Best of the Sidebar Blogs Today

Here's summary of some of the most interesting things I found as I was surfing my sidebar today.


Fun Turns To Tragedy!!! presents a 5 minute video of Jet Powered Man, which he calls "...the coolest thing that I have seen all year".

It's not Rocket Man ... This guy has wings, and a dwell-time of 5 minutes instead of 30 seconds ... but this looks like The Dane From Heaven.

Icarus, eat your heart out.


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45-caliber Justice includes a 31 minute video From Penn and Teller called "The War On Drugs Is Bullshit!".

Yeah, I know what you're thinking.
No, I don't do drugs.

Wait a minute ... yes I do.

I smoke cigarettes, drink liquor and coffee, and put oleomargarine (the evil "Trans-Fats") on my morning English Biscuit. Oh, and did I mention the bacon?

Nicotine, Alcohol, Caffeine, Transfats, Nitrates ... all legal drugs. And they all will kill you.

What's worse, the Drug Warriors will kill you, as I have mentioned before.

(Ninth Stage also has a few words to contribute on the same subject.)

The fact is, the war on drugs has caused the death of innocents , but we can't say that it has actually served its original purpose ... to lessen the number of people who use ilegal drugs. In fact, narcotics usage has increased since the War on Drugs began in 1971. (And as Penn and Teller propose, the case can be made that "street drugs" are actually less expensive today than they were 25 years ago.)

This is a program which already costs us billions of dollars a year, is not effecting the desired results, and actually causes harm to people who are not otherwise involved except for the excesses of those agencies who are attempting to stop illegal drug usage.

What's wrong with this picture?

The video will educate you. I don't know that the opinions presented there are supported by the actual facts, but at least it will make you think.

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Cowboy Blob tells the story about an 18 year-old who tried all the non-confrontational give-up-your-stuff approaches to pacify a mugger, until said mugger said "your backpack's still heavy, what else do you have in there?"

At which time the teenager came up with The Perfect Squelch.

I loved the story. Hope to hear more about "Harry".

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My Ol' Pal Phil at Random Nuclear Strikes *(SoftGreenGlow)* encourages you to contact your legislator in response to some interesting RKBA bills now being considered in Congress.

Phil's getting cranky and won't tell you how to contact your legislator because, as he says, "If you don’t know them off the top of your head/have their contact info in you “Favorites”, what are you doing calling yourself “An Advocate for Gun Rights”?"

I'm not quite as cranky as Phil is tonite. I'll tell you how to contact your legislator(s) because (Ta-Dah!) I have them bookmarked.

If you don't, yet ... get with it and make your bookmarks tonite.

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Kevin at The Smallest Minority (One of the two Bloggers in The World who are even more verbose than I) has a surprisingly short article about "What it's like to take a CCW class in Kentucky". He presents it as "I'd exhaust myself trying to fisk this one".

Having read the article, I was struck by three things:

1. He's right. I couldn't possibly fisk all the points ... pro and con ... which are raised in the original article (and I admit I'm feeling a little guilty about linking directly to it, because I want to encourage us all to visit the folks I'm citing here.)
2. The author describes himself as a " ... liberal, pierced, tattooed, Zen Buddhist freak...". And he obviously holds his fellow CCW Instruction Pupils in contempt, who he refers to his fellow instructees as (among other, more colorfully descriptive phrases) "backwoods detritus".
3. Still, the article is particularly well-written, and while his contempt for the usual RKBA priorities are made obvious by his glib patter, he makes his main point resoundingly clear; he wants to acquire official permission to carry a concealed firearm " ... to protect my wife and myself ..." and "... to have some harmless, high-caliber fun ...".

While the author is contemptuous of his fellow denizens of the range, he puts himself in the same category by virtue of his recognition of the two main reasons to possess a firearm: self-defense, and enjoyment. (Sport, competition, plinking, hunting ... it's all under the same umbrella.)

If you read this post, you'll probably be as enturbulated as I found myself. "This guy is an elitist asshole" may be your first reaction, but you may find yourself saying, as I did: "yeah, but he's our asshole". He enjoys shooting, he's willing to make the effort to jump through the hoops just to acquire a CCW license, and he recognizes the primary reasons for owning and using a firearm.

Everything else is hyperbole.

If you don't check out any of the other interesting links, I sincerely encourage you to read the Zen Anti-NRA (can't say I blame him, entirely), Anti-Bubba, lo-cal rant.

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Speaking of which, I have been thinking about the establishment of a Monthly Award, to be offered for the most thought-provoking (or provocative) gunblog-related post. I don't have a name for it, and I doubt it would be something which would 'catch on' as an honor to be coveted by the awardees.

But if you have a suggestion for the name of such an award, I would appreciate some help here. It's something which I have already decided to do, and if I had already established it I would have awarded the "What it's like to take a CCW class in Kentucky" for January, 2007.

Okay, partly to piss him off, but mostly because it is so well written, and because it reveals a facet of the author's private priorities which he may not acknowledge even to himself ... justification for the 2nd Amendment.

If you have a suggestion for the name of this award, please emal it to me (see the email address at the bottom of the page) or comment on this article.