Monday, April 30, 2018

Looking for 2 5/8" Aluminum Square Bar

Odd size.  Trying to avoid machining 2.75" down.   Right now I use 2.75" acetal that I run through a planer.

I had thought of using shims.  And when I looked for .100" thick aluminum, I found it!  (The local metals store does not have it.)  2.5" bar with 2 .100" shims gives 2.700".  I need to slide into a 2.75" inside square tube, so this will likely be a epoxy the shims on, tap it into the tube, then screw through the tube and shims into the 2.5" bar.

Sunday, April 29, 2018

When AI Isn't Enough

I mentioned that I had listed the Colt 4x20 scope for the AR-15 on eBay?  Remember those?  Beautiful, slides into the carry handle and requires no rezeroing when you take it out and reinstall it.  I already have five bids currently at $235.

I also listed a Bushnell 4x-12x40mm BDC scope.  I mentioned in the very detailed description that the BDC dial for it was supposed to be the same for .223 and .308 FMJ, which seemed unlikely, but worked with my AR-15 and M1A.  So eBay rejected it because:
Due to numerous laws and regulations regarding the sale of assault weapons (including parts and accessories for assault weapons), these items aren't allowed on eBay.
You may list accessories that would fit a variety of different weapons, such as scopes and sites. However, if you sell these items, you can't mention assault weapons in your listing.
But a scope listed as for an AR-15 (and mine is not the only such example), are not a problem.  So I relisted it without the naughty words AR-15 and M1A.

I notice there is a Report Item link that I suspect some gun control nut clicked, who has no idea what the Colt 4x20 scope is for.  Thank goodness our enemies do not know anything about what they are trying to ban.

Saturday, April 28, 2018

Forgot How Painfully Funny Rat Race Is

Today, we went to the funeral of a 30 year old woman who committed suicide.  There are no happy funerals but watching this slide show the family had created of pictures from babyhood to just a few months ago and listening to stories of what a comic she was: would you stuff food up your nose while working for a telemarketing firm?

So a comedy was absolutely essential.  Rat Race is a 2001 comedy with Rowan Atkinson and John Cleese produced and directed by one of the Zucker brothers.  You end up in pain from how much the laughing stretches the muscles.  The scene after the Jewish family visits the Barbie Museum (Klaus Barbie) is still too funny to watch without muscle pain.  The balloon, rope, and cow sequences are classic Zucker.  The only part not family friendly is the Jacuzzi with Pepto-Bismol and sailor hats gag.  I think that was put in there just to get the rating raised; a G or PG rating is death to teen audiences.

Oh and if you know someone in serious trouble:

Boise Area and someone you know is going through the grief of suicide?

This concludes today's public service announcement.

Cahokia Mounds

I show an aerial picture of the Cahokia mound in my U.S. History class, but since we were passing nearby when I went to Southern Illinois University last week, we stopped to look.  There are more than one of these structures; lots of them; 50 million baskets of earth moved by back.

There is a little black line on top:

And lots of other mounds of smaller size:


apparently platforms for elite homes.

The Mississipian culture that built them flourished during the Medieval Climate Optimum when grain grew plentifully enough to allow a large centralized state, before the Little Ice Age ended it.

I blame Roman jets and SUVs.



Just Put a Colt 4x20mm AR-15 scope on eBay

Here.



Wilson-Rogers 8 Round Magazines (87D)

They will not go into a Colt Mark IV series 80 without pressing the magazine release.  Even then, they will not go far enough in to feed a round.  Is the Colt so far out of specs for 1911s?

No, they work fine.  I loaded the magazine with PMC Starfires, a JHP intended to compete with the Winchester Silvertips.  (You old folks will remember the screech the gun control groups made about it when it came out, causing them to pull it back and reissue under a new name.)  When I used FMJs, no problem.  Magazine just needed a harder kick to get past the magazine latch.  Real test will be shooting, of course.

Stopping the Moon

I have battled with getting the Crossbow equatorial platform working with the 17.5" reflector for several months,  and I was getting ready to return it.   Wednesday night, I was able to get it properly aligned on North and even at 500X, the Moon was completely stopped in its tracks.  (And 500X was at the top limit for the atmospheric conditions on Wednesday night. ) Absolutely no motion was visible.   I expect to do astrophotography with the big scope again.

Not Sure if the NRA TV Interview Yesterday is Why...

But the Amazon sales numbers are going from horrifying to mildly disappointing:
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #81,830 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Why is the book so hideously priced?  Two reasons:

1. Small print run, until you know there's a market for it.

2. I was whining about the price to Dave Kopel at a symposium recently.  Praeger Press recently published a book by him, and he noticed that Praeger did a far better job on editing than trade publishers that have published books.  I am currently reading R.S. Bray's Armies of Pestilence: The Impact of Disease on History published by Barnes & Noble and while informative, it is a mess.  Lots of punctuation errors; some typos; many sentences that run to 60 or 70 words; some grammatical defects; in desperate need of some condensation. 

