Depression is a horrible thing. Large or small it harms. In 22 years ago I lost my mentor, my safety net, my mentor.

He was coming home after having pizza with a friend of ours. This was unusual because the friend had not wanted to go to the regular restaurant. He was driving home on the interstate in a light rain. About a half mile from his exit he came up over the crest of a hill at around 65-70MPH.

In his lane was a stopped car. He swerved into the lane and missed the stopped car but spun out ending up pointing south in the north bound lanes. An Este semi-trailer also doing around 65-70 MPH slammed into his car.

My friend was killed. According to the autopsy it was “instant.”

A car with a doctor pulled over and people rushed to give first aid as there were some four or five vehicles involved. The doctor that was the passenger got out and attended to the living.

In the post accident report it was found that only one person had any alcohol in their bloodstream and at way below legal limits. The doctor who wasn’t driving. He had had a glass of wine with dinner. He had his wife drive because of that glass of wine and the fact that he had had a very long day.

My world ended the next morning when I got an email from my mentor’s father stating that his brother had died the night before. I didn’t think his father had a brother so called to find out. Turns out that his sister had used their fathers email account to send out the message to the mailing list.

I was the person to tell all his friends that it wasn’t his uncle that had died, it was him.

It hurts even now.

For the next 3 or 4 years I lived in depression. I rode my bike on a 100 mile one way commute three times per week. On the way home, alone in my helmet I would look at every overpass and say “Just aim right there and it will all be over. It will be painless.” And each time for dozens of overpasses I would say “not tonight”.

I don’t remember if I was on any medication for depression at that time but if I was, it didn’t seem to help. My depression stayed with me but my will to live exceeded any drive to suicide when my wife-to-be became pregnant. It was something to live for.

But depression remains. It has cost me clients. There is this place where I knew what had to be done but there was always something else I wanted to do. It was hard to talk to people because I knew I was disappointing them.

Earlier this year I decided that yes, I was actually clinically depressed and got help. A little blue pill. Not that one you dirty minded folks. I did not want to do it for fear they would “red flag” me. They didn’t.

It took about two months before I started functioning on a more normal basis.

Suicide is no longer something that is just a step away. It isn’t a consideration.

One of the things I remember is reading how Bob Owens had driven to the end of his street and used his firearm to kill himself. As a voice in the 2A community it hit hard. I vowed that I would never disgrace the 2A with a firearm. It helped.

So I give you this song. It is from the movie and is longer than the version on the TV show.

Suicide is NOT painless. It hurts. It hurts you and it hurts those around you. There are people there to help. Don’t be afraid to reach out if you are hurting. There are people that care for you, even if you can’t see or feel them.

If you or someone you know may be struggling with suicidal thoughts, you can call the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK (8255) any time day or night, or chat online. Crisis Text Line also provides free, 24/7, confidential support via text message to people in crisis when they dial 741741.

Let’s have a quick recap of Sam Brinton.

He is a gay, non-binary male who dresses in women’s clothing.

He is most famous for hosting fetish workshops on pup play kink, where he sodomizes men who wear leather abd rubber puppy masks.

He’s a vocal defender of underage gay prostitution.

He was hired by the Biden Administration to be a DOE SES, which is an equivalent government rank to a general and has a Q Clearance.

He was hired despite a whistle-blower publishing a report on how he was technically not qualified for the job he has, meeting only the educational and experience credentials for a GS-11.

Well… his story got weirder.

Non-binary Biden nuclear official charged with stealing woman’s $2.3K luggage at airport

A Biden administration employee – and one of the federal government’s first gender non-binary officials – has been accused of stealing a travelor’s luggage from the Minneapolis airport in September.

Sam Brinton, the deputy assistant secretary for spent fuel and waste disposition at the DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy, was charged with felony theft after allegedly snatching a Vera Bradley suitcase reportedly worth $2,325 from baggage claim at the Minneapolis St. Paul Airport on Sept. 16, according to court documents.

Brinton, who uses they/them pronouns, was captured on surveillance video grabbing the luggage and removing its ID tag identifying the owner, the filings state.

Brinton initially denied stealing the suitcase to police officers, but later claimed they took it by mistake and still had it in their possession.

“If I had taken the wrong bag, I am happy to return it, but I don’t have any clothes for another individual,” Brinton first told the officer. “That was my clothes when I opened the bag.”

However, Brinton called the officer back two hours after their first conversation and confessed to not being “completely honest.”

The official was charged with felony theft of a moveable property without consent, as first reported by the local Minnesota outlet, Alpha News.

Brinton — who became one of the government’s first non-binary officials when taking the job — was placed on leave about on month ago following the accusations.

He may be convicted but I doubt it.

