Tie a rope on and hang on.  Propose a name for these daredevils.

Columbia River Gorge in the Rain

For those who expressed skepticism that thew Gorge is ever not in rain, a few weeks back:

stupid

I had about $80 in cash in my wallet from sales of some books at this event Sunday night.  I went into a Shiloh Inn In Roseburg yesterday to check in, and because of an urgent need to visit the restroom, I ran there, leaving my wallet on the country.  Now I find that cash is missing.

I won't be so Idaho trusting in the future.

Not Really Oregon Without Rain

But part of why the state is so green and forested.

Last Night's Event Was Wonderful

The Firearms Policy Coalition put together an event that as immodest as it sounds, was largely built around me!  Seeing my smiling face on thje program cover was ego boosting, and it was gratifying how many people showed up laregely on the draw of ME!  To hear some of the other speakers tell the tale, I am an important part of why gun rights have survived. Now if I can get my swollen head through the door!

Heading North Through Dunsmuir and Bend Oregon The Next Few Days

Need a  speaker for your event?

Strange Charges

I stayed at the Grand Sierra Casino & Resort last night in Reno (the town so close to hell, you can see Sparks [Nevada]), and this morning my Discover Card had a $479 charge from them on it.. I called them, and they had no knowledge of any such charge, only an $11 charge.  Discover is trying to figure out where this charge came from.  Very odd.

UPDATE: THAT CHARM US NO LONGER PENDUNG.

SS109 Ammo At A Good Price

Cheaper Than Dirt has SS109 ammo at a decent price, at least compared to the Reno Gun Show yesterday.  The way Obama is seting us up for thermonuclear war, preparing for the end of civilization sounds like a good idea.

If Only There Was An Opposition Political Party

The Weekly Standard reports:

An Iranian journalist writing about the nuclear negotiations between the United States and Iran has defected. In an interview Amir Hossein Motaghi, has some harsh words for his native Iran. He also has a damning indictment of America's role in the nuclear negotiations.

“The U.S. negotiating team are mainly there to speak on Iran’s behalf with other members of the 5+1 countries and convince them of a deal," Motaghi told a TV station after just defecting from the Iranian delegation while abroad for the nuclear talks. The P 5 + 1 is made up of United States, United Kingdom, Russia, China, France, plus Germany.

Sounds like treason, except for the "black guys who look out for big corporate interests" exception to the treason law.  If only Republicans wanted to pursue their partisan interests, they would be opening impeachment hearings.  I am glad that I don't live somewhere likely to be attacked; Iran is  going to nuke the areas with strong liberal populations, and they are going to be astounded that their president assisted in their own destruction.

To their credit, French gays are beginning to support  the National Front:

Beauvais France ((AFP) - Sebastien Chenu, a former gay activist, does not seem a typical member of France's far-right National Front (FN), a party accused of deeply reactionary views with a history of homophobia.

"The National Front is the only party whose leader is a woman and its deputy leader is gay," he points out over a glass of Chablis in Beauvais, the northern town where he is standing as a candidate in local elections this week.

Despite opposing same-sex marriage and touting traditional family values, Chenu says the FN under leader Marine Le Pen is actually more open to minorities than mainstream parties.

"Marine Le Pen represents a sort of absolute freedom in a political world that is very policed, where everyone resembles each other. She has come in and shaken things up," he says.

But it is not long into talking with Chenu that the limits of that freedom become apparent.

Asked about Muslims and Roma migrants, Chenu quickly reverts to common FN tropes.

Roma "poison the daily life of Parisians"; immigrants "reproduce cultures that destabilise areas of towns... It's not for us to integrate them, it's for them to assimilate themselves," he says.

Gay support for the FN is rising: a recent Ifop poll showed 26 percent of homosexuals in Paris supported the party, compared with 16 percent of heterosexuals.

I suspect the throwing gay people off buildings thing is beginning to cause French gays to reconsider the merits of replacing Frenchmen with Muslims.

More Mileage Boasting

Crossing Sierra on I-80,  29.8 mpg,  74.0 mph.

the Ring Frodo Throws Away At the End Of Lord of the Rings

Rhonda was beginning to think it was reborn as a key fob.  She could not get the Jaguar to stay locked.  If you have the fob within one meter of the door when you lift the handle, it automatically unlocks it.  Clever, sort of.  So it feels like it isn't lockinng!

my wife is driving

Note the average speed and still impressive gas mileage.

