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Sarah Palin's enemies are automatically added to the Endangered Species List.

calendar   Tuesday - June 09, 2020

Memories and other junk

I started this post about 12 hours ago but the day got in the way. Mr. Busy, that’s me. Riiight.

So I forget completely what I was going to post about. Maybe it was something in these links?

WHO: pandemic getting worse (as it hits the malaria zones down around the equator)

Urges Nazi level surveillance. Yeah, that’ll work.

A clearly frustrated World Health Organization (W.H.O.) warned Monday the global Chinese coronavirus pandemic was “worsening” not receding, telling countries loosening lockdowns to observe active surveillance and tracing of infected populations.

The W.H.O. issued its warning as Moscow emerged from its strict coronavirus lockdown. With more than 485,000 cases, Russia has the third-highest number of confirmed infections after the United States and Brazil.

As other large parts of Europe, along with Asia and the United States reopen, the W.H.O. reported a record number of new coronavirus cases globally, using that as evidence for its warning calls for countries to keep their lockdown gains secure.

Director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said some 136,000 cases had been reported in the previous 24 hours, “the most in a single day so far,” with the majority of them in the Americas and South Asia.

I wonder if everyone else on the planet is as fed up with the WHO as I am? I won’t be fooled again, thanks anyway.

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No more cops in LA schools, because White Supremacy. Riiight

The United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA), representing teachers and support staff in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), called Monday for the elimination of the 400-member police force protecting schools in the district.

The Los Angeles Times reported that the teachers’ union made the announcement at an event with Black Lives Matter leaders, and called the move a step toward dismantling “white supremacy”:

Leaders of United Teachers Los Angeles said Monday they support a movement to eliminate the Los Angeles School Police Department, a force of about 400 that serves the L.A. Unified School District and accounts for about $70 million of the district’s $7.9 billion budget.

“We have to dismantle white supremacy. We must … defund the police and bring in the mental health services that our students need,” said Cecily Myart-Cruz, the incoming president of UTLA, which represents about 30,000 teachers, nurses, counselors and other staff in the school district.

The union leadership endorsement and public announcement during a labor news conference with Black Lives Matter Los Angeles bring an influential voice to what is certain to be an intense debate over school safety.

Leaders of the police union voiced dismay. School police officers are often called upon to break up fights, keep the peace in gang-ridden school districts, and deter school shootings, which have been a worry in recent years.

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No, I think this is the one. Oh yeah, this is AYFKM level BS

George Floyd’s Family Petitions United Nations to Help Disarm Police in the United States

The family of George Floyd, the black man killed while in police custody in Minneapolis on Memorial Day, has sent a letter to the globalist United Nations to ask for its help in disarming police officers in the United States of America.

The family’s legal team facilitated the letter, which was sent on Wednesday, according to NBC News:

The group sent a letter on June 3 to one of the international body’s working groups asking for support for the end of the provision of military equipment and military-type training for police, the teaching of deescalation techniques, independent prosecutions and autopsies for “extrajudicial” police killings, and more.

“When a group of people of any nation have been systemically deprived of their universal human right to life by its government for decades, it must appeal to the international community for its support and to the United Nations for its intervention,” Floyd’s family attorney Ben Crump said in a press release.

The U.N. issued a statement on May 28, three days after Floyd’s death, and included the names of other black people in the U.S. who died in police custody.

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, this situation has become a political ploy, striking while the iron is hot and letting no crisis go to waste. I’m not in favor of militarized police departments or federalization of those departments in this country either. That’s way too Turd Word Socialist for me. But this isn’t about that. This is yet another lever to pull to get one certain group a free ride. I mean a freer ride. This is not going to end well.

