Joe Doakes, erstwhile of Como Park, emails:Hind Rocket at Powerline reports on the Cuban Drone crisis, saying, “Cuba is a great example of how long an incompetent, tyrannical and utterly discredited regime can hold on to power as long as it has a monopoly on guns.”

Sure.

And given Cuban mechanics’ facility at keeping old cars going, I’d think sending the plans for Sten guns to Cuba might work, too…

After a few months of listening to some of my Libertarian and “Alliance 4 Freedom” friends yakking about how the Trump administration and the GOP are the real gun control party – driven by a couple of dumb remarks by Kristi Noem, Jeannine Pirro and Trump himself – Joe Doakes points out something that I’ve written about over at HotAir. 

Trump, for all his northeastern ambivalence about guns and the 2nd Amendment, has done more to reinforce the right to keep and bear arms as a right (let’s not focus on “bump stocks” for right now) than any president…

….I was about to say “of my lifetime”, but the correct ending to the sentence is “…that any president has ever needed to”.  

It’s of particular interest to me – partly because of the orgy of gun grabbing that the MN Senate just passed (it’s going to die in the House, and it’s pretty much intended to rile up the Karens for mid-terms), and partly because I am a litigant against the city of Saint Paul’s peek-a-boo “assault weapons ban”.  

Anyway – Trump’s prior squishiness about binary triggers notwithstanding, I never thought I’d see a Department of Justice react to a pinheaded local and state gun control bills quite like this:

It’s a great change. 

Let’s hope it survives 2028. 

At Columbine, it took four hours for the SWAT team to enter the building.   There’d been reports of bombs – half-true – and protocol was to make sure the bomb squad had had its say before sending the SWAT team in.  By the time SWAT got into the school’s library, the victims and shooters had been dead for hours.  

Police training changed after that, as Federal law enforcement studies showed that the most successful deterrence to spree killers was to try to kill them.   It threw off the careful planning that almost all of them put into their attacks. 

Nevertheless, the police at Parkland dawdled for long enough for the murderer to have enough time not only to kill 17, but to leave the premises.  Uvalde was even worse – cops not only stalled for an hour, but threatened to arrest parents to wanted to take matters into their own hands while it still mattered; it took a team of Border Patrol to end the standoff.  

And now comes news that the Brooklyn Park police knew what was going in the Hortman residence for half an hour before they went in – by which time Vance Boelter was halfway to North Minneapolis on the bizarre chase that led to his eventual arrest.  

Some are hollering “cowardice”.  As my first carry permit instructor Joel Rosenberg said about civilian self-defense shooting, “a life or death decision you make in a split second in the dark is going to get analyzed to a fine sheen by lawyers sitting in a warm, well-lit, secure room for as long as they need”., and I suspect that’s true for police as well; room-clearing against someone who’s expecting you is frightfully dangerous, body armor ain’t perfect and even when it does stop a bullet it leaves you pretty banged up.   I’ll wait for a more thorough investigation (and I may be waiting a while) before I judge anyone’s character.  

But for those crying “cowardice” – this seems like a fine time to point out that people in our society consider our own lives  to be of incalculable worth, needing to be preserved no matter what and defended…

…by cops, who are expected to put their lives on the line for what a cop makes – an average of about $68K in the US today.  

So – what is it that makes your life of infinite value, but a cop’s worth risking for $68,000?

That’s the central thesis of Geoff Snyder’s classic “A Nation of Cowards” – a seminal article on the moral imperative to see to one’s own defense first before blithely expecting society to do it for you.  

It is, of course, a personal choice – but like most personal choices, there’s a moral component to it as well. 

Joe Doakes, once of Como Park, writes:

When the people of a nation have been disarmed and oppressed, it is fanciful to expect them to rise up against the well-armed government which is oppressing them.  The Founding Fathers knew that and thus enshrined in the Constitution the right to keep and bear arms, not solely for defense against robbers or home invaders but also against a tyrannical government.