Interstate 90 in Nevada.

Winnemucca. What A Sad Little Town.

Some years ago, I was driving thjrough northern Nevada, and I saw a civic boosterism billboard that was just tragic: Winnemucca: city of paved streets.  Compared to the road from there to Oregon, that is a distinction.  The only thing that makes it tolerable is Nevada now recognizes my Idaho enhanced concealed weapon permit.

Americans Least Concerned About Global Warming

Gallup reports that of all the environmental concerns Americans have, global warming is at the bottom of the list:

PRINCETON, N.J. -- Americans' concern about several major environmental threats has eased after increasing last year. As in the past, Americans express the greatest worry about pollution of drinking water, and the least about global warming or climate change.

In most of America, they answered this question with chattering teeth!  I must confess, the power of the left speaking with one voice, and at high volume, seems to be less powerful than I assumed.

Electric Cars Not Less Polluting Than Gas Cars

CBC (amazingly enough) interviews a Green professor who says electric cars often do nothing to reduce CO2 production:

Yet new research suggests that even if every driver in Canada made the switch, from gas to electric, the total emissions might not actually go down. It all has to do with where the power that fuels those electric cars comes from. Depending on where in the country you live, going electric might not be as green as you think. 

The study comes from Chris Kennedy, a professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Toronto.

Coal provides the electricity that charges those cars in much of Canada, and when you consider transmission losses, no surprise!  This study of electric vehicles vs. internal combustion engine cars in France comes to a similar conclusion: the nuclear power plants and hydroelectric power in central France is what makes electrics sensible.   This is no surprise: electric cars, like most other environmental causes, are really a way for those who lack a conventional religion to feel morally superior, and that they are "doing something."

Please, I Want One For Christmas (To Clear Snow From The Driveway)

WiFi File Transfer

I could not get either Samsung Link or Kies Air to work.  One wanted a rooted smartphone, the other would not usefully do anything.  But WiFi File Explorer seems to do the trick.  The Android side is here.  It seems to set up a http server, which you interrogate through the smartphone's IP address and port 8000.  You can delete, copy, zip, and unzip files on the smartphone's file system, and download files to the PC.  Unfortunately, download zips the files before downloading.  This is certainly efficient for moving many files, but for moving images and video, not so much, since JPG and most video formats are already quite compressed.

Still Waiting For The Benefits of Same-Sex Marriage in New York

A recurring argument of those Christians who don't understand homosexuality is that if they could get married, they would become stable and monogamous. Not having the paper apparently forces them into casual sex.  This news report about rising syphilis rates in NYC is one of those mysteries:

Syphilis in the city is on the rise, and health officials aren’t sure why.

Instances of the chancre-causing disease spiked 8 percent in the first half of 2014, from 585 to 628 cases.

The disease has shown a steady increase long-term as well with 1,167 reported cases in 2013, compared with 117 cases in 2000....

Officials are scratching their heads, since studies show condom use is remaining steady.

Deputy Health Commissioner for Disease Control Jay Varna conceded Monday that the data is based on self-reporting, a potential flaw.

He said anonymous sexual hook-ups through the Internet are a hurdle to prevention because partners often don’t stay in touch.

Officials said the “vast majority” of syphilis cases are among men “who have sex with men.”

Syphilis is overwhelmingly a disease of gay men throughout North America.  Blinding ocular syphilis is becoming an issue on the West Coast.  Somehow, it doesn't sound the white picket fence relationship that Modern Family promotes.

Samsung Link

Samsung Link lets you share files between PC and Samsung smartphones through WiFi, but so slowly that using a USB connection makes more sense. There is supposed to be a Windows Explorer method of copying files, but I don't see it.

Total Solar Eclipse

The 1786 Massachusetts Loaded Firearms Law

Quoted in Idaho Statesman Today

http://www.idahostatesman.com/2015/03/23/3713171_idaho-reflects-national-gun-trend.html?rh=1

The Slippery Slope

Maybe not the best title choice.  Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) was a landmark Supreme Court decision, striking down a state law prohibiting doctors from providing contraceptives to married couples.  There were cynics who suggested it could lead to the scrapping of all laws regulating sexual morality, Justice Goldberg's concurring opinion argues that this decision does not affect other such laws.

Finally, it should be said of the Court's holding today that it in no way interferes with a State's proper regulation [381 U.S. 479, 499]   of sexual promiscuity or misconduct. As my Brother HARLAN so well stated in his dissenting opinion in Poe v. Ullman, supra, at 553.

