The idle musings of a former military man, former computer geek, medically retired pastor and now full-time writer. Contents guaranteed to offend the politically correct and anal-retentive from time to time. My approach to life is that it should be taken with a large helping of laughter, and sufficient firepower to keep it tamed!
The Soviet-era 9K38 Igla man-portable air defense system, or MANPADS (depending on the version, launching either the SA-16 [Igla-1] missile, the SA-18 [Igla] or SA-24 [Igla-S]) is very effective. When South Africa tested the SA-16 against the then-current version of the US FIM-92 Stinger missile, back in the 1980's, they found the former to be superior to the latter.
Nevertheless, to be effective, the Igla has to be launched successfully. If you fail to achieve that, interesting things can happen - as a hapless soldier found out during the recent Clear Sky 2020 military exercises in Ukraine.
I'm not sure what happened. I know some missiles can be "locked" into their launch tube, to avoid slipping out while it's being carried: so I guess it's possible that this missile's lock had not been released. Alternatively, it may simply have stuck in the tube, either through dirt or debris being present, or through being improperly inserted.
Whatever the cause, I wouldn't be surprised if the shooter had to change his underwear afterwards!
I thought it might be helpful to explain the difference between the lute, the theorbo and the archlute, all mainstays of baroque and Renaissance music.
The lute is the "base instrument" for the other two. Wikipedia defines the lute as "any plucked string instrument with a neck and a deep round back enclosing a hollow cavity, usually with a sound hole or opening in the body. It may be either fretted or unfretted ... The European lute and the modern Near-Eastern oud descend from a common ancestor via diverging evolutionary paths."
The theorbo was developed during the Baroque era to provide a stronger bass voice to the instrument, particularly for use in early opera and other genres. Wikipedia notes that "A theorbo differs from a regular lute in that the theorbo has a much longer neck which extends beyond the regular fingerboard/neck and a second pegbox at the end of the extended neck. Low-register bass strings are added on the extended neck. This gives a theorbo a much wider range of pitches (notes) than a regular lute."
The archlute is a sort of mid-size compromise between the smaller lute and the larger theorbo. Wikipedia calls it "Essentially a tenor lute with the theorbo's neck-extension".
To illustrate the differences in size, I found this image in several locations on the Internet. I've no idea who owns the copyright for it, and I'll gladly provide that attribution if the owner cares to get in touch.
Of course, the instruments sound very similar, with stronger bass notes from the larger archlute and theorbo. Here's a selection of videos of both being played. The first two provide introductions to the instruments, after which there are several short pieces. Enjoy!
Here's an interesting combination: an archlute and a salterio, a zither-type instrument.
Now for some theorbo pieces.
And here's one played by both archlute and theorbo, to highlight the aural and visual differences between the instruments.
Back when he ran Lethal Force Institute, Mr. Ayoob offered a number of courses, including LFI-1, -2 and -3, equating to basic, intermediate and advanced levels. I took all three, and learned so much it's hard to describe it all. Today his Massad Ayoob Group offers the same courses under the labels MAG40, MAG80 and MAG120. I recommend them all, but particularly MAG40, which introduces the basic concepts they all teach and provides a foundation for more advanced training.
Mas says his classes aren't so much about shooting (although you'll fire several hundred rounds during one of his courses) as they are about "managing the lethal threat environment". He takes you through the legal, social, political and cultural aspects of defending your life against criminal attack, and helps you understand the various dynamics at work when (and after) you pull the trigger. Personally, I think everyone who owns a firearm for self-defense should take at least his "MAG20 / Classroom – Armed Citizen’s Rules of Engagement" course (the theoretical component of MAG40), in order to understand the basics of what's at issue from those perspectives. If any self-defense course is worth its weight in gold, it's this one (and, of course, its bigger brother, MAG40). You can do the shooting component of the latter, MAG20 Live Fire, as a half-course after you've taken the theoretical component, if you prefer. This splits MAG40 into 2 two-day segments, convenient if you can only train on weekends.
His book "Deadly Force" incorporates the lessons taught in MAG20 / Classroom, and is therefore (IMHO) an indispensable part of any defensive shooter's bookshelf. I re-read it periodically, at least once a year, to refresh my memory of its contents; because, if I'm unfortunate enough to have to use my firearm(s) in self-defense, its contents will immediately come into play. I'd better remember and understand them, or I'm going to get the short end of the stick!
Here's his chapter titled "Standards".
If forty-some years working and teaching in the justice system has taught me anything, it is this: If you act to the standards by which you know you will be judged, you should not be found wanting in the judgment.
No two use of force incidents will be exactly the same in every respect. There is a virtually infinite potential for branching of circumstances. Because of this, the courts will hold us to standards, to a formula if you will. For the same reasons, it behooves all of us to use a formula to analyze each situation we face to determine whether lethal force is justified.
Lethal force (or deadly force; the terms are interchangeable) is that degree of force which a reasonable and prudent person would consider capable of causing death or great bodily harm. Various laws use the terminology “great bodily harm,” “grave bodily harm,” “serious bodily harm,” etc.; the easiest way to remember it in layman’s terms is “crippling injury.”
The set of circumstances that justifies the use of deadly force is a situation of immediate danger of death or great bodily harm to oneself or other innocent persons. Since deadly force is normally only allowed as a last resort, the danger should be otherwise unavoidable and not created by the defender himself. This brings in an element called preclusion, which can vary according to jurisdiction and circumstances, and will be discussed separately in this book.