Oh, and the “defund the cops” stuff is really about getting them to stop doing all the domestic disturbance stuff, the suicide prevention, the cops in schools bit, and all the other lower level tasks. Maybe even traffic enforcement. Replace those jobs with social workers. Which will be just fine until those fools start getting their asses beat or shot when they try and go all squishy gooey on people in those situations. It ain’t gonna work, period.

~~~~

So why am I posting at all at this hour of the night? Well, we’ve had a bunch of ants in here the past couple of days. The nearly microscopic little black ones. As small as the feet on a regular small black ant. We cleaned the heck of the unit, I even steam sanitized the floors. And we’re only feeding the kittehs what they’ll eat on the spot then taking their bowls away. But still, a highway of those itsy bitsy little ants across the floor in the morning. Sugar ants I think they’re called. So I went out and got some of the liquid borax ant traps, and a can of Raid ant spray in the floral scent. Actually ... as is usually the case ... the Latin brand of spray has nearly double the amount of poisons in it, but the store didn’t have any of the new softer scented ones, and I know that the original stuff smells pretty bad. And strong. So I got the Raid, and sprayed it under several places where the ants seemed to be coming from or going to. Then blocked those places off from inquisitive cats with cardboard boxes. Just in case. So the post? Oh yeah. Scent memory. Raid Ant & Roach Floral is the scent of cheap hotel rooms. I always figured it was some kind of air freshener. Nope. But one good whiff and I placed it instantly. It’s been an awful lot of years since I spent any time in cheap hotels. Aah, youth. But the nose knows, and never forgets. I sprayed outside too, around the door and the kitchen slider. 


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/09/2020 at 10:58 PM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous •  
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Spying For COVID

China lied, the world died. China is asshoe.

Spy Data Study: Kung Flu In Wuhan In AUGUST???

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normal parking load, early COVID parking load, empty lot during lockdown




Satellite images of hospital parking lots in Wuhan suggest the coronavirus – which stemmed from the Chinese city – may have been spreading in China as early as last August.

A new study from Harvard Medical School, which is yet to be peer-reviewed, found a “dramatic increase in hospital traffic outside five major Wuhan hospitals beginning late summer and early fall 2019”, Harvard Medical professor and lead author of the research, Dr John Brownstein, said.

Dr Brownstein said the traffic increase also “coincided with” an uptick in searches on Chinese search engine Baidu for “certain symptoms that would later be determined as closely associated with the novel coronavirus”.

While the team have acknowledged the evidence is circumstantial, Dr Brownstein said the study makes for an important new data point in the mystery of COVID-19’s origins, with the disease only thought to have originated in November.

While individual hospitals had days of “high relative volume in both fall and winter 2019”, five of the six hospitals showed their “highest relative daily volume of the analysed series, coinciding with elevated levels of Baidu search queries for the terms ‘diarrhoea’ and ‘cough’,” the team, which included researchers from Boston University and Boston Children’s Hospital, wrote.

Dr Brownstein told CNN the study was all about “trying to piece together a complicated puzzle of what was taking place at the time”.

“The data is especially compelling because we saw increases in people searching for gastrointestinal disease – diarrhoea – which were increasing at a level that we hadn’t seen at all, historically, and we now know that gastrointestinal symptoms are a really important marker for COVID,” he said.

“A huge percentage of people that actually end up testing positive in Wuhan actually had presented symptoms of diarrhoea.”

Yu can run, but Yu can’t hide.

So, we have eyes in the sky that can count and analyze the heat signatures of the number of vehicles in a parking lot. And we have deep enough access to the Chinese internet to be able to analyze the terms used in their search engines.

Link to the research paper. Graphs and sat pics are down at the end of it.

Abstract
The global COVID-19 pandemic was originally linked to a zoonotic spillover event in Wuhan’s Huanan Seafood Market in November or December of 2019. However, recent evidence suggests that the virus may have already been circulating at the time of the outbreak. Here we use previously validated data streams - satellite imagery of hospital parking lots and Baidu search queries of disease related terms - to investigate this possibility. We observe an upward trend in hospital traffic and search volume beginning in late Summer and early Fall 2019. While queries of the respiratory symptom “cough” show seasonal fluctuations coinciding with yearly influenza seasons, “diarrhea” is a more COVID-19 specific symptom and only shows an association with the current epidemic. The increase of both signals precede the documented start of the COVID-19 pandemic in December, highlighting the value of novel digital sources for surveillance of emerging pathogens


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/09/2020 at 10:02 AM   
Filed Under: • pandemic and epidemic diseases •  
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The Beyond Obvious News

News story: “7 shot in 10 minutes in Brooklyn shootings”

Do you even need to click to know who done it? Hell no.

Seven people were wounded in three shootings just 10 minutes apart Monday night in different Brooklyn neighborhoods, police said.

