Shall Not Be Questioned » Current Events

World War I Generation is Gone

Sebastian — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 16:35:49 +0000

The last surviving World War I vet has died at 110. It was a woman, that served as a mess steward. Apparently the last combat veteran died in May of last year, in Australia.

SOPA and Gun Control

Sebastian — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 18:55:54 +0000

From PJ Media:

Q: What does the proposed SOPA (“Stop Online Piracy Act”) legislation have in common with gun control?

A: Both would punish the innocent for the bad acts of a guilty few.

The article proceeds to tear apart the logic of gun control as being virtually identical to that of SOPA. I had never realized until I started interacting with gun control fanatics more how they really are incapable of drawing a distinction between responsible individuals and misusers. Their position is quite simple that because we have no good way of predetermining whether someone is responsible, or will misuse, we have to assume everyone will misuse. This is a poor basis for a free society.

Homicide No Longer a Top Cause of Death

Sebastian — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 15:37:04 +0000

This is certainly progress:

For the first time in almost half a century, homicide has fallen off the list of the nation’s top 15 causes of death, bumped by a lung illness that often develops in elderly people who have choked on their food.

And all this has happened while we’ve been liberalizing our gun laws, and selling more and more guns. Kind of puts a damper on the narrative of the gun control busybodies doesn’t it?

A Notable Passing

Sebastian — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 03:37:25 +0000

I had never actually heard of this man before, but now that I am aware of his passing, I find it a sad note:

In 1942, a man named Gordon Hirabayashi was among a handful of U.S. Citizens of Japanese Ancestry to refuse to evacuate his home in Seattle to be herded into an internment camp. For that “crime” he served one year in prison, and was not exonerated until four decades later by the U.S. Supreme Court, which finally acknowledged that the mass evacuation of and internment of Japanese Americans had been based wholly on prejudice and was without justification.

I hadn’t been aware there were some who resisted. I believe that what happened to Japanese-Americans during World War II was so heinous, they would have been completely justified in resisting the government with force of arms. Unfortunately, however, compliance was probably the path of least resistance. With racism widespread in mid-20th century society, and the Japanese having just bombed Pearl Harbor, I don’t think sympathy to this path would have been widespread, and they likely would have been crushed mercilessly. It would only have confirmed everyone’s bigotry. But would they have had the moral right? Absolutely.

One reason I’ve never been able to warm up to blogger Michelle Malkin is because she wrote this book, trying to justify what I think is not at all justifiable. It’s one of the things that made me very reluctant to identify with conservatives.

My Summary of the Iowa Caucuses

Sebastian — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 03:03:53 +0000

Bitter has been filling us in on the whole Iowa Caucus results, which I can only really sum up as the big mama elephant shouting “Shut up, quit complaining, and eat your Romney! There’s starving SoCo’s out there who have nothing but Santorum to eat!”

Forgive my absence today, but my career (the one that pays the bills) is currently is having to come first. I have some very positive developments I am working on. That’s all I can say for now, but I may be able to say more later.

A Disturbing Defense

Sebastian — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 20:31:00 +0000

Every couple of years you seem to get some yahoo who claims to have found something or other in an unopened can of soda. This has happened with Mountain Dew, but what’s disturbing is Pepsi’s defense:

“the mouse would have dissolved in the soda had it been in the can from the time of its bottling until the day the plaintiff drank it,” according to theRecord. (It would have become a “jelly-like substance,” according to Pepsi, adds LegalNewsline.)

Follow through to get the link. It’s not all that surprising, really. Mountain Dew contains a lot of citric acid. That’s why the Pepsi guy was quoted as saying “our product is essentially a can of battery acid.” Do the Dew!

If you’re thinking of switching to Coke products, well, Coke contains a lot of phosphoric acid, which is arguably worse for you than citric acid.

Wishing You a Very Merry Christmas

Sebastian — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 19:13:28 +0000

We started the day with the opening of presents. I got a lot more clothes that I needed, and Bitter got a ceramic knife set, a knife block, and a few videos. Then it was time to celebrate Christmas with gunfire. Jason and I headed to the club (my the club), along with his dad, to test fire his CNC milled AR pistol. It was found to be rather sensitive to ammunition, in that it fed well with hot 5.56, but not so wonderfully with .223 reloads. But it definitely worked pretty well once we got the ammo figured out. I’ll have video later.

Politicians are the Same Everywhere

Sebastian — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 15:19:15 +0000

In the wake of random tragedy, is to suggest there’s probably some new law that wouldn’t have prevented a damned thing, but will nonetheless sound good to those weak souls who demand that the government do something. We have plenty of these worms here in America, but I think the only difference is we’re a bit, and sadly only a bit, more willing to say publicly, for all to see, they are worms, and should be ignored. But maybe only a bit is enough to at least slow the advance of the lowest common denominator.

Letter From Lincoln

Sebastian — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 13:12:33 +0000

Dave Hardy made a recent trip to the National Archives in Washington D.C. to do some research, and uncovered a previously unpublished hand-written letter from Abraham Lincoln. This is extremely cool, but I have to admit to being unable to read the letter. Sometime in elementary school, I can remember being forced to adopt handwriting, and by Junior High, teachers abandoned this crusade, and let students write however they were comfortable. I’ve always preferred printing to handwriting, so that’s what I went back to. I admit to being unable to read all but the most modern handwriting.

Bitter and I recently had a laugh when she challenged me to write out a love letter to her in longhand, and I was utterly unable to do it. I spend so much time typing these days that I can barely print legibly, let along write anything, other than my signature, out longhand.

I feel handwriting will be a lost art in a generation or so. How long before you have to seek out experts to translate a letter like Dave has brought into the digital age? How long, in an age of digital signatures, will kids even be able to write their own name out longhand? How long before we go back to illiterate times when “making your mark” was enough?

Speaking of dead skills, how many people alive can still understand shorthand? Although, like most people who were raised pre-texting/pre-IMing era, I lament the younger generations use of texting speak, I can’t help but think it’s just a variant on an old historical habit.

Ding Dong, Kim Jong Il is Dead

Sebastian — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 04:02:41 +0000

Good Riddance. And now, this tribute:

UPDATE: Ironically on the same day Vaclav Havel died.