No Vermont/Alaska Carry in New Hampshire
# Charley Reese - Peace Possible - that "peace dividend" we were promised never materialized, because of too many war-mongers in Washington. Kick them out. Get America's military out of the rest of the world. And enjoy the dividend.
Americans, instead of acting like sheep, ought to start thinking of a peaceful world and how we might attain it. It is possible. The benefits of peace would be enormous.
The conflict currently being used to sustain America's vast empire (more than 700 foreign military bases and intelligence installations) and its attendant military-industrial complex is essentially one we created.
Terrorists the world over did not declare war on us. The overwhelming majority are concerned with local issues in their own countries. Only one organization, al-Qaida, declared war on us. It has probably less than 1,000 members. We don't need 1.2 million men under arms, an ocean-girdling fleet, a $400 billion defense budget and a $40 billion intelligence budget to deal with 1,000 or fewer individuals.
We could even consider what they say their demands are. They want us out of the Arabian Peninsula. That's not a bad idea. We don't need to station military forces on the Arabian Peninsula. Oil has a peculiar characteristic: If you don't sell it, it's more or less worthless. Since the countries in Arabia are neither industrialized nor have much else to sell, we need not worry about who governs them. Anyone who governs them will sell oil, because for the government it's sell oil or revert to poverty.
The notion that America needs military forces to "protect the oil" is a self-serving myth.
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As for Afghanistan, we should simply get out. We destroyed the Taliban and reinstalled the warlords and their opium business. We should simply say, "Good luck with your elections and farewell." The notion that Afghanistan is going to transform itself into a Western-style democracy is as crazy as the notion that Iraq will do the same thing.
And as for Iraq, we should also wish the Iraqis well on their elections and simply say "Goodbye." The Iraqis are capable of electing a government and recruiting an army, provided we leave them alone. The idea that American forces have to remain in Iraq for years and years is another lie. If our own president were truthful, he would admit that we came to loot rather than liberate.
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It would be nice for Americans to be admired and welcomed once again as we used to be before this monstrous empire was constructed during the Cold War. Now, the imperial government in Washington, despite the absence of a Soviet Union, wants to maintain the empire and more or less rule the world. That is the path of perpetual conflict and eventual ruin, as it has been for every empire in human history. Dwight Eisenhower warned us of the dangers of the military-industrial complex, and we ignored the warning
# Dr. Robert Bowman at The Baltimore Chronicle - Some Dare Call It Treason: Wake Up America! - a retired Air Force Colonel loudly proclaims that the Busheviks should all swing. Bravo! [root]
Here's what the first President Bush wrote about that in his memoirs:"Trying to eliminate Saddam would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. Apprehending him was probably impossible. We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. There was no viable exit strategy we could see, violating another of our principles. Furthermore, we had been self-consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-Cold War world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the United Nations mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression that we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the United States could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land.My brothers and sisters, it is just too darn bad his son can't read!
I've been severely criticized for speaking out in opposition to this war. So have you, probably. We're told that we're aiding and abetting the enemy. We're told that we should support the president no matter what. We're told that patriotism demands that we support the war. They say that we're abusing the freedoms that our troops are in the Middle East defending. They say we should be ashamed to be protesting while the troops are in the desert protecting our right to do so.
Well I say, Hogwash!
I feel an affinity for the troops over there in Iraq. They are my comrades in arms. I admire their sense of honor and sacrifice. I understand why some of them believe they should be there. They have neither the experience nor the wisdom to see past the lies they have been told. The truth is, they are not over there protecting our freedoms. Our freedoms are not under attack from Saddam Hussein or the remnants of his Baathist party. Our freedoms are under attack by John Ashcroft. They are threatened by John Poindexter. They are trampled by Donald Rumsfeld. They are disdained by Dick Cheney. And they are not even understood by George W. Bush. The battle to preserve our freedoms is not taking place in Baghdad and Tikrit. It is taking place in Central Park in New York City, in Lafayette Park in Washington DC, in Ghirardelli Park in San Francisco, and in River Front Park in Melbourne, Florida. The front lines go right down US 1 and up New Haven Avenue.
It is we, here at home, who are the foot soldiers battling to preserve our cherished freedoms by exercising them, in spite of opposition and ridicule. It is we who protect our civil rights through speaking out. We are the Minutemen sounding the alarm against tyranny. We are upholding the spirit of the American Revolution. We are preserving the freedoms that the troops in the desert have a right to come back to. The troops getting shot at in Iraq are not protecting us. We are protecting them, and their honor and their freedoms. We have just completed a forced march through hostile territory to defend their freedoms and ours, and the ideals America was founded on. We are protecting this nation by speaking truth to power. Let us do it loudly and fearlessly and courageously and joyfully, for we are the true patriots!
