NRO:

The Washington Post:

On the livestream, Fry was rambling almost incoherently about the government, abortion, the Middle East, nuclear power plants, drone strikes in Pakistan and his belief in UFOs. He railed against “monopolies” and “chemical castration” by the government. He was angry that he couldn’t “find a way to make an income without paying taxes for atrocities.” He complained that nobody would bring him any marijuana. He spoke about killing himself and said he had his weapon at his side.

[ … ]

“David, this is Ammon Bundy,” he said on the 96-second clip. “I want you to know that there is a future out here. You have a future. . . . Your actions here really mattered and we love you. Please come out of there.”

After several silent minutes, Fry lit a cigarette and said, “Well, alrighty then.”

He shouted that he wanted everyone there to say “Hallelujah.”

The FBI agents yelled “Hallelujah!”

Thirty miles away, at an FBI command post in an old schoolhouse in Burns where top state and federal officials were watching a live video feed, everyone shouted “Hallelujah!”

And Fry walked out of the tent.

Oh dear.  So there are a number of tactical, logistical and strategic lessons learned in this set of events.  According to Robert ‘LaVoy’ Finicum, Bundy started this occupation on the spur of the moment, rather unplanned.  Whimsical, ad hoc outings perhaps have a place in romantic relationships, but not in military operations.  They had no logistical support, they had no means of egress, escape and evasion, they didn’t know if they would have the support and agreement of anyone else, and they carried guns with them on what they apparently intended to be a peaceful protest.

Don’t ever carry a gun you don’t intend to use.**  This group wasn’t prepared to pull their triggers, so the guns should have been left at home.  It should have been a old fashioned sit-in like the hippies who protested the Vietnam war.  If they were intent on taking guns and using them, they should have planned this set of events much differently.

Their communications was a disaster, and sadly, the presentation of the issues was so bad that it harmed the cause of reducing the size and influence of an out-of-control federal government.  Many of us can agree over the offensiveness of forcing us to fund planned parenthood and other progressive causes with our taxes, as well as socialized medicine for people who choose not to work.

But nuclear power plants are a great contribution to the clean, cheap electrification of America, and very few of us believe in UFOs.  At least, I don’t.  I’m surprised that Fry didn’t bring up notions of the American government taking down the WTC, and fake moon landings.  None of this, by the way, is related to the mistreatment of ranchers, the horrible prosecution of the Hammonds, and the ownership of land by the federal government.  They didn’t stay on point because they apparently didn’t have a point.

Finally, if you’re armed and occupying a federal building, demanding that the fedgov bring you marijuana is probably bad press.  You know what I mean?

UPDATE: ** To address idiotic comments I’ve seen about this remark on Mike’s web site, this remark has nothing to do with concealed carry, and you know it.  Carry a rifle, pistol, ammunition and tactical gear if you intend to conduct close quarters battle or small unit maneuver warfare.  Do not bring an AR-15 or a scoped rifle to a sit-in.  If you do, you’ll be charged with obstructing a federal officer in the performance of his duties and spend the next three decades in federal prison, while other men have to work to support your wife and children.  And nothing good will have come of it.

When I found out about Scalia’s death on Saturday, I yelled “No, No, No, No,” fifteen or twenty times at the top of my lungs.  Much badness will follow.

While Mitch McConnell has said that the vacancy will be filled by the next president, he is a traitor like Paul Ryan.  The Senate and House have given Obama everything he’s asked for seven years.  They won’t stop now.  Ted Cruz has promised to filibuster any nominee, and good on him for planning this ahead of time.  I predict that the other senators will hang him out to dry like the worthless, quisling traitor, spineless crap weasels they are and like they did on his filibuster of Obamacare funding.

As to Scalia, I found that his Heller decision was his weakest, and leaves us with much work to be done by the Supreme Court in the future.  Perhaps it was the best he could get past the other justices, but he is now dead and the balance of the court may change for the worse.  This is a lesson for future justices.  Don’t do things incrementally.  We may not have you around long enough to finish the job.

His best work was in his dissents, and if you haven’t read the book “Scalia Dissents,” you owe it to yourself to get it and read it.  Not only is it educational for the cases that have been before the court (you need some understanding of them in order to understand his dissent), but it is a window into one of the great minds of the twentieth century.  His jurisprudence is a demarcation of the legal landscape for generations to come.

