A little late, and, sheesh, cheerleader pickin's are scarce for the night game teams, so let's just go with 2 units of Mk 1, Mod. 0 NFL Blonde Cheerleader.

That'll do for a bridge to the ONT.

Posted by: andy at 05:04 PM | Comments (139)
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OK, Ace posted a largely academic piece on stupid people with math'n shit, or at least a math symbol 's'. Theory is nice and all, but most people relate to practical real life examples better.

Today I dealt with a very real world stupid person attack that cost me about $230 out of pocket and several hours of nasty labor to get things put back to normal.

The first clue I was "under attack" - a $200+ water bill, when the bill is normally ~$30. I check everything inside the house - no leaks, same with the outside hoses. All tight as a drum.

Now working back towards the water meter...AHHH, soft wet earth, water bubbling up out of the meter's protective enclosure...

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Posted by: Purple Avenger at 03:42 PM | Comments (226)
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The Autumnal Equinox is upon us, as of 4:44pm EST. The warm nights of summer yield to chillier ones as we race towards winter, and as the seasons change, so do the skies above.
Think of this week's edition as a beginner's guide to autumn skies. We will look at the very brightest stars visible from the most light-polluted locales, a few easy-to-spot shapes, and a few starhops to guide you through the dim Celestial Seas that dominate the nights of Fall.
So lets begin! more...

Posted by: CAC at 02:13 PM | Comments (56)
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And Don't Forget! Dave's NFL thread is below, with boobies. And Oregon Muse's book thread and Andy's gun thread. A feller could have a pretty good weekend in Vegas with those things.

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Wait a minute -- I was told by Paul Krugman, Barack Obama, and the media that you have to spend, spend, spend to reduce the unemployment rate.

And yet in America, where we spent, spent, spent, the unemployment rate is distressingly high (and has forced millions out of the job market altogether), but in Germany, where they've pursued an Awful Austerity (ick!) program, they have low unemployment.

“It’s an Election Day like we haven’t seen for years,” Armin Laschet, deputy chairman of Merkel’s CDU, said on ARD television. “The FDP may still make it, but first of all it’s an endorsement of Angela Merkel’s policies.”

With unemployment near a two-decade low and the budget deficit virtually eliminated, voters backed MerkelÂ’s handling of the domestic economy, EuropeÂ’s largest, and her push for austerity in the euro zone in exchange for aid.

While the Christian Democratic Union romped, they did so at the expense of their ally, the Free Democrats, who might not even get enough of the votes to have any seats in the Bundeswhatever at all.

Which, alas, means that Merkel might have to strike a deal with the Socialists.

The Greens, the SPDÂ’s favoured partner, took 8 percent, and the anti-capitalist Left Party got 8.5 percent. The anti-euro Alternative for Germany got 4.8 percent, according to the television projections as of 6:20 p.m.

The projections showed MerkelÂ’s party just three or four seats short of an absolute majority. She may still be forced into a grand coalition with her Social Democratic rivals.

I hate linking Politico but: The Greens may have been punished for "Veggie Day."

In what could be a cautionary tale for First Lady Michelle Obama's efforts to tweak Americans' diets, Germans look set to punish the Green Party for urging that public cafeterias go meat-free on a designated "Veggie Day" each week in order to help the environment and reduce cruelty to animals. Borrowing colorfully from English, German newspaper Bild described public reaction to the idea as a "shitstorm."

At her party's final campaign rally on Saturday, Merkel joined in, slamming the Green proposal.

"You will never hear from the Christian Democratic Union party when you should eat meat and when you shouldn't," Merkel said to loud applause from her supporters and campaign workers in the Tempodrom theater.

...

It was in many ways an easy shot for Merkel to take, but her resistance to "Veggie Day" seemed to involve more than just needling an opposition party over a perceived misstep. Having spent 45 years under Communist rule, she appeared to chafe at the state intruding into decisions as personal as what food to ingest.

Merkel noted that she herself skips meat on Friday, but that she'd be damned if she'd make that a government policy.

I haven't been this excited about Strong German Leadership since Hitler!