In World War 2, the United States air-dropped Liberator pistols to enable disarmed people in The French Resistance to kill Nazis. That wasn’t enough to win the war – troops in the air, on the seas and on the ground were still needed – but it was a gesture of faith in ordinary people’s ability to seize control of their own future.

I think we should do it again, in Cuba and Iran, with leaflets saying. “It’s your country. Take it back.”

What can it hurt?

Joe Doakes

 

The Liberator was a single-shot .45 pistol with a rate of fire of about one round a minute; it had a plug bolt, and no extractor – the user would run a stick down the bore to extract the case after firing. It was literally useful for nothing but knifepoint range assassinations. It came with, essentially, a Bazooka Joe comic (kids, ask your parents) showing illiterate tribesmen how to use it.

Records of its use are sketchy, but doesn’t love the concept?

I’m going to advocate for a revival of the “Sten” gun – a submachine gun designed and built in record time in the UK right after Dunkirk, when speed and simplicity were king;  made out of stampings so crude the Soviets looked and said “uh, that’s some crude stampings, there) with only the bolt and barrel being machined, and using the trove of 9mm ammunition captured in North Africa until domestic manufacturing started, It equipped most of the Commonwealth armies (at least among troops that didn’t rate a Thompson) and was airdropped into occupied Europe in prodigious numbers.  Iy was also so simple that plans airdropped into Poland, France, Norway and Yugoslavia allowed them to be manufactured in quantity in occupied Europe.   

Crude?  Absolutely.  Some Brits claimed theirs jammed every time they were fired.  The one I shot had the back receiver cap fall off with the last round I fired. 

But it cost $15 in 1944 dollars to build, with maybe five man-hours of time, including machining.   

Apropos not much.  Honest.  

Joe Doakes, no longer from Como Park, emails:

Good take from a non-gun-nut view.

 

Very worth a read.  

Tim Walz was unable to cajole, emotionally manipulate or bully the MNGOP into a very special session on guns, to help him never waste the crisis of the Annunciation School shooting last month.  Go figure – the guy who is a walking symbol of tyranny and whose wife gets tingly at the smell of burning rubber wants to gut the amendment that makes being a tyrant risky. 

So he’s going to take the show on the road.

The “town halls” will no doubt follow the DFL’s format for these things perfected during the Obamacare “debate”; attendees will be screened for loyal membership in the DFL.

But I think a little tailgate party outside might be fun.  I haven’t organized anything like this in a while; I’m a little overdue.  

If the Governor starts scheduling these things in the Metro – and there’s not snowball’s chance on a Dominican beach limbo party that they’ll be anywhere but the Metro, Duluth or Kim Norton’s Rochester – it might be fun to have a little tailgate party outside.  

Hm.  

Check back. 

Joe Doakes, formerly of Como Park, emails:

Governor Walz wants to call a special session of the legislature this Fall, but only if Democrats can get the legislation they want guaranteed in advance.  Might be worth a look, assuming Republicans get the same deal.  What do Democrats want? 

Assault weapons ban.  High capacity magazine ban.  Binary trigger ban. 

Um, say Democrats, have any of you heard of the Bruen case?   Supreme Court held that the right to bear arms existed before the Constitution was adopted, so only regulations on firearms which existed prior to the Constitution can pass muster.  None of your gun control ideas existed in 1789.  All of your ideas are unconstitutional.  Why are you holding up a special session to pass laws you know are unconstitutional?

Joe Doakes

 

To squeeze engagement out of their emotional, gullible base? 

I don’t throw this kind of talk around lightly – but the DFL’s approach to this “special session” is intensely, profoundly, corrosively evil. 

Watch Walter Hudson’s video:

To run the story down:

1. Rep. Elliott Engen proposed language in the “Shield Act” that would have provided money for school security
2. The local rep for “The Ted Nugent Fan Club” sent a letter endorsing the proposal. 
3. Just kidding.  It wasn’t the Ted Nugent fan club.  It was the regional rep for Moms Demand Action.  A Bloomberg-funded gun grabber group.
4. That regional rep got her nose whacked with a news paper by the National Moms and the DFL.  Why?  Because they didn’t want a GOP freshman get a win when they wanted to take that district back.  