On a personal note, I do not know and have never met Scalia.  But my brother, who graduated from Emory Law School, has met him and had a chance to discuss his writings.  One question my brother posed went something like this.  “I admire your decisions and dissents, but what I really wanted to ask you pertains to your writing style and abilities.  Your writings can be understood by scholar and layman alike, and in my opinion it is part of what has made you so successful.  How did you learn to communicate the way you do?”

Scalia responded something like this.  “Thank you, I spent time reading and studying everything C.S. Lewis wrote.  Read and study his writings and you’ll find someone who can communicate to both scholar and layman.”  As for my reaction to what my brother relayed to me, I’m not surprised.  I know someone who visited England recently and took the C.S. Lewis tour, in which they saw his home, where he taught, personal effects and other such things.

The tour was given by one person, and my friends were the only ones on the tour.  “England,” said the tour guide, “has forgotten about Lewis.  The only people I guide now are Americans.”  How tragic.  Lewis was a national treasure.  So too, Scalia was a national treasure.  I fear we will not really know what we had and be able to miss it with necessary earnestness for a very long time.  But at least with me, I will not forget C.S. Lewis, and I won’t forget Scalia.  National treasures are like that.

AP:

Right fight; wrong strategy.

That’s what many ranchers and sympathizers opposing federal control of public lands in the West concluded after the armed occupation of a national wildlife refuge in Oregon.

[ … ]

“We’re not backing off,” said Greg Whalen, a military veteran from Las Vegas who supports the Bundy ranching family that led the occupation. “We’re actually going to fight harder – peacefully.”

Whalen and others say protests must remain a key part of the strategy – but they must be civil to avoid giving a reason for arrests.

Others suggest the battle should shift to the courts to pry authority over open space from the federal government. State lawmakers, notably in Utah, are considering a legal way to take control of U.S. lands that account for a majority of the West, including most of Nevada; about two-thirds of Utah, Idaho and Alaska; and half of Oregon.

Oh how sad.  They may as well read nursery rhymes and fairly tales to themselves.  I’ve done my share of criticizing the tactics employed by the occupiers at Malheur, but relying on the black robed tyrants to protect you from the beltway tyrants is a bad strategy.  No one has shown any proclivity for stopping anything this president has done, and they won’t start now.  Just to show you how bad it is, consider this.

President Obama declared three national monuments in Southern California on Friday, creating the world’s second-largest desert preserve and nearly doubling the amount of land he has unilaterally protected while in office.

The new Mojave Trails, Sand to Snow and Castle Mountains national monuments cover more than 1.8 million acres of land and include sand dunes, Native American petroglyphs and one of the continent’s youngest volcanoes. The designations under the 1906 Antiquities Act connect an array of existing protected areas, including Joshua Tree National Park, Mojave National Preserve and 15 wilderness areas, creating a nearly 10 million-acre arid land reserve that is surpassed only by Namibia’s Namib-Naukluft National Park.

[ … ]

Obama has now conserved more than 265 million acres through the Antiquities Act, which allows him to put federal lands and waters off limits to development without congressional approval.

This is breathtaking.  Consider this again.  Obama has unilaterally confiscated 414,000 square miles of land for use of the elitists, rich, and corporate robber barons who make the deals with the politicians.  414,000 square miles.  This is equivalent to a square block of land 644 miles on each side.  By one man.  With no one objecting, no one with the backbone or moral fiber to stop him.

Too bad for those who think politics considers the common man.

David Codrea initially recommended that NRA members recall Grover Norquist.  We had already briefly discussed that, and it should be clear where I stand.  Todd Rathner penned a rebuttal to David’s recommendation.

I strongly disagree with his suggestion that the NRA should focus on issues other than the Second Amendment.”

“The NRA is powerful and can defend our gun rights against all comers because it focuses like a laser on strengthening the Second Amendment,” Rathner explains. “We [NRA] are not the Republican Party. The NRA wants the support of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents. We are not the pro-life movement. Or the pro-choice movement. We want Americans of all world views to defend the Second Amendment.”

This is a silly statement.  People of all world views won’t defend the second amendment.  The constitution came from a world view that was unique in its understanding of the ultimate source of rights, which the constitution merely recognized.  As for needing people of all kinds to defend anything, I don’t really think there is such a real need, and I certainly have no felt need for such a thing.