"Adultery, homosexuality and the like are sexual intimacies which the State forbids . . . but the intimacy of husband and wife is necessarily an essential and accepted feature of the institution of marriage, an institution which the State not only must allow, but which always and in every age it has fostered and protected. It is one thing when the State exerts its power either to forbid extra-marital sexuality . . . or to say who may marry, but it is quite another when, having acknowledged a marriage and the intimacies inherent in it, it undertakes to regulate by means of the criminal law the details of that intimacy."

Of course, Griswold led to Roe v. Wade (1973) and Lawrence v. Texas (2003), and now this suit:

Sonoma County District Attorney Jill Ravitch — and, by extension, the county’s law enforcement community — has been drawn into a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the California law criminalizing prostitution. 

Ravitch and three other Northern California district attorneys, as well as state Attorney General Kamala Harris, are named as defendants in the U.S. District Court case, which argues, in part, that the 14th Amendment protects individual liberty over private sexual conduct, regardless of whether it’s paid for. 

The suit reflects recent case law and rulings that limit government interference in personal decisions involving sex, including the landmark 2003 decision in Lawrence v. Texas, in which the U.S. Supreme Court invalidated laws prohibiting sex between same-sex couples. 

“This, as a general rule, should counsel against attempts by the State, or a court, to define the meaning of the relationship or to set its boundaries absent injury to a person or abuse of an institution the law protects,” the ruling states.

I am not sympathetic to prostitution laws, but defining this as a right under the 14th Amendment just shows what happens when the slope is slippery enough.

More Feminist Arguments Against Trusting Women

A psychiatrist, Anne Skomorowsky, argues "You think your drunk college-age daughters are bad with their iPhones? Imagine them with guns." She then describes her irresponsible drunk 17 year old daughter:

My daughter dropped her first iPhone outside an off-campus party, the kind of sports-related, senior-sponsored event that is infamously associated with sexual assault. When the cops showed up, she stood frozen until someone grabbed her hand and pulled her into the woods. As she ran from the police with her friends, her phone fell into a snow bank and was never seen again.

We bought her a replacement, a highly desirable 5s that she promised to guard with her life. Weeks later, after another party, my “slightly drunk” daughter tumbled down some stairs. She wasn’t injured, but the iPhone screen was cracked.

 Yes, her daughter is clearly too irresponsible to carry a gun, drive a car, or perhaps go to college.  But at 17 she can't get a carry permit, anyway.  This is back to the fainting couches view of women that feminists should be opposing, not promoting.

Why This Neighbor's Request to Planning & Zoning Upsets Me

He has decided that CC&Rs do not apply to him.  The wedding reception business he wants to operate from his white elephant home will have room for 250 guests, with portapotties to avoid exceeding septic tank capacity.  This is the view I have now.  Listen for the bird calls, and imagine bad karaoke, 250 guests, some of them drunk just down hill.

I Could Not Write Fiction This Implausible

From 03/21/15 CBS:

UNITED NATIONS -- About 1,200 middle school children trudged through the latest snow storm to the United Nations General Assembly on Friday evening to hear hip hop singer and producer Pharrell Williams talk about climate change.

The U.N. sponsored the event, along the U.N. Foundation and MixRadio, to celebrate International Day of Happiness, established by the world organization in 2012. It transformed a normally conflict-focused, staid venue into a dramatically "happy" environment with a clear message: The next generation needs to pay attention to climate change.

I keep waiting for reality to strike, but the left is too far gone for that. They aren't going to stop this until a global warming conference in San Diego is disrupted by polar bears eating the delegates.

Another Victim Group

From Reuters:

(Reuters Health) – - People can be so turned off by obese individuals that they actually imagine a bad smell, according to a new study. 

Study participants who were shown images of heavy and thin individuals while sniffing odorless substances rated the “scent samples” as smelling worse when they were paired with images of heavy people.

“Our findings suggest that people may hold negative views of heavy individuals that are sufficiently entrenched that they can cross over into olfactory (that is, smell) perceptions though people may not be aware that they hold such views,” senior author Andrew Ward told Reuters Health in an email....

“They experience stigma and discrimination in just about every aspect of daily life - including healthcare, education, legal proceedings, personal relationships - even going shopping is fraught with potential and actual negative experiences,” Meadows told Reuters Health in an email.

“The world is not a friendly place for fat individuals,” said Meadows.

