Neglected

Things have been very busy for the last few months.  I will try to do better posting.

Even the mainstream media reports are beginning to grudgingly reflect bits and pieces of reality.

I think we will hear more about the Alt-Right this year.

I see some of the most sensible, down-to-earth, salt-of-the-earth people I know starting to show support for Trump.

Buy Ammo.

Better Odds Than Powerball

Armed citizen versus active shooter. 

Follow the link and check out the original WFAA story as well.

Ninety-nine point nine-nine-nine percent of concealed carry permit holders will never have to worry about the scenarios faced here, but it is interesting to see that they don't do all that badly.  Yes, a defender may get killed, and, in fact, it might even be likely in some situations, but even in those cases, it buys time for others and for the police to arrive.

Resistance of any kind changes the dynamic for the attacker, forcing his or her posture to change, breaking the mode of the attack.

None of us know what we would do under fire, even if we have been extensively training.  What I don't think I would do, armed or not, is "shelter in place".  I can't imagine cowering, just waiting for an attacker to find me.  I might run over women and children trying to get out, but I can't see crawling under a table, hiding and hoping I wasn't seen.  I might play dead with the best of them, but I don't think so.  I don't think anyone should.  Too often the aftermath of these attacks looks like the murderer was shooting fish in a barrel.

I blame television and movies.  Guns on film have always been extremely lethal in the hands of the writers under certain circumstances.  A single round from a snub-nose .38 is like a death ray when called for by the plot.  Edged weapons are like that, too.  Native American arrows apparently killed by hydrostatic shock.  It's amazing. 

With regard to body armor that a shooter might be wearing, keep in mind that the energy from a handgun round which does not penetrate armor still has to be absorbed and dissipated.  This is often like a body blow to a boxer.  The mass of the person struck determines, to some extent, the effect of a hit, but, again, a non-lethal strike still has to be processed by the attacker's brain and nervous system.  It's not something that most people can simply ignore.  They will adjust for it.  This buys the defender some time.

Whether or not the intended victims of a mass murderer are themselves armed, every distraction, every attempt at defense, no matter how futile, can lessen the number of rounds a gunman is able to expend.  Don't stand still.  Don't be quiet.  Don't surrender.  Don't make it easy.

Read, sometime, the citations of those given the Medal of Honor.  Very few of us have the kind of courage, determination and perseverance demonstrated by those noble souls.  I certainly am not of that caliber.  What strikes me, though, is how often the recipients suffered severe wounds and kept going.  If I'm going to die anyway I would like to think I could face it with the same persistence as the Black Knight, "'Tis but a scratch!"

Religious Freedom and Respect

How do we respect another person’s religious beliefs when our beliefs run contrary to those held by the person? 

First, we give the benefit of the doubt that a person is indeed sincere in his or her beliefs and is worthy of respect.  When this is disproven by behavior or statement, respect is no longer required. 

Second, we accept that there may be aspects of the belief system that are not adequately clear to us as outsiders and non-believers.   If we are interested, we can examine the doctrines in greater detail and with an open mind and find where that system converges or complements our own.  Then we have a basis for discussion and mutual enlightenment.  Or we may simply decide that we are not interested and leave the person and the religion alone for the most part. 

Religious freedom means that we do not require any person to join a state religion or demand that all acquiesce to and accept a certain set of religious beliefs.  Back in the days when Catholics did not eat meat on Fridays, it would have been acceptable to offer a Catholic friend tuna or peanut butter for lunch rather than a hamburger.  It would have been still more respectful on a personal basis to refrain from eating meat ourselves in their presence. Yet respect also means that, in the political and public arenas, the majority will not dictate to the minority nor should the minority dictate behavior and beliefs to the majority. 

It means I will respect the religious beliefs of others at the same time that I demand they respect my beliefs.  This seems to me the point that is failing to be understood. 

Since September 11, 2001, when the United States was successfully attacked by Muslims in the name of Islam, the West has been on the defensive.  We have been concerned about the “backlash” against Muslims.  We started a “war on terror”.  We should have started a war on Islamic radicals.  We should have been concerned about making Islam safe for those Muslims who respect other religions, who want to assimilate and live at peace with western civilization, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, atheists, etc. 

Instead of demanding that Muslims in the West respect our beliefs or leave, we have allowed the fundamentalists to intimidate us.  We have given in to their demands for accommodation while failing to make them meet the requirements of living in civilized and diverse society. 

Not far from where I live, there are a number of Amish families.  A little further on, there are some more Amish farms that have been there for fifty years or so.  Near where I grew up, several families of Amish have moved in and bought up a few old farms.  We don’t ask that they drive cars or watch Jimmy Kimmel, but we do require them to have slow-moving vehicle triangles, reflectors and lights on their buggies.  We let them milk their cows by hand, but we expect them to use electricity to run the refrigeration unit on their community bulk tank because that milk is sold to the public. 