But Mr. Rathner doesn’t want us to think two steps ahead.  Or another way to say it would be that Rathner doesn’t want us to consider logical consequences, simple first order effects.  We have gone to great lengths to make everyone understand that open borders, in addition to the other national maladies that would be involved, means loss of recognized rights to own firearms.  It starts with the cultural milieu of Hispanics and Latinos.

“For historical reasons to do with the nationalisation of the land under Lázaro Cárdenas and the predominant form of peasant land tenure, which was “village cooperative” rather than based on individual plots, the demand for “land to the tiller” in Mexico does not imply an individual plot for every peasant or rural worker or family. In Mexico, collectivism among the peasantry is a strong tradition … one consequence of these factors is that the radical political forces among the rural population are on the whole explicitly anti-capitalist and socialist in their ideology. Sometimes this outlook is expressed in support for guerilla organisations; but struggle movements of the rural population are widespread, and they spontaneously ally with the most militant city-based leftist organisations.”

One of the reasons for this reflexive alignment with leftism has to do with the the mid-twentieth century and what the Sovient Union and allied ideologies accomplished.  South and Central America was the recipient or receptacle for socialism draped in religious clothing, or in other words, liberation theology.  Its purveyors were Roman Catholic priests who had been trained in Marxism, and they were very successful in giving the leftists a moral platform upon which to build.  This ideology spread North from South and Central America into Mexico, and thus the common folk in Mexico are quite steeped in collectivist ideology from battles that were fought decades ago.

Thus, Hispanics and Latinos poll at some 75% favoring gun control.  Even if we acquiesce to Mr. Rathner’s claim on single issues, we still win because we’re right.  On this single issue, we cannot allow unfettered immigration.  David writes this about the issue in his latest response to Rathner.

Here’s the thing, Mr. Rathner, and you have to know this, which makes your “response” appear more disingenuous than “respectful”:  “Amnesty” with a “pathway to citizenship” represents nothing less than an existential threat to the Second Amendment. If Grover Norquist and his apologists continue giving NRA a pass to ignore it under a phony “single issue” excuse (which I just demonstrated is one of convenience, not consistency), you’re not going to have anything to “focus like a laser” on. And that’s in a matter of a decade or two.

Lastly, Mr. Norquist has shown a propensity to align himself with people who would do harm to this nation.  This may not be the single issue Mr. Rathner wants to focus on, but it’s good enough for me.  After all, I’m a professional employee, I serve my employer “at will.”  They can fire me any time for any reason.  So can we with Norquist.

Military News:

Since 2002, military police, like many specialties across the Army, had to adapt to serve the mission on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Investigations and community relations took a backseat to foot patrols and base security. The wide-range of abilities military police are capable of narrowed so they could face the challenges at hand.

Soldiers and Airmen from Joint Base Lewis-McChord had an opportunity to get back to basics during civil disturbance training on the installation Jan. 25 to Feb. 4 to face those shifting challenges.

“Our MPs could be called out on a variety of situations,” said Sgt. 1st Class Steven Ketchum, an instructor with the 14th Military Police Brigade, Fort Leonard Wood, Mo. “National Guard MPs got called out in Ferguson (Missouri) and during other civil disturbances. Units don’t train civil-stability operations as much as they could.”

The Missouri National Guard mobilized 2,200 Guardsmen to keep the peace during rioting in Ferguson in the fall of 2014. Likewise, 3,000 Guardsmen were mobilized to assist Baltimore police last spring.

[ … ]

For a long time, Soldiers were trained to see the battlefield in stark terms — friendlies and enemies. Recent civil disturbances have exposed the limitations of that philosophy.

While preparing for Ferguson, National Guard briefings referred to citizens on the ground as “enemy forces” and “adversaries.” The Missouri National Guard corrected course, but they struggled to overcome the perception of being hostile occupiers as opposed to peacekeepers.

“We are helping to keep everyone safe, whether they’re rioting or not,” Loxsom said.

MPs learned many lessons from deployments around the world. Staying strong in the face of adversity, operating in difficult environments, and remaining flexible to meet the mission are hard-won traits that have become part of their DNA.

As the Army’s focus adapts to a changing security environment, MPs are changing with it. They are finding their future by getting back to basics.

