles in Huntsville and if we ever get nukes, they'd better watch out."

We'll as talismans go, I guess there are worse ones. But my favorite talisman is this:

This is the Rifle of Power. For plain bad juju, it has the Egg, the Wand and the Missile beat all to heck. This is my talisman. There are many like it, but this one is mine. ;-)

Helmke Works Himself Into A Pre-Ejaculation Lather Over The Prospect Of Stealing Our Rights (and Vanderboegh Throws Cold Water On Him).

Paul Helme has a long piece here on what he intends to do with our liberty and property now that the Obamanoids have taken over. A sample:

New Day Dawning for Gun Violence Prevention
The Brady Campaign , To Prevent Gun Violence - January 21, 2009
By Paul Helmke, Brady Campaign president

Last year at this time, I said that America was turning a corner on the gun issue, and the watershed events of 2008 confirmed that prediction.

The past year brought fundamental change to the way we understand and talk about gun violence prevention. The year also offered hope for the future, as the Brady Campaign endorsed – and our grassroots activists helped elect – Barack Obama as President of the United States, along with many other new officeholders who support taking steps to reduce gun violence.

Looking ahead to 2009, we are optimistic about making significant progress in our fight for common sense gun laws to help make our families and communities safer. . .

Make no mistake, however, there is much work to do. There are only a handful of national gun control laws on the books today, and even those have loopholes. To help keep guns away from dangerous people:

We need to require Brady criminal background checks for all gun sales in this country, including at gun shows.

We need to restrict access to military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines.

We need to limit bulk sales of handguns to cut illegal gun trafficking.

We need to crack down on the 1.2% of corrupt gun dealers who account for almost 60% of crime guns in America.

We need to give law enforcement agencies like the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) the funding and staff they need to disrupt the illegal gun trade.

It really is a new day for the gun violence prevention movement in America. Yet if we are to build on the successes of 2008 and take advantage of the many new opportunities ahead in 2009, we will need your help.

To which I replied on the website:


New Day Dawning"? You have NO idea.

Pass an new ban on semi-automatic rifles of the sort you envision and have stated publicly that should ban several classes of heretofore legal weapons, and watch what happens.

Pass another law authorizing the federal seizure of total control over ALL private transfers of arms (the deliberately misnamed lie called the "gun show loophole"), and watch what happens.

"The time has come, the walrus said to talk of many things," like armed civil disobedience to the collectivist pukes such as Helmke who wish to seize more of our traditional, natural and God-given liberty and property rights.

For 75 years we've been pushed back from the free exercise of our right to arms. Each time, we went, grumbling. This time, Helmke, we will NOT back up. This time you will have to come and get us. This time, we will fight.

In the interim between the last time you felt this cocky, the election of Bill Clinton, and now, two things have happened -- Waco and Bill Clinton's adoption of rules of engagement for the Serbians that made the politicians, media and ideological support structure of the Milosevic regime legitimate targets of war. We have studied both. So should you, before you take this nation to the brink of civil war.

Be careful what you wish for, Helmke, you (and we) may get it.

Mike Vanderboegh
Pinson, AL
sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com
-

"The world's first global recession is just getting started."

Consider the societal disorder that this will cause if true (and I believe it is). Our country, gentlemen and ladies, is going to need the armed citizenry more than ever. Get ready. -- Mike


Expect the World Economy to Suffer Through 2009
Political risk is a bigger factor than ever.
Link here.
By IAN BREMMER and NOURIEL ROUBINI
Wall Street Journal, January 23, 2009

Some optimistic experts are now saying that though this will be a turbulent year for global markets, the worst of the financial crisis is now behind us. Would it were so. We believe that 2009 will be tougher than many anticipate.

We enter the new year grappling with the most serious global economic and financial crisis since the Great Depression. The U.S. economy is, at best, halfway through a recession that began in December 2007 and will prove the longest and most severe of the postwar period. Credit losses of close to $3 trillion are leaving the U.S. banking and financial system insolvent. And the credit crunch will persist as households, financial firms and corporations with high debt ratios and solvency problems undergo a sharp deleveraging process.

Worse, all of the world's advanced economies are in recession. Many emerging markets, including China, face the threat of a hard landing. Some fear that these conditions will produce a dangerous spike in inflation, but the greater risk is for a kind of global "stag-deflation": a toxic combination of economic stagnation, recession and falling prices. We're likely to see vulnerable European markets (Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria), key Latin American markets (Argentina, Venezuela, Ecuador and Mexico), Asian countries (Pakistan, Indonesia and South Korea), and countries like Russia, Ukraine and the Baltic states facing severe financial pressure.