Meadows said most scientific attempts at improving the situation haven't been very successful.

“Public health messages and the 'War on Obesity' aren't helping because they frame the fat individual as the villain, and media representations of fat people are almost entirely negative," she said.

When this stigma is pointed out, Meadows added, people often respond by saying that if fat people don't like being treated badly, they should lose weight. 

“Fat is one of the few stigmatized groups who are expected to change themselves in response to being bullied and harassed,” she pointed out.

 Does anyone recognize this.

What Is This "Every Self-Described Feminist Make Themselves Look Stupid Day"?

From the Daily Caller:

Andrea Grimes, senior political reporter at the lefty women’s site RH Reality Check, sank to a disgusting new low Thursday by saying that guns should be confiscated only from white men.

 “Suggestion: we don’t have to vaporize all the guns. Let’s just vaporize white men’s guns,” Grimes tweeted, linking to an article about Arizona shooter Ryan Giroux.

 “White guys cannot be trusted to use guns responsibly. It is time to stop giving guns to white guys,” Grimes added. ”I mean, it’s time to stop giving guns to everybody, but we can start with the white guys.”

Or is she just trying to sell more guns and ammo?  One comment I saw said, "NOTE TO SELF: Zero new rifle optics this weekend."

When Even The Nation Criticizes The Rape Culture Crowd

It is a pretty big sign that the feminists have gone off the deep end:

Last Monday, about thirty Northwestern anti-rape activists marched to their school’s administrative center carrying mattresses and pillows. The event was a deliberate echo of the performance art project of Columbia student Emma Sulkowicz, who is lugging a mattress everywhere she goes on campus for a year to draw attention to the university’s failure to expel her alleged rapist. At Northwestern, the target of the protest was not a person accused of assault, but the provocative feminist film professor Laura Kipnis. Her offense was penning a February essay in The Chronicle of Higher Education, titled “Sexual Paranoia Strikes Academe,” which argues against her school’s ban on sex between professors and students, and more broadly against the growing obsession with trauma and vulnerability among feminists on campus.

“If this is feminism, it’s feminism hijacked by melodrama,” she writes. “The melodramatic imagination’s obsession with helpless victims and powerful predators is what’s shaping the conversation of the moment, to the detriment of those whose interests are supposedly being protected, namely students. The result? Students’ sense of vulnerability is skyrocketing.”

Including, apparently, their vulnerability to articles in The Chronicle of Higher Education. As the protesters wrote on a Facebook page for their event, they wanted the administration to do something about “the violence expressed by Kipnis’ message.” Their petition called for “swift, official condemnation of the sentiments expressed by Professor Kipnis in her inflammatory article,” and demanded “that in the future, this sort of response comes automatically.” (University President Morton Schapiro told The Daily Northwestern, a student newspaper, that he would consider it, and the students will soon be meeting with the school’s Vice President for Student Affairs to further press their case.)

 I do not doubt that many women at college have had some bad experiences, but many of them are more properly "survivors of drunken regret" than rape victims. But to the left, any encouragement of careful thought before sex is a sign of being a victim of Christian fundamentalism.

Reed College: Committed to Suppressing Data & Differing Opinions

From Daily Caller:

A student at Reed College has been banned from class for denying the existence of “rape culture” in the United States and arguing that the oft-repeated statistic that one in five women are raped at college is bogus.

Jeremiah True, 19, received an email from professor Pancho Savery on March 14 telling him he was making his classmates so uncomfortable that he was no longer welcome to participate in the “conference” sections of his Humanities 110 class, a course which focuses on the art and literature of classical Greece, according to BuzzFeed News.

True says he sparred with his classmates on a variety of issues, but says it was his criticism of the 1-in-5 rape statistic that ended up being the tipping point.

“There are several survivors of sexual assault in our conference, and you have made them extremely uncomfortable with what they see as not only your undermining incidents of rape, but of also placing too much emphasis on men being unfairly charged with rape,” said Savery in an email True posted online. “[Other students] have said that things you have said in our conference have made them so upset that they have difficulty concentrating in other classes. I, as conference leader, have to do what is best for the well-being of the entire class, and I am therefore banning you from conference for the remainder of the semester.”

As Instapundit likes to say, bring back the fainting couches!