That situation of immediate danger of death or crippling injury is normally determined by the simultaneous presence of three criteria. Different schools use different terminology, but the most widely used and court-proven standard has been in use for decades: ability/opportunity/jeopardy. “Ability” means that the assailant possesses the power to kill or cripple. “Opportunity” means he is capable of immediately employing that power. “Jeopardy” means that his actions and/or words indicate to a reasonable, prudent person that he intends to do so and is about to do so. We will discuss each of these in great detail in this book.
Throughout, the law-abiding armed citizen must maintain the mantle of innocence. Think of the mantle of innocence as a legal cloak that shields the wearer from successful accusation of wrong-doing. The defender must not have provoked the encounter, must not have started the fight, or an element of guilt and wrong-doing will accrue. If it lay within the defender’s power to end the argument or abjure from the conflict, but instead he “kept the ball rolling” and things predictably escalated, he may very likely be held to have been at least partially at fault.
Some states, but not all, have provisions for excusable homicide as well as justifiable homicide. In essence, a finding of excusable homicide means that the deceased probably shouldn’t have been killed, but any reasonable and prudent person under identical circumstances would likely have made the same mistake as the person who killed him. By contrast, a finding of justifiable homicide says in essence that the person who killed the deceased acted correctly in doing so. In either case, the person who is responsible for the killing is held harmless.
We must have reasonable fear of death or grave bodily harm when we employ this level of force. Reasonable fear is starkly distinct from what the law calls bare fear, which never justifies harming another. Bare fear is naked panic, a blind and unreasoning fear. It is understood that when panic comes in, reason departs. The necessary reasonable fear doesn’t mean you’re soiling your pants or running away screaming; reasonable fear is simply that apprehension of danger which any reasonable, prudent person would experience if they were in the same situation as you, knowing what you know at the time.
General Rules of Engagement
Each state has its own statutes and codes, colloquially known as “black letter law.” The laws are interpreted through the prism of case law, decisions by appellate courts which essentially nail down the fine points. Some of the clearest, most easily understood legal definitions and interpretations may be found in the given state’s recommended jury instructions on the various issues. All of these may be researched at a legal library. In every county seat, at or near the county courthouse, you will find a legal library that is open to the public. The legal librarians, I’ve found as a rule, are delighted to help ordinary citizens look up these things.
Because ours is the most mobile society on Earth, we are constantly moving between jurisdictions. No lawyer can memorize the vastness of The Law in its entirety; that’s why every law office has its own legal library. No police officer can memorize them all; that’s why the patrol car has a mobile data terminal with the capability of looking things up. It follows that the law-abiding armed citizen can’t hold all the laws in his head, either. For that reason, in this book as in my classes, I teach generic principles that are common to the law of all fifty states.
Now, let’s move forward and examine these matters in greater detail.
You'll find much more food for thought in Mr. Ayoob's book. I can't recommend it too highly (along with Andrew Branca's book, discussed last week). Both are permanent fixtures in my library.
As I've said elsewhere, I think we're likely to encounter many disruptions to our routine as the elections draw nearer. Riots and protests will interfere with daily life in many cities, as will looting mobs intent on stealing whatever they can while police are preoccupied with legal and political issues. At the same time, COVID-19 and other disrupting factors are already interfering with supplies to distributors and retailers, making many of the things we need harder to find and more expensive.
I'd like to suggest a few resources to help plan around these realities, over and above those that have already been discussed in these pages. These links will give you additional food for thought, and perhaps some ideas that will be useful.
First, The Organic Prepper has an excellent article titled "The 7 Pillars of Urban Preparedness". It's a very useful overview of what it means to be prepared, and the basic steps we need to take in each area. The "pillars" are water, shelter, fire, food, signaling/communication, medical/hygiene, and personal safety. Highly recommended.
Mr. B., who blogs at In The Middle Of The Right, offers his thoughts on areas of preparedness to consider in two articles (so far):
Moving on to personal defense and protection, Michael Bane has a sobering overview of the current climate and what it implies for our security. He calls it "Staying Alive in the Brave New World".
Maybe if we all take a deep breath, calm down and relax, we’ll come through this. But maybe not. “Maybe” is a very big word. As we have said on THE BEST DEFENSE, self-defense is always a compromise, a balance of risk/reward. If we apply that same thinking to our current situation, we see the fallacy in “relax.” If we relax and the current crisis just fades away, everything is cool. If we relax and are, in fact, wrong, we lose the country, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the vote, our guns and maybe even our lives. The teeter-totter is wildly weighted on only one end.
SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, given those assumptions, what do we need to know as we face the Brave New World? I have been thinking about that a lot and talking to my team, who I believe are the best in the world at what they do. If we immediately move down to a “tactical,” as opposed to “strategic” level, here are some thoughts.
In particular, note his first point:
If you are not armed all the time, you are a fool. The time for fond illusions of safety has passed.
Massad Ayoob is well-known to many readers of this blog. I've taken three courses from him, and I'll offer an excerpt from his book "Deadly Force: Understanding Your Right to Self Defense" in my "Saturday Snippet" feature tomorrow morning. He recently gave an interview to the Armed Citizen's Legal Defense Network, titled "Defense Against Mobs", that I think is one of the best overviews of our current urban unrest and how to deal with it. Here's a brief excerpt from a long and very informative article.
What we are seeing ... is most aptly described by a friend of mine who is a very street-wise police supervisor in a major, high crime city. He said ... the mob is not working with one mind, one purpose and one target. What we have is the Antifa types and the opportunistic looters basically seeding themselves in among those I would call the legitimate protesters–the people who are there in good conscience and good faith, to cause no physical harm to anyone and to voice what they believe is a very important concern.