Solution to the pricing: buy the book; read it; donate it to your local library; take the entire list price as a charitable donation on your Schedule A.

Another Mass Murder; No Guns

4/27/18 Associated Press:
BEIJING (AP) — The death toll has risen to nine in Friday's stabbing attack outside a middle school in northwestern China allegedly carried out by a former pupil seeking revenge for having been bullied.
The Mizhi county government in Shaanxi province reported that another 10 people have been hospitalized with injuries resulting from the rampage outside the No. 3 Middle School in the rural area that took place as classes were being dismissed for the evening.

Friday, April 27, 2018

That Was Nice: Applied for Known Traveler Number on April 24th

Have them today.  I guess our aliases as Mohammed Bloup-A-Lot and Fatima Exploding-Bra did not show up.

Back When I Was Going Through Rehab

This thing was part of the process:

I Have No Idea Who Kanye West Is

But this line out of an article was too funny:
But as far as music that people who have never asked their creative writing professor at Bard for an extension on a personal essay goes, Kanye is the only answer to Neil Young asking himself what would happen if he made an entire record of proto-techno songs about Aztecs with his vocals distorted to make it sound like he is singing underwater.

Is My Emotional Support Rattlesnake Allowed?

If you walked into the Grace Hopper College courtyard last year, you may have seen a cat on a leash. Last fall you might have seen a dog; this semester, there are two of them scurrying around Hopper.
These are emotional support animals. While Yale College does not allow students to live with pets on campus, University Policy 4400 allows students to live with emotional support animals, also called assistance animals, “on a case-by-case basis in a reasonable accommodation for a documented disability.”
Last year, there was one registered support animal on Yale’s campus, a kitten named Sawa. There are now 14 — a number that Sarah Chang, associate director of the Resource Office on Disabilities, expects to rise.
“If what has played out at other schools is true, then yes, [there will be] a lot more,” Chang said. “I do think we’re going to see a large increase in numbers, definitely.”
The rest of the article makes me wonder how this generation of snowflakes is going to handle the death of a loved one.  There is no safe space from that.

The Crooks Are Getting Smarter

We get lots of automated telemarketer calls, usually from "Heather" about improving our credit score.  We don't need any help on that; at the Chevrolet/Cadillac dealer, the finance guy told our salesperson we could have whatever we wanted: top 1/3 of 1% of applicants.  And most of these credit improvement schemes are really fraud; they take $1000 and you get nothing.

Most recently, we are getting automated calls that are smarter.  They listen for gaps and certain words.  It can at first seem like a real human being.  One of them was soliciting funds for the United Breast Cancer Foundation.  My wife was emphatic: No.  So a week or two later arrives a $30 pledge card.  I looked them up: they made the 50 worst charities list.

If only Don't Call Lists worked.

English Springer Spaniel or French?

She was chewing on something this morning.   I saw a frog leg stocking out the side of her mouth.

Always Grateful for the High Morals of the Gun Control Crowd

8/16/16 New York Times tells the tragic story of the end of the Bloomberg-owned Pennsylvania Attorney-General:
Even by Pennsylvania’s unbuttoned standards, it was a scandal of exhausting length and tawdriness, a seemingly endless parade of pornography, personal and political vendettas, smear tactics, barely veiled threats, conspiracy and cover-up. So when the state’s attorney general, Kathleen G. Kane, announced on Tuesday that she was resigning, one day after her conviction for perjury and conspiracy, among other charges, even her supporters might have been excused for welcoming a sense of closure.

Pennsylvania Again Recognizes Idaho Concealed Weapon Permits

The Pennsylvania Attorney-General bought into office by Bloomberg, had to leave office after a perjury conviction, but while there she scrapped reciprocity with Idaho.  I could not see any lawful reason for her action.  The new A-G, while still unfriendly to reciprocity, is again recognizing Idaho licenses.

Spring Has Sprung!

I spent yesterday morning reading on the front porch in shirt sleeves.  I have put the heavy bathrobe in the far depths of the closet, and pulled out the light camo one (a Christmas gift from my son).  I had to use the A/C in the Jag.

Good News, But Still Tragic

The number of new mothers aged 10 to 14 years in the U.S. hit a low, according to new statistics from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
In 2016, there were more than 2,200 infants born to mothers aged 10-14, compared to more than 8,500 in 2000.

More Proof Trump's Sabre-Rattling Threatens World Peace

NORTH and South Korea have agreed to the complete denuclearisation of the peninsula.
At their first summit in more than a decade, the two sides announced they would seek an agreement to establish "permanent" and "solid" peace on the peninsula.
The declaration included promises to pursue military arms reduction, cease "hostile acts," turn their fortified border into a "peace zone," and seek multilateral talks with other countries, such as the United States.
In his first ever press conference in front of the world's media Kim Jong-un said:“We are one nation we cannot be separated. We share the same blood.
"We are living with each other. We are brothers.”
The Koreas said they hope the parties will be able to declare an official end to the war by the end of this year.
Christiane Amanpour interviews South Korea's foreign minister who gives the evil warmonger credit for the breakthrough.