Policy remedies will have limited effect as insolvency problems constrain the effectiveness of monetary stimulus, and the risk of rising interest rates (following the issuance of a wave of public debt) erodes the growth effects of fiscal stimulus packages. Only when insolvent banks are shut down, others are cleaned up, and the debt level of insolvent households is reduced will conditions ease. Between now and then, we can expect further downside risks to equity markets and other risky assets, given the likelihood that markets will continue to be jolted by worse-than-expected financial news.

The U.S. twin fiscal and current-account deficits will rise over the next two years as the country runs trillion dollar-plus fiscal deficits. We're all aware that foreign actors have financed most of this debt over the past several years. During the 1980s, the U.S. also faced the burdens of twin deficits, but relied on financing from key strategic partners like Japan and Germany. This time, the situation is more worrisome because today's financing comes not from U.S. allies, but from strategic rivals like Russia, China and a number of relatively unstable petrostates. This leaves the U.S. perilously dependent on the kindness of strangers.

There's some good news in this interdependence. The mutually assured economic destruction that this relationship implies ensures that China can't simply pull the plug on all this financing without suffering a considerable amount of self-inflicted pain. Reducing its financing of Washington would, among other things, put significant upward pressure on the value of China's currency, sharply undermining its export sector and, therefore, the country's economic growth.

But over time, the ability and willingness of China and others to finance U.S. deficits will diminish as they begin to run fiscal deficits of their own. They'll need to use their financial resources at home just as a tsunami of U.S. Treasury bond issuances peaks.

Politics will make matters worse, primarily because governments in both the rich and the developing worlds are intervening in their economies more broadly and deeply than at any time since the end of World War II. Policy makers around the world are hard at work crafting stimulus packages filled with subsidies and protections they hope will breathe new life into their domestic economies, and preparing to rewrite the rules and regulations that govern global markets.

Why is this dangerous? At the G-20 summit a few weeks ago, world leaders pledged to address the crisis by coordinating their economic policy responses. That's not going to happen, because politicians design stimulus packages with political motives -- to satisfy the needs of their constituents -- not to address imbalances in the global economy. This is as true in Washington as in Beijing. That's why politics will drive the global economy more directly (and less efficiently) in 2009 than at any point in decades. It is politics that is creating the biggest risk for markets this year.

This is part of a worrisome long- term trend. In China and Russia, where histories of command economics predispose governments toward what we've come to call state capitalism, the phenomenon is especially obvious. National oil companies, other state-owned enterprises, and sovereign wealth funds have brought politicians and political bureaucrats into economic decision-making on a scale we haven't seen in a very long time.

Now the U.S. has gotten in on the game. New York, once the financial capital of the world, is no longer even the financial capital of the U.S. That honor falls on Washington, where lawmakers are now injecting populist politics into economics decisions. Companies and sectors that should be left to drown are being floated lifeboats. This drama is also playing out across Europe and Asia. As engines of economic growth, Shanghai is losing ground to Beijing, Mumbai to Delhi, and Dubai to Abu Dhabi.

Global markets will also face the more traditional forms of political risk in 2009. Militancy in an increasingly unstable and financially fragile Pakistan will continue to spill across borders into Afghanistan and India. National elections in Israel and Iran risk bringing the international conflict over Iran's nuclear program to a boil, injecting new volatility into oil markets. The impact of the financial crisis on Russia's economy could produce significant levels of unrest across the country. And Iraq may face renewed civil violence, as recently dormant militia groups compete to fill the vacuum left by departing U.S. troops.

The world's first global recession is just getting started.

Mr. Bremmer, president of Eurasia Group, is co-author of the forthcoming book "The Fat Tail: The Power of Political Knowledge for Strategic Investing" (Oxford University Press). Mr. Roubini is a professor of economics at New York University's Stern School of Business and chairman of RGE Monitor.

"They have the focus of a badger guarding its den and will still react very strongly . . . if you stick your hand in there."