This whole charade is about headlines and votes.  This is what Richard Carlbom (who looks in NO WAY like a young Herman Göring, pinky swear) specializes at.  

Piglet wants to have a special session to try to jam down the DFL’s pet gun bans.  

Even the DFL knows it’s doomed:

They never had the votes; the House is tied, and would depend on at least one GOP “compromising” with the DFL, and not a single Republican in either chamber has made a final vote against gun rights in over 25 years.  

In the meantime, the Senate – which is tied today, and even with the one vote majority the DFL will likely retain after the special election to replace Nicole “the Catburglar” Mitchell, there are 3-4 “moderate” DFLers in very purple districts – Afton, the Arrowhead, Moorhead – who are clearly not thrilled about their prospects if they get saddled with a Metrocrat gun grab proposal.  

Some might remember 2002, when every “moderate” outstate DFLer who’d voted against carry permit reform got crushed, flipping the House to the GOP and paving the way for “Shall Issue” permitting and making Tim Pawlenty’s first term a lot more pleasant. 

So – if the votes aren’t there, why do it?

Remember – Richard Carlbom runs the DFL.   He’s the guy who took a bunch of chanting points and turned it into a social media logrolling and gaslighting campaign that not only got gay marriage passed (which may have been inevitable anyway) but took down the Voter ID amendment, which I’m pretty convinced we’re paying for today.  

I expect this “special session” is mostly an attempt to get a bumper crop of video to wrench out of context to play for the gullible uninformed voter that is the DFL’s stock in trade.  

That, and fundraising. Lots of fundraising. 

SCENE:  The basement studio of AM1280 The Patriot.  Mitch BERG is hosting his weekend talk show.    Unbelievably, across the table is Richard CARLBOM, chair of the MInnesota DFL party.  Why did he agree to an interview?  Search me. G-MONEY, the producer, is through the glass window in the control room, adjusting levels.

BERG:  So Mr. Carlbom – you’re advocating a “special session on guns”.  Since the House is tied and at least some outstate DFLs are going to be very uncomfortable trying to jam down gun bans, this would seem to be more of a DFL fundraiser than a special session.  Your thoughts?

CARLBOM:  F)ck that cynical sh1t…

(G-MONEY, the producer, frantically hits the dump button).  

BERG:  Er, you can’t talk like that on the radio.k 

CARLBOM:  Talk like what?

BERG:  You can’s swear on the radio. 

CARLBOM:  I didn’t.   I’m just talking like all the real Democratic men. 

BERG: OK.  So – special session or fundraiser?

CARLBOM:  Well, one f)cking thing you conservative a$$h0l3s miss is…

(G-MONEY frantically smashes the dump button again)

BERG:  Y’see, you did it again?

CARLBOM:  Did what?

BERG:  Swore on the radio.  That’s a no-no. 

CARLBOM:  It’s just the f)cking way all of us m0th3rf__ing authentic big-d1ck Democrat p1ss working f3lch men Cl3v3l4nd St34m3r men are f3lch d1rty s4nch3z w4d (G-MONEY hammers the dump button; steam starts pouring from the delay box). 

BERG:  You’ve been a political flack your entire career.  (Looks up at the call board). We’ve got an anonymous caller on the line – Ken from DC, you’re live and on the air…

CALLER:  Mr. Carlbom, has anyone ever told you that you look like a slightly younger Herman Göring? 

CARLBOM:  Ken?  Ken Martin?  Is that you?  

(But the line has gone dead). 

And SCENE

Joe Doakes, no longer of Como Park, emails:

Governor Walz plans a special session of the legislature to help Democrat fundraising efforts.  