If anything, he pleads down to a slap on the wrist because a non-binary, cross dressing pervert is too high on the victim hierarchy to get into any real trouble.

The Federal Government has already ignored more disqualifying points than imaginable, a simple thing like theft is no big deal.

It’s sad to say it but it’s true.

Two news articles to consider.

First:

Homebuyers canceled a record 60,000 purchase contracts last month because they’re waiting for mortgage rates and home prices to fall

Nearly 60,000 homebuyers walked away from deals in October as the average mortgage rate reached 7%, according to a report from Redfin, a Seattle-based real estate firm.

The dip in pending home sales was the largest drop since Redfin began tracking the data back in 2013, the report said. While pending home sales fell across the country, Allentown Pennsylvania led the nation with a 54.9% year-over-year decline. Greensboro, North Carolina had the second highest pending home sale cancellation rate with buyers walking away from half of homes that were under contract.

Rising home prices have been a chief scourge for homebuyers and homebuilders alike throughout the pandemic. Since March 2020, the median home price in the US has increased by more than 41%, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

These advancing home prices have quelled homebuying demand, especially among first-time homebuyers. The National Association of Realtors estimates that home sales will decline from 5.2 million in 2022 to 4.8 million in 2023 because of high mortgage rates and inflation, which is putting additional pressure on homebuilders to offload newly built properties from their balance sheets.

Second:

Amazon confirms it has begun laying off employees

Amazon confirmed on Wednesday that layoffs had begun at the company, two days after multiple outlets reported the e-commerce giant planned to cut around 10,000 employees this week.

The initial cuts at Amazon will impact roles on the devices and services team, per a memo shared publicly by Dave Limp, senior vice president of devices & services at Amazon

Amazon and other tech firms significantly ramped up hiring over the past couple of years as the pandemic shifted consumers’ habits towards e-commerce. Now, many of these seemingly untouchable tech companies are experiencing whiplash and laying off thousands of workers as people return to pre-pandemic habits and macroeconomic conditions deteriorate.

Facebook-parent Meta recently announced 11,000 job cuts, the largest in the company’s history.

The housing market is crashing and the country’s second largest retailer is laying off 10,000 people just before Christmas.

I can’t think of stronger signs that the economy is fucked far beyond imagination.

Yes, the Biden Administration has been lying to us.  We feel it every time we buy groceries or fill up our cars.

But holy fuck, what were seeing must be the tip of the iceberg that is going to rip a hole in our ship of state and sink our economy like the fucking Titanic.

Democrat Senator Chris Murphy says "we have to have a conversation about whether we can continue to fund law enforcement" in counties and states which have declared themselves "Second Amendment sanctuaries." pic.twitter.com/TxFbuAulDa

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) November 27, 2022

The Left went nuts when the Republicans floated the idea of denying illegal immigration sanctuary cities federal funding.

The Left is now floating that same idea except against places that prioritize the Second Amendment over restrictive gin laws.

It’s crystal clear they value illegal immigrants over Constitutional protection.

But moreover, the idea of a Second Amendment sanctuary city is a perversion.  The Bill of Right applies to every citizen everywhere in our country.  We don’t need a Second Amendment sanctuary, the cities and states that violate the Second Amendment need to be punished.

Felonies surge 40% on NYC subways compared to 2021 — but MTA touts more cops to stem crime wave

Felony crimes — including murder, rape and robbery — have surged on the subway system by 40% so far this year compared to 2021, according to newly released NYPD stats.

At least 1,917 felony crimes were reported from January through October — up from the 1,367 tallied during the same period last year, the figures prepared for Tuesday’s MTA board committee meetings showed.

Last month alone saw 210 total felonies, up from 198 in September, the NYPD said.

The October tally included three murders, two burglaries, 51 robberies, 46 felony assaults and 108 grand larcenies — all increases from that month in 2021, according to police.

Killings in the subway system since 2020 have also skyrocketed to the highest annual levels in 25 years as the city grapples with an overall spike in random violence, NYPD stats show.

Law abiding citizens are trapped underground in a cave with vicious predators and increased violence happens.

This next partisan interesting.

Reached for comment, a spokesman for the MTA said an influx of police officers announced last month by Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mayor Eric Adams has led to less crime.

“The NYPD is now putting more officers on subway cars and on platforms, and so far this month it has resulted in a drop in crime,” said the spokesman, Aaron Donovan.

Riders and transit workers who spoke to The Post on Sunday were split on whether the recent influx of cops had made an impact.

“They just wait until police are not around,” said grocery store worker Lee Rivera, 25.

Felonies are up 40% but it would be worse if it weren’t for the increase in cops.  That’s the logical conclusion here.  That tells you how really bad it is.

