A great article over at Recoil magazine about the M3A1.
The old Grease Gun was named for its resemblance to the tool still used by mechanics today. Inspired by the British Sten and German MP40, and developed during early WWII, “the Greaser” was made almost entirely of stamped metal with only a couple of machined parts. Production cost was $15 per unit in 1943, equal to about $220 today. The Army touted it as more accurate than the Thompson, claiming a soldier firing an M3 full-auto offhand would keep 90 percent of his rounds inside a 6×6-foot target at 50 yards. We like to call this claim “absolute nonsense;” the Greaser was appreciated for its ability to spray an area with heavy .45 rounds, but nobody ever called it precise.
Nobody ever called it precise, but you could lay down a base of fire with it, and it was fairly easy to hit a half-silhouette at 50 meters.
The M3A1 was my favorite personal firearm during my Army years. It was cheap, clunky, and inaccurate, but it was a helluva lot of fun to shot. There was something cool about spraying .45 ball across the lndscape.
I don't do Twitter, so I don't know, but PJMedia tells me that the hashtag #FireFauci was trending yesterday. Here's the headline.
'Fire Fauci' Trends on Twitter as His Mixed Messages and Inconsistencies Finally Get Called Out
Here's the deal with Fauci. I don't believe anything he says anymore, because if I wait a couple of hours, whatever he says will change. I understand that what he is doing is not an exact science, but his understanding of it should not change on an hourly basis.
But, he probably cannot be fired. He's a government worker, and is probably so ensconced in the Civil Service that he'll be there until he retires. But, we can choose to ignore him, or mock him, or even write blog posts about how utterly inconsistent he has been. He loves the media adulation, and he wants to be relevant, and once this pandemic is over, he'll go back to being a faceless functionary.
The world will be a better place when people forget who Anthony Fauci is.
Belle bought us a laser target for fast draw practice that doesn't require ammunition. We have some laser cartridge's that we've used in the past, but this system takes it up one level, so that we can actually get times, and score hits and misses. The system is sold through the Association website, I already had the timers, so we only had to buy the laser target.
I spent part of this morning learning to set it up and calibrate it. The learning curve is pretty flat once you read the instructions, but it does have to be calibrated to the ambient light levels.
We can use this for dry-fire practice at the club, and for teaching new shooters how to manipulate the revolver without having ammo involved. I can see that the grandkids might have a lot of fun with this thing. The target is 8" in diameter, which is a good size for learning reactive shooting. It won't give shot placement, but won't give you a score if you miss it.
The US Supreme Court has once again punted on the Pennsylvania election case, claiming that now that the election is over, the question is MOOT.
Here’s the thing about this particular case in Pennsylvania. The legislature had voted and passed legislation that mandated ALL ballots, including absentee ballots, be received by 8pm on election night. Any ballots received after that deadline wouldn’t be counted. This was a well-known rule throughout Pennsylvania.
But then, the State Supreme Court got involved after Democrats sued. Suddenly, in the midst of the election, after ballots had already been sent out, the court moved the deadline to three days AFTER the election. Their reasons? Covid and the U.S. mail. Stupid reasons if you ask me. But that is what Pennsylvania’s court did. They arbitrarily overruled the legislation because reasons. What’s even worse about their ruling is it also opened the door to allowing ballots to be counted, even if no signature nor a valid postmark. But nothing to see here, no potential of election fraud whatsoever. None.
Here's the problem as I see it. The legislature allowed these shenanigans. The legislature had recourse, after the election date. The US Constitution requires that the legislature meet after the election, to certify the results. If the legislature had refused to certify the results of the election based on the changes made in election procedures, the result would have been that Pennsylvania would have sent no electors to the Electoral College.
Likewise, in Georgia, Arizona, Michigan, et al, if those legislatures had refused to certify the results to the election. There would have been a huge uproar, but it would have been Constitutional, The legislature holds the responsibility to certify the results of the elections in their respective states, and that certification should be more than a rubber-stamp..
As much as I rail at the Supreme Court, they may have backed into the correct conclusion. The certification of an election rests with the legislature. If the legislature fails to hold the election officials accountable, then why should the Supreme Court hold them accountable?
There are reports that Elon Musk has moved to Texas. When seeking conformation, Musk responded with a reply that many should use when talking to the media.
Oh, snap.
I'm on the list. Both Belle and I qualify, and I went to our local apothecary and signed up. They'll call me in a couple of weeks. However, the Great Southern Ice Storm made last week a No-Go, so I'll be that the timeline was pushed back a week.
I'm not scared of the vaccine. The Army poked a lot of stuff in my arm that didn't make much sense. One time they gave me a shot for Black Plague.
"Where are you sending me that I need a Black Plague shot?"
"Nowhere, but it's not in your records, so you get one."
However, ny buddy Termite sent me this interesting graphic that sums up the feeling of a bunch of people.
I'm sure this will be an instant classic among the pre-school set.