Thursday, April 26, 2018

Tater is Again Misbehaving

I thought we had the urination issue solved.  Apparently not.  Very frustrating.

More Evidence That People Who Believe in Nothing Can Believe in Anything

1/24/17 Vice about how the War in Iraq was really about getting access to a stargate:
For those of you not in the know, according to Hollywood, stargates are ancient alien devices that can allow any user to teleport instantaneously to another gate, no matter the distance—which, when you think of it, is super duper cool.
Yes, leftover from the Sumerians.

And the example I sometimes use for my students of why any random website may not be trustworthy:
From the flat earth to 9-11, Sandy Hook and Boston Bombing False FlagsLearning about the flat earth is just the beginning of really knowing what is going on in the world. If you already know about other conspiracies and what certain corporations and governments are doing to you, then you are well head of the rest. If the flat earth is the first thing you’ve learned that tells you we have been lied, too, then there is a lot more to learn.
When you tell others about what is really going on in the world, it’s good to start where it’s easy to show the proof of what “our” government is doing to us. An example would be what happened on 9-11. Since there is a lot of videos you can show, people can’t argue with that. For example, the destruction of building #7, which was not hit by a plane; a building that fell on its own “foot print” does not occur just because a plane hit another building!
Yes, the Christian Flat Earth Ministry!

More Winning: Health Care

New proposed Trump administration regulations aim to make how much hospitals charge patients more transparent—a continuation of federal Obama era initiatives to pull the curtain back on the notoriously opaque American health care system by making hospital service charges easily available online. But, as with the Obama administration efforts, questions remain on just how useful the hospital pricing information will be for average U.S. consumers.
The proposal from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is part of its annual guidance for Medicare, the gigantic federal program that covers millions upon millions of elderly and disabled Americans. Its purpose is ambitious: To nudge American health care to more quality care and away from the fee-for-service model that rewards conducting more tests and services.
This is a darn good idea.  When  I had my aortic valve replaced, I asked the paperwork clerk what this was going to cost. "About $120,000."  I was already in a gown, and on a bed, so I wasn't going shopping.  But when this was billed to Blue Cross, it became $4000.  The whole "For your insurer, it is a tiny fraction of our cash pay price," is just nonsense.  The huge discount drives up the price of uninsured patients.

Can We Get One More Quirky Idea into This Suit?

4/25/18 Charlotte Observer:
One of North Carolina's most notorious all-male prisons is the focus of a court fight over religious liberty led by a transgender witch.
Jennifer Ann Jasmaine says in her handwritten, federal lawsuit that Lanesboro Correctional Institution is blocking the practice of her spiritual beliefs, which happen to be rooted in witchcraft.
I'm waiting for the "I'm following the path of my Aztec ancestors.  Can I have an obsidian knife, a pyramid, and some POWs?"

Some of My Gay, Atheist, Progressives Acquaintances Are Going to Be Rethinking...

their enthusiasm for this guy.  4/25/18 Daily Mail:
Pope Francis has praised exorcisms as a 'way to fight against evil' and 'escape from the power of sin' in a controversial weekly address.
The pontiff, in an impassioned speech in St Peter's Square in Rome, urged Christians to 'drive out evil' and emphasised the importance of baptism in order to exorcise demons.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5657065/Pope-Francis-praises-exorcisms-way-fight-against-evil.html#ixzz5DmqzuG40
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Another NRA Hater

But Reinking exhibited signs of being paranoid and delusional that manifested in his infatuation with Swift, Det. Sgt. Rob Martellaro noted in a report of his conversation with Sustrich.
Sustrich said Reinking told his coworkers that he bought Swift a $14,000 ring and was going to marry her. But he also said that Swift harassed him.
Another coworker told police that Reinking said Swift was hacking his bank accounts. Rocky Mountain Crane employee John Turley also said that Reinking told him he was gay, which confused everyone because he also said he was going to marry Swift, the police report states.
Turley said he knew Reinking had two rifles and two pistols. He also said he knew he had “mental issues,” according to the report. Reinking disliked the government and the National Rifle Association and he believed he was a sovereign citizen, Turley told police.

Something to Think About

Both Texas and California became part of the United States because American-Mexicans (immigrants from America to Mexico) had divided loyalties and preferred being Americans.

Manifest Destiny on a Huge Scale

There is an American flag that I have seen where the 50 stars are replaced with a spiral galaxy: sort of Manifest Destiny for the Milky Way, not just the North American continent.   (Or in Eldridge Cleaver's patriotic post-Marxist vision, all of the Western Hemisphere.) I can't find it.  For the Manifest Destiny section of American history next semester, I think it would make a great gag.

Not the one that I had seen but it works.