Hillary Clinton Wants To Send Us To Camps

How tone-deaf can one politician be, especially when she has complained in the past about a vast right-wing conspiracy. I can see the sign over the entrance now: Fun Through Re-Education. And this is the Democrat's front-runner? What will Boehner and friends have to do to guarantee this idiot's victory?

Where Gun Control Leads...

From Reuters:

BELGRADE, March 17 (Reuters) - The Serbian government asked people on Tuesday not to dispose of hand grenades and other munitions in the garbage, hoping to minimize accidents as it imposes tighter controls over privately held weapons.

The comments are a riot:

Only a Serbian throws away a perfectly good grenade. Hang on to it, you'll need it sometime soon. It's your history.

I'm sure people could donate them to a charity.There must be poor people somewhere in the world who would love to have grenades.

C'mon people! Dispose of the grenades in the bomb proof recycling container the city provides you with. Picked up every thursday.

Hell, tried flushing them, but they keep stopping up the toilet.

No Direct Flights From Boise to Reno?

I am about to go visit a friend in Reno who is recovering from a stroke, and I am again astounded that there are no direct flights from Boise to Reno.  Even one stop flights turn out to be as many hours as driving there and not much cheaper.  Owning your own jet makes more and more sense, but a bit out of my price range. Maybe this is the alternative, but I am sure still out of my price range.

Nice design touches on the Jaguar XF

Usually, cars have the power window buttons self-illuminated so you can find them in the dark.  While driving home last night, my wife and I noticed the entire area illuminated by a diffuse blue light.

Sacramento March 29th

https://www.firearmspolicy.org/events/cramer/

jaguar gas mileage

Very impressive.  We saw 30 mpg on one segment of I-84 where we had the cruise control set at 71 mph.  Remember that because of the -8 speed automatic the engine is only turning at 1500 room at that speed.

Current segment: 237.9.  Miles; 61.9 mpg avg; 26.1.  Mpg.

400 miles per tank!

Things I No Longer Need

A couple years back, I bought a Satechi SoundFly, a cute little device that stores MP3s and plays them back through the FM frequency you pick.  Think of it as a low cost CD changer for your car.  The sound quality is actually quite good--not CD quality, but not much inferior.  It has an SDHC slot where you can put all your 32GB of MP3s, and play them back.  It comes with a remote control as well, although why you would try to use it in a car I have no idea.  It powers from the cigarette lighter.

I don't need it because there is a USB slot in the new Jaguar, and I now have the 16GB SDHC card plugged into a USB adapter there. You can find newer versions at Amazon.com for $60.  I would love to get $25 shipped for it.

Be Out of Town For Several Days

I am headed to Portland to visit my mother Monday.  First big road trip in the Jaguar.

Ten Years Ago, Me Buying One Would Have Been Funny

Until the right hand completely returns, this is a necessary gadget:

Ribbed Handle Zipper Pull and Button Hook

I can't grab the zipper on my pants very well, and getting some buttons through button holes isn't easy.

But can I use it to unbutton?

More Signs of Spring

I heard birds singing this morning when I woke up.  A meadowlark on top of the telescope garage was especially loud.

With PowerPoint Slides

Democrats As Slow Learners

Even half-witted Democrats like Clinton ever since 1994 have recognized that gun control is not a crowd pleaser.  But now that BATF has withdrawn its proposal to ban M855 .223 ammo, Congressional Democrats are pushing for them to do so.

Congressional Democrats are pressuring the Obama administration to move ahead  “swiftly” with a proposal that would ban a form of armor-piercing ammunition.

In a draft letter first obtained by The Hill, Democrats are urging the director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to use his “existing authority” to keep “dangerous ammunition out of our communities.”

“We hope that the Bureau will swiftly review comments on the proposed framework and issue a revised proposal that will address the danger posed by handguns that fire 5.56mm and other rifle ammunition,” Democrats write in the letter.

The ATF had sought to prohibit gun companies from manufacturing or selling 5.56 mm projectiles for M855 cartridges, arguing they are a threat to law enforcement officers because they can be used in handguns.

But the proposal generated a firestorm of opposition from Republicans and gun groups, who denounced it as an attack on the Second Amendment that could open the door to sweeping restrictions on ammunition.With the backlash growing, the ATF backed down earlier this week, shelving the proposal indefinitely to allow time for “further study.”

West Virginia Going Constitutional Carry?

From Guns.com:

Lawmakers in West Virginia are delivering to Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin legislation that will expand access to National Firearms Act-controlled items and grant concealed carry without a permit.