“No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!”
If we want to get back to normal, we're just going to have to make the decision to get back to normal, government be damned. This "14 days to slow the spread" has lasted a whle year now, and I've had abut enough of it.
It appears that Chuck Schumer doesn't have enough to keep him busy, so he spent some time this weekend talking smack about Texas.
“The bottom line is, Texas thought it could go it alone and built a system that ignored climate change,” Schumer said during a Lower East Side press conference, referring to the state’s decision to stay off the country’s national power grid.
“It was not what’s called resilient, and now Texas is paying the price,” Schumer said.
“I hope they learned a lesson,” he added.
I wouldn't bet against Texas, Chuckie. If I was a betting man, I'd bet that Texas learns whatever lessons that come from this storm, and they won't be caught flat-footed again. I'd bet that Governor Abbot and the state legislature give this event plenty of attention and make plans to make usre it doesn't ahppen again.
Don't Mess With Texas.
So, I'm reading about this "anti-woke" backlash, and I'm wondering.
I'm the most un-woke guy you ever saw, and frankly, I'm amazed that so many people buy into the idea that ... well... Let me give you an idea.
It appears that someone walked into a gun shop in Metarie, LA and started shooting people. It didn't end well for the people, nor the shooter. Two people died before staff and customers gunned him down.
I'm sure we'll learn more in the coming days, but opening fire in a gun store is a sure recipe for disaster. Unless disaster is what he intended in the first place. If the guy intended to commit suicide, hecould have done it in the privacy of his own living room.
What an utter waste.
By my reckoning, the last time I shoveled ice was during the winter of 1979 at Fort Knox,, KY. I was 25 yers old. Today I shoveled ice again, and now I'm 67.
I haven't been in the shop for a couple of days, and I needed to get in there today and make sure that we sustained no damage. The shop is about a foot above the level of the house, and it was an uphill trek across slippery, thawing ice, so I found a flat shovel and started moving the inch or so of ice that remained on the north side of the building. The north side doesn't get any sunsine and the ice might stay there for another day or so.
Now, I can get into the shop from the front of from the side. Two days ago all that was covered in ice, but the sun came out for a little while yesterday and it's shining nicely out there right now Everything that is suny has melted, it is only the shaded areas that still have ice.
The roof of the shop has a 4:12 pitch and the ice on the roof is sliding during the melt. All this will be gone in another couple of days and the Winter Storm of 2021 will pass into memory.
SuddenLink came back up today at 0930 local, almost precisely 60 hours after it went down.
SuddenLink still sucks.
Andrew Cuomo killed a bunch of people through his mis-guided nursing home policies.
Tedd Cruz took his daughters to Cancun for a few days.
What is the legacy media interested in? You guessed it. The unplanned trip to Cancun.
I agree that the optics are bad on the Cancun trip, but what was Ted supposed to do? He's not the governor, nor even a city councilman. He certainly doesn't have anything to do with the electric grid and he absolutely can't control the weather. There was absolutely nothing he could do to mitigate the disaster, so he took his daughters to somewhere they could thaw out.
Cuomo, on the other hand, sustained a policy that led to the deaths of thousands, then actively fudged the numbers to hide it.
And now, the mainstream media wonders why nobody trusts them? Why we think they are all a bunch of hacks? Because they are a bunch of hacks.
In other news, we're thawing out in central Louisiana. There is still plenty of ice haging around (and I do mean hanging. Things might get exciting when it starts to fall.) And, SuddenLink Communictions has now been out since 2130, Wednesday 02/17/21.
SuddenLink sucks.
Two earthquakes today, one near Eagle Pass TX, the other near Manchester, OK.
I'm no geologist and have no idea what these two mean, or even if hey're connected, but it is interesting.
Here in he local area, the only cable TV provider is SuddenLink Communications. Just as soon as the weather gets bad, they go offline for no apparent reason and stay down for several days. SuddenLink provides my TV and internet.. They're the only game in town, and the corporate climate in that company is such that they hold the customer in contempt.
For the past 36 hours, I've been operating from a mobile hotspot, and that is not acceptable, not while I'm paying SuddenLink for services. Using my cell phone for internet service, I can go online and find out that I have a service outage in my area. But, they can't tell me when it might be restored. If I want a service credit for an outage, I have to apply for it.
Yeah, I know that we just came through a winter storm. But, we also came through several hurricanes last yea, and most of the cable and infrastructure is brand new. During this winter storm, we had a couple of power outages, but they were understandable, and lasted a total of about four hours. The electrical crews were out during the worst of it, making sure that their customers had power. I cannot say enough good things about Cleco, our power provider.
I can't say enough bad things about SuddenLink, our communications provider.
SuddenLink Sucks.
At this point, my TV/Internet/Phone has been down since 2130 local, Wednesday, 2/17/21. I'll keep track until it comes back up. I'll need this to apply for a credit.
