Everytown made a post about guns and domestic violence that comes from this article in The Trace.

I read The Trace article, and the one after it, My Ex-Husband Used His Guns to Terrorize Me — Without Once Pulling the Trigger.  

In reading both of these articles there were two words that I never saw, and their absence was glaring: Lautenberg Amendment.

The Lautenberg Amendment, the formal name of which is the Domestic Violence Offender Gun Ban.  The is federal law, passed in 1997, which prohibits possession of firearms by individuals:

(8) who is subject to a court order that

(A) was issued after a hearing of which such person received actual notice, and at which such person had an opportunity to participate;

(B) restrains such person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner of such person or child of such intimate partner or person, or engaging in other conduct that would place an intimate partner in reasonable fear of bodily injury to the partner or child; and

(C)

(i) includes a finding that such person represents a credible threat to the physical safety of such intimate partner or child; or

(ii) by its terms explicitly prohibits the use, attempted use, or threatened use of physical force against such intimate partner or child that would reasonably be expected to cause bodily injury; or

(9) who has been convicted in any court of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.

The Federal form 4473 which is part of NICS background checks includes questions about domestic violence and stalking.

The common theme of the two Trace articles is “guns are bad for women” but that’s it.  Neither acknowledges that some legal protection for the victims of domestic violence already exist.  So when Everytown says “Federal law does nothing to keep guns out of the hands of abusive dating partners or convicted stalkers” in their post, that’s a lie.

I was going to start a post about Cocks Not Glocks getting invited to the White House by a group called DoSomething.org.  I was going to rant on about how this is just the current administration spitting in our faces.  Cocks Not Glocks is an organization that makes no lucid points, does noting but mock concealed carry in the most sophomoric way, and contributes nothing positive to the dialog about guns.

Then I went to the Cocks Not Glocks Facebook page to see if they posted anything more about their trip to DC.

This is the first post that I saw:

Pardon my language but THAT IN ONE PICTURE IS THE WHOLE FUCKING POINT OF CONCEALED CARRY!!!

That’s it.  That’s the whole argument for women to carry a gun.  Right there.

But they don’t get it.  It shot right by them.  They are trying to mock Trump using a flag associated with the Right Wing/Tea Party.  It’s not sinking in.

The Gadsden flag is field of yellow, embellished with a Eastern Diamondback rattlesnake.  The words on it are DONT TREAD ON ME.

The Eastern Diamondback is a dangerous snake.  It is known to strike without rattling, and if threatened can and will strike repeatedly.  Although its venom is not the most toxic venom of American snakes, it makes up for that by delivering the largest venom load of any American Snake.

The message is quite clear: if you oppress me, I will kill you.  It is a threat.  It is promise of death.

The message of the Cocks Not Glocks flag is exactly the same: grab my pussy and you will die.

This is a sentiment that I, as an advocate for concealed carry, fully and unequivocally  endorse.  I would use this flag to advertise a woman’s CCW course.

But Cocks Not Glocks is anti concealed carry.  They can’t back up their statement.  Their people cannot deliver meaningful violence against someone that grabs their pussies.  They are disarmed.  They are have no fangs and no venom to deliver.

They post a picture that shows a complete understanding of the value of concealed carry but fight against the right to concealed carry.  The mental stress from the cognitive dissonance of trying to understand this post has me literally shaking and twitching.

They are so close to enlightenment they can almost taste but are too ideologically dense for it to sink in.  It is madness.

Amber Rose is on this season of Dancing with the Stars.  My wife watches the show.  This revelation that, that tattooed monstrosity (a comment on the quality of her character) lead to a fairly intense discussion with my wife.

I loathe this woman.

She started life, if you will, as a stripper at age 15.  Nothing says budding moral superior like risking other people’s businesses and livelihoods by illegally showing your underage ta-tas.  She was “discovered” (hint: started screwing) Kanye West when she was a background extra in a music video.

The modern world, being the Kafkaesque dystopian hell hole that it is, once you start making the beast with two back with a hip hop star, the world becomes your oyster and you get elevated to the position of wise, moral authority.

Amber Rose managed to leverage being the derriere that Kanye West parked his manhood into being (according to her book) a “renown model, actress, pop-culture maven, and self proclaimed ‘bad bitch'” as well as fashion designer and entrepreneur:

Filled with expert advice and personal anecdotes, How to Be a Bad Bitch covers finances, career, love, beauty, and fashion while emphasizing confidence, positive self-acceptance, and authenticity.

