Social credit world???

Posted on by August 26, 2019

China has gone whole hog into the social credit scheme. The question is, are the US tech companies following suit here?

Or as the government itself says, “Keeping trust is glorious and breaking trust is disgraceful.”

Silicon Valley says: “Hold my soy latte.”

Full article, HERE. From PJ Media… and another HERE.

Now we know there are ‘algorithms’ that ban people on FB, Twitter, Instagram, and other chat channels. Michael Williamson and Larry Correia are two who have been nailed, among many others by FB, and often have no idea what it was that got them kicked. A couple of notable gun bloggers have also had their sites taken down by Blogger (owned by Google)…

And if you put a link on FB that takes people off site, those posts get throttled (this is verified, including some testing that I’ve done informally, where it literally takes three days in some cases for people to see those posts in their feeds, if they ever do).

Ironically, it ‘seems’ that most of the banning, shadow banning, etc. that is occuring is against conservative voices. Just like the Wiki dust up last month trying to remove conservative authors, this crap is ever expanding. I didn’t know AirB&B could ban you for life, but then I don’t use them. Nor did I know Uber drivers can rate you as a passenger, and get you banned from their service, again for life, without any recourse on your behalf.

A lot of the banning, limiting of voices appears to be more prevalent on mobile devices, especially those running the Android apps.

Are we now to the point that anything we say on line can be used against us? It sure as hell sounds like it. And from what I’m seeing from these articles and some security stuff that I follow, there really is no recourse.

Marta, over at VictoryGirls Blog has a slightly different take on it, HERE.

In either case, definitely food for thought… Dammit… I don’t WANT interesting times again.

The Grey Man- Down South…

Posted on by August 25, 2019

It’s alive!!!

Y’all have been bugging me for John Cronin’s backstory, so you get this…

Click the cover for the link.

The blurb-

After too much action, too much peace gets on a man’s nerves. John Cronin’s back from Vietnam and bored, when Billy Moore suggests he check out the brand new Drug Enforcement Agency. He’d expected paperwork and meetings; he got on-the-job training in South America with stakeouts gone wrong and ambushes exploding into firefights. 

This isn’t Cronin’s first rodeo, and now he’s taking the fight to the cartels, from the laboratories hidden deep in the highland jungles to the enforcers in the cities and secure compounds!

And as always, many thanks to the alpha and beta readers, Steph for the editing, and Miggy for correcting my lousy Spanish! All errors are mine.

And Tina did a super job on the cover, including making up the Joker!!!

As always, HONEST reviews are appreciated!

Net humor…

Posted on by August 22, 2019

Humor??? Or way too close to the truth?

The Lone Ranger No Longer Rides – in California.

The Lone Ranger was arrested in Lone Pine, California for the crime of illegally transferring silver bullets.  The famed masked man had just apprehended an armed felon after shooting the gun out of his hand.  As was his practice for the last eighty years, he gave a silver bullet to the outlaw’s victim.

She was a kindly old widow who was robbed and held captive by the desperado.  This lady, grateful that her life and property were restored, treasured the silver bullet as a symbol that justice was done.

The trouble started when she showed the bullet to her weekly garden club.  Upon seeing the gleaming memento, one lady fainted.  Another lady gasped that they were all going to die.  A third lady, who was also a member of CHA (California Hysterics Anonymous), warned that where there was a bullet, there had to be a gun. 
During the shocked silence an attendee desperately summoned the Sheriff on her cell phone. 
When the Sheriff heard their story he struggled to stifle a laugh.  He knew the old gentleman on the big white horse.  He also appreciated how many criminals the Lone Ranger had captured over the years.  However, since California voters passed Proposition 63, he had to uphold the law.

Predictably, he found the masked man enjoying a beer at the Dry Gulch Saloon back in town.

“Thanks for helping old widow Smith,” he said, “but did you really give her a silver bullet?”

“Yes,” replied the Lone Ranger, “after all that’s my trademark.  Got a problem with that?”

“Well, yes,” hesitated the sheriff.  “Ya see – under Proposition 63, you’ve got to be a licensed firearms dealer to give anyone a bullet.”

“Are you kidding?” asked the Lone Ranger.

