aubreyturner.org

I’ve been working on this for a few days behind the scenes.  This weblog is now being run on Expression Engine.  While Movable Type is still installed, it’s been changed to generate “mt_index.html” instead of index.html.  For those users who are linking directly to index.html, I’ve removed it and created an automatic redirect that will bring them to this page (the weblog is run from a PHP file called “index.php” and in order for that file to act as the main site index, the HTML file has to be removed).

In a short while I will also be moving my gun site to an Expression Engine weblog, just as soon as some technical issues are worked out.  I also hope to move my gunshow listings to some kind of weblog as well.

All of the previous entries and comments have been imported into Expression Engine.  However, all of the old archives from the Movable Type weblog are still available at their original locations.  Any links to those articles will still work.

This article (soul-sucking registration required) in today’s Fort Worth Star-Telegram mentions a survey in which 11% of drivers who participated said they’d been distracted by a dog jumping around in the car.  My “uh oh, here comes another law” sense was twitching as I read the article, because these kinds of articles are usually spawned by a press release issued by some do-gooder organization that wants to ban something or other.  In this case, the survey was commissioned by “Response Insurance,” who I’ll bet will be pushing a new law in the next year or so.

The full results of the survey were included, which I have captured here:

I was particularly appalled at item #7 in the list.  Disgusting habit aside, just how much concentration does it take for nose picking?  What does it say about these drivers that they’d be distracted from the road by it?  Are they performing some kind of detailed analysis on the haul from their rhinological expeditions?

I’ve been bad of late in failing to keep my ammo locker stocked up.  I was down to only two or three hundred rounds in each of my most commonly used calibers, and I’d practically run out of .22LR (scandalous, I know).

I put together a shopping list of what I needed in preparation for a trip to Cheaper Than Dirt over the weekend.  That list really brought it home to me the proliferation of calibers in my safe.  When I originally started buying guns it was for self-defense and I vowed to keep it simple and try to keep it down to a couple of calibers.  Then I started buying guns just because I took a liking to them.  Well, that blew my original idea of just having a couple of calibers all to hell. 

So I went with my friend Rodney over to Cheaper Than Dirt and bought a case of .45ACP, a case of 9mm, 500 rds of .380ACP, 500 rds of .357Mag, 500 rds of .38Spl, two bricks (1000 rds each) of .22LR, and 100 rds of .30Cal Carbine.  All told it was just a hair over $600.  It’s a definite shock to the system when you buy all of it at once.  It’s a lot easier when you do it a little at a time (a case here, a few boxes there, etc).

At the time the civilian contractors were killed in an ambush in Iraq I never said anything about the hideous outburst of hatred from the left.  I was too pissed to come up with anything more than incoherent sputtering whenever the subject popped up.

I don’t know why I would have expected anything better, given the treasonous actions of those who want our troops to die so they can have their cause vindicated.  Perhaps I thought they’d understand that these contractors are a) civilians, and b) working on projects that were important to getting Iraq back on its feet (even if some of them are working on those “evil” oil facilities). 

Anyhow, their hatred is hitting a bit too close to home for me to dismiss it this time.  I have an uncle who is in Basrah right now, working on a contract for KBR.  I won’t identify him by name lest any of these lefty bastards try to identify him (and as he’s my mother’s brother, he does not share my last name).  Here’s a short excerpt of an email he sent to one of my aunts.

Sorry for the delay in getting back to you. We still work 12-14 hrs/day, 7 days/week.

Things here at Basrah have really gotten hot. We have hit 130 degrees.  Before the end of July we’ll hit 140. We also are getting shelled and mortared more often. And so life goes on.  KBR gave me a contract for another year back in April and so I might be here till next year.

Having said all this, I hope it is understandable why I have no interest in hearing any bullshit about how any contractors “deserve” what happens nor do I have any more interest in listening to the anti-war left.  They’ve made their position perfectly and abundantly clear, and they’ve made themselves irrelevant in the process.

NRA News will start broadcasting on Sirius satellite radio today.  So far their broadcast consists of a talk show called “Cam and Company”, with Cam Edwards.  They also do regular news reports, although they focus on news related to guns, gun legislation, and self-defense.

I wish they’d get on XM, which would give me the excuse to get that Skyfi radio for home use (I’m already an XM subscriber, so I get a discount on a second radio, as opposed to paying another $12.00/month for Sirius).  But for now I can listen online via the website. 

Update: Thanks to Kevin for pointing out Cam Edwards’ weblog in the comments.

Another police department is replacing its 9mm handguns with .40-caliber Sigs.

Village police stepped into the cutting edge of law enforcement this week with $183,700 in equipment upgrades approved by trustees.

The Village Board voted 4-0 Tuesday with two trustees absent to install digital video cameras in 20 police cars and replace the department’s 9mm handguns with .40-caliber pistols.

…

Lansing police purchased the 9mm handguns 17 years ago, “when they were the best thing going,” he said. Since then, the FBI, Illinois State Police and U.S. Department of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms have switched to .40-caliber guns, officials said.

“The .40-caliber is an excellent choice, because you’re dealing with larger, heavier bullets,” Hoekstra said. “They’re very close to the 9mm as far as velocity, but they have more momentum.”