 

He doesn’t say it that way, of course.  He says it’s to pass gun control legislation in the wake of the most recent shooting. Knowing Republicans are unlikely to agree, Democrats plan to continue using the atrocity to dun their supporters for donations. 

 

“If nobody had guns, nobody would get shot.” Sounds simple, right?  But its First Order Thinking. It’s simple alright, too simple.  It ignores human nature.  

 

Second Order Thinking asks: “Take away ask the guns and what will Bad Guys do? Sit quietly painting landscapes?  Bake cookies, write music, go sailing?” No. 

 

Google “knife attack.” The Bad Guys will not sit quietly, they will substitute a different tool to do their evil, like the mass stabber at the Michigan Walmart. But this time, there will be no armed citizen to stop them.  

 

Take away knives and Bad Guys will use clubs.  Take away clubs and Bad Guys will use the very stones themselves, as Cain slew Able. 

 

The problem is not the guns, knives, sticks, or stones.  The problem is the Bad Guys. And Democrats have no intention of solving that problem.  

 

It’s too profitable. 

 

Joe Doakes 

Until we control human nature, weapon “control” will always fail. 

And trying to control human nature has led to imponderably greater evils than we’ve seen.  

SCENE:   Mitch BERG is having an Old Fashioned at a bar in northern Wisconsin.  Engrossed in a conversation with the waitress, he doesn’t notice Avery LIBRELLE has walked in, wearing a “MEAT IS MURDER” t-shirt.  

LIBRELLE:  Merg!

BERG:  Of, for…the second time this week, how ya doing…

LIBRELLE:  Shut up.   It’s the guns, stupid. 

BERG. So I’ve got a question for you, Avery.   Whenever a spree killer can be tied, however tenuously, to the right, the media and people like you get veeeery serious about dissecting connections to “extreme” ideology.  Like Vance Boelter…

LIBRELLE:  Extreme pro-life MAGAt!

BERG:  …but when it’s someone like the Covenant or Annunciation shooters, whose manifestos were like Gen-Z leftist movie screenplays, full of hate for Christians, Jews, conservatives, Trump…

LIBRELLE:  It’s the guns and only the guns!   And how dare you blame all transgender people!

BERG:  Where did I mention transgender people?

LIBRELLE:  You did. 

BERG: (Turns to stenographer sitting at next stool) Please read back the converstation starting with “shut up”:

COURT REPORTER:  OK.  Starting from where Mist…er, Mizz…er…(looks to BERG with look of inciipient panic)

BERG:  Don’t worry. Just read. 

COURT REPORTER:  OK.  

LIBRELLE:  Extreme pro-life MAGAt!

BERG:  …but when it’s someone like the Covenant or Annunciation shooters, whose manifestos were like Gen-Z leftist movie screenplays, full of hate for Christians, Jews, conservatives, Trump…

LIBRELLE:  I could have sworn I heard you call for the deaths of all transgender people.   

BERG:  You’re thinking of Mayor Frey…

LIBRELLE:  Shut up.  Why are you bringing a court reporter with you?

BERG:  Seems I need one lately. 

And SCENE.  

SCENE:  MItch BERG is ordering an omelette at a local diner.  Too late, he notices Avery LIBRELLE entering the building.  There is no graceful exit. 

LIBRELLE:  Merg!

BERG:  Er, hello, Av…

LIBRELLE:  Shut up.  The shooting in Minneapolis yesterday proved that “thoughts and prayers” aren’t enough.  They were literally praying…

BERG:  So it’s time to doooooooooooo something?

LIBRELLE:  Why the tone of mockery?  I’m serious.  It’s time to…well, it’s time for action!

BERG:  Any action?

LIBRELLE: Anything that works!

BERG:   Great.  So the state’s “red flag law” didn’t work, because for some reason nobody called the authorities about an apparently transgender person saying crazy things. 

LIBRELLE:  Heyyyyyy

BERG:  And to ban guns you’ll have to repeal the Second Amendment…

LIBRELLE:  Which we can dooooooo!

