Stop AB 962, The Bill That Could Kill

In the never ending war against liberty, California is considering passing a bill that would likely result in accidental shooting deaths and injuries. The bill would prevent handgun owners from practicing sufficiently to maintain their skills. If a gun owner is forced to use a firearm in self defense, society at large will be much safer if that person has recently been target shooting and is not fumbling around incompetently. Regular practice can mean the difference between the bad guy getting shot and a stray round striking property or an innocent bystander.

The bill would reduce safe practice by:

• Forbidding the sale or transfer of more than 50 rounds of handgun ammo per month to anyone who is not a licensed dealer
• Require ammo only be bought in person (i.e. banning mail order sales)
• Requiring vendors to keep a record of every ammo sale and report all sales to the state
• Require vendors to keep all ammo out of reach from customers so that buyers must seek assistance from staff before purchasing
• Require vendors to pay a licensing fee to the state (even if they already have a license to sell firearms)

Anti-gun people will probably think I’m crazy for opposing these restrictions, but take a moment to think it through before you decide. A leisurely one hour practice session with a hand gun for most people consumes about 200 rounds of ammunition, even when most of that hour is spent loading magazines, setting up targets, inspecting targets, collecting spent brass and other non-shooting tasks. A semi-automatic hand gun fires a round as quickly as the user can pull the trigger. In a regular slow fire practice session, a person will fire a shot every few seconds. Thus, a standard 10 round magazine will be emptied in about 30 seconds. 50 rounds of ammo during an unhurried practice session can be consumed in about 2.5 minutes of firing. If the shooter is practicing double taps, defensive shooting and quick reloads they might go through 50 rounds of ammo in less than half of that time (1min 15sec). Do you really think it a good idea for people with potentially lethal defense tools to be forbidden to practice with them for more than 1-2 minutes per month? What will happen when an unpracticed gun owner tries to defend themselves? Where will the bullets go if they they pull the trigger and miss the bad guy?

To make matters worse, the law doesn’t seem to distinguish between different types of hand guns. A typical concealed carry permit holder might be allowed to legally carry two or three different kinds of guns. For example, they might be permitted to carry a tiny gun that can be easily hidden under summer clothing, and a regular gun that can be concealed under normal clothing. Chances are good that those two guns will use different kinds of ammunition. If you are only allowed 50 rounds of ammo per month and need to practice with two different guns, you can practice with each gun half as much. That brings us down to maybe one minute of practice per month per gun, less time than you spend brushing your teeth before you go to bed each night.

As if this wasn’t bad enough, gun owners commonly own both a rifle and a handgun that fires the exact same type of ammunition. This simplifies ammunition purchases and lets them carry a single type of ammo when shooting. .22 rimfire, 9mm, .38 special, .357 magnum, .44 magnum and .44 special are a few examples of ammunition commonly used by both rifles and handguns. How can you prove to an ammo vendor what kind of gun you plan to fire their ammo through?

A single round of .45ACP ammunition costs about $0.30 if purchased in bulk (1000 rounds) over the internet. If purchased in a typical 50 round box at a local gun store, a single round will cost about $0.40, 25% more than by bulk. If we ban bulk purchases and tack on licensing fees and compliance costs, the price of ammo could go up by 50%. The cost of ammunition for a typical one hour 200 round practice session with a common .45ACP pistol would go from $60 to $90 (assuming they remembered to save up 4 months worth of ammo to allow for a one hour practice session). Such a large increase would significantly discourage practice.

Note that a similar Federal law was repealed in 1986 after the BATF testified that it was useless at preventing crime. The City of Pasadena passed a similar law, and repealed it two years later after realizing that they were generating a huge and costly database wasn't actually helping the police.

Please contact your state assemblyperson and the senators on the California appropriations committee to demand that they oppose this bill. Even if you hate guns you should oppose this bill because it will only serve to reduce the competency of law abiding gun owners without reducing gun ownership. No matter how you feel about guns, it is in your best interest that whoever squeezes a trigger on a firearm be well practiced, accurate and safe when they do it.

S.C.O.T.U.S. Affirms 2nd Amendment (sort of)

By now, nearly everyone has heard of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that overturned the Washington D.C. ban on handguns. For the most part, it affirmed the 2nd Amendment, which is fantastic news for anyone who believes in the right to bear arms for self defense, checking government power, or both. It also affirmed that the 2nd Amendment bestows an individual right, and not merely a right for militias to bear arms.

For the most part, this ruling made me happy, but I'd like to caution firearms advocates not to celebrate too hard. There are several things that really should be considered about this ruling, lest complacency lead firearms owners to think that they can rest on their laurels.


Problem #1:
The fact that this issue was credible enough to make it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court is a bad sign. The 2nd Amendment is very clear, and should not require a prolonged process of legal escalation for a gun ban to be thrown out. The very first judge who looked at this case should have thrown out the ban without much more than a few minutes consideration. What part of "shall not be infringed" did the lower courts not understand when this was first challenged?



Problem #2:
This was a 5 to 4 decision. That means that a single swing vote is all that stood between the highest legal authority in our nation declaring that the 2nd Amendment was null and void. It means that 4 justices, people that are considered the most experienced and powerful legal experts in the country, disagreed with the the decision to uphold the 2nd Amendment. Think about that for a moment. Our country is still dangerously close to invalidating a cornerstone of the U.S. constitution. What happens when this issue comes up again (it will), and on that day we have one additional anti-gun justice on the bench?


Problem #3:
This decision included enough wiggle room for other kinds of gun bans to successfully be passed. Here are some quotes from Justice Scalia:

"Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms."

Note that the 2nd Amendment's "shall not be infringed" wording says nothing about conditional limitations on the right to bear arms. Scalia's comments undermine this simple clarity by saying that it is indeed possible to establish quite a few limitations on firearms ownership, and if enough of these limitation are passed into law, owning, selling and transporting firearms could become so onerous as to create a de facto ban of them.



