Friday - August 15, 2014

Syrian WMD Destroyed

Hey, remember Syria?

Remember how there’s this massive civil war going on there, with tens of thousands of casualties, all sorts of horrific war crimes being done by both sides, Obama’s Red Lines, and Syria’s “possible” use of poison gas? Remember how the whole world, with the help of the Russians, was going to neutralize the stockpiles of Assad’s chemical weapons? (the ones that didn’t come from Saddam Hussein, wink wink, nudge nudge??)



Well, progress is being made. At sea. So far, 581 tons of precursor chemicals used to make mustard gas have been destroyed. ( OMG. Can you imagine the size of the killing field that nearly 600 tons of poison gas would make?? ) Under the watchful eye of a multinational naval task force that includes the British frigate HMS Montrose, several Scandinavian cargo ships have shuttled the evil stuff to the American ship MV Cape Ray. Cape Ray is a 650’, 37 year old RO/RO container ship, now owned by the US Navy and currently modified as a chemical disposal factory, and is doing the job at a well guarded and undisclosed location somewhere at sea in the Mediterranean. 

And those 581 tons? That’s not even 75% of the overall stockpile. The Cape Ray has 269 shipping containers full of the crap on board. But progress is being made, and the story of putting a chemical hydrolysis plant on a ship and getting it halfway round the world is actually quite heroic.

[ April 10, 2014 ] The MV Cape Ray left for the southern Italian port of Gioia Tauro to retrieve an estimated 560 tons of mustard blister agent and other materials extracted from Syria’s war-fractured territory. The move took place two days after President Bashar Assad’s regime delivered the last of its declared chemical-warfare stockpile into international custody, enabling the commencement of a destruction operation slated to take place in the Mediterranean Sea.

WASHINGTON, Aug. 11, 2014 – Specialists on the U.S. container ship M/V Cape Ray continue their work in the Mediterranean Sea, neutralizing chemical materials from Syria and contributing to what the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, or OPCW, on August 7 confirmed as the destruction of 74.2 percent of Syria’s chemical stockpile.

U.S. military and civilian specialists aboard the ship began using the field deployable hydrolysis system to neutralize Syrian chemical materials on July 7, Director of Pentagon Press Operations Army Col. Steve Warren told reporters at the time, anticipating that it would take about 60 days to complete the job.

On August 5 at the Aberdeen Proving Ground-Edgewood Team CBRNE capabilities showcase, Adam Baker, a chemical engineer and project manager with the U.S. Army Edgewood Chemical Biological Center, detailed the hard work that went into turning a land-based hydrolysis system into a field-deployable system in just five months.

“We had a gap in capabilities for a system that was transportable, that could be operated out of a remote location and that would [process] bulk liquid agent at high throughputs.”

The system had to be able to be transported to a remote site and set up and be sufficient with a supply of reagents and diesel fuel, Baker explained. The project was given the go-ahead in February 2013. In November 2013, he said, “That’s when they made the decision to start putting it on the Cape Ray.”

The timeline was short, Baker said, and they couldn’t start from scratch with a new system, so they used a process from the former Aberdeen Chemical Demilitarization Facility, or ABCDF, that had been used a decade ago to neutralize 1,700 tons of mustard – part of the destruction of the United States’ own chemical stockpile.

The entire Syrian stockpile of precursors required to make sarin gas has been destroyed by US experts on board a US neutralizer ship, Pentagon officials have confirmed.

“I am pleased to announce that the crew aboard Cape Ray has completed neutralization of 100 percent of the sarin precursor aboard the ship, which amounts to about 581 metric tons neutralized,” Pentagon spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said.

Warren added the Cape Ray crew are now in the process of neutralizing 19.8 tons of sulfur mustard and should be completed by the end of August.

Syria agreed to the destruction of its chemical weapons through a US-Russia brokered deal last September. The decision was sparked by a deadly sarin gas attack in August 21 near Damascus that killed hundreds of people. The West blamed President Bashar Assad forces for it, while Damascus accused the rebels of committing that terror act as a provocation.

So, some good news for a change. Go Navy.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/15/2014 at 08:02 AM   
Filed Under: • Insanity • International • Middle-East •  
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So Much For Summer Swelter

Heavens to Kitteh Kats, here it is, the middle of August. And it’s 55°F this morning.

Summer swelter? Not hardly. This has been one of the coolest summers around here in I don’t know when. Well, so it seems. Our official state climatologist says that actually, so far things have been rather average. It just seems colder because we’ve had so many bloody hot summers recently.

Despite a general feeling amongst NJ residents that July 2014 was a cold summer month, in actuality, compared to long-term records, it was rather average. The statewide average temperature of 74.5° was 0.5° below the 1981-2010 mean. However, it was 0.3° above the 1895-present mean and ranked as the 45th warmest July of the past 119 years. Even the number of afternoons with temperatures of 90° or higher was close to normal. So why the common misperception? Some armchair psychology brings me to four possibilities:

1) The first half of the month was above average, while the more recent weeks were on the cool side. Our perceptions are biased toward the most recent.

2) People have yet to “recover” from the cold start of 2014. The dubious media ramblings of the “polar vortex” returning to the eastern US in mid-July fueled these thoughts.

3) The most recent four NJ Julys all rank in the top six for warmth over the past 119 years. This was an amazing run of hot Julys.