BERG:  You can’t.  You’ll need 2/3 of Congress – you might get 35%, once.  And if for sake of argument you do, then yo’ll need 38 states.  You might get 10, one time.   So that’s not happening.  

LIBRELLE:  OK, wise guy, what do you have?

BERG:  Something that been 100% effective so far in preventing school shootings. 

LIBRELLE:  Oooh,  Go for it. I’m all ears.  

BERG:  It’s a policy used in 1,000 school districts nationwide.  And in 25 years, there’ve been zero shootings at any of them, during school hours, on school property.  

LIBRELLE: Let me guess- religious and home schools?

BERG:  I said districts.  Public. schools.   

LIBRELLE:  OK. So far so good. . 

BERG:  Not a single child harmed.  That’s what we’re going for, right?

LIBRELLE:  Right.   Must be some really progressive policy!

BERG:  They’ve rejected the “gun free zone” label.   They allow staff to carry their own firearms.  Some of them require training, others don’t’, but the point is, anyone thinking about shooting up a school has to reckon with the fact that any teacher, any principal, any janitor, any lunch lady can end them.  

LIBRELLE:  That’s horrible!

BERG:  Why?

LIBRELLE:  More guns ocn’t fix the problem. 

BERG:  First – it’s not “more guns”.  It’s the possibility of any gun.  And if “no school shootings” is your goal, then that seems to have hit the spot, doesn’t it?

LIBRELLE:  That…just…

BERG:  VIolates your sense of moral aesthetics?   

But steam is coming out of Librelle’s ears.  

And Scene.  

First, the good news: in the last week or so, the Minneosta Gun Owners Caucus won its long legal battle to extend carry permits to citizens over 18 years old.   The Caucus has long held that it’s absurd that Minnesota restricts carry permits to people over 21 years old, when they can sign contracts, join the military, and are held fully responsible for their actions as adults at 18. 

Several levels of courts agreed, and the US Supreme Court refused to hear Keith Ellison’s final round of appeals.   While I’m sure Minnesota’s regulatory state will squawk, qualified 18 year olds can now exercise the same rights, as citizens, that the rest of us do. 

Which didn’t land quite the same way with everyone.

“Lucky” Rosenbloom, who runs a…er, unique shop on Dale at Saint Anthony, just off I94 in Frogtown, a long-time permit trainer, isn’t going to take students below 21:

“It’s more important to have safety,” Lucky Rosenbloom, a state-certified firearms instructor, said. “These kids are impulsive. They’re not going to think. Some of these kids still think that they’re invincible,” he added about his decision to not have 18–20-year-olds in his classes.

“I’m ruling it out. I will not teach [them],” Rosenbloom added. “I’m not worried about the backlash.”

Well, that backlash is already starting to roll in.

And roll, it did:

Now, Lucky has always been a colorful character. He’s got a knack for publicity.

And it’s his business.  He can serve anyone he wants, unless they’re gay, trans or have any other special political privileges; it’s not like he’s a baker or anything. 

And it’s not like I was going to Rosenbloom for my refresher training, so it’s not like I can boycott the guy. 

But it’s a bad look. 

…then governor Piglet and the DFL are lying about self-defense reform. 

To recap:  In Minnesota, if you’re outside your house, to use lethal force in self-defense you must:

• Reasonbly and immediately fear getting killed or maimed
• Not be the aggressor
• Use only the force needed to end the threat
• Make a reasonable effort to retreat (remember – doesn’t apply at home).  

House File 13 – a “Stand your Ground” bill – would remove only the last bullet. 

And any smart person knows that.

But smart people aren’t the DFL’s niche:

BTW, the “Stand your Ground” bill was defeated on a straight party-line tie in the House last week. 

That means votes are on record. 

The last time the House DFL voted straight-line against a gun-rights bill that lost a floor vote was 2002, when “Shall Issue” permit reform was barely defeated. 

The GOP went on to win every single one of those outstate DFL seats; every outstate DFLer that voted against gun rights lost that fall.  And with a GOP House and Governor (and a few iron Range DFL senators voting “yes”), Shall Issue passed the following session.