Don't get me wrong; I think today's ruling came out about as well as we could have expected, and gun owners are entitled to a little celebration. Nevertheless, I think it is important to keep this ruling in perspective and continue to actively support pro-gun organizations and vote against any politician who expresses a desire to further restrict the private ownership of firearms.

NOAA Study Suggests Global Warming Not Increasing Hurricanes

After Hurricane Katrina, lots of people were quick to tell us how global warming was to blame for an increased frequency and intensity of hurricanes. Now, a recent study from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) suggests that this isn't the case. Read the title link for the full story.

This is the sort of thing that frustrates me about globing warming alarmism. Otherwise rational people jump to unsubstantiated beliefs much in the same way primitive peoples used to blame bad things that they didn't understand on evil spirits. We have enough proven and fully understood environmental problems that we can work on without needing to invent a climatic bogey man. Lets cut down on water pollution, slow down population growth, protect some natural habitat and work on things that we can make a definite impact on. When science comes up with a climate model that actually works, is accurate and survives a couple of decades of peer reviews, we can use it to figure out what negative impact mankind is having on global climate and what we can do to minimize it. In the meantime, let's make quantifiable and measurable progress towards making the world a better place without relying on guesswork and ineffective knee jerk legislation that is far more likely to harm our economy than it is to save the planet.

Global Warming or Global Cooling?

The title link is to a great article showing how different sources of historical temperature data tell conflicting stories. Data from NASA implies that global temperatures are increasing while information from the UK Meteorological Office, University of Alabama and Remote Sensing Systems clearly show that temperatures have been falling for quite some time. To further confuse matters, the often cited NASA data did not support global warming until the raw data was massaged to no longer match the original measurements. Older temperatures were interpolated and adjusted downwards, and recent temperatures were presented as higher than the actual raw values that were initially recorded.

I suggest you peruse the entire article, as it offers graphs and visual aids to clearly illustrate the issue and help open-minded rational people understand just how imperfect global temperature predictions are. You might also like to read the much shorter Herald article discussing how global temperatures are not likely to increase in the next decade.

Global warming is an easy and seductive cause precisely because it is so difficult to measure or prove. Climate models are imperfect and ever changing. Good intentions, alarmism and knee jerk reactions have taken the place of objective science in this politically charged issue. Vote to tax SUVs or mandate that corn be turned into fuel instead of food and suddenly you are “saving the planet”. Climatic data never actually needs to improve as lack of success can always be blamed on too little effort, freak climatic anomalies, or the ever popular "we did our part but China’s pollution nullified our efforts". To make matters worse, now that the global warming movement has gained so much momentum, powerful individuals and groups have become vested in the global warming “problem”, and scientists must produce research that supports this belief or risk losing their funding and positions. Science is rapidly being replaced by dogma which makes it much harder for us to objectively learn more about our climate and what impact our species is having on it.

In the late 1800’s there was fear of an impending ice age. By 1930, we were supposedly threatened by global warming. In the 1950s, people decided that global warming wasn’t happening after all. In 1975, the New York Times reported “A Major Cooling Widely Considered to Be Inevitable” and public schools taught children that we were beginning a new ice age. Most of these scares were based on a perceived average surface temperature change between 0.5 and 2 degrees Fahrenheit. Think about that for a moment. As little as ½ of a degree of change has been grounds to proclaim globally and historically significant climate change. Here we are on the surface of a thin crust of rock covering a ball of molten magma spinning around a massive and ever fluctuating ball of burning gas, subject to cosmic radiation, solar flares, plate tectonics and volcanism and yet people really think that a perceived and heavily disputed tiny average temperature change is absolute proof of a long term trend caused by humans. It is especially absurd if you consider how few years worth of data we have to analyze compared to the vast and complex climatic history of our planet.

Glaciers are indeed melting in places, but they are growing in others. In places such as Greenland and Switzerland, receding glaciers have revealed ancient villages, proving that the areas were devoid of glaciers in the not so distant past. How can we then say that the current absence of glaciers in such areas is unnatural and caused by manmade carbon emissions? Sure, polar bears and other species are threatened by climate changes, but so were dinosaurs, woolly mammoths and countless other species that were wiped out long before the dawn of human industry. Our climate is so vastly complex that we are unlikely to understand it well enough within our lifetime to accurately predict long term climate changes.

We would be far better of if kindhearted people applied their good intentions to othe environmental issues where they could make real and measurable progress. If for example, global warming activists instead spent their efforts buying up land to protect it from development, globally distributing contraceptives and educating people about the dangers of overpopulation, they could protect a vast amount of unspoiled habitat and slow the rate of new polluting consumers being brought into the world.

Malkin Criticizes Coulter for Slur

As any reader of this blog can tell, I am neither a conservative nor a Republican. Nevertheless, I often enjoy reading Michelle Malkin's blog, as her views are similar to mine on the subject of illegal immigration. Most of all, I enjoy her sincerity and class. The title link is to an example of her doing the right thing and not engaging in blind party solidarity.

As most have heard, Ann Coulter recently made a comment at a conservative convention that more or less called John Edwards a f@ggot. Often in politics, you see influential people of like ideology overlooking each other's wrongdoings or standing shoulder to shoulder and congratulating each other on the wittiness of their personal attacks. Malkin did not buy into this, and rightly tore into Coulter on her blog:

We expect CPAC to be a place where conservative role models speak with clarity, passion, and integrity. There are enough spewers of mindless filth, vulgarity, and hatred on TV, at the movies, and in the public schools. We don't expect our children to be exposed to that garbage at the nation's preeminent conservative gathering.

...

With a single word, Coulter sullied the hard work of hundreds of CPAC participants and exhibitors and tarred the collective reputation of thousands of CPAC attendees.

Nice work, Malkin!