“Wish I was,” said the embarrassed sheriff, “and to boot whoever receives the bullet has to be registered with the Department of Justice.”

“Holy guacamole!” exclaimed the masked man.  “Did I do anything else wrong?”

“Well,” said the sheriff, looking even more sheepish now, “there’s the little matter of you shooting a gun out of the outlaw’s hand.”

“What!” said the Lone Ranger.  “If I hadn’t done that, the skunk would have plugged me for sure.”

“I know that,” admitted the Sheriff, “but he’ll probably sue you for failing to retreat and using unnecessary force.  If they convict you, they’ll take your six-shooters away for good.  Which reminds me, according to California law, your pistols have too large a capacity.  If I were you, I’d convert those six-shooters into five-shooters as quick as you can.”

“Jumpin’ Junipers!” exclaimed the Lone Ranger.  “I’d better tell this to my faithful Indian companion, Tonto.”

“Hold on,” said the Sheriff.  “I need to remind you that Indians are now referred to as Native Americans.  We privileged male palefaces have got to remember that.”

As the Lone Ranger sat in shocked silence, the sheriff explained his rights and proceeded to take him in.

Postscript: Upon being provided an attorney at state expense, the outlaw successfully sued the Lone Ranger.  He claimed that he could no longer work since he had suffered the permanent loss of his trigger finger.

Governor Gavin Newsom urged imposing the maximum sentence for possession of illegal ammunition and a firearm that exceeds lawful capacity.  He received a huge monetary award, forcing the Lone Ranger to sell the silver mine.

Tonto was deemed innocent, but victimized by virtue of being a member of an oppressed minority.  He was given land by the state and now operates a very profitable casino.

After getting out of jail, the Lone Ranger could not find a job since he was now an ex-con.  Fortunately, Tonto lets him do light janitorial work at the casino and sleep in the basement.

YGTBSM!!!

Posted on by August 23, 2019

Once again San Franfreako steps up and makes Florida man look good…

San Francisco has introduced new sanitized language for criminals, getting rid of words such as “offender” and “addict” while changing “convicted felon” to “justice-involved person.”

<snip>

A juvenile “delinquent” will now be called a “young person with justice system involvement,” or a “young person impacted by the juvenile justice system.”

<snip>

And drug addicts or substance abusers, meanwhile, will become “a person with a history of substance use.”

Full article, HERE.

This is apparently IN ADDITION to making a number of things ‘not a prosecutable’ crime… Really?

And this makes one wonder why anybody with any sense would actually want to even visit that POS town, unless you came with a complete Tyvek suit, rebreather, and booties to keep from tracking crap everywhere you went.

Even more interesting, apparently a number of ambulance services will no longer transfer patients to San Franfreako, citing medic’s fears of being robbed at gunpoint for any meds that ‘might’ be on the ambulance during their time in SFO…

And then there is this- Mapping San Francisco’s 132,562 Cases Of Human Feces, from Zero Hedge, HERE.  

I really don’t see how anybody from there can hold their heads up in polite company, much less justify what the city…well, I was going to say fathers, but that doesn’t work… ‘people’ are doing to the poor residents who actually have housing, pay taxes, etc. at an absolutely STUPID rate, and they get shit… literally on their doorsteps…

Unless… Just a thought, San Franfreako is trying to ‘prove’ they are better at screwing up than LA is, and they think they can better LA’s rep as the disease capital of the US, HERE…

I truly feel sorry for those who live in any of these cities…

TBT…

Posted on by August 21, 2019

One more on P-3s and I swear I’ll get off them… LOL

This was done back in 2011, for the celebration of Naval aviation, one of a number of ‘throwback’ paint schemes. Now what makes this one interesting is that it was done by NIPPI Corporation’s Aircraft Maintenance Division in Atsugi, Japan.

For those that many not know the history, the “VP-44 Strawberry 5″ paint scheme replicates a scheme applied to the PBY-5A Catalina flying boat used by the VP-44 Golden Pelicans to locate the Japanese fleet shortly before the Battle of Midway fought June 4-7, 1942 in the Pacific Ocean.