I mean, since Helmutt Kohl or whoever. I meant Helmutt. Auto-correct and all.

The left is going to keep pushing this notion as the State as paterfamilias...

Roman law and tradition (mos maiorum) established the power of the pater familias within the community of his own extended familia. He held legal privilege over the property of the familia, and varying levels of authority over his dependents: these included his wife and children, certain other relatives through blood or adoption, clients, freedmen and slaves. The same mos maiorum moderated his authority and determined his responsibilities to his own familia and to the broader community. He had a duty to father and raise healthy children as future citizens of Rome, to maintain the moral propriety and well-being of his household, to honour his clan and ancestral gods and to dutifully participate—and if possible, serve—in Rome's political, religious and social life. In effect, the pater familias was expected to be a good citizen. In theory at least, he held powers of life and death over every member of his extended familia through ancient right but in practice, the extreme form of this right was seldom exercised. It was eventually limited by law.

I don't know why it's required to explain, at this late date, why this conception of the State is primitive, backwards, and hateful of freedom and human dignity, but apparently it is so required.

Posted by: Ace at 09:27 AM | Comments (304)
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Great culture you've got there, Savage Animals.

Lieutenant Nigara was a well-respected officer whose work went far beyond the female body searches that fill the days of many policewomen. But today, Nigara, the top policewoman in Helmand province, died from her wounds after being shot twice on her way to work, just three months after her predecessor was assassinated in the same way by attackers who have never been identified.

The death was the latest in a campaign of assassinations, intimidation, assaults and kidnappings of prominent women around Afghanistan that has raised fears that the modest gains made by women in the last decade will be wiped out as western troops head home.

The New York Times interviewed her recently. She said she loved her job and wasn't afraid of the Taliban's bloody, actual War on Women.

In an interview this month, Lieutenant Nigara said she was undeterred by the deaths of her two colleagues. She told of living with constant death threats and in near poverty after her brother, also a police officer, was shot and paralyzed. She had been caring for him and his four children, in addition to doing her job.

“I’m living in a ramshackle house, and whenever I come back there from duty, I smile to my husband that I am alive,” she said.

She added: “I love this job, and I see my countrymen in trouble and the country in a critical situation, and I feel women’s role is important in policing.”

Lieutenant Nigara originally joined the force during the Communist era in the early 1990s, and she returned after the fall of the Taliban.

She recounted how in 2006 she stopped a would-be suicide bomber, who was wearing an explosive vest, by throwing her arms around him in a bearhug. She apprehended insurgents and drug smugglers several times, even though they were disguised in burqas. And she said she once climbed onto a rooftop to capture an insurgent sniper.

“I am receiving threats on a daily basis,” she said. “The smugglers and terrorists are threatening me, saying I should give up, but I tell them that I am an Afghan woman, and I won’t leave the job as long as there is blood in my veins.”

I have a feeling that she was among the anonymous interview subjects of this NYT piece, in which Afghanistan policewoman noted that sexual harassment and even rape were part of the job.

The report, which the United Nations has circulated only among senior Afghan officials at the Interior Ministry, found that about 90 percent of the policewomen interviewed described sexual harassment and sexual violence as a serious problem, and that about 70 percent of the policewomen said that they had personally experienced sexual harassment or sexual violence themselves, according to people who saw the report or had it described to them.

While a much smaller fraction reported either being raped or otherwise sexually assaulted, the overall picture was of a police force in which women were constantly at risk.

...

WomenÂ’s rights advocates said that because Afghan policewomen were afraid of being penalized for revealing the problem, it was extremely difficult to get them to talk about abuse. That is all the more true if the person committing the sexual abuse is their commander or one of his close friends on the police force.

The policewomen interviewed by The Times said they feared being fired or demoted, or being sent to work in a job that was far away from their home if they complained.

Most policewomen are low-level security screeners at checkpoints or government buildings, and in many instances they are the only person earning money in the family and desperately need their salaries — usually around $240 per month.