UPDATE:
It looks like conservative blogger Hugh Hewitt has also entered the fray:

The use of a hateful slur word in a public forum is beyond the pale. It saddens me that we can’t have unanimity on such a simple and basic point.

As for me, in spite of all the thoughtful emails I’ve received to the contrary, I’m sticking with my original assessment of Ann and her “joke”: Idiotic. Disgusting. Stupid. Moronic.

It's good to see people speaking out for what is right, even if it might cost them a storm of complaint email from the more radical segment of their fans.

Global Warming or Global Cooling?

Ever since Al Gore's documentary won an Academy Award, I've heard a number of people authoritatively claiming that the concept of "global warming" is an undisputed and undeniable fact. This is wrong, and can only be said by someone who is either ignorant or who cares more about a political agenda than they do about the scientific method.

Here are some quotes from a recent TIME article on the subject. Before you read these quotes, keep in mind that TIME is a product of AOL Time Warner, and is considered by many to have somewhat of a leftist political bias, so this should not be dismissed as anti-Gore/pro-corporate political dogma:

... a growing number of scientists are beginning to suspect that many seemingly contradictory meteorological fluctuations are actually part of a global climatic upheaval. However widely the weather varies from place to place and time to time, when meteorologists take an average of temperatures around the globe they find that the atmosphere has been growing gradually cooler for the past three decades. The trend shows no indication of reversing. Climatological Cassandras are becoming increasingly apprehensive, for the weather aberrations they are studying may be the harbinger of another ice age.

Telltale signs are everywhere —from the unexpected persistence and thickness of pack ice in the waters around Iceland to the southward migration of a warmth-loving creature like the armadillo from the Midwest.Since the 1940s the mean global temperature has dropped about 2.7° F.

Please click on the title link and read this entire article. There is an abundance of scientific data to support the idea of global cooling, and the scientific community is very divided about whether we are facing global warming or global cooling. If people truly care about human impact on the environment, they need to stop fixating on the trendy and politically popular myth that global warming is an established fact. If we as a species are having an adverse impact on the planet, we need to consider all available data and use the scientific method to find a comprehensive explanation of the nature and cause of that impact.

If we let ourselves be suckered by Gore and other political activists into thinking that their assertions are unchallenged scientific facts, we may exclude other ideas that might better be able explain or minimize our impact on the environment. Gore definitely has a political agenda, and his annual $30,000 energy bill makes me suspect that his environmental activism is more about self promotion than saving the planet. Environmental activism can be hugely profitable for those people at the top of powerful environmental organizations or who manage to seize the limelight. Whenever someone screams "The sky is falling!" people line up to make donations to that cause, and some of that money is used to pay hefty salaries and fund lavish lecture junkets. I bring this up not to claim that Gore and other global warming activists are all thieving liars, but rather to point out that we should not treat their words as gospel. Climatology is a a matter of science and should be decided by the scientific community at large after considering all available data. It is not in our best interest to place blind faith in self-promoting politicians who selectively publicize their favorite bits of "evidence" while blithely ignoring vast amounts of conflicting data.

Further Reading:
If you have an open mind and would like to learn about a less frequently publicized aspect of environmental theory, you might enjoy Michael Crichton's novel, State of Fear. While the plot isn't terribly realistic or gripping, it does a good job of explaining how the environmental movement isn't necessarily as selfless as many like to think. It also does a nice job of weaving an opposing view to global warming within the context of an easy to read story. The book is riddled with foot notes citing specific scientific studies and bits of evidence that refute simplistic global warming theories, so in addition to proving some light entertainment it also can serve as a starting point to help people delve into less publicized climatological data.

3 Minute History of American Warfare

Maps Of War has a brief animated list of the various wars that the United States of America has been involved in. It zooms to areas of conflict on a map, shows the number of American deaths from that war, and then attributes those deaths to the political party that was in charge at the time the war began. At the end, you can compare which political party was responsible for leading us into conflicts that resulted in the most American deaths.

Click on the title link and then click "Play" when the map finishes loading.

Note:
I have not verified the accuracy of each piece of information presented in this animation.

Libertarian Response to State of the Union Address

Here are some highlights followed by my own thoughts:

Health Care:

...health care reforms should be the province of state and local governments. The federal government should not be involved; there is nothing in the U.S. Constitution granting it license for such involvement.

Look at how many people come here from Canada for serious medical procedures rather than trust their nationalized health care system. Look at how many people in the UK go to private clinics to get better and faster treatment rather than use the far cheaper practitioners of socialized medicine. Anyone who has switched from an HMO to a PPO type of medical insurance will tell you how much better it is to have more control over your own health care decisions. Under an HMO, I was told what kind of medicine and treatments I was allowed to have. Doctors would recommend a medicine for me, and then give me something less effective when they realized the good stuff wasn't covered by my plan. Under a PPO, my doctor offers me whatever she thinks will best help me and then offers me other choices if I can't afford the good stuff. Under my HMO, it took me over 3 months before I could get permission to see a specialist. Under a PPO it took me 3 days. National/Universal/Socialized health care would effectively create the world's worst HMO, and government policy makers would decide what treatments patients are allowed to have and what medicines doctors are allowed to prescribe.

Education:

Today, Republicans and Democrats compete over which big government programs and mandates can be forced on state and local governments. No Child Left Behind should not be reauthorized. Bush said he wants children in failing schools to have additional options. We agree, but that should be left to state and local governments to hash out.

"No Child Left Behind" should have been named "Let's All Be Mediocre and Illiterate Together". All this program has done is take away from teachers the ability to tailor coursework to best help their students. Miscreants and slackers are pushed through the system along with everyone else because it's virtually impossible to flunk them. Non-English speaking Illegal alien children are given the same resources (and more) than citizen children of tax payers. I say we do the best we can for the majority of children so that most kids can fully realize their potential. Take the kids who can't or won't learn academics and put them into remedial vocational schools where they can learn rudimentary literacy, basic math and some job skills that will help them support themselves. Why try and force fractions and algebra on kids that won't do any homework?