Be sure to hear the nuance in the article.  “Enemy forces.”  Not good.  Need better PR.  Call them “everyone,” and tell them you want what’s good for them.  Call us “peacekeepers.”  The “future” of Army MPs is getting back to the “basics,” by which they mean stability operations.  Not breaking up fights between drunken Soldiers, but stability on the streets of America.

The times they are a changin’.

News From Texas:

Some predicted that the law would lead to a surge of 911 calls, but according to Cpl. Tracey Knight, spokeswoman for the Fort Worth Police Department, not much has occurred:

“We do not have anything interesting to report. Two calls so far, no issues. We have no concerns and we have had no problems.”

Sheriff Dee Anderson adds:

“I said before this became law that I thought it was going to be much ado about nothing, but I didn’t know it was going to be this much nothing.”

Carolyn Daniel, a volunteer with Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, argues it’s “too soon to tell” what effect this law will have:

“Changes in legislation can take years to determine an impact.”

Fox News reports that a number of local businesses are now banning firearms on their premises, “as well as national chains, including Starbucks [and] Jack in The Box.” But other businesses, like Home Depot and Bass Pro Shops, have embraced open carry.

But if we look to another state in which open carry was signed into law, the evidence suggests the new Texas legislation will not be an issue.

Mississippi began allowing open carry on July 1, 2013. Fourteen months later, virtually no issues had arisen.

WAPT reported in September 2014:

“The Mississippi Highway Patrol and the Jackson and Byram police departments said there have been little or no incidents reported. Utica police had one incident, where a man forgot he had his weapon on, but he put it back in his truck, authorities said.”

WAPT also quoted Vicksburg Police Chief Walter Armstrong:

“We have seen several [people utilizing the open-carry law] over the last year. I would imagine somewhere between 10 and 12…

I have to admit, initially I was a bit nervous about the debate of the law and the passing of the law. But to my surprise, we have not had one single incident as it relates to open-carry.”

Some Mississippians had similar fears regarding open carry, specifically relating to open carry at bars or pubs.

Prior to the Mississippi law going into effect, Hinds County Constable Jerry Moore argued it would be “total chaos” if the law were to be implemented:

“You get enough fights at the clubs and things that we have to respond to now. Can you imagine running up into a club of 50 to 100 people and trying to get order?”

Law enforcement also has mixed feelings about the Texas law. A survey conducted by the Texas Police Chiefs Association yielded some interesting results.

I told you so.  I said this.

Oooo … boogey man gonna getcha!  Hold me Uncle Bob!  I askeerd!  “Walking disaster.”  “Trouble.”  “Volatile and deadly situations.” Oooo …

Again, as a citizen of a traditional open carry state, I’m going to tell you what’s going to happen here.  Nothing.  That’s right, nothing.  Life will continue in the lone star state unabated, and the doomsday predictions of law enforcement and the progressives will go down as a monument to their hatred of the common man.

And this.

Really, folks, this has become a silly, exaggerated, inflated, dramatic, overly-complicated, hysterical fit.  I can say that because my home state is a traditional open carry state, and I have open carried, and seen others doing the same.  It’s just not the problem you are making it out to be.  When it’s time for open carry to be legal, some men will decide to open carry, and life will go on.  Business will occur, and the only crimes that may spiral out of control would be SWAT call-outs from politically motivated callers who use the cops to drive their points.

Here’s a note to Texas police departments.  If you don’t want to be used, don’t oblige.  Don’t do it.  Just say no.  Stand up for yourself.  Be men.

Blood won’t run in the streets, I have said.  The sky won’t fall, chicken little can go back to sleep, and the world can know that open carry isn’t the problem the “Moms demand [fill in the blank]” and LEOs say it is.

Florida is next.  And then comes South Carolina, if communist State Senator Larry Martin gets out of the way.

The Fiscal Times:

“I always carry a weapon on me. If I’d been at the Bataclan or one of those bars, I would have opened fire. Perhaps I would have died, but at least I would have taken a shot. The worst thing is the powerlessness to respond to those who want to kill you,” he said.

Well now.  I don’t really know you Donald, and we don’t send each other Christmas cards.  I care what my readers do, and perhaps they care from time to time what I do.  But I don’t really care what you do.