4) Those sticking their toes in the Jersey surf in early July were shocked by water temperatures in the 50°s and may have equated this to the cool July atmosphere. The cold surf was actually indicative of persistent southerly winds that brought atmospheric warmth. This wind flow led to coastal upwelling that pushed warmer surface waters offshore and introduced cool deeper waters to the surf zone.

Yes, I know, I should stick to my day job!
...
Also likely contributing to most everyone’s view that this has been a rather stellar summer in the weather department is the almost uninterrupted streak of sunny or at least mostly rain-free holiday and weekend weather. Whether our fine weekends and the overall atmospheric pattern will hold through the remainder of the summer is uncertain. However, by early August average daily temperatures begin a slow descent, thus most often late season hot spells don’t last as early as those earlier in the summer.

Funny, isn’t it? When the weather folks had their panties in a twist over Global Warming, one or two tenths of a degree was Big Deal. Now that things are cooling off, half a degree is nothing to worry about. Personally, I don’t think any of this is anything to worry about. I’m perfectly happy not feeling like a swamp creature for once, and our A/C bill this season is delightfully small for once.

And I’m glad that the massive downpour the other day missed us almost completely. We had a brief shower, but along parts of the NJ shore and up into NY’s Long Island they had 5” - 10” or more of sudden rain. Flood time!

Posted by Drew458     on 08/15/2014 at 07:39 AM   
Filed Under: • Climate-Weather •  
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Dusting things off here in the back room

My goodness.

There are something like 16 people who have the power to write posts here. Admins, Super Admins, and Posters. Posters? I’m pretty sure I’ve never assigned anyone that category.

And some of them still visit. Some have stopped by within the month.

Rancino, you can write stuff. Miss your comments and links, buddy, even though you come by all the time. And thanks again for your support. So how about it? Want to sound off about anything?

Somnambulist57, you can write stuff. Wait, who? Not sure I know who you are.

Mr. Christian, of course, can still write stuff. Remember Mr. Christian?

Severa, bless her heart, can still write stuff. If she would ever stop by. It’s been a few years now.

John C and Tim C (no relation) can make posts too. At least I think they can. They’re in an old old category called Posters, which I think might be left over from when the back room here had that little forum.

Ronald Reagan’s Ghost not only can post, but he has an email account on the server here. How about them apples? Golly gee, remember him? Takes me back to Yellowdog days, and Tannenbaum, OCM and Annoying Little Twerp. Times gone by.

OCM remains the one and only truly banned forever twice member. Sorry Guy, I wish it didn’t have to be this way.

Guess I should vacuum and dust more often.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/15/2014 at 12:16 AM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff •  
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   Thursday - August 14, 2014

Mr. President, Finally

Gosh, I think for the first time in my life I was almost proud of this guy.

Speaking without visible teleprompters, Obama just delivered a short statement on the situations in Iraq and in Ferguson Missouri. He made little eye contact with the cameras, instead looking far left, far right, and down almost constantly.

Looking corporate casual, but noticeably gray and a bit sallow, President Obama said that the air strikes against ISIL has broken their siege against the Yazidi on Mt. Sinjar, and that with the tons of humanitarian aid delivered and the thousands of evacuations done, “the situation on the mountain has greatly improved.” He was also very clear to state that what has been done there is all that we’re going to do there, but aid will flow to the Iraqi government (and the Kurds?).  And that almost all of the small number of military advisors recently sent there would soon be leaving.

Speaking on the Ferguson situation, Obama called for calm, and called for patience while justice is done. He mentioned Michael Brown by name, and said how this was a tragic loss for the young man’s family. He said that no time was the right time to attack police, and that rioting was never called for. He said how journalists should not be jailed for doing their jobs. On the other hand, he said how police forces must avoid using excessive force. He let us know that his boy Attorney General Eric Holder was on it, and that the investigation would include federal authorities working closely with local ones.

No questions from the press were taken.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/14/2014 at 12:10 PM   
Filed Under: • Obama, The One •  
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How Big A Wimp Is He?

Man, this hurts.

When even the FWENCH tell our President to cowboy up, you know he’s a wiener.

• Obama is on Martha’s Vineyard while Iraq undergoes regime change and terrorists slaughter ethnic and religious minorities
• Calling heads of state to lobby participation in humanitarian assistance program – in between golf and fundraising
• Washington Post columnist wrote that the president ‘risks fueling the impression that he is detached as the world burns’

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has a message about Iraq for Barack Obama: Get back to the White House and do something.

‘I know it is the holiday period in our Western countries,’ Fabius told a radio interviewer Tuesday in France,’ but when people are dying, you must come back from vacation.’

Full-time workers in France are guaranteed a whopping five weeks of paid vacation every year, making his plea all the more urgent.

Obama is on a family and golfing holiday in a ritzy neighborhood of Martha’s Vineyard but says he will come back to Washington this weekend before returning on Tuesday to fun, sun, and more golf.

As town after Iraqi town is conquered by ISIS, an Islamist terror group that claims it has established an ‘Islamic state,’ Obama’s approach has consisted so far of airlifting humanitarian supplies to victimized groups, protecting the aid drops with airstrikes, and begging for help from allies.

Britain, France, Italy and other European nations have backed the humanitarian assistance with material and personnel, reported The Wall Street Journal, which first broke news of the French diplomat’s criticism.

Meanwhile Obama and Vice President Joe Biden have been encouraging a nascent Iraqi government from a safe distance, while assuring Americans that the U.S. won’t enter another prolonged war with boots on the ground.