Energy:

If we want the lowest possible energy prices and alternative energy sources to develop, we need to get government out of the energy business and let the free market work.

Amen. Stop subsidizing anything to do with oil and level the playing field for alternative forms of energy development. If oil R&D becomes more expensive, oil companies will pass on that cost consumers and alternative fuels will become more attractive to the public. Don't go overboard and tell automakers what kind of cars to make or create new taxes on oil companies, just back away and let free market competition solve our problem in a fair environment.

Government Spending:

The President indicated that he intends to exercise some spending restraint and to balance the budget. He also suggested reforms that are supposed to prevent billions of taxpayer dollars from being spent on earmarks. Those are fine words, but we should look at his actions, too. ...If he is truly opposed to earmarks, he could have used his veto power, but he didn't. If a Libertarian president had been handed such bills, they would have gone, unsigned, back to the Hill with a simple message attached: For the sake of the American people, become financially responsible now.

Republicans are just as bad as Democrats when it comes to throwing away our money. Don't look expect reform from any incumbents in the big two parties, spending our tax dollars is how they exercise and maintain their power. Vote them out of office and throw your support behind 3rd party reformers. If even a few big party politicians are seriously threatened by 3rd party reformers, things change. Look at how the Republicans pushed the "small government" agenda in the early 90's after Ross Perot split their presidential vote and helped elect Democrat Bill Clinton into the presidency.

Jon Stewart on Ted Stevens and the Internet

The title link is to a clip on YouTube.com of Jon Stewart mocking Ted Stevens and government ignorance of the internet. I thought it would be a fun way to wrap up this series on government and technology. (I found the link for this file on the IPAC blog, a non-partisan organization dedicated to preserving information freedom through balanced information policy.)

The reason I wrote this series is that I believe we tech-savvy people have a duty to help protect our nation from ignorant politicians. We know how important technology is, and what a huge impact it can have on our lives. It is vital that we research the people that we vote for and make sure we aren't electing people who think of the telegraph as a new-fangled hi-tech device. If someone is running for office, we can’t afford to just vote for them because they've held that office since before we were born. If a representative makes an ass out of himself while giving a speech about technology (ex: Ted Stevens), write him a scathing letter and then vote him out of office (don't send email as he probably won't know how to use it). We can also help defend against technology-ignorant politicians by discussing major technological issues with other voters. Remember that people who don’t know much about technology are less likely to get their news online, so a conversation might be the only way they learn about important technology issues.

Technology and Government

As a follow up to the Ted Stevens post, I here are two more examples of what happens when ignorant government officials make technological decisions for our entire nation:

Example #1: File Sharing Technology
Peer-to-peer file sharing technology allows computer users all over the world to easily exchange files in a manner that is difficult to monitor, track or prevent. As a result, this technology is heavily used to illegally distribute and download music recordings, movies and other copyrighted material. This illegal activity, however, does not mean that file sharing technology is “bad” and that it has no legitimate uses. Peer-to-Peer technology is a fantastic way to distribute information over the internet without overloading a single server or network. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) doesn't care that this technology can be also be used for legally distributing files, and thus they launched a campaign to crush file sharing technology. Eventually this issue ended up before the U.S. Supreme Court, and all nine justices unanimously decided that peer-to-peer companies like Grokster can be held liable for copyright piracy on their networks.

According to Justice Sourter:
"There is no evidence that either company (Grokster or StreamCast) made an effort to filter copyrighted material from users' downloads or otherwise impede the sharing of copyrighted files."

According to Donald Verrilli Jr., an entertainment industry lawyer:
"Copyright infringement is the only commercially significant use of file sharing"

In short, a group of very elderly Justices who have most likely never even used peer-to-peer technology and who don't understand its potential have declared open season on people who facilitate it's usage. Now, people who facilitate peer-to-peer networks are faced with the impossible and immoral task of censoring all traffic on their servers (which they would probably get sued for) or risk being sued out of business by the RIAA.

The ironic thing is that since this decision, the entertainment industry is now partnering with peer-to-peer companies such as BitTorrent and Guba.com to distribute their movies and content. Likewise, Apple has all but formally announced that their next operating system will include bit torrent technology to allow for easier distribution of patches and possibly even some files from iTunes. Thus, the very technology that has been under attack as being only useful to pirates is suddenly being embraced by the industries that have been trying to destroy it.

Example #2: RFIDs in Passports
The U.S. State Department plans to start issuing e-passports to Americans starting in August. This will entail embedding an RFID chip in passports that contains your identification information. This would allow devices to scan the passport from a short distance to retrieve this identity information, and will supposedly make for faster and more accurate processing at customs checkpoints. The problem is, this technology is NOT secure.

Hackers have already figured out how to create long range RFID scanners that can read this sort of information over long distances (i.e., from many yards away). They have also figured out how to change the information embedded into RFIDs, and even transmit a virus via RFIDs. And all of this before the first e-passport was even issued! Imagine what hackers will be able to do in 10 years by the time this first generation of e-passports expire? Will anti-American terrorists use this to identify targets for kidnapping? Will terrorists capture your identity from a distance, and then embed that identity into a chip on their own fake passport so that they can travel without the hassle of being arrested? All of these things will probably be possible in the near future. Google for RFID Hacking if you'd like to see some of the ways RFIDs have already been compromised by hackers.

Sen. Ted Stevens Clueless About Internet

The title link is to an .mp3 recording of comments made by U.S. Senator Ted Stevens. He is chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and was a big reason why the so called "Net Neutrality" bill was shot down. This sound bite is part of his 11 minute speech against the Net Neutrality clause. Please click on the title link and listen to the 2.5 minute clip before reading further.

This is a typical example of how people in our government are regulating areas of our lives that they know absolutely nothing about.