The Amish may or may not be offended by our motor vehicles, cell towers, fast food restaurants, and Fakebook pages.  They don’t say much about it – not to non-Amish.  I see them, and, in the summer, occasionally, smell them, at the local Dollar Store.  I have never seen one grope a woman because she is wearing make-up and is immodestly dressed.  I have seen them in the halls and emergency rooms at the hospital where they seem pleased to have access to modern medical equipment and the knowledge of skilled, modern physicians.  They certainly pay their own way, and I respect that.  They ask that we let them live as they choose, and they give us that same consideration. 

Islam needs to learn this lesson.  Or stay out of the West. 

Something Shocks Me

Breitbart reports that none other than Missouri's own Phyllis Schlafly has endorsed Donald Trump.

Schlafly is the social conservative of social conservatives.  I can understand a Cruz endorsement, but she seems an unlikely supporter of the Donald.  This is the key:  

Today, Schlafly tells Breitbart that the defining and most important battle is immigration.

I have said before that the GOP establishment does not understand the voters when it comes to immigration.  Trump does.

Trump may be a bogus candidate, a stalking-horse in the manner of Ross Perot, but, like Perot and NAFTA, he has an issue that resonates.     

Ghost Dancers 2016

Politics are useless.  We bought into the “Reagan Revolution” and the “Republican Revolution” just as the left has bought into the Half-Kenyan Bastard’s “fundamental transformation”.  As bad as Obama has been for the United States – and the world, the regime is simply riding the extreme swing of the pendulum. 

We used to say that a conservative is a liberal who got mugged.  The new saying may be something like a libertarian is a collectivist who got mugged by the government.  Apart from destroying freedom, government does nothing well.  This makes it difficult to undo the encroachment of government by political means.  There is too much entrenched bureaucracy, too many federal judges with political agendas, too many overzealous prosecutors at all levels, and far too many people in both the 1% and the 99% classes who suck the government teat.

The key is to change the culture – which is virtually impossible for an individual or even a group, but I think there is a zeitgeist.  More importantly, I know that all belief systems and cultural trends are subject to the cold judgment of reality.   Being a Christian, I also trust in God, but all sane humans, regardless of beliefs, must acknowledge an objective reality.  It seems that an increasing number of people, particularly in the West among the so-called First World nations, are not that sane.

 We read of a religious movement among the Native Americans of the 19^th Century called the Ghost Dance.  Unlike the fictional portrayal of the Ghost Dancers in the Western genre, there were several variations of the belief system.  Possibly the most widespread and benevolent occurred as a result of a vision to a Paiute shaman named Wovoka around 1889.  Wovoka had participated in the earlier Ghost Dance movement of the 1870.  In addition to ritual dances, Wovoka’s prophecies emphasized righteous living and non-violence, prayer, mediation, and chanting.  The result, it was believed, would be a return to the old ways, peace with the whites, and a new world where the resurrected dead would be united with the living. 

Many tribes sent representatives to Wovoka’s reservation in Nevada for instruction in this revived Ghost Dance.  As the dance and teachings were taken back to the various tribes, language and tribal culture introduced variations and re-interpretations.  This is perhaps most notable and notorious among the Lakota. 

Kicking Bear, a Miniconjou Teton Lakota, was one of those who made the pilgrimage.  As he took the Ghost Dance to the Pine Ridge reservation, his interpretation differed significantly from Wovoka’s.  The emphasis on non-violence disappeared.  The Lakotas at Pine Ridge began to wear the infamous “ghost shirts” which were supposed to be impenetrable by the white man’s bullets.  As word of this spread, it raised concerns among citizens and the military.  The ultimate tragic result was the Massacre at Wounded Knee. 

Is there a lesson for us today?  For one, disarming a population makes massacres much easier on the oppressors.  For another, our culture has adopted a view that reality is subjective, that the world can be what we want it to if we all just wish hard enough.  There was some truth in what Wovoka taught, and, like him, I believe the living and the dead of every people, tongue, tribe, and nation will be reunited in a new heaven and new earth, wherein dwells righteousness.  Until then, though, the “old ways”, as Wovoka pictured them, with the tribes free of the reservations and the buffalo on the plains as a living sea were not to return. 

There are bad people in the world.  There are greedy people – even among the poor.  There are thugs, including those who hide behind government uniforms, badges, and court orders.  The last few generations in America have grown up in a time of historically unprecedented ease, peace, health, wealth, and abundance.  We are, in short, spoiled.  A spoiled child believes that he can and should have whatever he desires, and that it is only parental intransience that stands in his way.  Barack Obama is only the most obvious present example of this attitude.  I don’t even blame the HKB for this as it is what he was taught as a child among the Reds and nothing has ever shown him otherwise.  Why should he believe differently?  The only real problem is white people refusing to step aside.

The truth is that resources are limited, that somebody has to work to provide for those who think it’s their right to sit on their collective and collectivist asses.  You can’t produce energy from thin air.  You can’t run power plants, power industries, create jobs, heat and cool homes, keep food cold, grow corn and beef and bacon, make iPhones, or any of the other myriad of things that make modern civilization possible without dealing with the basic realities of physics and chemistry.  Cars are not going to run on fairy dust, and the fairies aren’t going to ride the bus.  Your #hashtags won’t stop bullets any better than Kicking Bear’s ghost shirt.