Eyebrows went up Wednesday in Washington, though, when the White House announced that Obama was leaning toward deploying ground troops to Mount Sinjar, a northern Iraqi hideout to which tens of thousands of Yadizis, a persecuted religious minority group, have led from ISIS.

Ordinarily, I’d say the froggy could vous allez sable de livre (go pound sand), but in this case he’s right.

And it looks like today, Vacation Guy is doing something. Hopefully, not something stupid. Or, at least less stupid than usual.

Oh goody ... he’s going to give a speech at 12:15. Although half of that will be about the riots in Ferguson MO, so expect him to cuss out the cops and be all rayciss once again.

... 12:49, still waiting ...

Posted by Drew458     on 08/14/2014 at 10:53 AM   
Filed Under: • Iraq • Obama, The One • Racism and race relations •  
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Ha, Got It In One

Your dam right.

Pity that no one listens any more.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/14/2014 at 10:50 AM   
Filed Under: • CULTURE IN DECLINE • History • Humor •  
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Once In My Lifetime

No longer is there an airworthy Avro Lancaster in the Americas. On Friday morning, the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum’s MK. X Lancaster landed in England, ending what is being described as an epic adventure across the Atlantic Ocean that began Monday. Arrival festivities at Royal Air Force Coningsby airport were slightly dampened by soggy weather that kept the world’s only other airworthy Lancaster from greeting the Canadians in the air. Not to be deterred, RAF fighters escorted the Lanc in at about 2 p.m. local time. The Canadian bomber will take part in numerous airshows over the next six weeks in the United Kingdom along with the RAF-owned Lancaster. The last leg of the trip across the North Atlantic was a 5.5-hour flight from Iceland.

Considered by many to be the most famous Allied bomber of the Second World War, the Avro Lancaster had flying characteristics that allowed it to be tossed around like a fighter and operational performance only exceeded by the later developed Boeing B-29. Equipped with four 1145-HP Rolls-Royce Merlin X engines, versions carried bomb loads as high as 22,000 pounds.

...

The plane was set to fly out of Hamilton Monday morning, but an engine failure kept it on the ground for the next 24 hours. On Tuesday, all four engines fired perfectly, and the bomber successfully made its way to Goose Bay, Labrador.

Wednesday morning, the plane flew to Keflavik and spent Thursday in Iceland with a side trip to Reykjavik, setting the stage for the last leg today, a 5 ½ hour flight to Coningsby.

Two of the eight man crew of the Canadian Lancaster which landed at RAF Coningsby this afternoon have spoken of their joy at finally uniting the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight’s version with their own aircraft.

Co-Pilot Leon Evans said: “We just flew across the Atlantic in a Lancaster, so what about that?

“The weather man from RAF Coningsby was absolutely correct so we came down from the Hebrides over Scotland and down the east of England.

“I wanted to land and have a beer in one of those beautiful pubs but the rest of the guys had other ideas.

Landing video here.

Dambusters reunited: World’s only two airworthy WWII Lancaster bombers fly together over Britain for the first time in 50 years

Lancaster bombers united on windswept RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire for what will probably be last time
Lancaster Thumper, part of RAF Battle of Britain Memorial flight, joined Canadian Lancaster Vera from Ontario
Two aircraft are expected to visit some 60 air shows and public events across the UK over the next five weeks
Planes had been due to pass over Lincoln Cathedral last Friday, but poor weather caused flight to be postponed
Lancaster bombers most famous for Dambusters raids - attack on German dams with ‘bouncing bombs’ in 1943

Two Second World War Lancaster bombers flew together in the skies over Britain yesterday for the first time in 50 years.

The world’s only two airworthy Lancaster bombers were united on a windswept Lincolnshire airfield for what will probably be one of the last times.

The Lancaster Thumper, which is part of the RAF Battle of Britain Memorial flight, joined the Canadian Lancaster Vera from a museum in Ontario.

Leon Evans, chief pilot for the Canadian Lancaster’s historic trip, said: ‘We haven’t had two Lancasters fly together in a display before.

‘It’s pretty unlikely it’ll happen again because these airplanes might run out of airtime. Vera’s getting older and already has about 4,500 hours on her.’

Vera’s journey from Canada took four days, involving stops in Newfoundland, Greenland and Iceland before she arrived in Lincolnshire on Friday.

More than 7,377 Lancasters, 430 of which were built in Canada, were made during the Second World War but many that survived were scrapped.

The Avro Lancaster is one of the Second World War’s most-recognisable British aircraft.

It is most famous for the Dambusters raids, which saw 19 Lancasters attack German dams with Sir Barnes Wallis’s ‘bouncing bombs’ in 1943.

Always loved the look of this plane. It’s like a flying brick with gigantic wings and tail stuck on. Who cares if it didn’t go 3 zillion mph; this one had style. Oh, what I wouldn’t give to be there to see and hear these wonderful creatures take flight.

more links
http://www.clactonairshow.com/
http://www.warplane.com/lancaster-2014-uk-tour.aspx
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avro_Lancaster

Posted by Drew458     on 08/14/2014 at 09:37 AM   
Filed Under: • History • Military • planes, trains, tanks, ships, machines, automobiles •  
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   Wednesday - August 13, 2014

You Are Citizen Zero

Not, not the primal AIDS or Ebola patient.

You. You, the voter. The citizen. The emailer, phone caller, letter writer, soap box speaker, blogger, political opinion holder. You, the person your elected “representatives” are supposed to represent. Which means, do your bidding. Or at least work in your behalf.