The gunplay started at about 10:40 p.m. on Bainbridge Street near Malcolm X Boulevard in Bedford-Stuyvesant, cops said.

Two men, ages 27 and 34, were each struck in the leg, authorities said. They were taken to Kings County Hospital and were expected to survive.

Malcom X Blvd, victims shot in the legs. Case closed.

Black Lives Matter. Except to other blacks.  Isn’t there a bible passage about a mote in my eye but a cinder in yours?

Finally, at about 10:50 p.m., four people — a woman and three men — were caught in a hail of gunfire on Bristol Street near Newport Street in Brownsville, authorities and witnesses said.

The woman, 23, is in critical condition and the men — ages 17, 35, and 50 — all suffered non-life threatening injuries, cops said.

A witness to the Brownsville shooting, 55-year-old Robert Green, said so many shots were fired that he lost count.

More shots than you can count, but nobody is dead, and 3 of the 4 aren’t majorly wounded. Case closed, again.

Police have no suspects. Duh. 


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/09/2020 at 09:44 AM   
Filed Under: • Racism and race relations •  
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calendar   Monday - June 08, 2020

funny bits

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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/08/2020 at 05:30 PM   
Filed Under: • Humor •  
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Duck Season! Wabbit Season!!

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• COVID: 11 New PA Coronavirus Cases Traced To Jersey Shore Gathering


• RIOTS: UK leader says anti-racism protests now ‘subverted by thuggery’


• COVID: High altitude living can protect you against COVID?


• RIOTS: Man shot by driver who rammed SUV into Seattle protester crowd. Also, rioting.


• COVID: New Zealand: No More Coronavirus Here At All


• RIOTS: NYC shifting money from cops to social services


You remember what they told us. People on the beach? Fools. Three people riding together on a boat in Michigan? Lethal. Tepidly reopening the economy? An experiment in human sacrifice. The virus doesn’t go away because you’re bored. It doesn’t care that you’re grieving, your livelihood is ruined, your business has collapsed, or your spouse is abusive. You can’t pray it away at your church. So stay home, stay safe, and flatten the curve.

And that’s an order.

Unless, of course, you’re protesting racial injustice. Those protesting George Floyd’s death in crowds large enough to fill a small stadium have evaded scrutiny from the same people who told us that Floridians lying distanced on a beach were Literally Killing People. Some elected officials say that these protests are different — that the demonstrators have a good reason to be congregating on the streets. As Bill de Blasio said, the protests are much different from the matter of the “aggrieved store owner or the devout religious person.” They don’t have good reasons to break quarantine. The looters do.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/08/2020 at 08:15 AM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous •  
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calendar   Friday - June 05, 2020

You Waited THIS Long??

Gun Sales Surge In NYC Suburbs As Rioting Gets Closer

Four hour wait just to get in to Long Island gun shops

“You don’t need a gun to protect yourself, just call the police” is curiously no longer something people are arguing.
...
In the last several days we’ve seen many people on social media say that they’ve called the police and have been told the response either wouldn’t happen or would take a long time. It seems now more than ever that Americans increasingly aren’t relying on the police to protect them and are taking things into their own hands.

Unrest across New York and America has left some feeling concerned for their safety, and prompting dozens to line up outside a Long Island gun shop Tuesday.

Fruma Tannenbaum stood in the long line outside LI Outdoorsman in Rockville Centre. Her wait for a weapon was triggered by fears of demonstrations across the country.

“I would like to protect my property in case anybody comes on and wants to loot, steal, do anything to me,” says Tannenbaum. “I want to be prepared and I want to be able to protect myself and my family.”

The fears come in response to a week of protests against the death of George Floyd in Minnesota, in which some have turned to fires, looting and clashes with police.

It was a similar scene at Coliseum Gun Traders in Uniondale, where the owner says dozens of people are waiting to buy weapons and ammo.

“It’s the first time I’ve seen people really scared,” says Andrew Chernoff. “They’re saying that they definitely want something to be able to defend themselves and they’re scared there’s going to be civil unrest. That they’re going to need to defend themselves from.”

Gong estimated his store has seen sales rise within the last week as much as 20 percent. Video taken at his store showed several mask-wearing customers patiently waiting in line to enter.

“They wait three, four hours to enter the store,” he said. During the pandemic, the store has reduced its hours, opening three times a week for about four to six hours.

The uptick in sales stems directly from the protests, he said.

Gong, who is Chinese, said most of his customers are people from minority communities who want to support his business because it’s minority-owned. They’re buying guns now out of fear of criminals, not police, he said when asked why his customers have said they want a gun now.

“Criminals, looters,” he said. “They’re not going to buy guns for cops, they’re going to buy guns for the criminals.”

Long Island gun store owners said they’ve seen spikes in sales before: Y2K, the passage of gun control laws, before and after elections. But this time is different, they said.