Tuesday, April 24, 2018

Copycat Effect Again

4/24/18 CNN:
(CNN)Alek Minassian, the man accused of steering a white rental van down a packed Toronto street killing 10 people and leaving 15 others injured, appears to have praised the killer in a 2014 attack near the University of California, Santa Barbara.
Just before the deadly incident Monday, Minassian wrote on his Facebook page: "All hail the Supreme Gentleman Elliot Rodger!"
That was what he called himself to explain why he could not get a girlfriend.  This is a longstanding problem with "assault media," glorifying mass murderers.

Does Anyone Have a List of Valid Email Domains?

The response from my ISP's support is:
(1) The message was sent from a mail server which is listed as a verified spam source on major real time blacklists (RBLs)
or
(2) The message was sent from a mail server which doesn't have a valid forward confirmed reverse DNS (FCrDNS) record
While all properly configured mail servers have reverse DNS records which check out backward and forward (the mail server's IP points to a valid host name, and that host name is likewise pointed to the same IP) and there is no way to disable that check if you wish to make sure that all other mail is delivered to your Inbox it is possible to request that one or all of your domains be added to a special "skip RBL check" list.
If we do this no incoming mail will be bounced due to it coming from a verified spam source/blacklisted mail server. While this would help guarantee that all wanted incoming mail reaches you please note that this change may (and likely will) cause an increase in unwanted spam to your domain's inboxes. 
It appears that I need to whitelist every conceivably valid mail server.  Can you all provide a list of your email domains?  (One on each line, in comments.)  It is hard to imagine so many misconfigured mail servers.

More Evidence That Snowflakes Reflect the College Administrators

A backpacking trip in the Rothrock State Forest and day hikes in the Laurel Highlands and Shenandoah National Park in Virginia were among the Penn State Outing Club’s 2018 spring-term events.
After this weekend, though, the 98-year-old organization has nothing on its calendar, and unless things change, it won’t.
The Outing Club isn’t allowed to go outside anymore. 
According to an announcement posted by the club on its website last week, the university will not allow the club to organize and run outdoor, student-led trips starting next semester.
“This is a result,” the announcement said, “of an assessment of risk management by the university that determined that the types of activities in which PSOC engages are above the university’s threshold of acceptable risk for recognized student organizations.”...
Ms. Powers responded, saying the university conducted a “proactive risk assessment,” that was not based on any previous participant injuries. She said PSOC activities were rated high risk because they take place in remote environments with poor cell phone service, and sometimes far from emergency services. 
I don't know.  Is it riskier than taking a shower with the Penn State football coach?

Monday, April 23, 2018

Kill That Tank: When Hollywood Still Loved America

Yes Walt Disney Made This Training Film



And this one:

You Broke into the Wrong Rec Room

The funniest scene in movie history:



and the real life equivalent.  4/17/18 News 5 Jacksonville:
GLEN ST. MARY, Fla - Three men say they were asleep inside a mobile home in Glen St. Mary about 4 a.m. Sunday when they heard a voice outside yell “Sheriff’s Office!” before the front door burst open. 
In stormed a masked gunman who fired off a single round before two of the men inside, one armed with an AR-15 rifle and the other with a handgun, emerged from two bedrooms and opened fire.

More Evidence We Have a Mental Illness Problem, Not a Gun Problem

The man suspected of gunning down four people at a Waffle House restaurant in Tennessee during an early-morning, half-naked rampage has a history of run-ins with police -- including once telling cops that music star Taylor Swift was stalking him.
Authorities in Tazewell County, Ill. revealed Sunday that police encountered Travis Reinking, 29, in a CVS parking lot on May 27, 2016 during an apparent "mental health crisis," according to a police report obtained by Fox News.
At the time, deputies said Reinking believed Swift was stalking him, hacked his phone and had climbed a building to chase him. He also threatened to kill himself, according to the sheriff's report....
Last July, Reinking was arrested by the U.S. Secret Service after he crossed into a restricted area near the White House and refused to leave, saying he wanted to meet President Trump.
The suicide threat alone should have been a sign that he needed hospitalization.  And being stalked by Taylor Swift?  She force herself on him, and such resistance would also be a sign of mental illness.  The rest of the story shows clear mental illness:
A little over a year later, the Tremont Police Department found Reinking swimming in a public pool in his underwear and reportedly exposing himself. In that June 16, 2017 incident, Reinking was wearing a pink woman's coat over his underwear at the time, and a concerned citizen contacted authorities because they believed he had an AR-15 rifle in his possession, the report said.
Best of all, he would have passed a background check until his arrest by Secret Service:
Reinking was not armed at the time, but at the FBI's request, Illinois state police revoked Reinking's state firearms card and seized four of his guns, authorities said. The AR-15 used in the shootings on Sunday was among the firearms seized. 