But here’s what I do care about.  How much have you pressed those communists in New York to let your fellow citizens carry guns?  You know, those poor people who are left “powerless to respond” when gangsters and thugs rob, beat and kill them?  After all, you want to be the leader of the “free world,” so shouldn’t it matter whether you’ve spoken out in favor of the rights of those around you?

Oh, that’s right.  I guess you haven’t.  I recall that informative conversation you had with Field & Stream, where you said this.

I do have a gun, and I have a concealed-carry permit, actually, which is a very hard thing to get in New York … And, you know, I’m in New York City, so I have a concealed-carry permit, and I meant to tell you—I just wanted to point that out because it’s so hard to get, and it’s one of the hardest things you can get.

Okay.  It was all about you.  Never mind.  I’m back to where I started.  I don’t really care what you do.

David Codrea:

“While many people might disagree with statements made by those involved in the Malheur takeover, Americans have a fundamental right to freedom of speech,” the ACLU of Oregon declared in a position statement on charges against Santilli. “We can all agree that we should not hold members of the media or protesters in jail without bail simply because they have shocking or abhorrent views. These are principles that we must stand by, even when we disagree with the message of the speaker.”

David adds, “Love him or hate him, if the government gets away with its prosecution of Pete Santilli, freedom of expression and freedom of the press will be effectively quashed.

And I’ve noticed that holding people without bail appears to be a favorite tactic these days of prosecutors who find the accused particularly objectionable.  They seldom get away with it unless judge feels the same way.  Oftentimes they do.  So whether you find justice seems to be related to whether they like you and whether they perceive you to be a threat to their social pecking order.

David Codrea:

Vote yes on the recall of Grover Norquist from the NRA board.

I didn’t know there was one, and I certainly will.  I’ve weighed in before on this worm.

Former ISIS sex slaves take up arms against ISIS.  My question: where are the men?

Muslim migrant abuse of Christians.  As I’ve said, this problem isn’t really that difficult to solve.  Remember Herschel’s Dictum.

Fox News:

An employee at a Michigan General Motors Technical Center said he was fired after he pulled a gun to stop a knife attack at the plant on Wednesday, but his bosses eventually reversed their decision and let him return to work.

Didarul Sarder, a 32-year-old valet service supervisor, “now has his job back,” Warren Mayor Jim Fouts said in a Facebook post.

Sarder said he had a valid concealed pistol license and was carrying his gun when he saw a 52-year-old woman being stabbed by another woman just outside the main entrance of the central office building, FOX2 reported.

“The lady kept saying ‘I’m dying, someone help,’ and it was just natural reaction,” Sarder said. “I just see this lady getting stabbed. I only had, like, half a second to think and I un-holstered my firearm and pointed it at her to drop the knife.”

Sarder said he told the suspect to freeze until police arrived to arrest her. The woman who was stabbed, Stephanie Kerr, is in critical condition after being stabbed in the neck, back and abdomen, officials said.

Fouts told FOX2 the attack began when the 32-year-old suspect entered the plant asking to speak with Kerr. The two met in the lobby but eventually went outside. That’s when the suspect pulled a knife. The suspect hasn’t been identified because she hasn’t been charged or arraigned yet.

“I hope she makes it,” Sarder said. “Maybe those few seconds before the police arrived could be the difference between life and death.”

But after the incident was resolved, Sarder said a GM employee fired him for having the weapon on the premises.

“He said, ‘You shouldn’t have had a firearm here,’” Sarder said. “’After this is done he needs to be escorted off the property. He’s not welcome back here.’”

Sarder added: “I was really bummed out. I got a little emotional.”

Sarder said he had worked on the grounds for a company contracted by GM since December. He said he was never informed of a no-gun policy. Sarder’s wife, Jakia Sarder, told The Detroit Free Press that Sarder had worked for the company for almost 10 years.

“Right after it happened someone in authority asked him off the premises because he violated company rules with a gun,” Fouts wrote. “That was absolutely the wrong response to this hero. However that decision was over-ruled by higher ups and he now has his job back.”

But I’m willing to bet their policy still hasn’t changed and he still isn’t allowed to carry a gun.  The company would rather the poor woman have perished than allow an employee to stop a crime with a weapon.  Meh … yawn … what’s a life when there’s a corporate policy to consider?