Standards

I see a lot of propaganda from gun control and gun rights activists.  Both typically use fear to sell their message, whether it's "guns will murderize you" or "you need a gun or you aren't safe".  It is the way of things, people respond to fear, whether it's rational or not.  But one thing the gun control advocates seem to do is to delight in throwing about blood and tragedy.  I find it distasteful to promote a cause using the bloody shirts of a person who has been murdered.  Especially in tragedies, I find it distasteful and even dishonorable to use the event to promote an agenda.

Many reputable gun rights advocates try to avoid this sort of thing, trying to be respectful in the aftermath of a mass killing.  At the school shooting a few months back, the NRA refrained from making a statement other than supporting the victim's families for a week.  I think that's appropriate.

But since the bombing in Boston yesterday, I keep seeing parodies of propaganda calling for bomb control.  Gun rights people mocking gun control advocates by using their posters and changing "gun" to "bomb".  It's distasteful and disrespectful of the victims.  In fact, I'll go as far as to say I think it's shameful, and it hurts the movement.  People should stop doing it.  People with honor should be respectful to the injured and their families and discuss political and civil rights topics another day, using facts as the basis.

Trustworthiness Based on Employment

The basis of the idea of civilian gun control is that some people are less trustworthy than others.  If you are a police officer you are trusted to own and carry a gun.  If you are an accountant, you are not.  Well, unless you are an accountant for one of the scores of government agencies that provide guns to their employees.  So if you are a field engineer for the Dept of Agriculture you are trusted enough to be armed.  If you are a field engineer for an oil company, you are not.  If you are a case worker for the Dept of Education, you can carry a gun.  If you are a case worker for the Salvation Army, you are not.  This is the basis of gun control, if you work for the government, you are trustworthy.  If you do not, you are not.

This baffles me.  Now- police and soldiers, sure, they get special training.  But isn't it the training that matters?  Does the fact you work for a bureaucracy mean you are trustworthy enough to own a gun?  But working for a bank, a factory or an accounting firm means you aren't?  I really don't get the logic of that. 

What made me think about this point is two stories I read today.  One where a government didn't secure a bunch of guns, which resulted in 20,000 M-16 Assault Rifles (yes, actual assault rifles, not the rifles gun control advocates like to label "assault weapons" in the US).  The other, where a government agency in my state, a police agency even, handed over private information on hundreds of thousands of people in disregard for the law.

But if you follow the logic of gun control advocates, only these people are trustworthy enough to own and carry firearms. 

Government Agencies That Work

I was going to limit this post to praising the US Post Office, but that doesn't really fit my rambling style, so I'll comment on a few other government agencies that seem to do a pretty good job.  In general, people don't enjoy having to interface with government.  When was the last time you heard someone talk joyfully about the last time they had to get a building permit, went to the DMV, spoke with the IRS or has an impromptu meeting with the police?  It's pretty rare.

But some of my experiences contrast with this.  My local post office is fantastic.  The lines are never long, and yesterday I sent two small packages out, one to either coast.  Including the cost to use their packaging the total cost was less than $10.  That's pretty impressive, and I'm relatively sure they will get to their destination in a couple days.  UPS would have cost me double that.  That's one way the Post Office still is the leader, cost effective mailing of letters and small packages.  They do a great job for a very affordable price.

Do Politicians Believe in Math?

I'd guess politicians only believe in the fact that they can say whatever numbers they want and most people believe the numbers are truthful and comparative.  That's certainly not the case.

We live in a vibrant country.  People want to move here.  We have a growing population.  We have a growing work force.  Oh, wait, not according to the federal agency that publishes unemployment numbers.

See, they have a number they basically make up called the "Labor Participation Rate".  The number isn't made up, but how it's derived is, and it changes to suit the message politicians want to spread.  See, if somebody doesn't want to work, or decides to stop looking or goes on disability, they aren't considered unemployed!  It's like magic!  One day you are unemployed, then a day later you hit a threshold and now you are considered to not be!  As of now the Labor Participation rate is 63%.  That's rather low compared to history.

You'll also notice, if you follow that sort of thing, that most weeks the unemployment numbers are announced.  Then a couple days later they are adjusted to be worse.  Then the next week they announce the numbers (based off the adjusted numbers, of course) then quietly again they are adjusted to be worse than announced.  This happens most weeks.  We get the impression that the job market is improving faster than it is if we just pay attention to the headlines.  When you start to look at the actual data, the pictures is much less rosy.