My friend said the crowd today is not a mob; the crowd today is an ocean in which the predators swim, hide and are essentially effecting camouflage. They emerge out of the ocean to set fires to buildings, to violently assault people, and then to melt back into the protection of the crowd. They are using the crowd in the same way that Saddam Hussein used human shields: taking women and children and settling them in camps surrounding all the military bases during the Iraq war when he was afraid the Americans would obliterate his military bases.
That changes things entirely in the 2020 riot situations.
. . .
You don’t know who’s who! You are going to have to be really careful ... What you have got here are sharks that swam out of the ocean and there might be a little wave of good-faith protestors coming out of that ocean trying to pull the sharks off of you. You don’t know for sure. Target selection and target determination are going to be absolutely critical.
We should understand that from now until the elections in November, there will be a series of attempts to manipulate the American electorate: to condition it to produce and/or accept a politically correct outcome, one that favors the progressive left and destabilizes the "deplorable" faction in US politics. The first signs are here already, and in case you missed them, I'd like to point them out.
The Democratic Strategist has three editorial goals–(1) to provide an explicitly and unapologetically partisan platform for the discussion of Democratic political strategy, (2) to insist upon greater use of data and greater reliance on empirical evidence in strategic thinking and (3) to act as a neutral forum and center of discussion for all sectors of the Democratic community.
As The Democratic Strategists’ editorial philosophy states, the publication will be “proudly partisan, firmly and insistently based on facts and data and emphatically open to all sectors and currents of opinion within the Democratic community”.
Kudos to them for being so honest and up-front about their agenda. Not all political organizations are.
Ed Kilgore wrote an article in the New York Intelligencer, a left-wing journal. Note that he did not identify his own affiliation and outlook, potentially misleading readers, who might thus take his words for serious journalism instead of party political propaganda. He warned of what a progressive digital data firm, Hawkfish, calls a "Red Mirage", where initial election results might show Trump ahead, but later ones (incorporating many postal votes) might overturn his winning margin, leading to confusion and confrontation.
[I]f by election night all polling place ballots and 40% of vote-by-mail ballots (in states where vote-by-mail will surge high above historical levels) are counted, Trump will temporarily lead in even safely blue states. Given his history of false claims and dismissal of vote-by-mail, Trump may exploit this Red Mirage to claim victory and dispute any subsequent change to the electoral map.
. . .
So at this point, the faith in an Election Night result is not being shaped by Trump campaign preparations for pulling a fast one. That will likely change, so there is no time like the present to begin educating everyone on the red mirage and its sources.
On the face of it, his article might be expressing genuine concern that the public would misunderstand the counting of many postal votes, which could radically change the announced results of the election so far. However, there's another side, one expressed by more conservative commenters. For example, commenter Matt Bracken circulates this diagram on social media (click it for a larger view):
Bracken concludes: "... the entire DemSocRat reason for pushing mass universal mail-in ballots is to swing the election with fake votes after Nov. 4." He sees the so-called "Red Mirage" as an attempt to condition the American electorate to accept the result of such manipulation, and not to question it.
You'll have to decide for yourself whether you believe Kilgore's or Bracken's interpretation of what Hawkfish has to say. I must confess that from my perspective, looking at how the progressive left has warped and manipulated anything they could get their hands on in recent months, I'm inclined to agree with Bracken. When postal votes are issued en masse, with few if any safeguards to ensure they reach those they're supposed to reach, and even fewer safeguards to prevent their manipulation and misuse before they're returned, that's far from a remote possibility.
A landslide for Joe Biden resulted in a relatively orderly transfer of power. Every other scenario we looked at involved street-level violence and political crisis.
. . .
[To avoid chaos] The media also has an important role. Responsible outlets can help educate the public about the possibility — indeed, the likelihood — that there won’t be a clear winner on election night because an accurate count may take weeks, given the large number of mail-in ballots expected in this unprecedented mid-pandemic election. Journalists can also help people understand that voter fraud is extraordinarily rare, and, in particular, that there’s nothing nefarious about voting by mail. Social media platforms can commit to protecting the democratic process, by rapidly removing or correcting false statements spread by foreign or domestic disinformation campaigns and by ensuring that their platforms aren’t used to incite or plan violence.
Finally, ordinary citizens can help, too — perhaps most of all. As the jurist Learned Hand said in 1944, “Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it . . . while it lies there, it needs no constitution, no law, no court to save it.” This is as true now as it was then: When people unite to demand democracy and the rule of law, even repressive regimes can be stopped in their tracks. Mass mobilization is no guarantee that our democracy will survive — but if things go as badly as our exercises suggest they might, a sustained, nonviolent protest movement may be America’s best and final hope.
Reading Ms. Brooks' article in isolation, despite its strong left-wing perspective, one might think she was merely offering suggestions as to how the news media might help to avoid complications. On the other hand, reading it in the light of Mr. Kilgore's article a couple of days earlier, do we detect an attempt to build momentum, to "educate" news media in their "progressive responsibilities", to get them all "on message" and make sure that their propaganda is prepared for use well in advance of the need for it? Is this part of preparing the ground for what Mr. Bracken describes as the "Red Mirage" takeover bid?
I'll leave you to draw your own conclusions. For continuing perspective on this, look for more articles in the mainstream media on the same theme in coming days and weeks, all pointing out the need to warn people that the initial election results might not be the final ones, and to expect confusion.
Consider this, too, in the light of the ongoing Antifa/BLM riots and unrest across the country, all designed to destabilize our society and pressure voters into supporting a liberal/progressive agenda and candidates. Putting that together with the "Red Mirage", I can't think of more fertile ground into which to inject thousands, if not millions, of fraudulent postal ballots, in an attempt to overturn what might otherwise be unfavorable election results, and ensure a progressive victory. Can you? Are you connecting the same dots I am?