Senator Stevens (recently famous for Alaska's $320 million dollar bridge to nowhere), was born over 80 years ago and lived nearly all of his life before the internet even became accessible to the average consumer. It would be very surprising if he knew much about the internet, and his rambling speech proves that he knows absolutely nothing about how it works. Nevertheless, he, and people like him, are deciding on what kinds of regulations should be placed on the internet. This will affect how much people pay to use the internet and what kind of content consumers are able to access. It could even effect what content providers survive.

I find this very frustrating. There is no shame in someone from his generation and cultural context not understanding the internet, but it is infuriating that someone who can't even grasp the fundamental concepts is a key player in regulating what has become the most vital communication system in the world. The internet delivers information and entertainment to and facilitates commerce for nearly a 1.5 BILLION people and should not be regulated by those who aren't even vaguely familiar with it.

Why can't these politicians get some help from their staffers, do some basic research and actually learn about an issue before they start making policy? Either their egos are so bloated that they don't realize the magnitude of their ignorance or they are utterly owned by lobbyists and corporations and just make up stuff to defend the positions they are paid to take. Why do voters even allow jerks like him to govern us? Is Ted Stevens really the best that Alaska has to offer as a senatorial candidate?

For those of you not familiar with the "Net Neutrality Issue", here's a quick summary:

AT&T and other Network Infrastructure owners have expressed a desire to charge additional money from web sites and services that you visit/use in exchange for not blocking your access to access them. For example, your ISP could tell someone like YouTube.com or Google.com to pay them extra money if they want to ensure that you and other users of that ISP/phone lines are able to view their content without undue slowness.

This is admittedly a biased oversimplification of the issue, but since most people who visit this site are fairly tech savvy, I don't want to spend too much time explaining all of the details of Network Neutrality in this post. If you'd like more information, try this Wikipedia link.

500 WMD's Found In Iraq

It looks like we not only found WMD's in Iraq, but we found them quite some time ago and they are just now bothering to announce it. Here's an excerpt from the foxnews.com story:

Reading from a declassified portion of a report by the National Ground Intelligence Center, a Defense Department intelligence unit, Santorum said: "Since 2003, coalition forces have recovered approximately 500 weapons munitions which contain degraded mustard or sarin nerve agent. Despite many efforts to locate and destroy Iraq's pre-Gulf War chemical munitions, filled and unfilled pre-Gulf War chemical munitions are assessed to still exist."

...

"This says weapons have been discovered, more weapons exist and they state that Iraq was not a WMD-free zone, that there are continuing threats from the materials that are or may still be in Iraq," said Rep. Pete Hoekstra, R-Mich., chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

The weapons are thought to be manufactured before 1991 so they would not be proof of an ongoing WMD program in the 1990s. But they do show that Saddam Hussein was lying when he said all weapons had been destroyed, and it shows that years of on-again, off-again weapons inspections did not uncover these munitions.

Granted these weapons were old and do not prove the existence of recent WMD manufacturing, but they do serve to regain some of our credibility on the Iraq issue. I find it odd that the Bush administration wasn't trumpeting this earlier, but perhaps it's more politically expedient to reveal this now when his poll numbers are slowly beginning to recover. If we found these weapons after critics have begun to say that they don't exist, I wonder what else we might eventually uncover over time.

Where Are the Unions on Illegal Immigration?

I've often wondered how labor unions and union members feel about the issue of illegal immigration. Unions constantly badger non-union mega-employers such as Wal-Mart about how they don't pay a fair working wage (which I actually think is true). Unions are some of the largest, wealthiest and most influential political entities in our country and are adversely affected by illegal immigration every day. After all, every employer that hires an illegal alien for skilled manual labor is in effect reducing opportunities and wages for union workers. Construction, in particular, is turning more and more to illegal alien laborers and away from more costly union workers. This is why it puzzles me that unions seem to be quiet on this issue.

The title link is to a humaneventsonline.com story about how the Bush administration supposedly plans to put in a super highway to connect Mexico and Canada. Though I've never heard this reported elsewhere and can't vouch for the veracity of the story, here are some quotes that should make union workers angry:

Once complete, the new road will allow containers from the Far East to enter the United States through the Mexican port of Lazaro Cardenas, bypassing the Longshoreman’s Union in the process. The Mexican trucks, without the involvement of the Teamsters Union, will drive on what will be the nation’s most modern highway straight into the heart of America.

...

A good reason Bush does not want to secure the border with Mexico may be that the administration is trying to create express lanes for Mexican trucks to bring containers with cheap Far East goods into the heart of the U.S., all without the involvement of any U.S. union workers on the docks or in the trucks.

Since the unions have tremendous influence over national politics, and the Democratic party in particular, I would think that now is the time for them to clamor for pro-border security and anti-illegal immigration candidates and policies. The Bush administration has engendered a lot of outrage, and is at risk of a national anti-Republican backlash at the polls that could potentially cost them control of congress. In this climate, it should be pretty easy for a Democrat to get elected this November. If unions use their vast political influence, they could see to it that illegal immigration is greatly reduced. (Don’t get me wrong, as a neo-libertarian I’m no more in favor of Democrats than Republicans, but I like the idea of anyone who will actually do something to stem illegal immigration.)

Readers of my blog and web site know very well that I'm not a big fan of unions, but it just seems like the illegal alien issue would be the perfect rallying cry for them. Given our current political climate I would think their influence could be used to great affect for the benefit of all legal workers, and in particular, union workers.

Knife Amnesty in the UK

From the BBC:

Machetes, meat cleavers and axes as well as knives were among the haul of 17,715 surrendered to the 43 police forces across England and Wales.

...

Mr Coaker urged those who had not yet handed in their weapons to do so.

"The initial figures for the first week of that campaign are very encouraging, " he said.

"That is 17,715 fewer weapons that can be used in a crime against ordinary, law-abiding citizens.

"If you carry a knife out of self-defense, you run the risk of having it turned on you. Carrying a knife is illegal and will not be tolerated. It could land you four years in prison"

...