The two measures have tracked through the state legislature by wide margins with the shall-sign measure unanimously approved in both chambers while the proposal to allow permitless concealed carry passed Thursday 79-21 in the state House after the Senate polled 32-2 for it last week.

“We’re here to protect our people from big government,” said Delegate Michael Ihle, R-Jackson, of the carry bill before yesterday’s vote. “This is a step in the right direction. It’s not perfect, but it gets us much closer on the 2nd Amendment to doing what’s right.”

The legislation, SB 347, would repeal language in the current state code that makes it illegal to carry a concealed handgun without a permit. As long as the individual is legally able to possess a firearm under state and federal laws, they may carry a concealed pistol or revolver for self-defense purposes. This would include carrying while hiking or hunting, or while traveling in a motor vehicle, or in public. However, with or without a permit, carry would still be prohibited on certain public properties such as the state Capitol, courthouses, public schools and colleges.

- See more at: http://www.guns.com/2015/03/13/west-virginia-sends-shall-sign-constitutional-carry-bills-to-governor/#sthash.mpCnpRU9.dpuf

Lawmakers in West Virginia are delivering to Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin legislation that will expand access to National Firearms Act-controlled items and grant concealed carry without a permit. - See more at: http://www.guns.com/2015/03/13/west-virginia-sends-shall-sign-constitutional-carry-bills-to-governor/#sthash.mpCnpRU9.dpuf

Lawmakers in West Virginia are delivering to Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin legislation that will expand access to National Firearms Act-controlled items and grant concealed carry without a permit.
The two measures have tracked through the state legislature by wide margins with the shall-sign measure unanimously approved in both chambers while the proposal to allow permitless concealed carry passed Thursday 79-21 in the state House after the Senate polled 32-2 for it last week.
“We’re here to protect our people from big government,” said Delegate Michael Ihle, R-Jackson, of the carry bill before yesterday’s vote. “This is a step in the right direction. It’s not perfect, but it gets us much closer on the 2nd Amendment to doing what’s right.”
The legislation, SB 347, would repeal language in the current state code that makes it illegal to carry a concealed handgun without a permit. As long as the individual is legally able to possess a firearm under state and federal laws, they may carry a concealed pistol or revolver for self-defense purposes. This would include carrying while hiking or hunting, or while traveling in a motor vehicle, or in public. However, with or without a permit, carry would still be prohibited on certain public properties such as the state Capitol, courthouses, public schools and colleges.
- See more at: http://www.guns.com/2015/03/13/west-virginia-sends-shall-sign-constitutional-carry-bills-to-governor/#sthash.mpCnpRU9.dpuf

Lawmakers in West Virginia are delivering to Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin legislation that will expand access to National Firearms Act-controlled items and grant concealed carry without a permit.
The two measures have tracked through the state legislature by wide margins with the shall-sign measure unanimously approved in both chambers while the proposal to allow permitless concealed carry passed Thursday 79-21 in the state House after the Senate polled 32-2 for it last week.
“We’re here to protect our people from big government,” said Delegate Michael Ihle, R-Jackson, of the carry bill before yesterday’s vote. “This is a step in the right direction. It’s not perfect, but it gets us much closer on the 2nd Amendment to doing what’s right.”
The legislation, SB 347, would repeal language in the current state code that makes it illegal to carry a concealed handgun without a permit. As long as the individual is legally able to possess a firearm under state and federal laws, they may carry a concealed pistol or revolver for self-defense purposes. This would include carrying while hiking or hunting, or while traveling in a motor vehicle, or in public. However, with or without a permit, carry would still be prohibited on certain public properties such as the state Capitol, courthouses, public schools and colleges.
- See more at: http://www.guns.com/2015/03/13/west-virginia-sends-shall-sign-constitutional-carry-bills-to-governor/#sthash.mpCnpRU9.dpuf

Sacramento, March 29

I am tentatively scheduled to speak before a gun rights group in Sacramento the evening of March 29.  As I get more details I will post.

Spring?

It has been warm enough to open the windows in the house!

Too Stupid To Hold Public Office?

From Talking Points Memo:

In a tabloid-worthy twist, a Democratic lawmaker in Indiana has been busted for sexting with the same woman who brought down former Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) two years ago.

Indiana state Rep. Justin Moed (D) admitted on Tuesday that he sent sexts to Sydney Leathers, the woman who sexted with Weiner in 2013, the Indianapolis Star reported Tuesday night.