If the first chapter of her book isn’t titled “How to get famous by f**king a rapper” than she is doing a disservice to her readers.  The sequel will be co-authored by Kim Kardashian.

Among the absolute worst examples of her accolades and qualifications, earned for engaging in coitus with the most embarrassing thing to happen in the history of the VMAs is a to be recognized as a paragon of virtue on the matters of sexual empowerment and rape.

Amber Rose created a foundation to sponsor Slut Walks.  The stated purposed of this foundation and its Slut Walks is:

The Amber Rose Foundation is a not-for-profit organization that aims to promote discussion about women’s rights and equality issues. The foundation is specifically geared towards women empowerment and fighting against victim blaming. 

She, and the other women that participate in these walks, do this by going completely insane in public.  The Other McCain and Zombietime (2012, 2011) have covered previous Slut Walks.  They make no sense.  No rational mind is able to comprehend the mass of contradictions that goes on at one of those events.  I’m not going to even try and break it down for you because I don’t want to give myself brain damage.  You can read the Washington Post’s attempt at explaining the Amber Rose trademarked variety of Slut Walk and fail miserably.

The particular bone I have to pick with with Slut Walks in general and Amber Rose’s variety in particular is on the issue of victim blaming.  The modern, third wave feminist definition of victim blaming seeks to separate the victim of a crime (for all intents and purposes, rape and sexual assault) from ANY personal responsibility.  Even suggesting in the slightest that women should be mindful of their situation and act accordingly is woman hating misogyny.

This is at this point that the brand of feminists that push this belief go from being an ideological danger to women and start posing a real, physical danger to women.

I will agree, that in a ideal, perfect world, a woman can wear whatever she wants, get drunk, stumble down a dark alley, take off all of her clothes, and pass out drunk on a park bench with her legs spread, and wake up the next morning entirely unmolested.

There is a joke about a theoretical physicist that helps a dairy farmer and comes up with a solution to the farmer’s problem, but it only works for – the punchline – “spherical cows in a vacuum.”  For those of you who don’t get the joke, is an idea system in which there are no variables other than what the person who is modeling the system wants to include.  The heart of the joke is that there is no ideal system in the real world and the model will fail to accurately help the dairy farmer.

So back to Slut Walks and victim blaming… there is no ideal world.  Evil exists.  The solution to rape is not as simple as the sign below suggests.

The “don’t tell me how to dress” seems to be a little bit of a red herring.  Usually the suggestions to women on how to avoid being the victims of sexual assault include: don’t get drunk around strangers, don’t accept a drink from a person you don’t know, avoid walking alone in certain areas or at certain times of day, etc.  Mostly things that the CCW/tactical community would list as being situational awareness.  This is still considered to be victim blaming.

Let me make this clear.  No one can control the behavior of anybody but themselves.  Evil exists in this world.  Mass shootings are universally condemned in the West, yet they still happen.  Children are taught from a young age not to hit, but the knockout game exists.  There are people who will commit egregious acts against others if they believe that they can get away with it.

The message to women from Slut Walks is that they should let down their guard and turn a blind eye to the presence of evil in this world, because we should remind those who seek to do evil that they shouldn’t do it.  This is disastrously naive.  In an ideal, perfect world, this might be effective.  But in a world where women are not spheres traveling in a vacuum, all this does is embolden women to put themselves at risk.  Being situationally aware is not victim blaming.

There have been several sexual assaults on the AAMU campus in recent weeks.  I would never blame a woman for being assaulted by three masked men with a gun.  Those men should not be committing such horrible crimes.  However, it’s not victim blaming to say “Ladies, this real and tangible threat exists, for your own safety, avoid being alone on campus after dark until after these men are arrested.  Travel with a friend, boyfriend, battle buddy.  Stay safe, minimize your risk.”

To call the above statement victim blaming means that people should put all the responsibility for their safety into the hands of others.

The ultimate illogic of this way of thinking is best illustrated by the overall message of these Slut Walks:

All men are (potential) rapists who need to learn to control their lust.  The nebulous concept of “the patriarchy” oppresses women and creates a rape culture.  Despite that half the population is posed to rape at a moment’s notice and be glorified for doing it,  women should not put any effort into protecting themselves in any meaningful way.  The best way to combat rape is by having a stripper who got famous for boning a rapper have a bunch of women march around in their underwear carrying nonsensical signs.

To a rational person, all this seems to do is insult decent men who don’t and won’t rape, and have women expose themselves to danger by denying the fact that evil exists and some small percent of people will do terrible things, no matter what the law say, let alone any hand lettered sign.