Man, you are one sumbdhit sucker. Lew. Zer.

A startling new political science study concludes that corporate interests and mega wealthy individuals control U.S. policy to such a degree that “the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”

The startling study, titled “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens,” is slated to appear in an upcoming issue of Perspectives on Politics and was authored by Princeton University Professor Martin Gilens and Northwestern University Professor Benjamin Page. An early draft can be found here.

Noted American University Historian Allan J. Lichtman, who highlighted the piece in a Tuesday article published in The Hill, calls Gilens and Page’s research “shattering” and says their scholarship “should be a loud wake-up call to the vast majority of Americans who are bypassed by their government.”

The statistical research looked at public attitudes on nearly 1,800 policy issues and determined that government almost always ignores the opinions of average citizens and adopts the policy preferences of monied business interests when shaping the contours of U.S. laws.

Plenty more right here.

But I’m telling you about a news story that tells you what you’ve already known for years. You’re just a tax paying dupe. Government is for those who can afford it. Period. Probably always has been.

Of course, if businesses were not taxed, then they’d have no legitimate leg to stand on to claim the right of payola to ensure representation. And if a simple law existed that said nobody could contribute more than $1000 per year to political candidates, parties, or causes combined, then that would give us a vastly lowered and leveled playing field.  I’m sure there are other ways of achieving the same ends, but the rich sure seem to get what they want. Always.

And you get to pay the bill. Always.

More here ; thanks to Doc Jeff for this link.

Posted by Drew458     on 08/13/2014 at 03:04 PM   
Filed Under: • Government • Corruption and Greed •  
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a few words from littlejohn

My final post for this evening a good way to say good night.

My favorite columnist, Richard Littlejohn has written what many have been thinking for a long time.

Yes, it is a bit long, but worth the read I think. 
What say you Lyndon?

Democracy? No, Britain’s now a judicial dictatorship - and it’s time for revolution, writes RICHARD LITTLEJOHN

By Richard Littlejohn

First, the good news. The European Court of Human Rights has ruled unexpectedly that British prisoners denied the vote are not entitled to compensation or legal costs.

That should go some way to deterring the steady flow of vexatious cases brought against the Government.

If opportunist lawyers believe there is every chance they won’t get paid, they are less likely to tout for business in Britain’s jails.

Claimants who realise they will not be receiving a fat cheque from the taxpayer, even if they win, may decide that resorting to law is not worth the bother.

The good news ends there, though. The bad news is that the European Court has again asserted its supremacy over national parliaments.

It ruled that MPs were wrong to vote overwhelmingly to prevent prisoners taking part in elections and insisted they must be given the right in future.

This case has been rumbling on for almost a decade, at goodness knows what cost in time and money. It was originally brought by ten men serving sentences in Scottish jails, among them notorious repeat sex offenders.

Had the court ruled that they were entitled to compensation, taxpayers could have been landed with a bill for millions of pounds as thousands more convicts crawled out of the woodwork to lodge similar claims.

The most disturbing aspect, however, is that such matters have to be decided by foreign judges and not by British MPs.

How absurd that the question of whether or not prisoners should get the vote rests on a decision by a supra-national court comprised of judges for whom no one has ever had the chance to vote.

We may kid ourselves that we live in a parliamentary democracy, but the reality is that we are ultimately governed by a judicial dictatorship, accountable to no one, with its power base in Strasbourg.

It’s bad enough when government policy is re-written by unelected jurists from countries such as the former Soviet satellite states, with no distinguished history of respect for genuine human rights.

But increasingly, British judges are flexing their muscles, too. Lord Neuberger, president of Britain’s Supreme Court — a typical Blairite, European-style institution — has admitted that the Human Rights Act has given the courts a blank cheque to make up laws as they go along.

Judges are using the excuse of ‘human rights’ to establish new rules on everything from privacy and sham marriages to assisted suicide. They are handing down the most perverse interpretations of statute, which often fly in the face of justice and decency.

Yet far from expressing reservations about this unaccountable judiciary and its implications for democracy, Neuberger declares that it’s a good thing — because it keeps governments in check.

That stands the entire principle of British justice on its head. Our system was founded upon MPs making the laws, and judges interpreting and enforcing them.

All of this stems from the incorporation of the European Convention on Human Rights into British law — which Tony Blair proclaimed as his greatest achievement in politics.

Blair’s wife, Cherie, and her Left-wing activist lawyer friends even set up a new chambers, Matrix, to cash in on the bonanza of cases generated by the new legislation.

This was only to be expected. New Labour was a party of lawyers, for lawyers. If anyone is concerned about the predominance of public school boys at the top of British politics, they should look at the shallow, self-selecting gene pool from which our judges and top barristers are drawn.

Those of us who warned at the time that the Human Rights Act was a charter for criminals, terrorists and illegal immigrants, as well as a goldmine for the legal profession, were howled down as enemies of justice.

The judiciary regularly displays undisguised contempt for public opinion, for the people who pay their wages.

Another judge, Peter King, said recently: ‘There seems to be an expectation that the public interest trumps everything else. It seems to me that is not necessarily the case.’

He was justifying his decision to grant a Bangladeshi double murderer the right to move to England, where he has relatives, under the section of the Act that guarantees ‘the right to a family life’.

As if we haven’t got enough criminals of our own. We used to deport convicts. Now we are importing them — with the full blessing of the courts.

The Home Office will have to issue this Bangladeshi citizen with a visa, despite initially refusing permission on the grounds that his presence was ‘not in the public interest’.