A further disincentive to talking publicly about sexual abuse or coercion is that many Afghans already believe female police officers have loose morals simply because they are willing to work in public with men who are not relatives. If a woman admits that she is under pressure to have sex, conservative relatives might force her to quit — or even kill her to expiate the perceived dishonor to the family.

As for Nigara's predecessor as the country's top policewoman: In April, Lt. Islam Bibi reported that her own brother had attempted to murder her three times.

On the fourth of July, she was murdered.

Many human rights campaigners say Lt BibiÂ’s murder is just one example illustrating how a reversal is already under way.

Last month, in a decision that attracted little public attention, a court freed the in-laws of a young woman who had been tortured for refusing to be married off at the age of 13 or 14. And there is a growing backlash against a presidential decree designed to protect women.

You know what would be an interesting experiment?

A widespread, First-World-Wide asylum for Afghan women.

Take their women. Well, not take them; just offer them a way out. Let the population plunge and in 40 years you've got no problems.

Posted by: Ace at 12:07 PM | Comments (191)
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These young ladies are clearly offended by the Washington Redskins' team name.

Week 3 schedule.

And here's an interesting piece in the WSJ - Bengals Fans: No More Katy Perry

The move is a win for tradition, but it also is proof of a national problem. Stadium music nationwide is calcified. Most arenas and stadiums play the same songs they have been playing for years, since testosterone-fueled rock is what people expect.

I'm not sure that's really true. The rotation is hard to crack, and once you're in, your're sure to be there for a while, but the first time I heard the song below the fold, I knew it'd make that cut (and it did), but it's not testosterone-fueled rock by any stretch of the imagination. more...

Posted by: andy at 08:00 AM | Comments (255)
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Reloading Revisited

A few weeks back, we had a discussion of the economics of reloading. I included a caveat that there were many ways to influence the cost per round outside the example presented, and the main thing I had in mind when I wrote that was bullet casting.

The only bullets I've cast myself were soft lead maxi-balls for my dad's .54 cal. muzzle-loader, but molds and materials are available for pretty much every caliber. Cast bullets are great in low pressure handgun rounds (although they can introduce a leading problem that you'll need to address in your gun cleaning regimen) but they can also be used with gas checks to load high pressure handgun or rifle rounds.

The Cast Boolits forum is good resource to get you started, and I know we have some bullet casting readers who'll put us some more knowledge in the comments.

America's Real Mass Shooting Problem

In the wake of the Navy Yard shooting, where yet another mentally disturbed person went on yet another shooting spree, there are some encouraging signs that people are assessing the situation and correctly identifying the root cause: e.g., Reason, Krauthammer, and this survey by Gallup:

Forty-eight percent of Americans blame the mental health system "a great deal" for mass shootings in the United States, unchanged from January 2011. At the same time, fewer blame easy access to guns now (40%) than two years ago (46%), making the mental health system the perceived top cause of mass shootings.

Of course, some people will never get the message.

Related, via @ComradeArthur: The Central Planning Solution To Evil

More On Starbucks

If you've listened to this week's podcast, the first hour or so of which is gun-related, you know my position on the Starbucks kerfuffle: open carry advocates foolishly overplayed their hand and forced Starbucks to react. You also know I support Starbucks' right to make whatever policies they want and let the chips fall where they may.

McDonald's and Dunkin' Donuts appear to see a business opportunity ... at least, that is, until people who feel like they have to make some sort of statement make asses of themselves and cause these businesses to reconsider too.

Gun Of The Week

(answer below)
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Posted by: andy at 05:45 AM | Comments (136)
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Happy autumnal equinox and whatnot.

Posted by: andy at 03:07 AM | Comments (208)
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stuff below more...

Posted by: Gang of Gaming Morons! at 11:17 AM | Comments (59)
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According to CNN sources, three of the terrorists were from America.

Three of alleged attackers at Nairobi mall are from U.S., according to sources within terror group Al-Shabaab.

The BBC has a funny way to report on a terrorist slaughter of unarmed civilians:

Nairobi Westgate Shoot-Out Kills 11 in Kenya

Shoot-out? Were the children who'd gone to the mall to shop for school pants shooting back?

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