Ain't this a great country?

The Moneychanger

First Barack Obama gets elected, proving that anybody really can get elected president. Now that old re-tread Newt Gingrich is trying to get elected by claiming he isn't part of the Republican establishment. And while he's not as boring as Barack Obama, he IS fatter, & just as dangerous. But not as boring as Mitt Romney (first name "Catchers"), who can put thousands to sleep just by opening his mouth. And yet he is not the boringest of all. John Huntsman makes him look lively. These characters have all the charm and seriousness of the Seven Dwarves, but none of their intellectual stature. And how about that Ron Paul? Only presidential candidate that can turn invisible -- to the media?

Ain't this a great country?

Jim Rogers: Serious, serious problems, maybe perhaps war even.

Via Survival

We Should Take The Pain Now And Not Wait Until The Market Forces The Pain On Us

The problem is that the measures that America needs and not just America, many countries but especially America needs, would cause huge pain for a while. But if we don’t take our pain now and we wait until the market forces the pain on us, then it’s going to be you know a systemic collapse.

It’s going to be very, very serious pain; you’re going to see riots in the street. You’re going to see serious, serious problems, maybe perhaps war even. It’s better to go ahead and take the pain now, while it would be terrible for two or three or four years, at least we’d get it behind us and start over. - in FNN

Jim Rogers is an author, financial commentator and successful international investor. He has been frequently featured in Time, The New York Times, Barron’s, Forbes, Fortune, The Wall Street Journal, The Financial Times and is a regular guest on Bloomberg and CNBC.

December 27, 2011: Gun sales at record levels

Via Billy

December holiday shoppers were not just interested in buying the hottest electronics and toys -- they also were purchasing record numbers of guns, according to the latest FBI figures on background checks required to buy firearms.

With a few days left in December, the FBI reports the number of background checks has already topped the previous one-month record -- set only in November -- of 1,534,414 inquiries by gun dealers to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System also known as NICS. Almost half a million checks were done in just the last six days before Christmas.

Two days before Christmas, NICS ran 102,222 background checks, which was the second-busiest day in history. The one-day record was set this year on Black Friday, the big shopping day following Thanksgiving, with 129,166 searches. By comparison, the previous one-day high was set November 28, 2008, when gun dealers made slightly less than 98,000 requests for background searches.

It's not possible to tell exactly how many guns have been purchased because buyers often take home more than one gun. But most people pass the background checks. Only 1.3% of the searches result in people being denied permission to buy a weapon, said FBI spokesman Steve Fischer.

FBI officials did not offer a theory on the spike in gun sales. It's also not clear how many of the background checks were for people who never had owned guns before and how many were for gunowners adding to their collections.

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CBM: Something's Mighty Wrong

NC Patriots of ’61: Privates Solomon & Hugh C. McLean

North Carolina War Between the States Sesquicentennial
www.ncwbts150.com
"The Official Website of the North Carolina WBTS Sesquicentennial Commission"

North Carolina Patriots of ’61: Privates Solomon & Hugh C. McLean of Richmond County

Solomon McLean enlisted with his brother Hugh C. at Rockingham, Richmond County on 30 May, 1861, and served with Company D, North Carolina Troops, known as the “Pee Dee Guards.” Suffering a wound at the battle of Malvern Hill in 1862, he wrote home:

"The Yankees are advancing toward Richmond. They say they will have Richmond or Hell is their home and I fear Hell will be their home before they get it. God grant them a better place, for it will be bad for them to miss Richmond and get Hell."

Solomon was wounded again at Winchester on 19 September 1864 and did not return to duty until December of that year. Brother Hugh C. McLean, also in Company D, received a wound at Chancellorsville in May 1863, returned to duty only to be wounded and captured on the first day of Gettysburg in July. Hugh was taken North and confined first at Fort Delaware, then transferred to the infamous Point Lookout, Maryland where he died on 13 January 1864.

NC Patriots of ’61: Privates Solomon & Hugh C. McLean

SeymourJohnson AFB Goldsboro, NC: F-15 Ejection at Supersonic Speed

Via Cousin John

"Honor" killing victims

Link

Gülsüm Semin was severely beaten (repeatedly), scared to death of her family (and rightly so), and ultimately brutally beaten beyond recognition and "honor" murdered because she refused forced Islamic marriage in Turkey.

Amina and Sarah Said ran away from their brutal home life and their "devout father," only to be lured back by their mother on Christmas day and then brutally tortured and murdered not 24 hours later, in an honor killing on New Years day. Autopsy here. Full Atlas coverage here.

Noor Almalaki was run over in an honor killing last November in Arizona by her father for being "too Americnaized" and not Muslim enough. She hung on to dear life for three days before succumbing to her wounds.

Banaz Mahmood was killed in her apartment in London by her father, Mahmood, and his brother Ali Mahmood and 4 others because they didn't approve of her boyfriend. She had dishonored her Muslim family by falling in love with the "wrong" man. So they stomped on her, then strangled her to death. Her body was then moved 100 miles to Birmingham, where she was buried in a suitcase in a garden behind a house. They had tried to kill her before. Watch this video of Banaz days before her death, telling of the attempts to kill her.

Ron Paul on The Patriot Act & The NDAA

Link

“The founders wanted to set a high bar for the government to overcome in order to deprive an individual of life or liberty. To lower that bar is to endanger everyone. When the bar is low enough to include political enemies, our descent into totalitarianism is virtually assured. The Patriot Act, as bad as its violations against the Fourth Amendment was, was just one step down the slippery slope. The recently passed National Defense Authorization Act continues that slip into tyranny, and in fact, accelerates it significantly.”

--Ron Paul

WBTS veteran soldier footage, captured between 1913 and 1938

Re-Post

WBTS veteran soldier footage, captured between 1913 and 1938

NC concealed carry hit piece in NYT

Via Borepatch

The New York Times has written a hit piece on concealed carry in North Carolina. In particular, they try to make the case that North Carolina’s CCW permit process is flawed, and that it allows prohibited persons to obtain CCW permits. The Times offers the following:

More than 2,400 permit holders were convicted of felonies or misdemeanors, excluding traffic-related crimes, over the five-year period, The Times found when it compared databases of recent criminal court cases and licensees. While the figure represents a small percentage of those with permits, more than 200 were convicted of felonies, including at least 10 who committed murder or manslaughter. All but two of the killers used a gun.

2,400 crimes committed, and “more than 200 convicted of felonies” would seem to imply that 2,200 of the crimes were misdemeanors. But still, 200 felonies is a lot, right?

Well, lets see how many permits we have in NC? 228,072 So the raw rate of all crime is:

=2400/228,072 = .01 or 1%.

Felonies ->

=200/228,072 = .00008 or .08%. Get that? 8/100 of a percent that a CCW holder will commit a felony over a 5 year period.

We need to do some math in order to compare this with the general population. Note that the 200 figure is over a five year period. Lets assume that the 200 felonies are evenly distributed. (Normally this isn’t a good idea, but we are only really interested in order of magnitude comparison here.) 50 felonies in a single year period. Now, normally, crime rates are quoted in number of occurrences per 100,000 persons. Since the numbers are so close, I’m going to keep the math simple and halve the number of people who have CCW permits . Note that is will overstate the number of crimes committed by CCW permit holders. 25 felonies per 100,000 permit holders per year.

Let’s compare this with the general NC population, shall we?

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