If this ruling stands, what’s to stop criminals from all over the world deciding to make their home in this country? And what’s the betting he goes straight on to benefits?

To add insult to injury, we are not allowed to know the circumstances of his crimes or even his identity. He has been given lifelong anonymity, so he could move in next door to any of us and we would be none the wiser.

The ‘right to a family life’ provision is the most flexible and abused section of the Human Rights Act. It has deprived us of the ability to kick out murderers, terrorists, even war criminals wanted for genocide.

The number of foreign criminals who avoided deportation rose 50 per cent last year. They include murderers, rapists, robbers and paedophiles.

The perverse definition of ‘family life’ has been extended to men with a couple of illegitimate children they never see and to another illegal immigrant whose ownership of a pet cat was cited as evidence of his right to remain here.

A Bangladeshi student who was able to demonstrate he played for a village cricket team was ruled to have the right to a ‘private’ life in Britain and so he, too, could stay.

British judges appear to be more creative and indulgent than their Continental counterparts, who seem to have no compunction in deporting undesirable aliens.

Yet the right to ‘family’ life is not unqualified. The Act itself makes exceptions for public safety, crime prevention and national security; yet these are rarely invoked.

Even when they are, the courts still throw obstacles in the way of natural justice. Just look at the struggle to deport Abu Qatada. Our bored prisoners and their greedy lawyers have also been adept at exploiting their ‘human rights’.

A Jamaican convict avoided deportation by claiming after she was jailed that she had become a lesbian and would therefore face persecution if she was sent home.

Others have won the ‘right’ to heroin and gay porn behind bars. It’s amazing the number of jailbirds who claim to be pagans — and even transsexuals — so they are ‘entitled’ to special privileges.

One prisoner in Birmingham announced she had become a Red Indian and should be supplied with the appropriate cultural artefacts, including a drum and peace pipe — and, presumably, a tomahawk to protect herself in the shower block.

All this madness could explain why Home Secretary Theresa May has finally come round to demanding that we withdraw from the European Convention. Not before time.

It also might explain why the European court, while upholding prisoners’ right to vote, seemed to soft-pedal on compensation and legal costs.

Perhaps they think that throwing Britain a couple of bones might persuade us to stay on board the ludicrous European legal gravy train.

Most Tories want to replace the Human Rights Act with a British Bill of Rights. Why? We managed perfectly well for centuries. Britain had one of the most humane and effective legal systems on Earth, evolved from Magna Carta. Our common law served us well.

Britain has no need of laws made by unelected activist judges, based upon a foreign and wholly alien concept of justice and ‘human rights’.

That’s why we should scrap the Act and withdraw from the Convention.

Labour and the Lib Dems would never support that because it would mean Britain having to leave the EU. Acceptance of the Human Rights Convention is a rigid condition of EU membership.

But quitting the EU and the European Court would be the ideal outcome for Britain.

David Cameron’s best attempts at securing meaningful ‘reform’ of either are doomed to failure.

The only way is out: a clean break and a fresh start as an independent sovereign nation with its own legal system.

Come the referendum in 2017, we could even be magnanimous and give the prisoners a vote.

source

Posted by peiper     on 08/13/2014 at 02:21 PM   
Filed Under: • Editorials •  
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Time For A Judicial Recall

I swear, if I had to rewrite the Constitution, not only would I add term limits for ALL federal employees (or perhaps some kind of national draft of college graduates to do a 5 year hitch pushing papers), I’d throw in some kind of No Confidence vote. Especially for judges, who are nearly impossible to get rid of. And some of them are about 93 sizes too big for their britches ...

Say what???

The case in question is Kolbe et al v. O’Malley et al which named numerous plaintiffs including the Associated Gun Clubs of Baltimore, Maryland Licensed Firearms Dealers Association, Maryland State Rifle and Pistol Association, and the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), among others which challenged the constitutionality of Maryland’s strict new gun laws.
...
In what looks to be a terrible ruling for Maryland gun owners a federal judge has essentially ruled that guns that were regulated by the state of Maryland last year, including AR-15 and AK style rifles (as well as other magazine fed, semi-auto rifles with certain features), “fall outside Second Amendment protection as dangerous and unusual arms,” according to a 47 page opinion by U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake.

From the ruling ( “LCM” means Large Capacity Magazine, a magazine that can hold more than some arbitrary [ and historically decreasing ] number of cartrdiges ):

A. Infringement of the Second Amendment Right

The court must first determine whether the weapons at issue here are of the type falling within the Second Amendment’s scope. The defendants do not appear to claim Maryland’s ban on assault weapons and LCMs is longstanding such that it is presumptively valid.  ...

The court must instead evaluate whether the banned assault long guns and LCMs are in common use for lawful purposes. ... If they are not—or if they are dangerous and unusual —they fall outside the Amendment’s protections, and Maryland’s law banning the weapons is valid without further analysis.

20 pages of blah-blah-blah later ...

Upon review of all the parties’ evidence, the court seriously doubts that the banned assault long guns are commonly possessed for lawful purposes, particularly self-defense in the home, which is at the core of the Second Amendment right, and is inclined to find the weapons fall outside Second Amendment protection as dangerous and unusual. First, the court is not persuaded that assault weapons are commonly possessed based on the absolute number of those weapons owned by the public. Even accepting that there are 8.2 million assault weapons in the civilian gun stock, as the plaintiffs claim, assault weapons represent no more than 3% of the current civilian gun stock, and ownership of those weapons is highly concentrated in less than 1% of the U.S. population. The court is also not persuaded by the plaintiffs’ claims that assault weapons are used infrequently in mass shootings and murders of law enforcement officers. The available statistics indicate that assault weapons are used disproportionately to their ownership in the general public and, furthermore, cause more injuries and more fatalities when they are used.