It may sound crazy, but yes, there really were plans for a coal-powered jet fighter in Nazi Germany towards the end of the Second World War. What's more, the engine was test-flown aboard a Dornier Do-17 bomber - and it worked!
The aircraft and its unconventional propulsion system were the brainchild of Dr. Alexander Lippisch. He'd helped design the Messerschmitt Me 163 Komet rocket-propelled fighter, and was convinced that the delta wing held great promise for high-speed aircraft. He proposed a delta-wing fighter known as the Lippisch P.13a, a drawing of which (courtesy of Wikipedia) is shown below.
However, aircraft fuel was in very short supply at the time, and production facilities for jet engines were already overstrained. The project therefore envisaged the use of a coal-fueled ramjet engine, described as follows.
Initially, it was proposed that a wire-mesh basket holding coal be mounted behind a nose air intake, protruding slightly into the airflow and ignited by a gas burner.
Following wind-tunnel testing of the ramjet and the coal basket, modifications were incorporated to provide more efficient combustion. The coal was to take the form of small granules instead of irregular lumps, to produce a controlled and even burn, and the basket was altered to a mesh drum revolving on a vertical axis at 60 rpm. A jet of flame from tanks of bottled gas would fire into the basket once the P.13a had reached operating speed (above 199 mph), whether by using a RATO unit or being towed.
The air passing through the ramjet would take the fumes from the burning coal towards the rear where they would mix under high pressure with clean air taken from a separate intake. The resulting mixture of gas would then be directed out through a rear nozzle to provide thrust. A burner and drum were built and tested successfully in Vienna by the design team before the end of the war.
Photographs exist of the Kronach Lorin test engine being flown aboard a Dornier Do 17 bomber.
They're included in this brief video clip about the P.13a project.
A glider prototype of the Lippisch P.13a was designed, but not completed before the war ended. American occupying forces ordered the Lippisch team to complete the glider, which was then brought to the USA and successfully test-flown (without an engine, of course). Lippisch himself also came to the USA under Operation Paperclip, and assisted with the development of delta wing technology for the USAF. His influence can be seen in Convair's F-102 Delta Dagger and F-106 Delta Dart fighter aircraft, as well as the B-58 Hustler supersonic bomber.
However, the coal-fired ramjet idea died at the end of World War 2, and has never been resurrected. I daresay a lot of pilots were relieved about that!
I grew up knowing Safmarine quite well. The company was headquartered in Cape Town, South Africa, and its ships were well-known visitors to the "Tavern of the Seas", as the city was known. Here's one of its first container vessels, the S.A. Winterberg, off the Cape coast. Click the image for a larger view.
As a child, I remember the drama surrounding the wreck of Safmarine's S.A. Seafarer off Green Point in Cape Town in 1966. The image below is courtesy of the linked article at the Safmarine Mariner blog. The video is from a contemporary newsreel.
My father took me to Green Point to watch the rescue by Alouette III helicopters of the South African Air Force (SAAF). We joined thousands of other Capetonians who thronged the waterfront to stare at the spectacle. That evening the Green Point Lighthouse was stopped, and its light pointed directly at the wreck to aid in rescue efforts - something I've never heard of happening anywhere else.
I had some contact with Safmarine officers during part of my military service in the 1970's and 1980's. The company served many African ports, despite the opprobrium in which South Africa was held at the time due to its internal policy of apartheid. Inevitably, its ships and personnel (along with those of another local company, Unicorn Shipping) were co-opted by the South African government to infiltrate people and goods into "sensitive areas". Safmarine sailors (or, possibly, military personnel carrying Safmarine papers - one could never be sure, and one did not ask questions about such things) were also seconded to some nondescript tramp steamers plying their trade in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, the Red Sea and some Indian Ocean ports. Let's just say that those vessels were used to support some decidedly unconventional operations here and there!
Safmarine also operated an air freight subsidiary, Safair, which owned the world's largest private fleet of Lockheed L-100 Hercules aircraft (the civilian transport variant of the military C-130 Hercules). The SAAF operated seven C-130's, and wanted more, but could not buy them thanks to international arms embargoes. However, Safair could (and did) buy "civilian" freighter aircraft. I understand that at one point, it had 17 L-100's on its books, often flown by SAAF personnel in civilian attire. The SA Defense Force was its biggest customer, as can be seen below. Despite Safair's highly visible presence at SAAF airfields, the USA didn't raise any overt objections to the use of such "civilian" aircraft as military transports.
Safair continues in operation to this day as an independent corporate entity. It put its former military experience to good use ferrying United Nations peacekeepers and other personnel around much of Africa during and since the 1990's. I flew on its aircraft during aid operations from time to time. It's ordered ten of the new-generation LM-100J, a civilian version of the C-130J Super Hercules, which will make it the world's largest operator of that variant, just like its predecessor.
After the end of apartheid and democratic elections in South Africa in 1994, Safmarine moved its headquarters to the Netherlands and continued operations. Maersk bought the company in 1999, but continued to operate it as an independent entity, and its ships retained their "branding". Blue Safmarine containers are visible from time to time on the container trains that criss-cross the United States.
Indeed, one of those containers is currently in use as a storage shed for building materials at a construction site not a mile from my home. Seeing it every time I pass there brings back some memories, I can tell you . . .
At any rate, Maersk has now decided to fully integrate Safmarine's operations into its own corporate structure, and do away with the latter's separate identity. I'm sad to hear it, but not surprised, of course: corporate efficiency has its own needs and demands. Nevertheless, it's a little sad to see 74 years of maritime history vanish down the corporate plug-hole, so to speak. I daresay many current and former South Africans will feel likewise.