Moed, who is engaged and planning a September wedding, apologized in a statement to the Indianapolis Star.

"I am truly sorry I have hurt the ones I love most with my poor judgment. I am committed to rebuilding trust with my family and my community. This is a private matter and I ask for it to be treated as such. I apologize to my constituents and to everyone I have let down," he wrote in the statement....

According to Fox411, Moed sent graphic sexual texts to Leathers using the Twitter handle "Bitch Boy." The sexting relationship started when Moed responded to Leathers' Twitter post in February in which she said she was looking for a "new, legitimate #findom slave. Must actually be willing to spend money or you are useless to me."

What is findom?  A perversion that I don't know about?

A combination of 2 words: financial domination. Financial domination is a very real fetish involving a submissive being "forced" to give money to the Dominant. Terms like money slave, paypig, moneypig, walletslave, wallet rape are all part of the play involved in this type of Domination and submission. 

 I can see why a Democrat, who sees all of us as moneyslaves, would find this erotic.

Adventures in eBay

The LP gas valve I had replaced on the water heater worked often enough that I am selling it on eBay.  Someone might need it.

My Samsung Has An Adequate Video Camera

And once I found the right cable, transferring to PC was easy.

A tour outside my house.

Rich But Cheap

My suit is now way too large for me, and likely too large to alter.  My wife says I look like a 4 year old dressed up in his father's suit!  So I went to Deseret Thrift Store today, and bought a reasonably nice used charcoal gray suit for $15, then took it the dry cleaners.  Far cheaper than buying new!  Unlike my situation, where I lost a lot of weight, many men gain so much that their suit goes to the thrift store, and I win!

This Should Be A Major News Story; But The Left Is More Afraid of Christians Not Baking Same-Sex Wedding Cakes

From WLS, ABC's Chicago affiliate:

CHICAGO (WLS) -- The ABC7 I-Team looked into ISIS terrorists in the United States- not just a smattering of potentially violent radicals, but terrorists present in Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin, Michigan and all 50 states. In less than two years, ISIS has gone from a terror start-up overseas to what FBI Director James Comey calls a "chaotic spider web" in the US, with young Muslim men being radicalized in Illinois and the 49 other states. Comey suggests ISIS uses social media like a job fair. That's how he says terrorists snagged three New York men facing ISIS charges. "Those people exist in every state. I have homegrown violent extremist investigations in every single state. Until a few weeks ago there was 49 states. Alaska had none which I couldn't quite figure out. But Alaska has now joined the group so we have investigations of people in various stages of radicalizing in all 50 states," Comey said. In Chicago, there are several current federal cases of teenagers being recruited online by ISIS, buying plane tickets to travel overseas; plans interrupted by U.S. counter-terrorism agents, in some instances at O'Hare Airport.

we had a beautiful clear night last night

Clear with stable air. I rolled out the big telescope to look at Jupiter; the cloud bands were very visible, and all four of the Galilee satellites were on display. I still think I need to work on getting the collimate on a bit more precise. Still, a lovely evening. Retired is pretty nice, even with the nuisance of a right arm that isn't completely working, and a right leg that still drags.

Jaguar's global close command

THE Jaguar has a global open command where if you press the Open button on the phone hold it down for 3 seconds it will open up all the windows and sunroof summary; great way to cool the car off in a hurry. There is also supposedly a glObal close command, which I thought was holding the close the lock button on the fob for 3 seconds. actually it is a button on the outside of the driver's door that you hold down for 3 seconds and it locks the car, arms the alarm, and close all the windows and the sunroof. Very reassuring that you have the car locked up

Am I Reasonably Clear?

I probably need to slow down more.  This is not the final form of my Duke University presentation.

Coming to California March 28.

I am coming to visit my wife's brother in Sacramento.  Available for your gun rights group in the north end of the state thereafter.

our uninvited guest

we  were enjoying our first dinner outside now that spring is arriving, and we ended up with thIs Uninvited guest:

Felines Stick Together

Idaho Statesman published my piece About Constitutional Carry

http://www.idahostatesman.com/2015/03/08/3684162_gun-control-laws-dont-create-safety.html?rh=1 here

Not Sure When I Took These Pictures But They Were Apparently Taken With The Motorola Held Up To Big Bertha

 Crescent Moon with Venus?

Yes, that's Jupiter with the cloud bands.

More Pictures From the Past

From the Inner Passage of Alaska.  All taken with my antique Motorola Razr.