“This is like total new shooters,” said John Sweezey, the owner of Camp-Site Sport Shop in Huntington. “New gun owners.”

Michael Pucci, who owns Orion 7 Enterprises in Middle Island, said half the calls to his store are from women. The store specializes in historical, collectible firearms, but it also stocks some modern rifles and shotguns.

Some waiting outside Long Island gun stores on Wednesday condemned Floyd’s killing and said they support peaceful protests. It was the looters who scared them — and the prospect of widespread looting on Long Island in particular.

And the sin of it is, these frightened libs will go right back to voting Democrat once this is over. Because. They. Will. Never. Learn.

And the perhaps even bigger sin is, Long Island has been inundated with MS-13 for at least a decade. There are thousands of them there, stealing, killing, raping, beating, dealing drugs. But ... OMG those poor immigrants!! ... just look the other way.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/05/2020 at 03:46 PM   
Filed Under: • CrimeDemocrats-Liberals-Moonbat LeftistsGuns and Gun Control •  
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I forgot I was linked in Wiki

Fire in the hole!!

I did a post on this interim cannon ages ago. After the Civil War, where the best field cannon was the Model 1860 designed by John Griffen and built by the awesome Phoenix Iron Company, the ideas for breech loading and some form of recoil control resulted in the “grasshopper action” Model 1885, which was the first steel cannon in the Army. The barrel was built up from banded tubing, similar to the old iron Parrot gun of the Civil War. As metallurgy progressed, the early 3 banded barrel was replaced by the 2 banded barrel. The final version of the gun was actually designed to use smokeless powder, although this was often hard to get, and black powder used instead. These guns had nearly twice the range of the rifled muzzle loader field cannons used in the Civil War. The only real difference between the M1890 and the M1897 is that the newer one was made with a smaller powder chamber for the newfangled smokeless powder, while the larger black powder chamber on the M1890 gun was fitted with an internal sleeve the make a smaller chamber.

There’s one of these things in a little war memorial at the end of Main Street in Flemington NJ. I drive past it every week, for 12 years now. Eventually, I took a camera and paid a visit, and did a bunch of online research to figure out this oddball weapon. Made a blog post out of it, and wound up as Reference 8 on the Wiki page. Another reference there is to a much better research work than mine.

By 1902 these guns were obsolete. Technology was advancing that quickly.

It is a bit odd though that the Navy had a similar, older, smaller cannon called the Driggs-Schroeder, which did use fixed ammunition. Even more interesting because it was Driggs and Schroeder who designed the grasshopper action for this field piece. But the Army cannon went with bagged powder, not the faster and more weather resistant cartridge ammunition. Poor communication, or classic NIMBY-ism? [ I’ve been to visit the gun in the last pic at the above link. It’s in a little park on the edge of the Delaware River, just a few miles from here in Easton PA. I actually went there to take pics of the “free bridge” across the river there, and ... hey, check it out, a cannon! ]

I have no idea how I came to be looking at old cannons online again today. And I have no idea how I forgot about one of my most enjoyable blog research projects either.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/05/2020 at 01:35 PM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous •  
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I got your re-opening right here

Ah Trump, you magnificent bastard.

Unemployment “unexpectedly” drops to 13.3% as economy starts up again

Nice try Dems, but you lose. Again.

The unemployment rate fell to 13.3 percent and payrolls unexpectedly rose by 2.5 million workers as the easing of restrictions on business activity and government aid led to new hiring in May.

The U.S. unemployment rate fell below last month’s record-high 14.7 percent, which was the highest on record in data going back to 1948. Economists estimate that the unemployment rate reached 25 percent during the Great Depression, although that predated the scientific economy-wide record keeping the government now deploys.

The job gains mark a sudden turnaround from a month earlier, when the economy shed a staggering 20.5 million jobs, by far the worst monthly decline on records back to 1939.

Economists had expected the unemployment rate to rise to nearly 20 percent and the economy to shed an additional 8 million jobs.

The mandatory closures of many businesses and stay-at-home orders slammed what had been a very healthy labor market hard. The economy added jobs for 113 straight weeks through February, a record streak of growth. The unemployment rate was 3.5 percent in February. And yet job creation was running very hot, with the economy adding an average of 211,000 new jobs each month.

In May, employment in leisure and hospitality jumped by 1.2 million after falling by 7.5 million in April and 743,000 in March. Bars and restaurants hired an additional 1.4 million workers following a combined 6.1 million in job losses in April and March.

Construction employment jumped by 464,000 in May, gaining back almost half of April’s decline.

Dentist offices added 245,000 jobs. Health care employment overall rose by 312,00.

Retail shops added 368,000 jobs in May, after a loss of 2.3 million inApril. Over-the-month job gains occurred in clothing and clothing accessories stores were 95,000. Auto dealers added 85,000. General merchandise stores added 84,000.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/05/2020 at 12:55 PM   
Filed Under: • Economics •  