The almost complete breakdown of common sense, maturity and responsibility among the youth of our inner cities is summed up in an appearance in court in Chicago on Tuesday.
The initial story of Caleb Reed’s death was tragic enough: A 17-year-old activist with a bright future killed on a West Rogers Park sidewalk when someone shot from a passing car.
But a month later, as prosecutors brought charges in the case, a more devastating narrative emerged: Reed was killed by his own friend shooting blindly at a car down the street.
Video shows Genove Martin, 18, “kind of fired over his shoulder” at a Chevy Malibu about three houses down, but Reed was right behind him and the bullet hit him in the forehead, Assistant State’s Attorney James Murphy said in court Tuesday.
. . .
Both Reed and Martin participated in Becoming A Man, an academic and character development program offered at schools across the city. The program was launched nearly two decades ago at Roberto Clemente High School and served as a safe space for young men to develop social and emotional skills, according to their website.
. . .
Voices for Youth in Chicago Education, where Reed was a youth leader, released a statement Tuesday saying he had advocated not just to end violence but “to get help for young people who need to heal from the trauma they experience as a result of that violence.”
“What happened to Caleb is not a unique situation,” the statement read. “The tragic action that led to Caleb’s death is undeniably a call to invest in Black Lives.”
. . .
Reed ... was killed on the last day of the most violent month in Chicago in 28 years. At least 107 people were killed in July, more than double the same month last year, according to data kept by the Tribune. That’s the most homicides the city has seen in a single month since September 1992, when 109 were recorded.
Could there be a more damning testament to the complete and utter failure of inner-city upliftment and development programs?
"Both Reed and Martin participated in Becoming A Man, an academic and character development program ... a safe space for young men to develop social and emotional skills". Well, that worked out well for them, didn't it? How many other participants in (particularly graduates of) that program have also been injured or killed as the result of violent crime, and/or have committed such crimes? I'm willing to bet it's more than a few.
"Voices for Youth in Chicago Education" appears to be just another program sucking up taxpayer and community dollars while achieving little, if anything, of lasting value. Their appeal that Reed's death is "undeniably a call to invest in Black Lives" is so much arrant nonsense. Literally tens of billions of dollars are "invested" in America's inner-city youth every single year . . . and, equally literally, there's almost never anything positive to show for it. Instead, the same old crime, violence and despair show themselves again and again and again - just as they have in this instance. As an old saying puts it (no, not Einstein - he never said it): "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results". Invest more in inner-city programs? NO!!! How about first expecting - no, demanding - a measurable, enumerated, positive return on our previous investment there: and, if no such return is evident, killing the program(s) concerned once and for all? Anything else would be insane.
"... the most violent month in Chicago in 28 years. At least 107 people were killed in July ..." Insanity, much?
America has a terrible problem in its obsession with "programs". Do we have this, or that, or the other problem in society? Let's start a program to address it! Let's throw money and propaganda and activists at the problem! Yet . . . so few of those programs produce any positive result. All they appear to do is perpetuate the problem, while paying the salaries (usually rather nice salaries) of those who run the programs. They almost never actually change lives, because they don't demand that lives should be changed. Those they're trying to help are seldom, if ever, truly challenged - bluntly, directly, without compromise - to change their outlook on life, their attitudes, and their behavior. The programs are "all hat and no cattle", to quote an idiom common here in Texas.
We won't get a handle on this sort of violence until we give young people a few hard lessons in the reality of life. Right now, they're coddled into what passes for maturity in our inner cities, but never taught right from wrong; never taught that there is, indeed, absolute truth, and that we defy it at our peril; never challenged to be better than the gang-bangers and addicts and down-and-outs that surround them. It's all "acceptance" and "tolerance" and "non-judgement" - and that's why our inner cities, and many of those who live there, are the way they are today.
I'll let Tennessee Democratic Party state representative John DeBerry speak for the rest of us. He's one of the pioneers of the civil rights movement in the 1950's and 1960's, and speaks with the authority of one who has lived, and still lives, in the midst of these problems. He understands them from the inside. He's speaking of the present social unrest, but his words apply equally well to the environment of our inner cities. I highly recommend that you spend the seven minutes it'll take to listen to his words. They're worth it.
And that's the answer to inner-city programs and community organizers . . . and to preventing the deaths of even more youths. Give them a moral and ethical foundation that will not just suggest, but demand that they change their way of life, on pain of severe consequences. In the absence of such a foundation . . . why bother? They're on a hiding to nothing. (I saw the results, time and again, when I worked as a prison chaplain.)
That won't happen, of course. Too many people are making too much money at taxpayer expense by tolerating the present carnage. They use it as leverage to fund yet more programs that feather their own nests, political, financial and otherwise. Meanwhile, for Caleb Reed and Genove Martin as for so many before them, the daily reality remains crime and death.
Amid all the brouhaha over the US Postal Service, with Democrats alleging (farcically) that President Trump is trying to "defund" it and/or use it to prevent successful postal voting, we learn that much of the fuss is politically motivated. To any businessman with common sense, the measures implemented by the new Postmaster-General don't seem "political" at all, as we pointed out recently. Instead, they're vitally necessary to get rid of multi-billion-dollar abuses and inefficiencies.
One such abuse, overtime, is highlighted in a new report.
The U.S. Postal Service has racked up billions of dollars in excessive overtime from its workers over the last several years, even as its employee numbers have gone up and its mail delivery has declined, according to a new audit likely to raise questions about congressional Democrats' demands for a bailout.