Police say that from 1 July tough action will be taken on those found armed with knives.

However, some families of victims of knife crime have questioned the effectiveness of an amnesty, calling instead for tougher sentencing.

I know the weapon bans have been going on for quite some time, but every time I read about them I still get angry. These pompous and officious fools have no moral right to tell people they should remain as helpless as possible in order to maintain public safety. This crap about "carry a knife out of self-defense and run the risk of having it turned on you" is not justification for disarming people. Sure, some fools might think that a knife makes them invincible, but they probably aren't bright enough to survive an attack no matter if they are armed or not. Those who actually bother to learn how to use a self defense tool, such as a knife, pepper spray, stout walking stick or best of all, a firearm, are going to be able to do a lot of public good. A trained and armed person is less likely to be a victim, more likely to help someone else and more likely to remove a criminal from society.

This issue of disarming the public is never truly about public safety. Disarming the public only benefits criminals who want helpless targets and governments that wish to control people. Police officers prefer to arrest unarmed people. Leaders don't want to worry about rebellion when they pass laws that they know will anger the people. Keep in mind that it is already against the law to harm someone else without a good reason (e.g., self defense). Thus, outlawing weapons is redundant unless there are motives other than public safety. If you have a weapon and don't hurt anybody, you aren't a problem. If you use a weapon to harm someone, you've already broken battery and/or murder laws, regardless of the weapon. If you use a weapon to scare someone without cause, you have broken assault and/or robbery laws, regardless of the weapon.

Border Patrol Against Guest Worker Program

(photo from of msnbc.com)

According to the Detroit Free Press story in the title link, the Border patrol agents:

welcome proposals to clamp down on illegal immigration, but they also want a crackdown on employers who hire undocumented immigrants

support President George W. Bush's call to raise the total number of agents protecting the southern border by 6,000 to 18,000

support Thursday's Senate action to extend barriers erected along the border with Mexico and to deploy more vehicles and technologies to frustrate illegal entry

part ways with Bush on his guest worker program, a centerpiece of the Senate's immigration legislation. And they believe that without cracking down on employers, higher-paying U.S. jobs will remain a magnet for down-and-out people in Mexico

So there you have it: the professionals who are charged with the duty of securing our border want employers punished for hiring illegal aliens, want more man power, barriers and enforcement technology and are against the guest worker program.

Here are some more quotes:

On the Web site of U.S. Border Patrol Local 2544, the union that represents agents along much of the Arizona border with Mexico, there's contempt for Bush and Democrats as they work on immigration law.

"Every day that President Bush and the Senate hold real border security hostage to their misguided amnesty program, thousands upon thousands of illegal aliens continue to flood into the country," reads the chapter's home page. "Make no mistake, most of them get by us. We are losing this war, and it's not even close."

"The interior enforcement has taken a backseat to border enforcement. So once they get past the border, they're home free," said Albon. "If they don't have jobs that they can come to, then there's no reason for them to come, and they would stay where they are."

Xenophobic Mexico's Hypocrisy

Mexico and Mexican's often decry our desire to stop illegal immigration as racist and xenophobic. In their opinion, any attempt on our part to secure the U.S. borders and limit who is allowed to immigrate here is immoral. Take a look at these excerpts from a DetNews.com story and see how they do things in Mexico:

In Mexico, non-natives are banned from those and thousands of other jobs, even if they are legal, naturalized citizens.

Foreign-born Mexicans can't hold seats in either house of the congress. They're also banned from state legislatures, the Supreme Court and all governorships. Many states ban foreign-born Mexicans from spots on town councils. And Mexico's Constitution reserves almost all federal posts, and any position in the military and merchant marine, for "native-born Mexicans."

Recently the Mexican government has gone even further. Since at least 2003, it has encouraged cities to ban non-natives from such local jobs as firefighters, police and judges.

How can Mexico and Mexican immigrants be so hypocritical as to protest against our efforts to protect our borders? Just about the only job barred to non-natives in our country is President of the United States. Whenever I learn more about Mexico's immigration laws, I find it tempting to build walls and mine fields along the border just to spite them. If we passed half of the restrictions on foreigners that Mexico uses, there would be rioting and bloodshed all over our nation.

The foreign-born make up just 0.5 percent of Mexico's 105 million people, compared with about 13 percent in the United States, which has a total population of 299 million. Mexico grants citizenship to about 3,000 people a year, compared to the U.S. average of almost a half million.

Can you believe this? We should tell Vincente Fox and his corrupt henchmen to go suck eggs the next time they drag their hypocritical butts in front of a microphone to complain about U.S. border security and immigration policy.

BS from Bush on Immigration Reform

Here are some highlights from President’s Bush’s Monday night speech and my responses to him. (Click on the title link if you'd like to read the entire transcript at businessweek.com.)

For decades, the United States has not been in complete control of its borders. As a result, many who want to work in our economy have been able to sneak across our border -- and millions have stayed.

Once here, illegal immigrants live in the shadows of our society. Many use forged documents to get jobs, and that makes it difficult for employers to verify that the workers they hire are legal. Illegal immigration puts pressure on public schools and hospitals...strains state and local budgets...and brings crime to our communities.

Yep, this is all true. Unfortunately, Bush, you have no credibility on this topic because you have done absolutely nothing to resolve this problem. On the contrary, you have condemned the people of the Minutemen Project as vigilantes, and have spent far more effort comforting and placating Mexico's president rather than securing our porous borders. According to some reports, your administration even hampered the Border Patrol for political reasons. With this as your background, why should anyone look to you for a solution?

First, the United States must secure its borders. This is a basic responsibility of a sovereign Nation. It is also an urgent requirement of our national security.

This hasn't happened throughout nearly two full terms of you in power. Why should we believe you will do anything now?

