End the War on Freedom

"The brain is a wonderful organ. It starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office." -- Robert Frost

"Good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment." -- Barry LePatner

Redneck Anti-Terrorist Training - Hehe. Hit the "Back" button at the bottom of the page to check out some of Dave's other redneck photos. [brianf]

John Bergstrom's Attack Cartoons - Ambulance Chasers - cartoon commentary on society's bottom feeders. Hehe.

Cyber Cigarette Break - hehe. [lew]

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Anodyne is back this week after a six week hiatus. Welcome back, Monde! I missed you. Your voice matters. Just because six billion other people can talk didn't stop you from talking, so the wide world of other bloggers shouldn't stop you from blogging. You don't need to do anything unnatural on your blog. Just be you.

I am frustrated by the sheer number of blogs, and the sheer number of "e/n" sites out there. (That abr'v't'n apparently means "everything/ nothing" and I only just now found that out; I've assumed all this time that this meant "entertainment/news".) How can our voices be heard above this din? I mean, I'd rather there be many than none at all, and I dread the pin-drop silence of radical thought that might occur should some people end up getting their way...but jeez louise, jesusmaryjoseph and the donkey in the manger! Ever look at some of those meta sites that exist solely to be blogalogues? Tens of thousands of the things are out there! Everyone has one! How is this little thing going to get any attention without pulling some sort of stupid annoying purposeful-meme-forging stunt?

Joseph Sobran - Why Not War? - "war is the "least conservative of all human enterprises." Indeed. [lew]

Fear of defeat isn't the only reason to avoid war, except as a last resort. The chief reason -- is it necessary to explain this? -- is humanity. Modern warfare means untold suffering, death, mutilation, loss, grief. If you have to inflict all this on largely innocent people, it should be with some sense of regret. That too is conspicuously absent in the hawks these days. They regard war as a thrill (best enjoyed, of course, from afar).

Nobody knows exactly what will happen in any war, but it's wise to expect the worst. In 1991 I was afraid that many Americans would die, though I didn't predict large numbers. But I also feared other things. And here I was, alas, only too correct.

I feared that America would become hated around the world, especially in the Muslim world. I feared the rise of anti- American terrorism (and though 9/11 shocked me, it surprised me not at all). I feared that American arrogance would incur the contempt of civilized men. I feared that war would become an American habit. And I feared that this habit would only aggravate and accelerate the corruption of American government, making a return to constitutional rule more remote than ever.

Harry Browne at WorldNetDaily - Getting rid of the snipers - get rid of the gun laws that prevent them from doing so, and the people will deal with the snipers. [kaba]

When the sniper shot a woman this past Monday, several witnesses apparently saw the getaway car. Wouldn't it have been nice if just one of those witnesses had been carrying a gun? Perhaps the sniper's Reign of Terror would have ended right then and there.

Fortunately for the sniper, he's operating in an area where the gun laws are about as bad as they get in America. So he isn't likely to run into anyone who can stop him from killing.

...

The answer isn't, as some people suggest, that current gun laws should be better enforced.

The answer is simple: Repeal every gun law on the books.

Derrick Z. Jackson at The Boston Globe - The NRA's aim - another gun grabber attempts to use the tragedy in the D.C. area to disarm America. I wrote the following letter to the editor: [kaba]

Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2002 08:42:43 -0400
To: letter@globe.com
From: "Bill St. Clair" <bill@billstclair.com>
Subject: Letter to the editor
Cc: jackson@globe.com (Derrick Z. Jackson), bill@billstclair.com

Bullet from Nowhere?

Derrick Z. Jackson claims that the NRA thinks the Maryland sniper bullets came from nowhere. No. They came from a depraved human being, who is using a powerful tool (a gun) to kill people. He will be stopped by good people using powerful tools (guns). Had the folks who witnessed last week's shooting been armed at the time, we might be burying the sniper. Instead, he'll likely kill again before he is finally stopped (with a gun). Guns were recently banned in England and Australia. Both are experiencing skyrocketing levels of gun violence. Maybe Mr. Jackson wants that to happen here. I surely don't. Guns save lives. Every day.