Here is the truth that we proclaim. This war has nothing to do with national security or freedom or democracy or human rights or protecting our allies or weapons of mass destruction or defeating terrorism or disarming Iraq. It has to do with money. It has to do with oil. And it has to do with raw imperial power. It is based on a pack of lies. And it is wrong. Those who forced this war on an unwilling world are guilty of flagrantly violating the US Constitution, the UN Charter, and international law. What they have done is illegal, immoral, unconstitutional and TREASON.
# lunaville.org - Iraq Coalition Casualty Count - everything you'd ever want to know about the casualties incurred in Bush and Dick's war on Iraq. See especially the red pocks on their U.S. Fatalities Map. See Iraq Body Count for estimates of civilian Iraqi casualties. The minimum is approaching nine thousand. They have names for 692 of them. [root]
# Garry Reed, The Loose Cannon Libertarian - Parsing a Firearms Farce - lots of county "officials" went on record, before Ohio passed its concealed carry law, as intending to post signs forbidding the carrying of weapons in the buildings in which they work. They pointed to the part of the ordinance that allows employers to ban guns from their establishments. Mr. Reed points out that they are not employers. Everyone who works in their buildings is a government employee, and we the people are their employers. Real employers may make whatever rules they wish about what is and is not allowed on their property, but public servants may not. I won't hold my breath, however, waiting for a court to rule that way.
# Jeff Cooper's Commentaries - April 2004: Rites of Spring - I missed this one. It must have come out shortly before or at the same time as The Greening of the Desert. Spring at Gunsite is a delight; kudos for the cell phone pistol; military intelligence nothing to jeer at; firing from a car may be added to the Gunsite curriculum; Col. Cooper needs tutoring on the meaning of the adjective "digital"; the value of quickly assuming a shooting position; more on The Project: 20 hits in a 20 inch circle in 20 seconds at 1000 yards (it's not ten shots in ten inches at a thousand yards, as I said last time); the trouble with democracy; the Army rediscovers the cannister load for artillery; WMD; Sig Sauer service pistol prone to broken slides; the Mateba automatic revolver: a solution in search of a problem; coaxial handgun light not an essential advantage; 45-70 considered sufficient for African buffalo; the importance of situational awareness; Colonel Cooper's grandson headed to Africa with his Steyr 376 Dragoon; why the Cro-Magnon out-survived the Neanderthal; on the Spanish surrender to terrorists; new reports from the war in Iraq; "A female machine-gunner is something like a male nurse. The mechanics may be okay, but the attitude is all wrong"; reports of "ghastly gunhandling" from the front and Africa; pick the rifle, not the cartridge.
If you want government to intervene domestically, you are a liberal.
If you want government to intervene overseas, you are a conservative.
If you want government to intervene everywhere, you are a moderate.
If you do not want government to intervene anywhere, you are an extremist.
Joseph Sobran
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We have heard it said now more than once that in Iraq there are two kinds of troopers - those who have a 45 and those who wish they had.
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This is not a political paper, but it is a paper for shooters, and shooters should realize that the forthcoming election is critical to their future. As used to be said, "vote right, vote early and vote often."
# NRA-ILA - ClintonGunBan.com tells the story of Clinton's ban on ugly semi-automatic rifles. It includes a quiz. Flash required. [scopeny]
# Jonathan Ringel at The Fulton County Daily via Law.com - Martha Burk Wins Augusta Speech Challenge - Ms. Burke wanted to protest the Augusta National Golf Club's men-only policy, but a city ordinance required her to get a permit. The court ruled that the ordinance regulated only political speech, so it was unconstitutional. It still allows regulations that require a permit for all gatherings, independent of content. The PDF of the ruling is here (131K). Google's HTML version is here. [trt-ny]
The ruling could clear the way for Burk and the National Council of Women's Organizations to protest next year's Masters Tournament at or near the club's front gate. They held no protest this year because the ordinance allowed the sheriff to move protests to a field 700 yards away.
But Gerald R. Weber Jr. of the American Civil Liberties Union, which represented Burk, said the decision by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals would be felt far beyond the world of golf. The Georgia ACLU chapter is also representing groups planning to demonstrate at the G8 meeting, in which President Bush and leaders from seven other nations will discuss international trade.
Savannah and Brunswick, where some G8 protests are scheduled, have demonstration ordinances similar to Augusta's, Weber said. The 11th Circuit ruling, Weber added, "is going to have a very significant effect" on those laws.
# John C. Krull at Gun Week - The M1A--Springfield's Version Of Vietnam Era Military M-14 - a review of my battle rifle. I'm having a problem with it of late. It sometimes shoots double or chambers a new round with the hammer down. Needs work on the trigger group I fear. Or maybe the ammo I'm using isn't pushing the action back far enough. I'll try a couple of boxes of new commercial ammo. Or some of the milsurp that I bought when I got it instead of the stuff I bought more recently. Thanks for helping me think out loud...