Be Careful What You Wish For

4/20/18 Reason:

Many people who support gun control are angry that the federal Centers for Disease Control (CDC) are not legally allowed to use money from Congress to do research whose purpose is "to advocate or promote gun control." (This is not the same as doing no research into gun violence, though it seems to discourage many potential recipients of CDC money.)
But in the 1990s, the CDC itself did look into one of the more controversial questions in gun social science: How often do innocent Americans use guns in self-defense, and how does that compare to the harms guns can cause in the hands of violent criminals?
Florida State University criminologist Gary Kleck conducted the most thorough previously known survey data on the question in the 1990s. His study, which has been harshly disputed in pro-gun-control quarters, indicated that there were more than 2.2 million such defensive uses of guns (DGUs) in America a year.
Now Kleck has unearthed some lost CDC survey data on the question. The CDC essentially confirmed Kleck's results. But Kleck didn't know about that until now, because the CDC never reported what it found.
Kleck's new paper—"What Do CDC's Surveys Say About the Frequency of Defensive Gun Uses?"—finds that the agency had asked about DGUs in its Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System in 1996, 1997, and 1998.
Those polls, Kleck writes,
are high-quality telephone surveys of enormous probability samples of U.S. adults, asking about a wide range of health-related topics. Those that addressed DGU asked more people about this topic than any other surveys conducted before or since. For example, the 1996 survey asked the DGU question of 5,484 people. The next-largest number questioned about DGU was 4,977 by Kleck and Gertz (1995), and sample sizes were much smaller in all the rest of surveys on the topic (Kleck 2001).
Shock of shocks, they gave similar numbers to the oft-criticized Kleck survey numbers.  Probably why they were not published.

Why Gun Control is Ineffective at Preventing Mass Murder

One of the big ideas from my presentation at Southern Illinois Law School on Thursday was that even in gun controlled nations, mass murders are not all that rare.  4/23/18 CTV:
Police in Toronto say they have arrested a male suspect after a white van mounted a curb in the city’s north end, killing nine people and injuring 16 others.
Deputy Police Chief Peter Yuen told reporters Monday afternoon that police received multiple calls around 1:30 p.m. about a vehicle “driving on Yonge Street, striking a number of pedestrians between Finch Avenue and Sheppard Avenue.”
That is not an accident, but mass murder.

Sunday, April 22, 2018

A Flying First

For the first time in my life,  I experienced an aborted takeoff.  Just as we were starting to get going,  the engines suddenly allowed,  the air brakes went on,  and we turned off the runway.   The pilot told us that the air conditioning indicator came on.   We then for back in line.

I do not believe we aborted for A/C.  In light of the recent accident,  I think he did not want to scare us.

I Hate Flying

The more I do it, the more I hate it.  Perhaps flying had just become more unpleasant.  When I first started flying, there were no metal detectors.  If you were meeting someone who was arriving,  you could go all the way to the gate.   There were lockers you could store luggage in short term.  This started to change after the Alphabet Bomber series of terrorist attacks in Los Angeles,  then the hijackings to Cuba, usually by crazies who thought they were going to meet and kill Castro, but just ended up in Cuban prisons.

I remember a business trip in the early 1980s where the plane was 1/2 full,  and I was served a pretty decent dinner (not an overpriced snack box).  A friend flew to NYC in a 747 with 10 passengers.

And the seats in the Embraer puddle jumper were hard and unpleasant.  The MD80 Was more spacious but the seats were only slightly more comfortable.

Awesome Night

Spring seems to have arrived. Last night was clear and not too terribly cold.  I spent some time figuring out which direction for the power switch on the equatorial platform was on.  Eventually, I figured it out by  measuring voltage across the motor contacts.

Once out and aligned with the phosphorescent line pointing true north,  it was taking almost perfectly.  I still need to improve pointing by aligning the edge of the wheeled platform to the line. Also there is a vernier speed adjustment rheostat that I have stupidly moved.   Still, it was tracking.  The Moon was so wonderfully sharp; I have never seen even professional astrophotos that were sharper or more pleasing.   Venus was low in the west and gibbous phase is hardly ever awesome.   Look forward to seeing some more Moon pictures Anna maybe some deep sky objects soon!

Thanks to You Hobbyists

I drilled 1/4" holes in each end of the project box, tied knots in the leads inside the box, then glued the 12VDC to 3VDC transformer into the project box.



Know Your Audience

At the symposium Thursday, a question that was asked involved the primary intent of the 2nd Amendment.  I explained that self-defense was so deeply assumed that it was not even seriously discussed; resistance to tyranny was the big concern.  So I threw in a laugh line:
I keep hearing Trump compared to Hitler.  To which my question is: "What prison is Kathy Griffin being held in?  The same one where the Dixie Chicks were sent after insulting the last Hitler-like president, George Bush?"
My wife pointed out later that these law students are too young to remember the Dixie Chicks kerfuffle.

Saturday, April 21, 2018

This is Parris Island

YouTube video from 1970 showing Marine  boot camp.  I wonder this is as demanding today.

The Email Issue

At least 6 emails arrived at the yahoo address but not at my server.  I guess the next step is to figure out where these are getting filtered out.

