CouldnT have said it better ...

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... myself:

Leave the fundamentalists and bigots alone. In any marketplace in a diverse society, they will suffer economically by refusing and alienating some customers, their families and their friends. By all means stop patronizing them in both senses of the word. Let them embrace discrimination and lose revenue. Let us let them be in the name of their freedom – and ours’.

 This has been my feeling about the relationship between government and business for a long time now.

Gay folk are winning the argument; stop getting in the way of your own progress.

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I'm hoping Mike ...

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... has a more in-depth critique:

But to understand why the protests succeeded in toppling Yanukovych, it’s worth taking a glance at its strategies and military-style tactics. The protesters not only built a broad and inclusive coalition, but innovated where it mattered most: on the streets.

Really, it turned medieval.

 While I was watching a bit of news about the goings-on in Ukraine, I noticed that the protesters were not at all shy about using fire, and to good effect.

There's a saying in tanker circles (and most armor) that if you stop moving, you die. that's food for thought.

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So, he wants to use his interpretation of the 2A ...

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... as justification to change the 2A to mean what he already thinks it means?

Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens has released a new book focused, in part, on "improving" the Constitution through amending the Second Amendment--by making the rights protected therein applicable only to a militia instead of the citizenry at large. 

This is one of the most glaring examples for the need to impeach a LOT more public officials. It's not surprising that he's safely retired before he spouts this shit.

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As much as I may sympathize ...

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... this one seems like a stone cold loser:

Ros has filed a lawsuit in circuit court against Wells Fargo Bank, which she said fired her last year from her job as manager at the bank’s Oldsmar branch. Her lawsuit says the firing violated her constitutional right to carry arms and asks for monetary damages and attorney fees.

Some people just don't realize that the constitution is directed at government, not private business.

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In light of the Dunn verdict in FL ...

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... how many instances of LEO's being mistaken about weapons are excused?

Christopher Roupe was fatally shot in the chest Friday, Feb. 14 when Euharlee officers showed up at the door of his mobile home to serve a probation violation warrant for the boy’s father, WSB-TV reports. A female officer reportedly told the Georgia Bureau of Investigation that Roupe pointed a gun at her after he opened the door.

But the family’s attorney, Cole Law, said the boy was holding a Nintendo Wii video game controller, and was about to watch a movie.

 It's sad that police are now conditioned to believe that anything they can't immediately identify as safe is assumed to be a weapon, with predictable results.

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Sour grapes?

.
Say it isn't so!

A Volkswagen board member is threatening to withhold future investments in its Tennessee facility if the workers do not unionize, according to Reuters.

Now, who is it that's threatening again?

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Inconsistency in a liberals argument?

.
You knew that already:

As the Supreme Court has now rightly confirmed ... governments at every level are prohibited from restricting that right. And yet they damn well do, all the time, and to nary a squeak from the anti-voter-ID crowd. 

Like Mr Cook says, they only want rights they like expanded.

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The GOP is trying it's best ...

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... to get all of us hobbits in line:

Team GOP keeps talking about how conservative insurgents don't understand tactics and how we all want to get to the same place but disagree on tactics. "Tactics" is the new "electability" (which itself is really a tactical concept) and we all know how well that worked out.

I understand that politics is very much a game. The GOP and the Dems both play it, however, to stay in power; it just happens that it's the Dem's constituency that thrives on more power. The GOP certainly doesn't swing the other way on the I-want-power scale.

But just once, it'd be nice to have a president who would gladly sign the most far-right piece of legislation that congress was able to get passed.

Hey, a guy can dream can't he?!

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This essay from Matt Bracken ...

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... came over the Facebook transom:

Federal, state, or local. You, the man or woman with the badge, the sworn LEO or FLEA and those who inhabit the many law enforcement niches in between and on all sides. This essay is directed to you, because in the end, how this turmoil about gun control turns out will depend largely upon your decisions and actions over the coming months and years.

The rest of the essay goes through the way the police state is growing ever bigger, and what inevitably happens.

Go. Read. Plan.

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I suppose the big news of the day is ...

.
... the bitch slap the 9th Circuit gave California:

In a decision issued earlier today, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that the California law conditioning the right of “responsible law-abiding” citizens to carry firearms in public for self-defense purposes on a showing of “good cause” unlawfully restricts Second Amendment rights.
 Couldn't have happened to a more deserving bunch of fuckers.