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9 Lives, Feeding All The Woodland Critters

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don’t touch this bird, you could get melanerpes

Crivens, red bellied woodpeckers eat cat food. Every critter in the forest eats cat food, especially catbirds, except maybe squirrels. I haven’t seen any snakes doing it. Yet.

Sniffles, our itty bitty indoor cat, will sit at the window for hours waiting for a chipmunk or mouse to come and have a taste. She ignores the deer, the trash pandas, and any of the creatures bigger than her “massive” 5 1/2lb self, but is hypnotized by the little twitchy animals that visit the feeding bowl. She doesn’t do anything, but she does get all bushy and buggy eyed when they come by. Moe, Moe-ette, and their broods of baby possums don’t get her worked up either. Too big, too slow.

I was in the kitchen making yet another cup of coffee when I saw a movement from the corner of my eye. Our outdoor kitteh Ginger has his dish just outside our kitchen slider. We usually feed him at first light, but sometimes he doesn’t eat it all. Sometimes he comes back later. Sometimes he doesn’t show up, especially if the weather isn’t nice. And it’s not that nice today, super humid and slightly warm, with periods of rain here and there. Typical NJ day actually. 

So there’s a bit of cat food left in his dish today. And hopping around and having a few pecks at it is a red bellied woodpecker. Life in the frickin’ jungle, get that protein in where you find it. After he ate what he wanted I put the dish in the fridge, because we’re not supposed to leave food out, and we’re under a Bear Alert. Some black bear has been sighted here several nights in a row, so everybody panic!! But how about that. Woodpeckers and cat food. Who knew? 


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/05/2020 at 12:27 PM   
Filed Under: • Animals •  
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Another Bit Of History Lost For Now

Another one of my “rabbit hole” posts, in which a small news story leads to looking up all kinds of links and uncovering some impressive stuff. Hours wasted, but insight gleaned.

Confederate monument removed from downtown Mobile overnight

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MOBILE, Ala. (WPMI) — City of Mobile Director of Communications George Talbot has confirmed to NBC 15 that the City of Mobile removed the monument of Confederate icon Admiral Raphael Semmes from its pedestal in downtown Mobile overnight.

Mayor Stimpson issued the following statement Friday Morning:

On June 4, 2020, I ordered that the statue of Admiral Raphael Semmes be moved from its location at the intersection of Government and Royal streets in downtown Mobile.
The task was completed this morning, June 5. The statue has been placed in a secure location.

To be clear: This decision is not about Raphael Semmes, it is not about a monument and it is not an attempt to rewrite history.

Moving this statue will not change the past. It is about removing a potential distraction so we may focus clearly on the future of our city. That conversation, and the mission to create One Mobile, continues today

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The statue of Admiral Semmes was desecrated with graffitti just the other day, and the city immediately cleaned it up.

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The Admiral Raphael Semmes Confederate Statue in downtown Mobile was vandalized early Tuesday morning, right around the time Birmingham was pulling apart its own memorial to those who had fought and lost in the American Civil War.
...
Down in Mobile, the statue of Semmes, who defected from the U.S. Navy after 35 years of service to fight for the Confederacy, was being cleaned vigorously by city workers.

Using industrial power washers, the workers not only washed away the red graffiti but also the green patina from the copper plates surrounding the light sandstone. Parts of the statue have now been restored to its original state as when it was first erected in June 1900.

A city of Mobile spokesperson said a suspect has been identified and any decision to remove the statue would have to be collaborative.

Acting on what must have been awareness of a continuing threat, the statue was removed to somewhere safe. Hopefully, some day when saner heads prevail (as if) this statue can come out of hiding again.


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I read a post on Facebook the other day, put up by a long ago friend who grew up to be a super liberal. “Until Blacks Lives Matter, No Lives Matter”. Uh huh. Another quipped how her 7 year old daughter gets it, why can’t the adults?

Well, here’s one for all you woke-sters out there to grok. All these Confederate statues and memorials you want to destroy and erase are there to commemorate gallant men who served their country with bravery and pride. Duty called, they answered, and many paid the ultimate price. Generally, this has nothing at all to do with slavery, sexism, racism, or any of your 21st Century rose colored glasses. Nor, by long ago federal edict, are any of these men traitors or enemies. They were brothers, brothers in arms, on the wrong side of a family quarrel that claimed the lives of almost three quarters of a million Americans. And they were damn good at their jobs; these statues memorialize the best of the best.

So who was this Semmes guy? ( and the rabbit hole beckons ... )

Raphael Semmes was one of the most effective fighting sea captains in American history. Having served honorably in the US Navy for 35 years, surviving a famous shipwreck during the Mexican War (that ship itself “cursed” and famous for the only near mutiny in US Navy history, and probably the source for Herman Melville’s book Billy Budd, seeing that his cousin was on that ship at the time. That was before Semmes was aboard the USS Somers.), he joined the southern side when the war began.