First Aborted Takeoff

I experienced a first on Wednesday: an aborted takeoff.  We had started rumbling down the runway, when the pilot suddenly reduced power and applied the air brakes.  We rolled off the runway and he explained that one of his lights indicated the air conditioning system was not working but the problem was now solved, so we got back in line and took off.  I am skeptical that was the real failure indicator, but whatever it was, he was being cautious.

Friday, April 20, 2018

TSA Precheck

FIRSt time in years my wife and I did not get TSA Precheck.  Apparently you need to verify the names on the tickets issued by your issuer matches what is on file at TSA.

It is much easier not to have to take off shoes, coat, open laptop case,  get fondled by (in this case, by a very nice young black TSA guy).

However, it appears that TSA Precheck has changed from a "We will decide rather mysteriously that you are not a terrorist and automatically assign you" to a paid program that you have to apply for with correct IDs.  They charge $85 for five years.  This is a bargain compared to the delay and extra steps for "Are you a terrrorist"? screening.  You can apply here.

Thursday, April 19, 2018

Weirdest Spam Subject Line Yet

As distinguished from disgusting or perverse:
Sell your rabbits quickly online

Spoke At Southern Illinois University Law School Symposium Today

The reason was the 10th anniversary of the DC v. Heller decision.   Hope to have video of it at some point.   I always feel like I am making a fool of myself because of my voice problems, bitte I am tools that it was not a problem.

Southern Illinois is actually a pretty nice place,  but within 1 lightyear of Chicago is still too close.

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Beginning to Wonder If My Email Server is Dropping Emails

Could you email to clayton@claytoncramer.com  and Cc to claytoncramer@yahoo.com as well?

Thank you.  I have enough test data to evaluate. 

Tater Doing What He Does Best

Is There a More Effective Proof of Global Warming Madness?

4/16/18 U.K. Metro:
Fifty-six million years ago, the Earth warmed far above the temperatures we experience today – and ice at the poles melted.

Could the event – the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) – be evidence of global warming caused by an extinct civilisation which ruled Earth before mankind? It sounds like the kind of crackpot conspiracy to be found on ‘ancient alien’ UFO sites, but scientists have seriously investigated the idea. Professor Adam Frank of the University of Rochester writes in The Atlantic that the investigation could offer insight into how to find alien life – or about our impact on our planet. Frank writes, ‘There is a conundrum here. If an earlier species’s industrial activity is short-lived, we might not be able to easily see it. ‘The PETM’s spikes mostly show us the Earth’s timescales for responding to whatever caused it, not necessarily the timescale of the cause.

Read more: http://metro.co.uk/2018/04/16/another-civilisation-earth-humans-scientists-investigate-7470510/?ito=cbshare
Twitter: https://twitter.com/MetroUK | Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MetroUK/
Or evidence that dramatic changes in climate happen even without fossil fuels.

Despair Over Trump Presidency?

4/17/18 U.K. Independent:
Russian investigative journalist dies after mysterious fall from fourth-floor window

I Blame Trump

4/17/18 CNBC:
North and South Korea reportedly set to announce official end to war

And Yes, Russians Are Definitely Trying to Create Division Within the U.S.

An interesting ZeroHedge article about a NATO exercise in Norway has attracted lots of comments clearly pro-Russian and anti-Semitic.  Of course, with their Democratic Party allies, they may succeed.

Monday, April 16, 2018

Electronics Tinkerers

I have the project box.

That little matrix in the bottom--do you locate things like this:
by screwing into the holes at the end of the converter into those little holes?  And drill holes in the ends of the case for wires?  Or would milling be a better choice?

Let Delta know how you feel too

I just emailed their CEO, edward.bastian@delta.com explaining why my flight to St. Louis in a couple of days is my last flight on Delta. I'd they insist on playing politics,  they Clarke so not need my business.   They can fly all 100,000 committed gun control activists instead of 5,000,000 NRA members.

Tell Wells Fargo You Love Them

For all their other faults, they refused to bend to the gun control groups.  You can send them a thank you here.  Do it now; corporations are used to getting hate; show them that they are appreciated when they do the right thing.

I Love Watching the Left Destroy Itself

4/14/18 Daily Caller:
Former Hillary Clinton spokesman Jesse Ferguson blamed actress and political activist Susan Sarandon for Friday night’s strike on Syria.
Sarandon, who ultimately supported Jill Stein for president in 2016, was roundly criticized for helping “throw the election to Trump.” Clinton herself addressed the possibility in her book, “What Happened.”...
Sarandon, who revealed that she had faced threats of death and rape from Clinton supporters following the 2016 election, said in a 2017 interview that she believed America would already be at war if Clinton had won the election. “I did think she was very, very dangerous. We would still be fracking, we would be at war [if she was president]. It wouldn’t be much smoother. Look what happened under Obama that we didn’t notice.” 
Clinton supporters are so pro-woman.