SJW Feminist: “You shouldn’t rape me because of what I’m wearing.”

Normal man: “You are right.”

SJW Feminist: “Read my angry sign and stop taking part in rape culture.”

Rapist: *rapes anyway, because if a potential felony conviction won’t stop him, nothing scribbled on a poster board will either.*

It’s been obvious for a long time that Social Justice Warriors are not rational people, but this insanity goes far beyond insulting people on line and will cause actual harm.

I bought my first house in 2012.  I moved from South Dakota to Chicagoland in May after completing grad school to start my firs job.  The housing market had collapsed, the housing bubble burst, and Illinois was 4th in the nation for foreclosures.

My wife and I were looking for a place to rent but couldn’t find anything.  Everybody that was getting foreclosed upon couldn’t buy, so the rental market was insane.  Every time we looked at a place, by the time we got our background check check (check to pay for the background check) in, the place was rented out from under us.  We were panicking.  I needed to start work and had no place to live.  On realtor contacted us.  We had looked at three rentals in the same development, our credit was excellent, if we could scrape together a minimum down payment, we could buy for cheaper than rent.

We ended up buying a place across the street from a rental we looked at.  Mortgage/HOA/escrow/etc was $1450/mo for 3 bed/2.5 bath, 1,650 sq-ft.  The rental was $1750 for 2 bed/2.5 bath + loft, 1,450 sq-ft.  The house cost $197,500 at the height of the bubble when the last owner bought it.  I got it for $147,750.  The seller hated me, because I was getting $50,000 of free house from them.

My grandmother gave me the 5% down payment as a graduation present.

In February of 2015, I was relocated to Omaha.  I couldn’t sell my place in Chicagoland on short notice, the market was swamped with foreclosures for sale.  I put it up for rent, but by that time the rental market had slowed down.  My first tenant bailed on me and I was stuck paying for a mortgage in Chicagoland and rent in Omaha for three months.  I finally got a second tenant but I was only able to get enough to cover costs.   Without a down payment, I had to rent in Omaha.  3,000 sq-ft, 4 bed/2.5 bath, for $1,400/mo.

I was there until July of 2015 – yes, only five months – before relocating to Alabama.  Found a rental here for $1,200/mo, 4 bed/2.5 bath, 2,000 sq-ft.  It’s been a year and a half here.

I am contemplating buying a house outside of Huntsville.  $225,000, 5 bed/3 bath, 4200 sq-ft.  Still only doing a minimum down payment from some inheritance I got from my dad’s passing, I’m back up to $1,300/mo.  If I do it.  It’s an OK house.  It is big for the price, but lacking on amenities.  I’ve been told at $55/sq-ft it is a steal.  I don’t know.

I need to sell my place in Chicagoland.  I can’t be on the hook for two mortgages.  I have about $28,000 in equity in it.  If I sell it for what I paid for it, best estimate is that after closing and realtor costs I will have a take home of $0.00.  I will have lost everything I put into that house including the initial gift money.

I say all this because I hate buying houses.  I hate the housing market.  I hate the whole institution of realty.

I have been told that a house is a good investment.  Own property.

I got my first job and entered the real world right when the housing bubble burst.  For me, a house is not an investment.  It is not an asset.  It is not even a durable good.  I have pants that I have owned longer than my house.  I have work boots that have provided a better return on investment than a home.

I’ve read a lot of articles by various people on why millennials are not buying houses.

If you want some idea, here’s why.  Between the age of 18 and 33, I’ve lived in (in order) Florida, Indiana, New Jersey, South Dakota, Illinois, Nebraska, and Alabama.  I’ve lived in four apartments, three rental homes, and one place that I’ve owned.  In the one place that I’ve owned, I stand to lose about three years worth of savings.

My assumption is that every dollar I pay towards a home is just thrown away.  It will never be recovered.  A house is just a temporary place used for storing guns, kept warm by burning paychecks.

Seems that Kim Kardashian West is going to go quiet on social media following her robbery at gunpoint.  Apparently she attracted too much attention to her wealthy by constantly showing her affluence online in between her ignorant and vapid tweets.

If armed robbery is what it takes to get these mind-blowingly stupid celebs to keep their opinions to themselves, I might be inclined to go a little soft on crime.

As long as no one gets hurt, these robbers might have done the world a favor.

After last night’s VP debate, Everytown posted a link to this article on The Trace, again: Watch How Chicago Gets Flooded with Thousands of Crime Guns.