Since I became President, we have increased funding for border security by 66 percent, and expanded the Border Patrol from about 9,000 to 12,000 agents. The men and women of our Border Patrol are doing a fine job in difficult circumstances - and over the past five years, we have apprehended and sent home about six million people entering America illegally.

According to anti-illegal immigration experts, we need roughly 36,000 Border Patrol agents, and in merely upped the number to a third of this. While you are rattling off numbers, why not tell us how many of those 6 million people that were deported returned here within 30 days of being caught?

By the end of 2008, we will increase the number of Border Patrol officers by an additional 6,000. When these new agents are deployed, we will have more than doubled the size of the Border Patrol during my Presidency.

Should we believe you this time, Bush? Last time you promised two thousand additional agents every year, and then delivered only 200. Even if you aren’t lying this time, you are talking about upping their manpower to only half of what is necessary to secure the border.

One way to help during this transition is to use the National Guard. So in coordination with governors, up to 6,000 Guard members will be deployed to our southern border ... This initial commitment of Guard members would last for a period of one year. After that, the number of Guard forces will be reduced as new Border Patrol agents and new technologies come online.

So basically, these troops will start arriving just in time for the next election, with a reasonable chance that they will never even reach full capacity before you reneg and/or decide these troops are needed more in Iraq or Iran. This is too little, too late.

We have expanded the number of beds in our detention facilities, and we will continue to add more.

How about giving us the numbers? The last time you promised to increase the capacity of detention centers, it ended up being by a negligible amount. We have between 12 and 20 million illegal immigrants here right now, with more pouring in every day. Did you fund a few hundred extra beds so you could sound like you were doing something, or are you actually doing something meaningful like doubling our detention capacity?

Second, to secure our border, we must create a temporary worker program. ... I support a temporary worker program that would create a legal path for foreign workers to enter our country in an orderly way, for a limited period of time. ... And temporary workers must return to their home country at the conclusion of their stay.

BS! How does this secure our borders? It simply brings more people here who will encourage their family to do whatever it takes to join them here, including sneaking across our borders illegally. What will the mechanism be for expelling "guest workers" when they overstay their welcome? How will having guest workers here earning minimum wage discourage more illegals from coming here to take those same jobs for cheaper wages? How does it help our country if we import people who will send most of their wages to their home countries rather than participate in our economy?

This program would match willing foreign workers with willing American employers for jobs Americans are not doing.

Oh goody! Just what the American worker wants: Another path for employers to find people who will work for substandard wages so that low-wage Americans will either have to accept less pay and less benefits or go unemployed. Why not just encourage employers to outsource and send our jobs overseas if you don’t want them to be filled by Americans? Are you trying to see how many citizens you can get to draw unemployment, welfare and other tax based aid? This concept of illegals "doing the jobs Americans won't do" is complete and utter bull excrement. We have American workers in coal mines, chemical production plants and all kinds of other horrific jobs. Americans will do ANY job if they receive just compensation. What about the THOUSANDS of black Americans who can’t get jobs repairing the Katrina damage because FEMA contractors are importing illegals to work for less? There are numerous stories that blacks were offered $10/hr for these reconstruction jobs, and then were terminated once the illegal aliens arrived to work for half of that. Are these jobs you claim Americans won’t do?

Third, we need to hold employers to account for the workers they hire. It is against the law to hire someone who is in this country illegally.

You've had many years to do this and chose not to. Why haven't you made this a priority a long time ago? Why did only 3 employers in the entire country face fines for employing illegal aliens in 2004? I could find 10 employers who hire illegals within walking distance of my home. Your people couldn't find more than 3? In the whole country? Over an entire year? And now you want to convince us that you care? You should be going after THOUSANDS of employers every year until the problem stops.

Yet businesses often cannot verify the legal status of their employees, because of the widespread problem of document fraud. Therefore, comprehensive immigration reform must include a better system for verifying documents and work eligibility.

This is just a pathetic way to promote your concept of national id cards. There are already programs in place to verify the social security number of an employee and their right to work. Put the money into enforcing the existing program before you throw money at another program that will not be enforced. Illegal aliens often use invented/random social security numbers. We already have the ability to check if a social security number is valid; just compare it against the records to see that it matches the name and age of the correct living person. We can also quickly determine if multiple employers are contributing too much money into the same Social Security and tax accounts so that one number doesn't get used by multiple people. The truth is, the government likes the Social Security card fraud because it means those illegals who use fake numbers are putting money into the Social Security and tax funds that they will never be able to withdraw or get refunded. It's free money! The government doesn't want to stop this. I heard on the radio a couple of weeks ago that there are illegal aliens who used the Social Security number 000-00-0000 when they obtained jobs. Do you really mean to tell me that the government can't catch that as fraudulent without a costly new identification system?

Some in this country argue that the solution is to deport every illegal immigrant -- and that any proposal short of this amounts to amnesty. I disagree. It is neither wise nor realistic to round up millions of people

This statement is a diversion. Nobody really expects an army to forcibly scour the nation and deport all illegal aliens instantaneously. We expect you to enforce the existing laws and secure the border so that it is no longer desirable to be here illegally. If you find someone, throw them out. If not, make things difficult enough for them so that they don't want to be here so that they go home of their own volition. If employers don’t dare hire them, if schools don’t educate their children for free, if hospitals don’t treat them for free, they will stop coming and start leaving. After a few years of this, the illegal alien problem will go away.

…we must honor the great American tradition of the melting pot, which has made us one Nation out of many peoples. The success of our country depends upon helping newcomers assimilate into our society, and embrace our common identity as Americans. Americans are bound together by our shared ideals, an appreciation of our history, respect for the flag we fly, and an ability to speak and write the English language. English is also the key to unlocking the opportunity of America.

If we are a melting pot, then let’s turn up the heat and make them melt. If you really want them to assimilate, make it happen. Don't let them in unless they speak passable English. Make English our national language. Stop printing government forms in 20+ languages. Require immigrants to pass a simple English test to get residency and a more difficult one to become citizens. How can we be a united nation if our people can't even talk to each other?