As for their claims that assault weapons are well-suited for self-defense, the plaintiffs proffer no evidence beyond their desire to possess assault weapons for self-defense in the home that they are in fact commonly used, or possessed, for that purpose.

Finally, despite the plaintiffs’ claims that they would like to use assault weapons for defensive purposes, assault weapons are military-style weapons designed for offensive use, and are equally, or possibly even more effective, in functioning and killing capacity as their fully automatic versions.

So even though there might be nearly EIGHT AND A QUARTER MILLION of this type of rifle owned by citizens, it still gets labeled as “unusual” and a “cop killer” even though that particular use is distinctively rare (and a statistic kept by the FBI).

And here’s true wisdom from the bench: because evil black rifles like the AR15 (and the AK47) LOOK like “Army Guns”, and army guns are made ONLY to take the killing to Teh NMEE, they have NO defensive use, only an offensive use. And, best of all, they are “possible even more effective” - in other words, MORE DEADLY - than actual genuine machine guns.

Therefore they deserve a double dip of scary sauce, and are thus properly illegal in the state of Maryland. And those ultra naughty evil LCMs too, because OMFG, how many more toddlers could be killed in the 5 seconds wasted changing out a smaller magazine.

This woman, U.S. District Judge Catherine C. Blake, a Clinton appointee, is a completely illogical idiot ruled by her feeeewings. Tear off that black robe, take away her gavel, and get her the hell off the bench. Forever. ASAP.

PS - given that rifles are NOT registered in nearly all the states, just how on earth would Ms. Judge be able to say with any certainty that those 8.2 million rifles are owned by merely 3.15 million people (1% of the population, give or take)?  And even if that was true, how could a “mere” 3.15 million owner make anything rare enough to be called “unusual”? That’s about as unusual as pigeons in a city park. As rare as chickens on a farm. As rare as flies on sh.. ... well, you know.

Whack a doodle doo.

PS - I have a relative who owns an 1822 Springfield musket. Converted to percussion ignition for the Mexican War, it’s complete with the original 18” long toad-sticker bayonet. Although it’s days of firing a massive .69 caliber ball are long since past, at nearly 11lb and 7 feet long with bayonet, it’s still a damn deadly weapon. And so unusual ... I doubt if there are 500 of them left in all the world. And though civilian owned, it was originally military issue. Guess that one ought to be banned as well!

PPS - talk about having it both ways. Or denying it both ways. This decision makes the case that actual military style firearms, the kind any “well regulated militia” would want to use, are properly denied citizen’s ownership. So now we’ve got Miller, 1939 saying that non-military weapons can be regulated and made illegal, and this case, Kolbe v. O’Malley saying that military-"ish" weapons can be regulated and made illegal. And of course, under BATFE’s “Class III”, actual genuine military weapons already ARE illegal and/or highly regulated. Both sides of the coin, plus the edge.

PPPS - I guess the “home” is another way of saying “a free State” now? And “defense” now means “security”? Because I’m pretty certain that “home defense” doesn’t actually explicitly come up in “A well regulated militia, being necessary for the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”

Posted by Drew458     on 08/13/2014 at 02:07 PM   
Filed Under: • Guns and Gun Control •  
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so then …. what it take to get arrested and go to jail?  bad language will do it

So ... whatsitake to get arrested or go to jail over here?

Oh ... lets see.  Using the ‘N’ word will do that. Yeah. Use that and the kops will come down on you like ducks on a June bug.

What else? Erm .... using insulting language or causing discomfort or fear of harm.  Not certain but I think you could be arrested if someone said you did that.
Racist language. Yup. That one will do it for sure. 

How about if you glass somebody’s face. You know. Broken bottle and whammo.  Blood everywhere. What fun. How about that?
Nah.  Whats you askin? Hey. You be white boy?  Arrest and quick conviction and to the slammer. You won’t stay there a long time but you will probably go to jail.
However .... should you belong to a special group, and should your first name also be Jasmin. Ah well now we have a different set of rules.

Here’s your get out of jail card.

Estate agent who smashed glass in man’s face avoids jail… even though it was her 18th court appearance for violence

Yasmin Thomas attacked Ronnie Lee with broken glass in Bournemouth club
She has 17 previous convictions for assault and battery, court heard
Judge John Harrow said her criminal history was ‘breathtaking’
But she has been given a 12-month sentence suspended for two years
Also handed 80 hours’ community service after pleading guilty to ABH

By Luke Salkel

A woman who smashed a broken glass into a stranger’s face in a nightclub has been spared jail – despite it being her 18th conviction for assault.

Estate agent Yasmin Thomas, 21, left her male victim with serious eye injuries after she lunged at him with the potentially lethal object.

A court heard she has already been convicted for 17 crimes of assault and battery.

A judge branded Thomas’s criminal history ‘breathtaking’ and one of the worst he had ever seen of a woman her age.

But the female thug escaped with a 12-month sentence, suspended for two years, and 80 hours community service after pleading guilty to a charge of causing actual bodily harm.

She was also ordered to attend anger management classes.

Thomas attacked Ronnie Lee, whom she did not know, in Bar So nightclub in Bournemouth town centre after a row over an e-cigarette.