Stewart Rhodes jumped into my "Scaring the white folks" exchange over on Rosser's site. He left this as a comment, but I thought it deserved more prominence for the points he raises. Quoth Stewart:

Alas, I too could not resist chiming in over there in the rarefied air of supposed sophisticated economic analysis. Here was my response to the author's insinuation that Mike V. was somehow a racist for calling the NRA "Judenrat.":

Rosser said:

"Which brings us to "Judenrat" Vanderboegh, who somehow thinks he can undo his earlier remarks [equating the NRA to judenrats] by accusing me of acting like a Hitler apologist, followed by a statement apparently desiring my early death. Just what one would expect from someone who talks about "Judenrat." You don't happen to belong to the Aryan Nations do you, "Judenrat"?"

Rosser, Mike's use of the term "Judenrat" refers to Jews who did the bidding of the Nazis and actually assisted in the extermination of fellow Jews. It is not an antisemetic term, as you seem to think, but a term equivalent to "quisling" or "turn-coat." There are some who think this use of the term is unfair, but it is hardly a racist slur.

See this wikipedia entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judenrat

You would know this if you had simply done a google search for the term, rather than jumping to your apparently preconceived notion that hardcore gun rights folks just MUST be racist. Where did you learn that, from Morris Dees?

By the way, I attended Yale Law School and am very familiar with Professor Ayres.

Before I realized that he was simply another anti-gun academic who was seeking to "find" evidence to support his preconceived notions (just as Lott is accused of doing in the other direction and may well have done), I actually interviewed with him for a teaching assistant position.

I did not pursue the position further after I spoke with him, as his agenda was very apparent, however, during our conversation I suggested that if he really wanted to find out whether the issuing of concealed carry permits in Florida actually increases crime (as he was very evidently wanting to show) the way to find out is to simply compile the actual record of those people who got a concealed carry permit - did they commit crimes with their legally carried guns?

If the "gun crime" supposedly goes up because these people have been given permits and are now carrying concealed in public, then it is reasonable to presume it would be because those very same people are committing crimes with those guns. That would be a direct correlation between the two phenomena.

Was there any indication that the permit holders were the ones actually committing the crimes - and in enough numbers to account for any statistical increase? It just seemed to make sense to me that if you want to avoid the problem of correlation being mistaken for causation you would look for such direct evidence, rather than just a correlative rising of crime.

Sadly, Professor Ayres just wasn't much interested in that approach. Gee, I wonder why?

There is a reason for the old saw about there being three classes of lies: "lies, damn lies - and statistics," with the later being at the pinnacle of the art-form.

One point I will grant you is that most people who feel strongly about guns are indeed single issue voters who were silent as the grave while George Bush and his minions wiped their asses with the rest of the Bill of Rights for eight years - warrantless searches, "black bagging" and extraordinary rendition, secret detention and trial by kangaroo military tribunals using secret evidence or evidence extracted by means of torture, "enemy combatant status" denial of jury trial even for citizens, and the ridiculous arguments that the president had war powers equivalent to an absolute despot, etc.

For all too many "gunny" types, so long as thy have their gun, they still think they are free, even as the police state is being erected around them. Most are as blind to the rest of the Bill of Rights as you are to the Second Amendment.

But that does not mean they are wrong about the central importance of arms to freedom. They are correct about that, just as the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto were correct, and just as Aron Bielski, Jewish partisan leader was correct when he said about their fight against the Nazis: "Without a rifle you are nothing, worthless, you are waiting for death, any minute, any second."

And just as the men at Concord bridge were right about that in 1775.

I will forgive my fellow gun rights activists for not being equally passionate and vigilant regarding the rest of the natural rights of human beings protected by the Bill of Rights, and I will forgive your ignorance and blind hatred and hope that you expand your thinking about this subject.

But I also must tell you that it will not simply be a matter of whether you get your way politically/legally.

That will not be the end of the argument.

While too many have tunnel vision, with a single minded focus on their gun rights, they have the focus of a badger guarding its den and will still react very strongly (to say the least) if you stick your hand in there and try to take the one thing they still hold dear. So please don't poke them with your assault weapons ban "stick."

And that reaction will not be isolated to a few "gun nuts." For every Mike Vanderboegh you see on the web, such are merely the visible and vocal tip of a massive iceberg of defiance. Try to avoid playing Mr. Magoo and crashing into it, sinking us all into a true disaster.

Stewart Rhodes, Yale Law School class of 04. Winner of Yale's William E. Miller Prize for best paper on the Bill of Rights for research on enemy combatant status and proud founder of the Yale Law Gunners, law student shooting group (which was mostly made up of lefties who wanted to learn to shoot for the first time in their lives - and loved it!).

PS - III