. On 8 December 1846, while commanded by Lieutenant Raphael Semmes, Somers was chasing a blockade runner off Vera Cruz when she was caught in a sudden storm. Capsized by the heavy winds, she quickly sank with the loss of more than thirty of her crew

When Secession happened Semmes fought for Alabama. And he was so good at it that, over the years, the US Navy has named two destroyers in his honor.

After appointment to the Confederate Navy as a commander and a futile assignment to purchase arms in the North, Semmes was sent to New Orleans to convert the steamer Habana into the cruiser/commerce raider CSS Sumter. In June 1861, Semmes, in Sumter, outran the USS Brooklyn, breaching the Union blockade of New Orleans, and then launched a brilliant career as one of the greatest commerce raider captains in naval history.

Semmes’s command of CSS Sumter lasted only six months, but during that time he ranged wide, raiding U.S. commercial shipping in both the Caribbean Sea and Atlantic Ocean; his actions accounted for the loss of 18 merchant vessels, while always eluding pursuit by Union warships. By January 1862, Sumter required a major overhaul. Semmes’s crew surveyed the vessel while in neutral Gibraltar and determined that the repairs to her boilers were too extensive to be completed there. Semmes paid off the crew and laid up the vessel. U.S. Navy vessels maintained a vigil outside the harbor until she was disarmed and sold at auction in December 1862, eventually being renamed and converted to a blockade runner.

Semmes and several of his officers traveled to England where he was promoted to captain. He then was ordered to the Azores to take up command and oversee the coaling and outfitting with cannon of the newly-built British steamer Enrica as a sloop-of-war, which thereafter became the Confederate commerce raider CSS Alabama. Semmes sailed on Alabama from August 1862 to June 1864. His operations carried him from the Atlantic to the Gulf of Mexico, around Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, and into the Pacific to the East Indies. During this cruise, Alabama captured 65 U.S. merchantmen and quickly destroyed the USS Hatteras, off Galveston.

CSS Sumter, a 437-ton bark-rigged screw steam cruiser, was built at Philadelphia as the merchant steamship Habana. Purchased by the Confederate Government at New Orleans in April 1861, she was converted to a cruiser and placed under the command of Raphael Semmes. Renamed Sumter, she was commissioned in early June 1861 and broke through the Federal blockade of the Mississippi river mouths late in the month.
Early in July, the pioneering Confederate Navy commerce raider captured eight U.S. flag merchant ships in waters near Cuba, then moved to the South American coast where she took another pair. Two more merchantman fell to Sumter in September and October 1861. While coaling at Martinique in mid-November, she was blockaded by the Federal sloop of war Iroquois, but was able to escape to sea and resume her activities. Sumter captured another six ships from late November into January 1862, while cruising from the western hemisphere to European waters.

So after capturing 18 ships but being blockaded in Europe, the crew managed to sneak off, get back to the Confederacy, and were assigned to the CSS Alabama.

The C.S.S ALABAMA in the course of 22 months boarded 447 ships of all nations, captured 69 Union vessels, took 2,000 prisoners, sank the Union warship HATTERAS, and engaged the U.S.S. KEARSARGE.
During that time not one prisoner was injured to accident or disease, a large feat even today.  She observed international law and the finest “laws of the sea”.  Following her battle with HATTERAS the CSS ALABAMA put all her boats in the water and rescued all except two who were killed in the action...this at night with a Union squadron less than twenty miles away.

An officer and a gentleman, and a real fighter. When the Alabama engaged the USS Kearsage off of Cherbourg France, they lost. The massive guns of the Kearsage shot the stern of the Alabama to bits, and the ship sank. The commander of the Kearsage sat and watched the crew of the Alabama drown, until some were rescued by nearby English ships. At that point he bravely captured the surviving crew in the the two lifeboats they had managed to lower. Semmes got away.

Did he sit out the war after that? Oh heck no. He somehow got himself back to Cuba, snuck into Texas, made his way all across the South, and took command of the James River squadron defending Richmond His flagship was the new ironclad CSS Virginia II. They fought until Richmond finally fell, the squadron’s ship being burnt after losing a last, desperate river battle.

And still that was not the end. The sailors came ashore and became soldiers, running another blockade on land this time, to evade Union troops and join up with Gen. Johnston in NC. Semmes and his crew did not surrender until nearly 3 weeks after the war was over.

After the destruction of the naval squadron, Semmes’s sailors were turned into an infantry unit and dubbed the “Naval Brigade.” Semmes was then placed in command; Semmes intention for the brigade was to join Lee’s army after burning their vessels. Lee’s army, however, was already cut off from Richmond, so most of Semmes’s men boarded a train and escaped to join General Joseph E. Johnston’s army in North Carolina. A few men of the Naval Brigade were able to join with Lee’s rear guard and fought at the Battle of Sailor’s Creek.

Semmes and the Naval Brigade were surrendered to Union Major General William T. Sherman with Johnston’s army at Bennett Place near Durham Station, North Carolina, on April 26, 1865, and subsequently were paroled on May 1, 1865. Semmes’s parole notes that he held commissions as both a brigadier general and rear admiral in the Confederate service when he surrendered with General Johnston’s army.