Overtime pay has become so predominant at America's premier mail delivery service that more than 4,000 postal workers last year actually earned more in OT pay than their base pay, a 429% increase in highly compensated overtime earners since 2014, the agency's internal watchdog reported this week.
The situation exists in part because postal employees are allowed to determine their own overtime hours without needing prior management approval, and management does not always keep accurate payroll records, the audit report concluded.
. . .
The audit paints a picture of a postal service that is highly dysfunctional: Managers don't keep good records, staffing levels aren't maintained at authorized levels, and workers decide for themselves when they can charge overtime.
. . .
The audit revealed just how costly this OT tab has become: The annual bill for overtime charged by postal employees grew 35% from $3.7 billion in 2014 to $5 billion last year. Over the course of those five years, workers charged for an average of more than 100 million OT hours per year, the report said. Overtime, according to the IG, now accounts for between 13% and 16% of USPS' total costs.
. . .
Investigators flagged the massive growth in postal workers who earned 2x and 3x through overtime pay, citing some specific examples ranging from postmen to mechanics whose inflated paychecks raised questions about whether employees could really have worked as many hours as they charged.
"A mail handler in the Northeast Area earned $141,153 in total overtime pay by working 3,329 regular overtime hours, which resulted in $205,018 in total pay" the report noted. "This was equivalent to more than three times the amount of this employee's base salary. For perspective, this amount of overtime would have required this employee to work an average of 17-hour days, consisting of eight regular workhours and about nine overtime hours every day for 365 days a year.
Despite such remarkable findings, the Postal Service said it is not sure whether it should try to work to reduce massively rising overtime.
Do note the last sentence in the excerpt above. That's not from the Postmaster-General, who's trying to get a handle on an agency that's clearly administratively out of control. It comes from the general management of the agency, which doesn't see the need for reform. After all, they can always turn to Congress for another bailout!
I found the example of the "mail handler in the Northeast Area" particularly egregious. If he'd worked that many hours over so long a period, his personal relationships would be in ruins, his health would be broken, and he'd have collapsed from the stress of seven-days-per-week maximum effort. I'd say it's physically impossible for him to work as long and as hard as he claimed (unless he slept underneath the sorting table for most of his duty shift).
I wish I could find a job like that. It'll pay a lot better than writing books, I can tell you!
The United States Marshals Service is a largely unsung band of men and women, doing very important work, but mostly out of the headlines. I worked with a number of its agents during my service as a prison chaplain, since the USMS is responsible for most interstate transport of federal inmates. Those I knew were always very professional, very competent individuals, and I had a lot of respect for them.
The USMS has just had two major successes that the mainstream media have largely ignored.
The U.S. Marshals Service worked with local authorities to rescue 26 missing children and ensure the safe location of 13 others during a two-week operation in Georgia, according to a news release Thursday.
Authorities arrested nine people, many of whom had multiple arrest warrants for charges including sex trafficking, parental kidnapping, registered sex offender violations, drugs and weapons possession.
“The message to missing children and their families is that we will never stop looking for you,” said Director of the Marshals Service Donald Washington.
The rescued children were considered to be “some of the most at-risk and challenging recovery cases in the area, based on indications of high-risk factors such as victimization of child sex trafficking, child exploitation, sexual abuse, physical abuse and medical or mental health conditions,” according to the release.
The youngest child was reportedly just 3 years old, and, while many had been gone for several weeks, one was missing for two years before being rescued.
The U.S. Marshal Service has found 25 missing children in northeast Ohio ... during a monthlong investigation, according to Ann Murphy, public affairs officer for the U.S. Marshal Service, Northern District of Ohio.
Of these cases, about one-quarter are confirmed to be related to human trafficking or prostitution, Murphy said in a news release Thursday.
The U.S. Marshal Service has been working with its state and local partners over the past 20 days to find and recover missing juveniles from the Cuyahoga County area.
. . .
Members of the task force and its local partners will continue to work over the next several weeks to bring more children to safety, the news release said.
Full marks to the USMS for their successes. There are a lot of parents out there who've been reunited with their kids, and a lot of kids who've been abused who are now safe from further harm. They all may have problems to overcome, particularly in relating to each other, but at least those problems can now be tackled on a sound footing.
While the mainstream media are quick to highlight police and law enforcement problems, and rioters demand defunding of their agencies, it's good to remember that the basic functions of law enforcement go on day by day across this country, and help a great many people. 54 kids today have the possibility of a brighter tomorrow, thanks to being rescued from a ghastly yesterday. Well done, USMS, and thank you!
Reports of what's really going on in (and behind) the Antifa and Black Lives Matter demonstrations across America are coming in with greater regularity. The authorities aren't saying much about what they're learning, but they're clearly monitoring radio frequencies and cellphone location and use, among other techniques. We're seeing results in arrest warrants issued en masse after enough information has been gathered to justify them. (See, for example, recent developments in Portland and Los Angeles.) The Justice Department, in particular, appears to be deploying assets on a large scale to gather information.
Contrary to media claims, the situation in Portland has continued despite efforts by federal law enforcement to deescalate and get state and local authorities to take responsibility. Antifa and its allies have subsequently shifted targets from the federal courthouse to the Portland Police Bureau (PPB).
This article examines an ongoing effort by a complex, distributed antifa network to conduct a “dilemma action,” intended to target the PPB based on several days of open-source research and direct observation.
Put simply a dilemma action is a strategy using carefully-targeted types and degrees of civil disobedience to cause security forces to either concede the space and thus exhibit weakness, or respond in a manner that appears disproportionate and evokes negative sentiments in the population.