Thomas’s friend had snatched it from a friend of Mr Lee, and had thrown it on the floor.

Thomas then picked it up and thrust the device at Mr Lee, demanding: ‘Are you not going to say thank you? Who do you think you are?’

She then lunged towards Mr Lee with a broken glass, causing a serious gash to his left eyelid and two smaller cuts to his face.

The injuries were so close to his eye that Mr Lee feared he would lose his sight.

Tiny shards of glass were later removed from his eye.

Prosecuting, Carolyn Branford-Wood told Bournemouth Crown Court: ‘Miss Thomas, with a glass in her hand, lunged towards Mr Lee, who felt a blow to his left eye and blood trickling down his face.’

The court was told that Mr Lee was ‘very lucky’ not to have suffered any permanent damage following the brutal attack.

Miss Branford-Wood said doctors initially feared he had suffered a fractured eye socket following the assault, which also left him needing stitches to the cut on his eyelid.

Thomas, who lives in Bournemouth, worked as a sales negotiator at Palmer Snell estate agency. Yesterday the company refused to confirm whether Thomas was still employed.

Sentencing her, judge John Harrow said: ‘You have a breathtaking record of violence, one of the worst I have ever seen from anyone your age.

‘It is not without a lot of hesitation and some reservations, I must confess, that I’m going to suspend that 12 month sentence for two years.’

continued here

Posted by peiper     on 08/13/2014 at 02:02 PM   
Filed Under: • Crime • Judges-Courts-Lawyers • Justice - LACK OF •  
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immigration …. again.

Staying with immigration ..... this is what Brits have to contend with everyday.  And it’s been going on for years and years. 

Killer allowed to live in Britain

Labour has condemned a Home Office blunder that means a double-murderer from Bangladesh can come to live in Britain.
The shopkeeper - known only as “ZR” - won his case to be granted entry on human rights grounds after a paperwork error by the department.
The man was convicted of murdering two people in Bangladesh in 1990 and sentenced to life imprisonment, but released in 1997 due to a “general amnesty for good behaviour”.

According to papers released by the immigration tribunal, he married a British woman in March 1998 and they had three children, all UK citizens.
In 2011, ZR applied to the Home Office to come and join his family, but was refused on the grounds that his admission was “not in the public interest”.
The lower immigration tribunal then backed his case under Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects the “right to private and family life”.

But although Government lawyers could still appeal that to a higher authority, they failed to lodge the papers in time.
Refusing permission to accept a late appeal in the upper tribunal, Judge Peter King said: “I find that the application is out of time without any clear explanation for being out of time.

“I do not find that it is in the interests of justice or fairness for any extension of time to be granted. Accordingly this application is refused and time is not extended.”

Conservative MP Dominic Raab, who is campaigning to reform human rights laws, told the Sunday Telegraph: “It is a damning indictment of Labour’s Human Rights Act that a double murderer can claim a right to family life to skip past UK border controls designed to protect the public, and gain entry to Britain.
“Article 8 claims are making Britain a safe haven for the most dangerous foreign criminals.”

source

But Wait. There’s More.

American crack dealer cannot be deported ‘because he and depressed girlfriend will miss out on NHS care’

· Johnny Callie has high blood pressure, diabetes and a bad knee
· The conditions and his age would make finding work in the US difficult
· His girlfriend is too depressed to leave their home, let alone move to the US
By Steve Hopkins
An American crack dealer has won the right to stay in Britain because he relies on free NHS medical care and has a depressed girlfriend.

Johnny Callie was jailed for seven years in 2007 for conspiracy to supply crack cocaine and heroin following a two-year covert operation by Ipswich police.
Callie was part of a 10-strong gang that flooded the area with drugs from their base in Colchester and was arrested following raids in August 2005.

In January, 2011 Home Secretary Theresa May refused to revoke an order for Callie’s deportation after he appealed the automatic order made following his sentencing in November 2007.

But the decorated Vietnam war veteran, who is suffering from diabetes, high blood pressure and ‘degenerative changes to his right knee’ has now argued he would not be able to afford medical care in the US. He also cited the ill health of his long-term girlfriend.

The 64-year-old has been fighting his deportation through the courts since his release from prison in August 2010.
He earlier halted the order on the grounds it breached his right to family life under Article 8 of the European Convention for Human Rights.
Mrs May appealed that decision, but Judge Bernard Dawson ruled that Callie could stay.

source

Some of our readers, well come to think of it, all our regulars, have over time taken note of the judges who just don’t seem to be interested in keeping some folks out, or criminals in jails and when they do go, the rule seems to be short term. All in the name of human rights of course.
And when it isn’t crime and illegals it’s things like the following.

This Polish boy lives in Warsaw… So why do WE pay his child benefit?

By Sue Reid In Warsaw

Mateusz Kossmann is a ten-year-old boy with a winning smile.

Every morning, he’s taken to school by his mother Evita, who is delighted her son is in a small class of 14 other children.

The lessons are well-disciplined, pupils thrive academically and politely shake the hand of their teacher at the end of the day.

It is just the kind of education Evita wants for Mateusz — and she has found it in her native Poland after a dispiriting spell living in England.

Once Poland became part of the EU in 2004, Evita — like thousands of other Eastern Europeans exploiting the EU open borders policy — excitedly migrated to Britain with her husband Sebastian, and their young son, to begin a new life.