I’d say he may have been the only General Admiral in US military history. But the guy was one helluva fighter. An inspiration to generations of sailors, I’m sure.

His story ought to be a movie. He had more swash in his buckle than any Douglas Fairbanks or Lionel Barrymore movie ever made, and as many amazing escapes as in any Indiana Jones movie. Maybe throw in a few flirtatious scenes with some beauties in period costume, although I gather he was married the whole time.

So naturally, his memory has to be eliminated. Because RAYCIS.

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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/05/2020 at 09:50 AM   
Filed Under: • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat LeftistsHeroesMilitary •  
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calendar   Thursday - June 04, 2020

Might As Well Just Burn It

LA Cuts $150M From Police Budget, Gives It To “Communities of Color”

Bet that cash buys a whole shitload of lap dances and bags of crack.

Mayor Eric Garcetti announced an enormous transfer of city funds at a press briefing Wednesday, with $100 million to $150 million being stripped from the Los Angeles Police Department’s budget and reallocated to “black communities and communities of color.”

Calling this an “urgent moment,” Garcetti first announced an overall transfer of $250 million from the previously proposed budget to be “reinvested” in communities of color, highlighting “jobs, education, and healing.”

L.A. Police Commission President Eileen Decker then announced that $100 million to $150 million of those cuts would come from the police department budget.

“It is time to move our rhetoric towards action to end racism in our city,” the mayor said.

And another $100M is coming from other budget cuts. Buying off the crybabies, again. Straight up pandering.

I’d put the entire fund into primary education - at the classroom level only - and truant officers, and DARE programs. Anything else is a waste.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/04/2020 at 03:58 PM   
Filed Under: • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists •  
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Vile Action On TV

I found this to be infuriating and disgusting. How dare they! The Left is the lowest of the low, total shit-dipped scum suckers.

Nickelodeon Goes “I Can’t Breath”
8 3/4 minutes of black screen with tortured breathing sounds

Nickelodeon aired eight minutes and 46 seconds with the message “I CAN’T BREATHE” in white letters emblazoned across a black screen. The message’s length matches the purported amount of time former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin placed his knee on George Floyd’s neck.

The ViacomCBS-owned channel that caters mostly to children and teenagers went off-air with the video message’s text pulsated rhythmically in tandem with sound a person breathing. The video included a countdown timer as a header, counting down seconds and beginning at 8:46.

The video’s footer reads, “Join @colorofchange and countless others to call on public officials across the country to take real action. Text DEMANDS to 55156.”

Color of Change describes itself as “an online racial justice organization” advancing “a more human and less hostile world for Black people in America.” One of its founders is CNN’s Van Jones.

Chris McCarthy, the president of entertainment and youth brands at ViacomCBS’s, shared the following message with the company’s employees:

The last few weeks have brought to the surface long standing racism, videos of unspeakable behavior and the harsh reality of inequality many in our community deal with on a regular and daily basis. In Minneapolis, the horrifying murder of George Floyd, in Georgia the senseless killing of Ahmaud Arbery, and in Kentucky, the deplorable shooting of Breonna Taylor, to name just a few recent examples. This is on top of a pandemic which has emphasized the tragic inequalities that disproportionately impact communities of color, especially African American and Latinx communities, in addition to the unjust targeting of Asian Americans.

ViacomCBS aligned itself with Black Lives Matter, with its other channels and networks, including NTV, VH1, and Comedy Central, airing the same message.

This is disgusting. Pulling little kids into this is the lowest of the low. Instead of being used as human shields, they’re being used as weapons. And that’s over-the-far-horizon past the line of decency.



Meanwhile, it looks like Floyd had COVID, two kinds of heart disease, was high as a kite on dangerous drugs, and suffered a heart attack while on the street. A knee to his neck didn’t do him any good, but that isn’t what killed him. His own wretched condition killed him, along with police callousness and inattention

It turns out, for example, Floyd didn’t die of asphyxiation according to the medical examiner. According to the Hennepin County medical examiner’s report cited in the criminal complaint charging Officer Derek Chauvin with murder, he died of a heart attack. The autopsy also found Floyd had fentanyl in his system, had recently used methamphetamine, had coronary artery disease and hypertensive heart disease.

.

Yeah, I’m linking an Ann Coulter article. I don’t like her much anymore, but she does write well and thinks things out. Usually. She makes the point that we’re in another Rodney King situation perhaps ... the media isn’t showing us the whole video, and they sure aren’t telling us the whole story or any background. Such as that Chauvin and Floyd worked together for years at the same nightclub. That Chauvin’s wife, a former beauty queen, is divorcing him ... and that her brother was one of the other cops involved, who is now also charged. Or that Floyd did time inside, and had a significant record.