Civil disobedience for a dilemma action is usually characterized as “non-violent.” but it must be remembered that within radical left organizing circles property damage by itself is considered non-violent by definition. Portland protests in particular have been marked by a nightly damage toll heavily biased towards law enforcement and government property and buildings.
The course of the nightly action against the PPB followed a fairly predictable pattern: a contingent of notional BLM protesters rendezvoused with a group of antifa black bloc at a public park close to their objective. As they moved towards the police building which was their target, “corkers” -a sort of bicycle-mounted blocking force - closed off side streets and the scouting line - typically on mopeds - moved ahead and on the flanks. Behind them came the main contingent of black bloc. Upon arrival at the PPB the streets were blocked with vehicles and burning dumpsters, with the “corkers” stationed to direct traffic away from the action and the scouts setting up a picket line extending out several blocks, watching for police reinforcements and creating the strong impression of antifa control of territory.
The report goes on to describe typical developments during and after the riot, and concludes:
The dilemma action put the police in a conundrum: police have a responsibility to enforce order and control space, so doing nothing and allowing antifa to occupy and destroy property causes them to appear weak and ineffectual, thus inciting further acts against police. If they appear to respond too aggressively however - or intercept the march before it reaches its location, giving grounds for claims of a first amendment violation - they risk facing allegations of being tyrannical and overbearing.
It is best to think of the ongoing situation in Portland not as a series of otherwise conventional riots, but rather as an insurgency taking place between dueling narratives. Antifa seeks to displace police and steal for itself the mantle of “community defense,” while pinning upon the police the blame for disruption they themselves have caused. The ultimately successful party will be the one that consistently pressures their opponent into playing the assigned role as “the bad guys.”
We should note that the actions described in the report are evidence of training and organization far beyond what one would expect of a "spontaneous" protest movement. These are highly organized events, perpetrated by a trained cadre of leaders and community organizers. This infrastructure must have taken months to build, if not years. It's clear that Antifa/BLM are building a field army. Just like a core national army, they've had their "inner circle" preparing for this for a long time. Now, "conscript soldiers" (i.e. those who support their objectives enough to come out and demonstrate) are being trained during the nightly violence, and radicalized. They'll spread the message further, and take it to areas where enough local support is not available. (Note how many of the rioters in Kenosha were "out-of-towners", not locals: almost 60% of those arrested.)
We aren't dealing with "spontaneous" protests at all. We're dealing with an active, trained, motivated insurrection.
That's confirmed by another report about the demonstrations in Michigan some weeks ago.
The narrative being presented was that these protests were not centrally organized and that they were grass-roots protests just springing up in response to social issues. My time inside the protests verified that this just isn’t true; they are very organized and are being planned by someone.
. . .
The first one I attended was on the University of Michigan campus ... the first speaker pointed out that “allies from RevCom/ANTIFA” were present, just to provide “logistical support” including medical and security teams. The local RevCom leader got up and explained how to find the medics (Large red or green crosses) and explained that security was “circulating among the crowd” for safety. That was an ominous statement, as I’ll point out later.
I began moving through the crowd and quickly spotted several security team members, obviously watching the crowd for anyone who wasn’t clapping or cheering along. It’s important to note that these protests require 100% ideological agreement or they will approach you and become confrontational, so I made sure I was chanting along. I noticed almost immediately that despite the man who said he was the RevCom leader, a young man named Ethan, that I would later have many interactions with, was actually in charge. He is a security team leader within the ANTIFA organization.
The biggest observation from the first protest was that despite the claims that they aren’t organized, they are highly organized by a central organization. Ethan and his security/medical team have been at every protest I’ve attended in Michigan, including one at the Capitol an hour away. They use the ubiquitous BaoFeng Handi-talkie radios to communicate.
Ethan himself most frequently wears Interceptor Body Armor and a Guy Fawkes mask, while dressing in black and red. When he is not personally actually leading the march, he wears the full face Guy Fawkes mask to try and prevent being identified.
Next, I attended a smaller protest that was scheduled in Canton Township, Michigan, a small Detroit suburb. I arrived an hour early, and lo & behold, Ethan and his crew were already in place. The protest met in a local grocery store lot and Ethan’s team was patrolling the lot, checking cars for people who appeared to be watching the protest.
. . .
A few days later, I was attending a BLM protest in downtown Detroit. This one was different. The organizers, while they accepted the RevCom/ANTIFA medical assistance, refused the offer to assist with security and had their own provided by the local Masons club. Ethan was not to be stumped…despite their claims to refuse outside assistance to prevent “agitators”, I quickly found Ethan and his entire security team hidden among the crowd, still using radios, and conducting serious counter-surveillance, including snapping a few photos of me.
. . .
The next few protests were more of the same, with Ethan and his team following and intimidating anyone who didn’t appear to belong. They followed people to their vehicles and recorded license plate numbers. It’s important to note that they were very obvious about recording the numbers, in an attempt to intimidate anyone who might oppose their viewpoint.
At the Capitol protest, the game changed significantly. Ethan and his team met up with other RevCom/ANTIFA and BLM security teams from around the state and all were openly carrying arms, including long guns. Many of the ANTIFA people who showed up all in black were wearing helmets and soft armor, so they were ready for violence. They actively harassed and intimidated anyone they deemed as “Militia”.
. . .
As a follow-up, after I observed one protest in Detroit, my friend Ethan came out of the shadows and made a Twitter post that the Detroit Police had tried to run him over, complete with video. I was there. They surrounded the police cars and began beating on them, trying to force the police to use deadly force or hit them with the cars. The entire situation was a set-up designed to produce a new incident to create more tension and protests.