And 4/15/18 The Hill has Bill Clinton's attorney calling Comey a liar.

Watching Obama's People Call Each Other Liars Is So Fun

Comey is claiming that A-G Lynch was aware of his concerns about the Clinton email investigation.  Lynch (who you will recall had a long, almost secret meeting with Hilary's husband to talk about grandkids while this investigation was under way) now says:
“I have known James Comey almost 30 years. Throughout his time as Director we spoke regularly about some of the most sensitive issue in law enforcement and national security. If he had any concerns regarding the email investigation, classified or not, he had ample opportunities to raise them with me both privately and in meetings. He never did.”
If only the MSM was as interested in criminal behavior by their owners as they are with Trump....

A Tragedy; But Also a Sign of Where Fanaticism Takes You

A nationally known advocate for gay rights and the environment died Saturday in a fiery Prospect Park suicide, with his self-immolation meant as a wake-up call to save the planet.
The charred remains of David Buckel, 60, were discovered shortly after sunrise when firefighters responded to a 6:40 a.m. blaze in the southwest corner of the sprawling Brooklyn park.
“I am David Buckel and I just killed myself by fire as a protest suicide,” read a hand-written suicide note left near the blackened circle of burned grass. “I apologize to you for the mess.”
A second, longer note — left with the first inside an envelope marked “For the police” — said Buckel doused himself in “fossil fuel” before starting the fatal fire as a metaphor for the destruction of the planet.
“My early death by fossil fuel reflects what we are doing to ourselves,” he wrote. “A lifetime of service may best be preserved by giving a life . . . Honorable purpose in life invites honorable purchase in death.
So he used a fossil fuel?  That's not very carbon neutral along with being pointless.  No biodiesel available?

I Thought Starbucks Was the Center of Progressive Business

Calls are growing for a boycott of the Starbucks coffee shop chain after police were filmed arresting two black men waiting for a friend in a branch in Philadelphia.
Under the #BoycottStarbucks hastag on Twitter, people accused the chain’s employees of racially profiling the men, and criticised police for arresting them when they refused to leave.

Don't Call Them Quiche Eating Surrender Monkeys

PARIS, April 15 (Reuters) - French President Emmanuel Macron on Sunday said he had convinced U.S. President Donald Trump to keep troops in Syria for the long term and limit joint strikes to chemical weapons facilities.
Early on Saturday, the United States, France and Britain launched 105 missiles targeting what they said were three chemical weapons facilities in Syria in retaliation for a suspected poison gas attack in Douma on April 7.
"Ten days ago, President Trump was saying 'the United States should withdraw from Syria'. We convinced him it was necessary to stay," Macron said in an interview broadcast by BFM TV, RMC radio and Mediapart online news.
1. So it isn't Trump who wants us to keep us fighting there.

2. Trump can work with the leaders of other countries.

3. France wants us to keep troops there; where are French special forces?

Sunday, April 15, 2018

Saturday, April 14, 2018

Cleaning Up My Web Page Directory and Found These Funny and Beautiful Pictures







Lying Under Oath: Isn't That Called "Perjury"?

The Justice Department Inspector General alleges in a damaging report made public Friday that former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe inappropriately authorized the disclosure of sensitive information to a reporter and then misled investigators and former FBI Director James B. Comey about it on several occasions.
The report from Inspector General Michael Horowitz is remarkable for its level of detail, casting McCabe as a man who repeatedly lied to investigators and his own boss about his role in a disclosure of information, even while he lashed out at others who he thought might be responsible for leaks.
It accuses McCabe of lying at least four times, three of them under oath, and says that while he had the power to approve disclosures of information to the media, his doing so in this instance violated policy because it was done “in a manner designed to advance his personal interests at the expense of Department leadership.”
It also says McCabe and Comey contradicted one another in their descriptions of how a media disclosure was authorized. While the report favors Comey’s account, it will likely generate tough questions for him as he launches a media blitz to promote his new book.[emphasis added]
You can see why the Clintons funded the campaign of McCabe's wife (professional courtesy), and why McCabe is a darlinfg of the left.

Friday, April 13, 2018

I Sold It On eBay

You have seen the Weird Al video?  I listed some aged and somewhat decrepit Sherline handwheels on eBay, and received my buy it now price of $10 within a minute.