Bottom line:
Don’t give us any more of your disingenuous posturing designed to trick us into thinking you are helping. Enforce our existing laws, secure the borders and do your sworn duty to safeguard our nation. So far you have dropped the ball and betrayed our entire nation, and your recent speech did little to improve upon your gastly track record.

Today Is the Illegal Alien Boycott Day

Don't forget:
If you are an illegal alien, today is the day to boycott American goods and services, stay home from work, keep your kids out of schools and/or go somewhere and protest. According to illegal alien activists, this is how you will put pressure on our nation to let you stay here. It is more likely that such actions will simply show the nation how big of a problem you have become, but by all means give it a shot and see what happens. :)


If you are against illegal immigration and want to combat the effects of the boycott, spend some money. If you get lucky, you might even get reimbursed for up to $640 of your purchases if you send your receipts to the John and Ken show today. Also consider writing the people on this list and let them know you are against amnesty for illegal aliens.

Those of you living, working or passing through areas with large populations of illegal aliens might want to allow some extra time for your commutes as past demonstrations have targeted freeways and other areas for maximum disruption. If you do get caught in a traffic mess, don't get frustrated as this sort of disruption is a great sign for those of us who are against illegal immigration. The more of a nuissance the illegal alien movement makes of themselves, the more the rest of America will be inclined to support tougher immigration reforms.

Support the May 1st Boycott

AmericanPatrol has posted this CNN footage about the supposedly upcoming May 1 Boycott. In short, the idea is for Illegal Aliens and their sympathizers to boycott America that day. The boycott consists of not going to work, preventing their children from going to school, not buying or selling anything and avoiding all forms of business. The idea behind this is to shock the nation with the amount of economic damage that they can cause in order to convince us how important they are to us all.

I'd like to formally announce my support of this boycott. I hope as many illegal aliens participate in this event as possible. I hope the boycott is a wild success and that they manage to keep it going indefinitely. As a supporter of this boycott, I would like to offer the illegal aliens some friendly reminders to help them do a proper job of boycotting America:

• Don't forget to avoid our hospital emergency rooms and trauma centers
• Really stick it to us citizens by not drawing upon any tax funded assistance programs that day
• Hit us where it hurts by keeping your vehicles off of American roads and freeways
• Guarantee us further generations of underpaid housekeepers, gardeners and car wash attendants by keeping your kids out of school and making sure they don't participate in education programs
• Really make an impact by not sending any of our racist American dollars to your home countries so that your homeland doesn't profit from our evil
• Express your anger by not loitering in front of home improvement stores
• Tear up your fake Social Security cards and burn the false identification documents that the racist oppressors of this nation have driven you to acquire in order to obtain employment

For those of you who don't speak English, I'll provide you some of these same tips in your native tongue:

En el primero de Mayo, los delincuentes y criminales que viven en Los Estados Unidos sin autorización deben quedarse en sus casas. Eso es para mostrar los gringos la importancia de los inmigrantes. Los jovenes no deben ir al las escuelas, y los trabajadores no deben ir a sus trabajos. Tambien, nadie debe manejar en los calles. Por favor, quema sus papeles de identificacion y sus tarjetas de Seguridad Social falsos y no emvie dinero a Mexico en el primero de Mayo.

Those of you who sympathize with illegal immigrants and haven't yet come to this country can also help support the boycott:

• Don't sneak across our borders illegally on May 1
• Don't give out border crossing maps, pamphlets on how to apply for US government aid and the various other things that the Mexican government has been providing to would-be invaders

Keep on Protesting, Illegal Alien Criminals

According to WorldnetDaily.com, a recent Zogby poll confirmed the obvious:

Recent images of seas of illegal aliens marching in cities across the U.S. are having a far greater negative than positive impact on the foreigners' cause, according to a new poll.
...
Asked whether the protests have made likely voters more or less sympathetic toward undocumented workers, 61 percent said they're less likely to be sympathetic to the plight of illegals as a result of the protests, while only 32 percent of respondents said they're now more sympathetic.

I actually found the protests quite amusing. These people actually think that entering our country illegally, ignoring our employment and taxation laws, and waiving the Mexican flag, chanting in Spanish and disrupting traffic is somehow going to endear them to us. They claim they want to be a part of our country, yet do everything in their power to demonstrate that they are trying to conquer us for Mexico rather than join us through assimilation. Not only are many of these protestors criminals, but apparently they are also stupid.

Those that have been following these protests from the beginning will recall that at the early spontaneous demonstrations, the protesting illegal aliens carried Mexican flag while defacing or disrespecting the U.S. flag. Here's an example that was emailed to me a couple of weeks ago:

Note how the Mexican flag flies ABOVE the U.S. flag, and how our national symbol flies upside down, a mark of extreme disrespect when not used as a symbol to indicate a serious emergency. Television footage of these demonstrations initially showed veritable seas of Mexican flags. Now, over the last few days, educated activists and political organizers finally realized that this wasn't going over well with the American public. Recent highly organized protests have now featured Spanish speaking illegals waiving the American flag. Investigative reporting revealed that the politically savvy organizers brought large numbers of U.S. flags and tried to talk the protestors in to trading their Mexican flags in for free American flags in the hope that this trick would convince the voting public to support an amnesty for these falsely patriotic people.

If these people truly were respectful of our nation and wanted to join us, they would have come here legally, learned our language, culture and customs, and not been inclined to waive the banners of foreign nations on our soil and form anti-American groups like this one. Fortunately, it looks like the majority of registered voters already realize this, and about half of them are have come to understand what a huge problem illegal immigration is creating.

Likely voters said their biggest concern about illegal immigration is the burden it places on government social services at all levels. While 27 percent said the increased burden was their top concern, another 22 percent said they hold a companion worry – that illegals will trigger an increase in the cost of government services.