Bill St. Clair

Steve Miller at The Washington Times - Authorities check gun shops for clues - the a.t.f. and f.b.i. obviously have no clues. They're turning over every rock so it looks like they're doing something. The only way we're gonna catch this guy is to arm all the citizens so that the next time he attacks, the witnesses will be able to shoot him. [firearmnews]

Alisyn Camerota at Fox News - Sniper Could Be a Novice Shooter - a lady reporter, who had never before fired a gun, tried out an AR-15 at 40 yards. With just a minute of instruction, she was able to make a head shot on the target. Firing line discussion here. [firingline]

Sam Pfeifle at The Portland (Maine) Phoenix - The Right to Feel Better - an interview with Valerie Corral, a California resident whose cooperative supplies medical marijuana to sick people. [drugsense]

The medical marijuana debate is one I've always had a difficult time wrapping my head around. It seems, a priori , to be a non-issue. How is it possible that the government has no problem with doctors prescribing powerful drugs like percocet, vicodan, oxycontin, and morphine for folks to take home, but objects to doctors granting permission for very sick patients to grow and smoke a little dope -- even after states vote to allow it?

So, when I heard Valerie Corral was coming to town, I couldn't wait to speak with her. She is a hero to many people who feel that smoking marijuana can cure their symptoms in ways that pharmaceuticals cannot. As a sufferer of epilepsy -- and someone who self-prescribed her homegrown marijuana when she found that it kept her seizures in check - -- Corral was the first person to be recognized under California's Prop 215 Compassionate Use Act as an official medical marijuana patient.

Elizabeth Pariseau at The Daily Hampshire Gazette - Hemp Farming Issue On Ballot - some Massachusetts residents will vote on a non-binding referendum asking whether they support the farming of industrial hemp. [drugsense]

[Jason] Burk said advocacy for industrial hemp has interested him for years. "It's hard to sit back when I see something as blatantly obvious as this," Burk said. "It's just a plant. It's not psychoactive. How can it be illegal? It's like outlawing powdered sugar because it looks like cocaine."

Americans Against the War on Drugs is an organization strated by New Mexico governor Gary Johnson as a vehicle for his continued fight, after he leaves office, against the war on some vegetables. [drugsense]

So given all of that, what do we need to do? First of all, we need to legalize marijuana. Second, we need to adopt, harm reduction strategies for all other illegal drugs. We need to move away from a criminal model to a medical model. And when we say legalize, were not saying it's ever going to be legal to sell drugs to kids, or that it's ever going to be legal for kids to do drugs. It's never going to be legal to do drugs and do harm to another person- just like alcohol. If you have a drink at a bar, that's acceptable behavior. If you have a few drinks at a bar and get intoxicated, that's acceptable behavior. If you have a few drinks at a bar and get intoxicated, and then get in your car, that's not acceptable behavior- that's criminal behavior. If you get into a car and put someone else in harm's way, that's criminal behavior, and it should be. We need to apply those same principals when it comes to drugs.

Matthew Moore at The Age - No sympathy for the dead, but Bashir denies any guilt - the man thought to be responsible for the Bali bombings denies involvement, and displays an amazing attitude. [samizdata]

Asked if there was anything he wanted to say to families who lost relatives in the bomb blast, he said: "My message to the families is please convert to Islam as soon as possible."

Mr Bashir offered no sympathy for those who died; just his belief that by converting to Islam, the survivors could ensure they would avoid the fate of those non-Muslims who died and went to hell.

Thomas Sowell at TownHall.com - The sniper and the gun controllers - on the absurdity of the arguments of people who blame the tools instead of the people who use them. [sierra]

Guns are not the problem. People are the problem. Weapons matter primarily when the wrong people have them and the right people don't. It is the imbalance in weapons that creates the danger.

Sarah Schweitzer at The Boston Globe - For Howell, Libertarian view hits home - good profile of Massachusetts' libertarian gubernatorial candidate. [kaba]

Popular Science presents worldwide debut of Boeing's top-secret Bird of Prey - Yesterday, the Air Force and Boeing unveiled a formerly secret "black" airplane prototype. It's hard to see with radar or visible light, and looks very cool. There's a slideshow and video (14 megs). [pournelle]

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