Keep that anger going. 

It can not be the only issue that the GOP rides on (and it won’t be), and the MN Gun Owners Caucus must not be the only functional, focused group working conservative causes (and I don’t think it will be).

This this can be, and must be, a potent part of the right’s approach in this next election.

A US District Judge in Mississippi rules that the ban on fully-automatic weapons violates the Bruen decision.

He wasn’t happy about it – but he made the ruling:

In his ruling, Judge Carlton Reeves, an Obama appointee, made no bones at all about the fact that he hated what he was doing, but under Bruen — of which he is also not a fan — the law is very clear.

The Supreme Court has, of course, ruled that gun control laws like the machinegun ban can be justified in the case of firearms that are “dangerous and unusual.” Judge Reeves, however, ruled that while machineguns are dangerous, they are not, in fact, unusual. And we can thank the work product of the great legal minds of the US Department of Justice for their failure to argue that machineguns are rare. As the judge noted . . .

Bruen nevertheless tells us that there is an American “historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of ‘dangerous and unusual weapons.’” 597 U.S. at 21 (quoting Heller, 554 U.S. at 626). That is the law to be followed. The ultimate problem for the government, then, is this: although machineguns are “dangerous,” it does not explain how machineguns are unusual.  …

The Morgan case raised by Mr. Brown says there were more than 740,000 machineguns lawfully possessed in the United States in 2021. 2024 WL 3936767, at *4 (citing ATF data). The government has not pointed to any other number. The Court accepts it as true.

Seven hundred and forty thousand is no small number.7  The government presents no argument or explanation for why such a large figure is somehow not common. Merriam Webster’s dictionary defines common as, among other things, “widespread.”8 Three-quarters of a million of any kind of firearm is plainly widespread. 

The government also failed to show any historical evidence that banning machineguns would be consistent with gun laws at the founding.

It appears the legal and legislative sharks are circling the National Firearms Act.

Don’t get irrationally exuberant just yet:

Let’s be clear here. This ruling came in a criminal case and applies only to Justin Brown. Don’t head over to your local gun store expecting to buy full auto M4 any time soon.

The question now is, what happens next…whether or not the DOJ chooses to appeal the case to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. Yes, the Fifth is probably the most gun-friendly circuit in the nation. But they’ve also ruled in the past that machineguns are both dangerous and unusual. That, however, was before Bruen. And you can bet that if the Brown decision is appealed, the DOJ will come up with arguments supporting its contention that guns with giggle-switches are, in fact, rare.

 

So it’s too early to start shopping.

But not window-shopping.

…is law-abiding citizens buying guns at gun shows. 

Not guys like this:

For those who don’t scroll down in these attached Tweets:

Thompson was sentenced to a “mandatory” 5 years for felon in possession of a firearm in Sept. 2023.

[counts on fingers and toes…] that means he should still be in prison, right??

Nope, not in Minnesota. He was released early by the UNELECTED MNDOC Commissioner Paul Schnell (appointed by Timmy) after just one year, in Oct. 2024, despite the fact that he’s a repeat violent offender, who already had THREE prior convictions on gun cases, including machine gun possession.

Wonder if he took a “universal” background check?

All modern gun control is build on the National Firearms Act.   Gun Control Act of 1968?  Hughes Amendment?  Arbitrary BATFE power?   Most arbitrary local regulations?  Yes, yes, yes  and yes.

And tinkering with any of the arms of the octopus without going for the head is merely treating the symptoms. 

Rep Burleson (MO7) is going for the head.

The National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA) was the first federal law to impose limitations on firearm ownership. It requires Americans to pay a $200 tax, register, and undergo an application process to own certain firearms and accessories.

For decades, unelected bureaucrats have attempted to use the NFA to impose new regulations on gun owners without Congressional approval. This month, the ATF published a rule to reclassify firearms with pistol braces as short-barrel rifles (SBR), meaning millions of law-abiding Americans will become felons unless they submit to the NFA’s unconstitutional tax and registration scheme.