Facts? Who needs them? React to a video clip that may be out of context. Exactly like Rodney King. We may never know ... but this wouldn’t be even the third time the MSM has fired up riots via their biased and selective reporting. They can not be trusted.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/04/2020 at 12:46 PM   
Filed Under: • Miscellaneous •  
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calendar   Wednesday - June 03, 2020

That’ll Teach ‘Em

Every Arrested Rioter And Looter In St. Louis Released Without Charges

By Democrat DA

All 36 people arrested by St. Louis police during riots have been released without charges, according to Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt.

Schmitt said that St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner declined to charge any of the people arrested during riots between Sunday and Tuesday.

“To see that kind of level of violence and rioting that went on, police officers being shot and shot at, a retired police captain being murdered, people throwing rocks and gasoline and frozen water bottles at police officers, firefighters being assaulted and blocked from doing their job, businesses that have served the community for years being burned to the ground, it’s unfathomable that every single person arrested that night has been released,” Schmitt said. “It is stunning.”

Gosh, you’d almost think that the Dems were encouraging this kind of behavior. 


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/03/2020 at 03:33 PM   
Filed Under: • CrimeDemocrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists •  
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This May Not End Well

Riots, protests? Nah. Muesli bread!

I wanted to try making some kind of mult-grain bread with nuts and goodies in it, so I had the genius idea to use Alpen. Turns out Alpen is pretty hard to find where I live, so I got some of the Bob’s Red Mill stuff. Found some fairly fresh raisins in the cabinet, and some Craisins that weren’t too ancient. The dates were like gravel, so I tossed them. Oooh, let’s go all granola-squad and put some honey in.

And then when I was most of the way through getting out all my kit and collecting all the ingredients, I figured I’d look online ... and found out that my “original” idea has been done a million times already. Well fine. So I adapted a recipe, but added some extra bits anyway.

It makes a rather sticky dough. Not quite bread, but not quite muffin batter either. At least it has actual yeast in it, unlike those quick breads. Which are fine, but not what I wanted to make today.
ff w
So it’s in the big 4qt Cambro, rising. About time to check it. Update later maybe. A 2qt Cambro would work too, filled right to the top when the first rise was done.


UPDATE:
It came out pretty darn nice. On the one hand, very tasty with lots of yummy bits inside. On the other hand, most of those bits were solid things which don’t dissolve. So the volume of the dough got quite large even though there wasn’t all that much flour in it. I wound up finishing the final rise in my biggest meatloaf pan lined with parchment paper. I don’t usually do pan bread, but the pan holds a wet and sloppy dough in shape, and the baked loaf is easy to make sandwich slices from.

So, based on this recipe, I enhanced it to become:

UPDATE: This is the revised recipe. The original dough was far too wet, so I cut down on the water and added some bread flour.  Also, it had too much yeast, so I cut that in half. Worked just fine. This recipe makes a kilo of dough, a very solid loaf.

Crumb is better with the less moist dough as well. Not super open, but not lead bread either.


Muesli Fruit Loaf

1 cup (248gm) warm whole milk. I used the organic kind, which has more fat in it.
1/3 cup (82gm) water
1 1/2tsp SAF instant yeast
3 tbl (62gm) dark honey or a tiny bit more (75gm is OK)

1 1/4 cup (150gm) bread flour
1 cup (120gm) all purpose flour
1 cup (120gm) whole wheat flour
1 1/4 tsp (12gm) salt
1 cup (140gm) Bob’s Red Mill old country style muesli
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup Craisins
1/8 - 1/4 cup sweetened shredded coconut

Warm milk in the microwave for 1 minute. Dissolve honey in milk, then add the water to cool it. When below 100°F add yeast and stir. Let sit 10 minutes to activate. It will be very foamy.

Whisk together all dry ingredients including muesli and fruit.

Add the liquid to the dry in your mixing bowl. Mix thoroughly at low speed, using soft spatula to wipe sides of bowl. Adjust the feel of the dough; it may need a little more flour. 5 minute rest. Dough will be somewhat sticky.

Knead. Transfer to large (4 liter) greased rising bucket, let double. With the small amount of yeast this took almost exactly 90 minutes.

Dump dough onto a well floured work surface. Do 2 or 3 stretch and fold kneads, working dough into a rough batard ( stubby log shape ) and pinch seams.  Transfer dough to a well floured banneton, seam side up. Let rise 1 hour. Flip dough from banneton into a parchment lined large meatloaf pan, let rise another 30 minutes while the oven heats to 450F. Deeply score top of loaf, then bake 25 minutes. You can add steam if you want. Remove from oven, lift loaf from pan. Check brownness on sides and bottom; it may need a couple more minutes baking. Fruit on surface will char if over baked. Return loaf to pan, let cool 10 minutes then remove from pan and let cool fully.

VERDICT:YUM. This is almost desert bread. It’s got a slightly sweet taste from the honey and the coconut. It has lots of tasty bits inside. Texture is like a hearty whole wheat bread, slight crumb.

It is not a hard crusty loaf. I’d call it a keeper.


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Posted by Drew458   United States  on 06/03/2020 at 02:06 PM   
Filed Under: • Bread •  
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