Sebastian, now 35, found an £18,500-a-year job in a Bristol factory and the couple successfully applied to be given £82 a month in child benefits for Mateusz, which is more than four times the £18 rate paid for children in Poland.

The Kossmann family is also entitled to £143 a month in child tax credits - a benefit not paid by the Polish government - to supplement Sebastian’s low income. This is paid annually, in arrears.

Like countless other EU migrants, the family qualifies for the child-linked benefits because at least one parent works in Britain.

‘From day one, we felt the British welfare system was very generous,’ says Sebastian.

‘We are receiving far more than parents get in Poland. Getting the child tax credits, too, was a big amount of extra cash for us and we were pleased.’

But two years ago, the Kossmanns reluctantly took their son out of his local Roman Catholic primary school in Bristol after realising he was struggling to learn.

In a huge class of 35, he was bullied, almost had a nervous breakdown, began stuttering and then refused to speak at all — in English or Polish.

Evita recalls: ‘At first, Mateusz put on a brave face about going to school, but he would come back crying each day. Then he began panicking about going at all. It was heart-breaking to watch.’

continued

Have I mentioned the Romanian father of 15, that’s not his age, that’s the number he has fathered.
He earns £21 thousand .... but gets benefits of 55 thousand.
This is a very generous country. Just ask any native Brit.
Heck .... just ask he and his family.  Click their pretty pix for the whole story.

Finally .... aren’t ya glad, there’s this. Good grief Charlie Brown.  More of ..... them?
Yup .... all illegals and headed this way.

From Eritrea and Sudan, the new migrant queue at Calais: Latest illegal encampment to spring up has hundreds who are currently waiting for the first chance to escape

Hundreds of migrants set up new illegal camp in French port of Calais
Squalid, tented squat on town’s outskirts has been nicknamed ‘Jungle 2’
It was set up two months after previous one in the town was bulldozed
Most of the migrants in the camp are from Eritrea, Sudan and Ethiopia

By Paul Harris

Coming soon to a hood near you .... bringing what passes for culture and witchcraft not to mention disease and crime. Because they believe they have a right to be here, just like the romas and other vermin.  And few are actually deported because ... it’s true.  They have rights, some judges say.

Posted by peiper     on 08/13/2014 at 09:26 AM   
Filed Under: • Daily Life • Illegal-Aliens and Immigration • UK •  
• Comments (5) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

reverse immigration or … the great escape from england … french police apprehend and return

Now this is silly. I mean ... really off the wall.

The poor Brits just can not win this one.  Mind you .... the average Brit if such a thing still exists, don’t want this.  They are not immigrant haters. It’s the sort and the numbers that have them pulling the proverbial hair, those who still have any.
Anyway .... who care?  Oh sure. Politicians nearing election time. That’s when they care. But who really listens to the average person on the street who is law abiding and pays their way?  They’re all a bunch of immigrationphobes and raaaaaaacist.

French police catch 28 illegal immigrants trying to escape Britain - and swiftly return them

Two families with children and another 22 men were all found hidden aboard
Found on a Polish lorry when it arrived in the northern French port of Calais
P&O: ‘We have never seen anything on this scale before. It’s very unusual’
It is a rare example of ‘reverse immigration’

By Ian Sparks

French border police have caught 28 illegal immigrants trying to smuggle themselves out of Britain on a cross-Channel ferry.

Two families with children and another 22 men were all found hidden aboard a Polish lorry when it arrived in the northern French port of Calais.

It is a rare example of ‘reverse immigration’ - against the flow of hundreds of migrants a day who try to sneak aboard lorries and ferries from Calais to the UK.

The Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Afghani and Sri Lankan nationals are all thought to have been trying to return to their home countries by crossing illegally through Europe.

They were caught when the P&O ferry Spirit of France arrived in Calais at 2.20am on Thursday.

All 28 immigrants were returned to Dover at 6.40pm that evening on P&O’s Pride of Canterbury.

P&O spokesman Chris Laming said: ‘There have been occasions in the past when individual migrants have sought to go back to their homelands.

‘But we have never seen anything on this scale before. It’s very unusual.

‘There is normally one way traffic from France to Britain in the tide of illegal immigrants.

‘It is most unusual to see them going the other way.’

A Home Office spokesperson said: ‘Border Force officers in Dover are currently processing 28 people who were found by the Police Aux Frontieres in Calais concealed in a lorry which had crossed the Channel from Dover.

‘Under an agreement between the UK and French governments the 28 were returned to Dover in the same way as clandestine migrants found at our controls in Calais are passed to the French authorities.

‘If those questioned are found to have no right to remain in the UK we will take action to remove them.’

reverse immigration, source

Posted by peiper     on 08/13/2014 at 07:45 AM   
Filed Under: • FRANCE • Illegal-Aliens and Immigration • UK •  
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Hook!

Just watched Hook again. Robin Williams as the adult Peter Pan, and Dustin Hoffman as Captain James Hook. This was the last movie my entire family went to see together. Even the movie theatre we saw it in is closed. I thought it sucked back then, but it grows on you. I especially enjoy the sequence when Maggie (his daughter) realizes that ‘Peter Pan is my Dad?’ I don’t think anyone else besides Robin Williams could have played an adult Peter Pan. Maybe the guy that played Wesley in The Princess Bride. Maybe. Can’t help thinking that Mr. Williams forgot how to play. Life’s no fun if you forget that.

Posted by Christopher     on 08/13/2014 at 05:07 AM   
Filed Under: • MOVIES • Personal •  
• Comments (1) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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