Even if more cops is reducing crime, the criminals know that the cops can’t be everywhere and wait until there are none around to strike.

New York increased the number of cops and crime still went up.

That is the loudest ringing endorsement for concealed carry and self defense I’ve ever heard.

This is why it’s so important for Bruen to br enforced in New York.

The people need to be able to defend themselves because the city is doing a shit job of maintaining safety underground.

It is important to understand how the courts are structured in the US to understand when and where cases are filed.

There are the state courts along with a bunch of administrative courts, such as bankruptcy court, tax court, and EPA court. The administrative courts are some of the worse because the entire court is paid for by the agency that they are judging for. Just how often do you hear that an IRS hired, paid and compensated judge rules against the IRS?

The state courts lead upwards to the state supreme court. In some situations cases can be moved from the state court system to the federal court system for appeals.

Court cases are expensive. Even if your lawyers work for you it is expensive and most lawyers that do second amendment work are very expensive. Think $1000/hour upwards.

The different organizations need to be selective in how they spend their money. Given that the states have unlimited funds to fight a case it doesn’t cost them anything extra to delay and to have another hearing or require another filing or to have the case go to a different court.

Part of the reason that nobody showed up for the Miller case was that the original lawyers were no longer being paid. Miller, the defendant, had won on appeal and been set free. Nobody expected the government to appeal to the Supreme court. By the time that the case was appealed, the original lawyers were no longer interested and Miller was missing. Many presumed he was dead.

Cases get heard by the Supreme court if they are “important” or if there are multiple differing rulings from the different circuit courts. Thus, if the fifth circuit court hears a Texas case and decides that a restraining order or court order making you a prohibited person is unconstitutional and the ninth circuit court hears a California case and decides that the same law is constitutional then that conflict makes it more likely that the Supreme Court will accept the case.

This goes back to the American system of “Common Law”. Laws are applied in common across all jurisdictions and all people. If something is unconstitutional in Texas it should also be unconstitutional in California as well. Since the circuit courts are considered equal, when there is conflicting opinions at the circuit court level the Supreme Court needs to step in to clarify.

So we can take a look at the cases that are of interest to us right now.

Nothing is happening right now in the first circuit court area. ME and NH are pro-gun, MA, RI and CT are anti-gun. It is a 50/50 guess which way the first circuit will go but I’d bet on following Heller, McDonald, and Bruen.

In the second circuit court we have the New York CCIA. This is getting lots of attention and at the district level the state is losing. There are two cases moving forward. One being heard by judge Suddaby and the other by judge Sentra, JR. The second circuit court is as anti-gun as it gets. I fully expect them to rule that the CCI is constitutional on appeal.

In the third circuit court we have lawsuits coming out of NJ. The third is a little more pro-gun than the second but not by much. We’ve not heard decisions out of the district courts yet so we don’t know how the states will react and how the circuit court will respond.

In the forth circuit court we have a lawsuit against the MD AWB and standard magazine capacity bans. The forth is more pro-gun with WV, VA, NC, SC being pro-gun and only MD being anti-gun.

I don’t know of anything happening in the DC circuit court, at this time.

The fifth circuit court is hearing an appeal from the State of Texas defending an anti-gun law. The fifth is likely to side with the district court and rule against Texas. There have been a couple of articles saying that it is likely Texas appealed in order to lose at the circuit court level.

In the sixth circuit court there are some lawsuits coming out of MI.

I don’t know of anything coming in the seventh, eighth, tenth, or eleventh circuit court.

Which leaves that ninth circus court.

The ninth circuit court is famous for having the most decisions overturned by the Supreme court. They get it wrong 80% of the time when a case gets to the Supreme Court. Only the sixth circuit has a higher overturn rate at 82%. The ninth circuit court is also the largest court. It has 16 Democratic appointed and 13 Republican appointed with one pending.

The ninth circuit court had multiple cases remanded to them after the Bruen decision. Instead of just doing the right thing they remanded those cases back down to the district level where they are being heard.

While OR horrible measure 114 is highly likely to be found unconstitutional at the Supreme court level, it is likely to win at the district and circuit level. Since there are already multiple cases in the ninth circuit court it is not a good case for the national organizations to take up.

In addition, the district court hearing the California cases is very much an originalist. He wrote his last decision before Bruen and in it quoted Heller. That opinion was nearly as good as Thomas’.

There is more happening behind the scenes, I’m sure. But for now we have more than a few cases being tracked and mostly wins for us.

This was a summary of several reples I saw to this idiotic post:

But then again, he probably belongs to those who either ignore history or want to re-write it to fit his philosophy submission to the State (and him).

And if the problem is People Who Will Not Relinquish Freedom, then yes, I am part of the problem and gladly so.