Here’s an explainer – the first of many.

Even with GOP control in DC, it’s quixotic.

But it’s a step in the right direction.

Fun Fact #2:   The people angry about that insurance companies – UHG today, but surely all the other ones before long – want to force you onto national health insurance, which doesn’t “deny claims” so much as stall, ration and – well, deny treatment, and are actively exploring (and in some cases have arrived at) “euthanasia”, sometimes without asking any kind of consent at all, and above whom there is nobody to appeal.

Did I say “fun”? I meant “illustrative”.

“Why do you shooters get so anal-retentive about details?”

Because when you get details wrong with a gun, people get hurt, go to jail, or both.

Lucas Kunce, a former Marine Jagoffosaur [1] and candidate for the US Senate against Josh Hawley, is reaching out to win over “Regular Guys”.

WIth him, he took Adam Kinzinger a bunch of union guys, and an entourage of reporters to the shooting range for some guy time. 

It’s fair to say Kunce spun the results for all he was worth:

A richochet clipped one of the reporters.

Where did they screw up?

Let us count the ways:

• Shooting at steel targets – at 10 yards.  That’s pretty much guaranteed to richochet.
• Eye protection?  Kinzinger apparently wanted to protect his hairdo. 
• Oh, yeah – they had a box of Tannerite on the firing line.  If that ricochet had hit that instead of the reporter, it would have made a bigger headline than a boom. 

Here’s hoping that reporter’s insurance company takes Kunce to court (I have little. hope he’d do it of his own volition).

So – how is that battle for blue-collar guys going?

[1] UPDATE:  I’m told the title is “JAG Officer”, short for Judge Advocate General Officer, or military lawyer. 

I regret the confusion.

Last week, I ruffled some of the usual feathers by posting a link to this video by Ryan McBeth.

McBeth is a former anti-tank grunt who now does open-source intelligence and systems work. His Youtube and Substack channels are interesting; he doesn’t get everything right (he is still claiming Mossad figured out how to remotely blow up lithium batteries, although his reasoning for getting to that conclusion isn’t wrong), and he certainly runs in official-ish circles, but he shows his math.

I pointed this out, not to “run cover” for officialdom (wtf?) but out of awareness that all “sides” of every issue on social media are farming engagements to draw clicks, eyeballs, and of course the mother of all motivations, “monetization”. 

The real lesson?  Waiting for government to help you out after an emergency is a sucker bet.  Government may mean well but be incompetent; it may do its best but be overstretched; it might be actively undercutting you; it might be all three and then some.  But one way or another, example after example in the real world shows us you, the regular schnook, are likely to have to see to your own well-being after a disaster.  

Seeing to that well-being is either a waste of time, or absolutely vital – and you won’t know which until it’s too late.

This note comes from a friend of a friend:

“I’m in Asheville, NC right now and we were devastated by the hurricane. Day 5 of no power, water, internet, or even cell service. We are cut off from the world. Here’s what has mattered so far and what hasn’t in my particular situation:

Life saver #1 = Starlink internet. All our phones say SOS. Can’t text for help. Don’t know what’s going on. I plugged in my satellite internet and have been helping the whole neighborhood call loved ones. Everyone is offering me anything from their supplies because it’s so valuable.

Life saver #2 = Solar panels and 3000w battery pack. I can run satellite internet, electric kettle to purify water, charge headlamps, electronics, instant pot for cooking, ice maker for the cooler, everything I need. I’ll won’t run out of the sun like I would propane or gas if this extends a lot longer.

Life saver #3 = Gas cans and extra gas. These are sold out everywhere and are harder to get than gas itself. When power goes out so do gas station pumps. When you have portable gas you can run a generator, evacuate, drive to where the supplies are, check on family members, etc. People are stranded and sleeping at gas stations for days in their car waiting for power to come back on so they can get home.