Michael Z Williamson has more regarding an en banc hearing:

When Hearing or Rehearing En Banc May Be Ordered. A majority of the circuit judges who are in regular active service and who are not disqualified may order that an appeal or other proceeding be heard or reheard by the court of appeals en banc. An en banc hearing or rehearing is not favored and ordinarily will not be ordered unless:
(1)

en banc consideration is necessary to secure or maintain uniformity of the court’s decisions; or
(2)

the proceeding involves a question of exceptional importance.
(b)

Petition for Hearing or Rehearing En Banc. A party may petition for a hearing or rehearing en banc.
(1)

The petition must begin with a statement that either:
(A)

the panel decision conflicts with a decision of the United States Supreme Court or of the court to which the petition is addressed (with citation to the conflicting case or cases) and consideration by the full court is therefore necessary to secure and maintain uniformity of the court’s decisions; or
(B)

the proceeding involves one or more questions of exceptional importance, each of which must be concisely stated; for example, a petition may assert that a proceeding presents a question of exceptional importance if it involves an issue on which the panel decision conflicts with the authoritative decisions of other United States Courts of Appeals that have addressed the issue.

 Scanning over the decision, it appears that the majority took great pains to make their decision en banc-proof, following to a 'T' the reasoning of the Heller and McDonald decisions. IF the 9th hears this case en banc and then reverses, the plaintifs will have cause to appeal because the 9th didn't follow their own rules.

Have your popcorn ready!

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Huh?

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The government wants economic concerns to certify that they're not making economic decisions based on how regulations affect them economically?

Treasury officials said Monday that businesses will be told to "certify" that they are not shedding full-time workers simply to avoid the mandate. Officials said employers will be told to sign a "self-attestation" on their tax forms affirming this, under penalty of perjury. 

Were I in charge of a business domiciled in a friendlier judicial district, I'd refuse to certify on the grounds that answering truthfully would place me at risk sanction, or even jail. And I'd do it right from the jump and challenge it legally.

Progressives do understand that businesses exist  to make a profit; they just don't like it. And it is through government regulation that they turn businesses to the government's own ends.

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I know I piss people off ...

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... when I post that somebody needs to get beaten:

Colorado mother Jamelyn Steenhoek said she was sickened by the Denver District Attorney's Office refusal to file criminal charges against a Transportation Security Administration agent she says groped her in ways “as extensive as an exam” from a physician.

I post some of these things on facebook, and I know that a lot of my friends think 'Wow, Packetman's sure gone off the deep end'. I have, but it's only because there's no justice to be found, apparently, outside of violent action.

And I can assure you that if I thought that a TSA agent was getting out of line searching my daughter, you'd better fucking believe that there would be no number of officers that could keep me off of the offender. And I know a lot of folks who feel the same way.

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This kind of action ...

.... attacks the wrong end of the problem (autoplay warning):

Legislators here are working to keep students from getting in serious trouble for simulating a weapon with harmless objects like their fingers, Pop-Tarts or Legos.
Rep. Dennis Baxley, a Republican from Ocala, Fla., said his bill is designed to bar overreactions under zero-tolerance policies designed to keep weapons out of public schools.

Instead of passing more laws to do this or that, why don't parents start applying pressure where it matters - on those stupid school administrators who use 'zero tolerance' as a bludgeon to indoctrinate children?

Because the very last thing I'd do if someone was abusing my daughter is to call the state to have them pass another law.

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Aaron's monthly opportunity ...

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... to win shooty goodness!

A firearm opportunity ...

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... and an apology.

The apology is for the dearth of posts the last week. I haven't seen a lot that I felt like commenting on so I haven't. Today I'm nursing a side-effecty day after my injection, so I'm not sure when I'll feel up to blogging again.*

The opportunity is that my local library is raffling off a Kel-Tec PMR30 to raise money. One of the branches of government has reneged on its promise to fund the library and they're fighting tooth and nail to stay open the 3 days they are.

Tickets for the pistol are $10 each or 3 for $25. The drawing is Feb 15th, so if you're interested you need to hurry. Call Marshana at the Dade Co Library @ 706-657-7857. Remember that they're only open on Tues, Thurs and Fri and that they never expected to have out-of-town ticket sales so the attempt to buy may be moot (donations are, of course, welcome!). If they do another raffle of a pistol or other firearm, i'll try to find out sooner and try to make tickets available on the blog.

pm

*One of the constant casualties of The Affliction is that my left hand is at about 50% function. On days after my weekly injection that can go down pretty far, hence the lack of posting. I am humbled at the traffic I do draw with this blog but it was never intended to be anything more than an outlet for me to keep my brain engaged. If anyone gets anything from it I consider to be a blessed bonus!