I urge you to do your own research on this topic.  It will, unfortunately, hurt your faith in both politicians and the news you hear and read, but it's far better to understand the truth, and to understand how you are being lied to.

A Tale of Two Carbines

I tend to learn by doing.  I can study material and remember it, but to remember something for years it helps if I do it.  I tend to enjoy the experience of things, which is one reason I tend to switch out motorcycles every few years.  It's not that I get bored with what I have or think something else will be better (although sometimes that is the case) mostly I just get to know what I have and I want to learn something else.  You can only really get to know something when you use it a lot.  But after I get to that stage, I tend to get wanderlust, I'm ready to learn something else.

Sequester, My Ass, part 3

And what do we see today regarding new government expenditures?  My favorite is the BATFE looking for bids for a new database, a database to track people and who they associate with on social media.  You know, like blogspot.  Or Facebook, or Google+ (or hell, gmail or gchat for that matter) or twitter, or flikr, or any place on the internet you login and share things with other people.  The ATF thinks they need to know who you talk to and share things with all the time, just in case they think you commit a crime.  See, it's hard for them to find your friends to try to get evidence against you during an investigation, so they want to be pro-active.  We're all on the verge of being criminals anyway, right?

Increasingly, if you type it on the internet, the government wants to store and track it.  Be careful what you write, lest your idea of free speech crosses the government's line of dissident or insurgent. 

Who Supports Gun Control?

Not cops.  Over and over again you see articles and studies showing that most beat cops (not the guys in the office or the sheriff types that are elected and mostly politicians) support private gun rights.  In fact, in this most recent study, more than twice as many cops think banning "assault weapons" will have cause violent crime to increase rather than decrease, although 70% think it will have no effect at all. 

85% of the officers polled think the legislation supported by the white house will have "No effect" or a "Negative effect" on crime.

Only 5% believe that having armed citizen president in an active shooter situation (a mass murderer, like a school or movie theater killer) would make the situation more deadly.  86% believe that having an armed citizen present would reduce or avoid casualties in a mass murder situation.  This is in line with examples we've seen when armed citizens are present.

81% believe that gun "buy backs" do nothing to affect crime in a given region.

Anyway, read through the questions and answers if you are interested.  It's solid data from the people who respond to violent crime as their job, and it's an opinion I respect.  Remember, gun control isn't about making people safer, it's about control.  It's an flimsy excuse to chip away at existing rights.

Humane Executions

Well, this is horrifying.  I'd much rather face a firing squad than the people who carry out executions professionally, it seems.

It's hard to be sympathetic for people who receive the death penalty for particularly evil crimes, but if we as a society take minutes or hours to perform an execution, it's time to rethink the methods being used.

Touch Down

As mentioned in a previous post, I recently picked up a new motorcycle.  For the last couple years my garage contained a V-Rod and a KLR-650.  Very different bikes, but both great machines.  The particular model of V-Rod was the VRSCR, or Street Rod.  (Harley has terrible names for many of their models)  It was only made for a couple years, and probably the best handling bike Harley ever made.  It didn't really catch on, Americans didn't appreciate things like dual Brembo brakes up front and a taller suspension that handled better than other V-Rods.  Well, in 2006 and 2007 they didn't.  But I loved that bike.  It handled like a bike that was much lighter, and had an engine that was seriously fast, even when carrying a passenger.

But, I get the urge to try different things once in a while, so I'm selling the V-Rod and picked up a new bike.  I haven't even put 200 miles on the new one, but I'm impressed with the handling so far.  HD has come a long way since the last Softail I owned, a 2001 model.  This bike turns quite well.  The brakes are strong, but seriously mushy, something I plan to remedy in short order.   But even putting as few of miles as I have on it, I'm using most of the tire.  I think this is a bike where I'll be using the whole width of the tire.  No chicken strips for me!

Sequester, My Ass, part 2

We keep hearing in the news about services that will be cut and people losing their jobs due to the sequester.  I have a friend who is a research scientist, and he said they are all on the edge of their seats waiting to see what funding will be cut for research projects.

You know what isn't getting cut though?  The $62 million dollars the Department of Energy is spending on it's NASCAR team that hopes to race in 2015.  Because, see, it's more important to spend millions of dollars so an electric car can make left hand turns and make fast battery changes than in actually working on new clean energy sources.  That's just stupid.  The fact that it's unaffected by sequester shows our federal government is more interested in advertising and propaganda than projects that deliver results.