Life saver #4 = Knowledge on how to survive without a huge stash. Some preppers spend too much on stocking up and not enough on education. None of us knew the hurricane was going to be this bad. Some people lost their entire house including supplies. Those who know multiple ways to collect water, purify it, start a fire, find food, are the ones still alive that haven’t been rescued yet. I could go for another month if I had to with nothing but my backpack and tools.

Life saver #5 = Hand sanitizer. Sanitation is rough here and the hospitals are out of power, food, and water. People are starting to smell and after you touch something you do not want to get sick and go to the hospital because it’s bad there too. The water you do find may not be safe for hand washing without purification. I wash my hands with soap and water and then do hand sanitizer after to stay healthy.

Other things I’ve relied on:

Cash. No power means no debit cards can be used

Disposable cutlery and plates

A 4×4 truck that can drive where others can’t or help tow people to safety

Solar/battery radio

Dogs for company and to alert if someone is outside

Hasn’t mattered as much as I thought:

#1 = Guns! I haven’t even thought about needing my gun and realized I put too much on this. Strangers have come together in our area and are taking care of each other like you wouldn’t believe. Each person has a surplus of something and is missing something else. We all share while still respecting boundaries and only sharing what we choose. Again, this can depend on the area but here if you are acting paranoid/standoffish of others and open carrying a gun, the nice innocent people are going to avoid you and you will be isolated without community or resources. I’m still glad to have a gun but I wish I spent more time on other skills too instead of putting so much emphasis on shooting. (And to anyone who says, “it only takes one time and you will be glad for your aim”, you’re missing the point I’m trying to make here.)

#2 = Food. This is easy to find for me but it may be due to the part of the country I’m in. I can also fish, forage, and don’t cook much because I don’t want to waste water on dishes. I had shelf stable food prepped and lll probably end up only using 25% of it in a month. As people’s freezers start to thaw we’ve had big cookouts so it doesn’t go to waste and I’ve been full most nights.

Again, this list could be based on location, type of natural disaster, weather, etc But it’s interesting to me because I’m actually living it instead of preparing and wanted to share.”

 

As the correspondent notes in the last graf, it “could” be based on location.  And it most certainly is based on the relative health of the social fabric in the area. 

This is why I wonder how much prosecuting Kamala Harris did while she was in, and then leading, the San Francisco District Attorney’s office.

The first rule of armed self-defense, especially in a “blue” city, is you never talk about armed self-defense.

A particularly zealous DA – like Harris – could use a statement like Harris’s as evidence that one was looking to kill someone; if one were involved in an incident, the DA could use a statement like that to try to impeach the idea that you were an “unwilling participant” in the incident.  Which is enough to turn a righteous self-defense shooting into a term in prison, if you get the wrong jury. 

So let’s say I have my doubts.

Here’s some Kamala Harris “Brat Vibes” from her time as San Francisco DA:

Just because you have a gun in the sanctity of your locked home doesn’t mean we’re not going to walk into that home and check to see if you’re being responsible…

If you don’t find “ignoring the Fourth Amendment” absolutely disqualifying, I’m almost afraid to ask what you’ll let government get away with.

It may be a symptom of how complete the “Great Sort” has been – but the safer a Democrat is, the more comfortable they feel “saying the quiet part out loud”, as the kids say these days:

By the way, Governor Newsom:  No.  Denied. 

Now what?

Now, Warnock feeling safe? Well, he is, for another couple years anyway:

On the other hand…:

Anyway – if you are a Democrat, you need to make absolutely certain your candidates accept nothing less than completely confiscation, publicly, and immediately.

This came out on Tuesday:

So many responses:

• Please, Lord – let him file that case with the Roberts court.  I beg this of you.
• So let’s make sure we’ve got this straight – a mentally ill 13 year old in Minnesota is clearly competent to decide to chemically neuter themself, but an 18 year old who’s passed carry permit training and has a clean criminal record can’t defend their home and life?

Reason has been annihilated.