So, if you find "demonstrations" coming to streets near you, be aware that they're unlikely to be actual "protests". Rather, they're likely to be organized actions to destabilize your area, provoke police, and further the aims of the enemies of this nation, who seek to overthrow it from within. It's "terrorism lite" - and may become heavier as the elections draw closer.
I think it's important not to overreact to such provocations, because that's exactly what those behind them want. They'd like nothing more than to spread violence and bloodshed across our country. Rather, hold back your anger, no matter how justified, and let the authorities handle it. Of course, if the insurgents are stupid enough to threaten you with harm that you can't otherwise avoid, then all bets are off. On such occasions, Captain John Parker's orders at Lexington come to mind.
Tucker Carlson is, in my opinion, a national treasure, because he's one of the few commenters willing to put the truth out there, complete with supporting evidence, and let it speak for itself. He doesn't lie to us, unlike so many other so-called "journalists" who wouldn't recognize a fact if it bit them in the butt.
Here's Mr. Carlson's address from last night. THIS NEEDS TO GO VIRAL! He speaks nothing less than the truth in everything he says, and backs it up with video clips and other evidence. Watch the first 17 minutes of this video, and see for yourself - then tell your friends to do the same. The more people who see this, the better. It speaks for itself.
EDITED TO ADD: It looks like Mr. Carlson's video clip on YouTube has been censored. I've left the embed up, so you can see for yourself that the account associated with it has been removed. Why would they do that? I'll leave you to figure that out for yourself. However, the video is still available on Fox News. You'll find it here. Please click over there and watch it. It's truly worth your time.
This is what the November elections are all about. It's a choice between democracy and tyranny; between capitalism and socialism; between individual rights and the rule of the mob; between truth and lies.
It's hard to make sense of the current state of US trade with the Far East, particularly China ... If you put those two reports side-by-side, something's seriously out of whack. Imports can't be lower than ever by one metric, but higher than ever by another!
I'd love to know what's going on to cause this confusion. I suspect it has several causes ... Clearly, there are a lot of mis-matches somewhere in the system.
If anyone has a better idea what's going on, please share it with us in Comments, as US imports are a key economic metric.
Shipping lines continually slashed prices in years past to compete in declining markets. Under the health crisis that has rocked the global economy, however, carrier executives have reined back capacity in a display of discipline they’d long talked about but had never undertaken.
Container shipping has been marred by chronic excess capacity, and carriers have responded by undercutting each other in endless battles for market share at the expense of profit margins. Freight rates have often gone into tailspins that left revenues barely covering operational costs.
As demand collapsed from the city lockdowns in March and April, however, liner companies started canceling sailings and sidelining ships. At the same, falling oil prices because of pandemic-induced lockdowns sent fuel costs for carriers down sharply, a reversal from expectations that bunker costs would soar after a mandatory switch to cleaner fuels.
“All of a sudden, supply came in line with demand with huge fuel savings as a bonus,” said Jonathan Roach, container analyst at London-based Braemar ACM Shipbroking. “Doom and gloom forecasts were put aside and so far, we are looking at a highly profitable year.”
. . .
The turnaround suggests a new business approach has taken hold. Long-held convictions that big fleets and dominant market share would somehow, someday lead to profits have faded. Operators now insist they’ll deploy capacity only where it will pay.
If shipping lines are now sailing their vessels only when demand justifies it, that factors in to US trans-Pacific trade. Ships that are moving are filled to near capacity. That factors into trade calculations, as the volume/percentage of a ship's cargo (i.e. number of containers per vessel) that's offloaded on our shores goes up. However, if there's reduced demand, ships that would normally be sailing with partial cargoes are no longer being dispatched. If numbers of ships are used as a metric of trans-Pacific commerce, clearly, trade has fallen off. The actual number of containers shipped, and/or the value of their contents, are also factors, of course; but between both earlier metrics, the confusion over import volumes may be explained.
In case you're wondering why I pay attention to shipping and transportation, remember that they're critical metrics in assessing the health (or otherwise) of nations and economies. General Omar N. Bradley is credited with the saying, "Amateurs study tactics; professionals study logistics". He was speaking in a military context, of course, but it applies equally well to the study of economics. If you want a "canary in the coal mine" for what's coming our way, good or bad, in business and commerce, I don't know a better warning sign than the health of the logistics sector.
I did a double-take when I read this article yesterday.
Solving route planning is among the most important problems in the transportation industry. The dilemma is often framed in context of the so-called traveling salesman problem: What is the fastest way for a salesman to make multiple stops in multiple cities?
. . .
Routific, like many companies, has turned to the natural world for solutions. Driving its proprietary software is a popular algorithm based on the famous foraging behavior of honeybees, in which returning bees perform a waggle dance in front of other bees in the hive to indicate where a promising flower patch resides. As more bees flock to that particular spot, Kuo explained, they start branching out to other locations, ultimately optimizing a route for the entire colony.
A well-known method, the bee algorithm alone isn’t sufficient for real-world application, Kuo said, and Routific’s proprietary software is an evolution of that heuristic.
. . .
Offering up a case study, Kuo said a customer with 20 trucks in California, delivering 2,500 packages a day, was able to reduce its fleet by five trucks and saved $200,000 annually simply by optimizing the routes.
Clearly, I have a warped mind. I can't help imagining a delivery truck coming back to the depot or warehouse, then (as soon as its driver has entered the building) doing a waggle dance in front of the other trucks, to tell them which way to go next!
This could cause complications. For example, would a Nissan or Toyota truck do the waggle dance in interpretive Japanese steps (or turns)? And would a GM or Ford truck understand it? Inquiring minds want to know!