Guns That Evil Sen. Feinstein (D-Babylon) Would Accept

If You Do Not Know About It, It Did Not Happen

Nor will you let it influence you.  4/12/18 Daily Wire:
According to a new survey released on Thursday by the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, fully 41 percent of Americans don’t know what Auschwitz was, including two-thirds of Millennials. Approximately 22 percent of Millennials had not heard of the Holocaust, and 41 percent of Millennials thought 2 million or fewer Jews were murdered during the Holocaust.
This is troubling stuff.
It’s also informative, because it helps explain just why younger Americans seem so comfortable embracing identity politics and large, intrusive government. If you’d never heard of the genocide of the Jews by an all-encompassing state focused laserlike on race-based differences between people, you might be warmer to the notion that racial hierarchies in politics ought to exist. You might also be warmer to the claims of genocidal Islamist terror groups who claim that Israel is a land of victimizers. And if you’d never heard of the Soviet Union, you might be more sanguine about the possibility of socialism in the United States.
This is just one reason why teaching of history in America’s public schools matters so much. But that teaching in recent decades has revolved not around signal events in world history, but around the revisionist histories of Leftist advocates like Howard Zinn, who focus in tremendous detail on the sins of America without spelling out the true history of alternatives to the American way throughout the 20th century.
Yes, it can happen again.  Armed to prevent genocide: makes for a fine bumper sticker.

Riotously Funny Video on YouTube

Tiny Guns

Losing Hope in Prestige Universities

One of the symbols of irrational racism was that public swimming pools in the South were usually white only.  But:
A private college in California will be hosting a pool party later today at which white people will be excluded, with only “people who identify as POC” permitted to attend.
“POC” stands for “person of color.” The event will take place at Scripps College’s Sallie Tiernan Field House pool, according to The Claremont Independent.
A Facebook announcement of the event lists the party as being hosted by Café Con Leche, a student group identified in the post as “the badass Latinx at Scripps.”
“Bring your chanclas and the homies over to our nice ass resort pool, LET’S TAKE UP SPACE,” the announcement reads, advertising the event as “a safe space for…students that identify as POC to come together and build community.”
What next? Separate drinking fountains?

Fascinating Use of a Catholic University's Funds

Marquette University, an allegedly Catholic institution is being sued for firing an instructor who expressed disapproval of gay marriage.  They fired him:
It’s not often that a university buys Google advertisements to make its case in a lawsuit.
Yet that’s what the Catholic university in Milwaukee did ahead of next week’s oral arguments before the state’s highest court in a case that bears on academic freedom and due process.
 John McAdams and a slew of academic-freedom groups are challenging Marquette’s indefinite, unpaid suspension of the conservative political science professor after he criticized a fellow instructor for refusing to let a student disagree with gay marriage in her classroom.
This sounds like an incompetent attempt to bias the court.

There's a saying: "If you were on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence for a conviction?'  Marquette is safe, I think.

Too Disgusting to Even Summarize

Yale is paying a white, female rapper to perform.  This article about her at The College Fix discusses her "music" and is so repulsive that garden variety misogynous rap is almost uplifting by comparison.  The only quotable statements:
Earlier this year, Yale student Finnegan Schick penned an op-ed in The Daily News deriding CupcakKe’s work as “sins, not songs.”
“To call Cupcakke’s music ‘shocking’ or ‘vulgar’ is an insult to what’s truly shocking and vulgar,” he wrote. Her lyrics, he said, are “musical porn, plain and simple.” ...
Not every student is against Cupcakke’s upcoming performance. In addition the the Spring Fling organizers, Yale student Jazzie Kennedy supports the appearance.
In The Daily News on March 30, Kennedy defended Cupcakke, writing, “Part of being a feminist, in fact, is supporting women regardless of their preferences. Imposing rules and judgment only adds weight to the ball and chain that women are already oppressed by.” 

Wednesday, April 11, 2018

Can He Buy Bread Without Assistance?

Eating this fiery pepper can cause a “thunderclap” headache, doctors reported Monday. The headache was the result of an unusual blood vessel condition called reversible cerebral vasoconstriction syndrome (RCVS), doctors reported in the British Medical Journal’s Case Reports.
They described the case of a 34-year-old man who ate a Carolina Reaper hot pepper in a contest.
“His symptoms began with dry heaves but no vomiting immediately after participation in a hot pepper contest where he ate one ‘Carolina Reaper,’ the hottest chili pepper in the world,” Dr. Kulothungan Gunasekaran of the Bassett Medical Center in Cooperstown, New York, and colleagues wrote.
“Then he developed an intense headache,” they added. “The pain was excruciating and thus he came to the ER.”
 I like spicy food, too.  But as why wife pointed out when she saw this,  "Reaper" should be a clue.  Yes there are Chihuahuas named Rambo (like the one owned by the waitress at our favorite Mexican restaurant), but most of the time, if it has a name implying danger, it helps to be cautious.

Explaining High Technology to a Psychiatrist is Probably Very Hard

Dr John Crichton, the new chairman of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in Scotland, wants the sale of pointed kitchen knives to be banned to help reduce the number of fatal stabbings.
He first suggested the move three years ago, but his proposal did not win enough support from policy-makers. Since then dozens of people, including schoolchildren, have lost their lives as a result of attacks involving bladed instruments.
Let's see, can I sharpen a screwdriver to a sharp point?  If it is more than 4" long, it is likely to be as fatal as the "zombie knives" the British smart guys are now upset about.  Do these people have this little contact with Planet Earth to not understand the high technology of a grinder or even repeated application of sandpaper?