I included one of the comments in the screen grab, and the rest a very similar.  The goal is, of course, to make Chicago’s murder problem not the fault of half-a-century of Democrat rule, powered by the most influential Democrat Political Machine in the country; but the fault of the Republican governor of the neighboring state.

According to Everytown and people like them, the duty of the Governor of Indiana is not to pass laws and create policies that benefit the good people of Indiana, but to use Indiana to protect the criminals in Chicago from themselves.  Forget what the 6,5 million residents of Indiana want, the Governor of the Hoosier State has to make his priority the protection of young men in a handful of districts in Chicago, Illinois.

Having lived in Terre Haute, IN and Chicago, IL, I can tell you, what the people of Southern Indiana want and need is very different than the people of the Windy City.

The Bloombergians have been saying the same thing for year about every state south of DC and NYC.  The governors of Virginia, Georgia, North and South Carolina, and Florida should ignore and even subvert the will of their constituents to protect NYC from gun violence.  When I voted for a Republican governor as a resident of Florida, I was really murdering some teen in Harlem.

This is typical anti-Flyover Country prejudice and blame the GOP for Democrat short comings practice.

Spain is having a problem with its government.  It doesn’t have one, and hasn’t for more than three-quarters of a year.  Spain’s last two elections didn’t go so well.  In typical European style, they have a whole bunch of different parties representing everything from Communists on one side to Franco loving Fascists on the other, with just about every other political and economic ideology being represented in the middle; and not one party has gained enough votes to be declared the winner.

It you talk to the people of Spain, they really don’t think it’s a problem.

For the past 288 days, Spain has plodded along without an elected national government. For some Spaniards, this is a wonderful thing.  “No government, no thieves,” said Félix Pastor, a language teacher who, like many voters, is fed up with the corruption and scandals that tarnished the two previous governing parties.

Just like we were told in 2013 when the GOP managed to get the Federal Government shut down for a few days, the Spanish Government said it would be a disaster of biblical proportions.

Spain’s leaders warned that having no government would mean chaos and deprivation.

Turns out, the government lied.

Instead, more than anything, the crisis seems to have offered a glimpse of life if politicians simply stepped out of the way. For many here, it has not been all that bad.  “Spain would be just fine if we got rid of most of the politicians and three-fourths of government employees,” Rafael Navarro, 71, said inside his tiny storefront pharmacy in Madrid. Too little government is better than too much, he said.

I am 100% sure if you replaced “Spain” with the “The United States” in the above quote, it would be just as accurate.

There has been no United States-style government shutdown. There are no mounds of uncollected garbage, no unpaid police officers, no shuttered ministries, no public trains or buses halted.

Except in the US, all of those services are state and local.  They would be largely unaffected by a sudden downsizing of the Federal Government.

Nacho Cardero, the editor of El Confidencial, a news website, reader clicks on stories about the crisis had dropped steadily.  “People are exhausted,” Mr. Cardero said. “They don’t want to hear one more thing from these politicians.”

I second that emotion.  So do most Americans, I believe.

Manuel de la Rocha Vázquez, an economic adviser in the Socialist Party, said Spain was so polarized that politics had turned almost into a brawl. “There are only insults and blame and arrogance,” he said.

I see your polarization and raise you Black Lives Matter riots and politically motivated beatings.

“We already knew that politicians were corrupt, but now we also see that they can’t even make politics work,” said Ana Cancela.

Yep, here too.

The only sad news I saw from this whole failure of the Spanish government is this.

Joaquín Sánchez Sanz, the director of a nuclear fusion lab for the government agency Ciemat, said he spent about 40 percent of every day dealing with cutbacks imposed by the caretaker government.  Just five days before a contract was to be signed to supply cooling equipment to a lab in Japan, the project was canceled, Mr. Sánchez Sanz said. Moreover, every agency contract not already signed was canceled.

Ultimately, the lesson the Spanish have learned is just how unnecessary most government is.

“A lot of people said we would go to hell if we didn’t form a government,” said Ignacio Escolar, the editor of the news website eldiario.es. “But we’re still here.”

Seeing this gives me hope.  Maybe we can elect ourselves the Spanish Candidate this year.  By that, I mean nobody.  We don’t need them.  Like Rafael Navarro said, fire 75% of government employees.  Divide the budget money allocated to these worthless bureaucrats between the Military, FBI (make sure Director Comey is included in the firings), Border Patrol, NASA, CDC, Park Service, and National Laboratories.  Then they can just shut off all the lights in the government buildings in DC and go home.

I’m pretty sure, we’ll do just fine.