A lot of police forces went to 9mm all at once because it was the latest buzz in the industry at the time, even if it wasn’t the best decision to have been made.  That having been said, I wouldn’t hesitate to carry a 9mm (in fact I’ve done so).  As someone so wisely said, “The first rule of gunfighting is to have a gun.”  Whatever gun you have certainly beats the one you didn’t bring.  Still, bigger is better in terms of administering the Maximum Lifetime High-Speed Lead Allowance to a goblin.

Link via NRA News.com.

Be careful about surprising someone at inopportune moments.

A St. Paul woman who became frightened Wednesday morning when her boyfriend squeezed her too tightly while they kissed bit off part of his tongue, police said.

“I guess I bit down too hard,” the woman told officers, explaining that she has been victimized by men.

The woman, who is 43, was arrested for assault and could be charged today in Ramsey County, investigators said.

I find it odd that they arrested her if it was an accident, though.

One of my pet peeves concerns the incorrect use of “it’s”.  I don’t know whether it’s getting worse, or I’ve just become more sensitive to it, but I’ve been noticing it more of late.

Just for the record, its is an adjective referring to posession of something by itself (“The spider spins its web.”), while it’s is a contraction of “it is” (”It’s snowing outside.”).  Because English usually uses an apostrophe and an ‘s’ to indicate the posessive form of something, confusion between the two is understandable.  However, that doesn’t excuse it. 

The worst example I saw was a restaurant that had the phrase “Dining at it’s best” commited to two large signs, especially when you consider that two or more people had to have seen the phrase and none of them noticed.  It really stands out to me, though, because my brain translates “it’s” to “it is”, which makes no sense when you read the sign that way (“Dining at it is best”).

I tend to buy new vehicles.  Earlier this year I traded in my old Avalanche on a new one.  Mostly the reason was to get some upgrades that I wanted when I bought the first one, but that I thought I could get by without (and which I’d been regretting ever since).  However, every now and then I run into someone, who I’m sure has the best of intentions, that tells me that I’m stupid for buying a new vehicle and then launches into a discussion of how they were so smart to pick up such-and-such used vehicle, etc.  I’ve always wondered if these people have really thought through the implications of their advice.  Specifically, if it weren’t for the “stupid” people like me, where would all the good used vehicles come from?  Someone has to buy new vehicles or they wouldn’t have any used ones to buy.  Also, I tend to do all the scheduled maintenance and keep my vehicles clean.  Without me, they wouldn’t be able to get those great used cars/trucks.

Anyhow, I’m not unalterably opposed to buying a used car or truck.  I just tend to look at the deal a bit differently than someone who’s out for the lowest-cost alternative.  I place a high value on a factory warranty and not having to deal with unknown maintenance issues that the previous owner may have neglected.

The next time these people are tempted to call me stupid, perhaps they should reconsider.  They’d be wiser to keep it to themselves and realize that without me there’d be no used cars for them to crow about…

The Federal Trade Commission finally made its report to Congress today on a proposed do-not-spam registry.

The Federal Trade Commission today told Congress that, at the present time, a National Do Not Email Registry would fail to reduce the amount of spam consumers receive, might increase it, and could not be enforced effectively. In a report filed in response to a statutory mandate, the FTC also said that anti-spam efforts should focus on creating a robust e-mail authentication system that would prevent spammers from hiding their tracks and thereby evading Internet service providers’ anti-spam filters and law enforcement. To help focus these efforts, the FTC today announced that it will be sponsoring a Fall 2004 Authentication Summit to encourage a thorough analysis of possible authentication systems and their swift deployment.

…

The FTC’s report analyzed three types of possible registries: a registry containing individual e-mail addresses; a registry containing the names of domains that did not wish to receive spam; and a registry of individual names that required all unsolicited commercial e-mail to be sent via an independent third party that would deliver messages only to those email addresses not on the registry.

The FTC studied these three possible registry models by reviewing registry proposals from some of the nation’s largest Internet, computer, and database management firms; consulted with more than 80 individuals representing more than 50 organizations including consumer groups, e-mail marketers, anti-spam advocates, and others; demanded information from the seven ISPs that control over 50 percent of the market for consumer e-mail accounts; and retained the services of three of the nation�s preeminent computer scientists.

The Report concludes that all three possible registry models could not be enforced effectively. A registry of individual email addresses also suffers from severe security/privacy risks that would likely result in registered addresses receiving more spam because spammers would use such a registry as a directory of valid email addresses. It ultimately would become the National Do Spam List. Furthermore, a registry of domains would have no impact on spam and a third-party forwarding service model could have a devastating impact on the e-mail system.

It seems kind of silly that they had to waste all this time figuring this out.  Anyone with any knowledge of the unscruplous practices of spammers could have told them that any kind of registry would just turn into a list of validated email addresses that the spammers would hit harder than ever.

I know that Microsoft and a number of other big companies are behind the idea of an authenticated sender system.  The only problem I see is that given time the spammers will likely find some way to corrupt the system or work around it.  Perhaps it’s time for the real spam solution: find some of the spammers and kill them slowly and painfully as examples to the others.