(Standing, left to right): Aviation Machinist Mate 2nd Class R.J. Derouin; Chief Aviation Radioman Francis Musser; Ensign Hardeman (Copilot); Ensign J.H. Reid (Pilot) and R.A. Swan (Navigator).
(Kneeling, left to right): Aviation Machinist Mate 1st Class J.F. Gammell (NAP); Aviation Machinist Mate 3rd Class, J. Goovers and Aviation Machinist Mate 3rd Class P.A. Fitzpatrick.

100706-N-6855K-063

 

Now jump forward 70 years, and they’re partners with us, along with Canada and Australia. Photo at MCAS Kaneohe, during RIMPAC 2012.

And it’s begun…

Posted on by August 20, 2019

So much for that ‘due process’ on Red Flag laws… At least in Florida…

Article, HERE.

While this appears to be ‘accidental’, ironically, this is playing out almost EXACTLY as Lawdog predicted, HERE.

So now the gent is without any weapons, and it’s going to cost him who knows how much time AND money to get his own property back…

I just don’t have the words without resorting to cussing…

Editing… @#%*&!!!

Posted on by August 18, 2019

I know it’s necessary, and I’m VERY thankful for my alpha and beta readers, but I #@%!) HATE editing. Especially when they point out that yes, maybe ‘I’ knew what a particular comment/description/paragraph meant, but they damn sure didn’t. And you can spel chek all damn day and it won’t catch mis-wordings. Is that even a word?

And expansions to explain something means searching through the entire story/novella/book to make sure ALL of the changes make sense (which of course they don’t, so you end up fixing multiple things).

And once all THAT is done, you send it back out to the beta readers, who once again beat you up for (insert issue here). Which leads to another round of edits…

Then the editor gets her hands on it, lather, rinse, repeat… Sigh…

It would also help if I was a good writer, and hadn’t spent 40 years doing technical documents and briefings where punctuation didn’t have to be perfect… Grrr… And yes, I can spel Oxford comma, even if I don’t know how to use it, them, whatever… 🙂  That’s why I put a bunch of them at the end of the story and tell the alpha and beta readers to put ’em where they want to.

Along with this, I’m dealing with the cover art, and blurbs, and trying to fight off the muse that wants to add EVEN MORE STUFF to the story… Which is already about twice as long as originally planned…

And it’s a month late, because of the extra writing.

Writing is fun, the rest of it, not so much, and before any more people ask, I will not be doing Cronin’s time in Vietnam. There are plenty of stories out there on ‘Nam, written by much better than I.

Damn…

Posted on by August 17, 2019

Just…damn…

No words for this horror.

B.C. man with ALS chooses medically assisted death after years of struggling to fund 24-hour care.

Full article, HERE from CBC News.

IS THIS what is in store for us?

Book Promos…

Posted on by August 16, 2019

Well, we ‘finally’ got Wayne off his ass… So feed some starving writers!

Wayne Whisnand has his first short story out, Here There Be Pirates.

As always, click on the cover to go to the Amazon page.

The blurb-

A short story about an inter-dimensional assassin who is hired by a group of pirates to eliminate a local government official.

I was a reader for this one, and I think he did a damn good job, but since this is his first, we gave him this… So be gentle… or not… 🙂

And Joe Collins has a new book out too! Dauntless: The Pirate Wars

The blurb-

Dauntless, the United Confederation of Planets’ most powerful space based warship ever built by mankind, is on a training mission when she’s abruptly directed to an anomaly out past Mars. An unknown life force appears to be spreading mayhem and annihilation without pause.When she and her crew investigate, Dauntless finds herself in a horrific life or death battle. Not only her survival is at stake, but the 1,200 spacers, Marines, pilots and support staff’s lives are on the line. Dauntless fights with everything she has, reaching over and beyond the simple but life changing concepts of “Duty, Honor, and Selfless Commitment.” “I am Dauntless,” however, might not be enough to save Dauntless and all she represents against the overwhelming destruction facing her and her crew.

A I must say ‘we’ (that being us starving writers) DO appreciate the shekels you pass our way. We do work hard to write stuff that people want to read. We know we’re not big fish, hell, we aren’t even little fish… We’re more like minnows, and the competition is pretty stiff.

A long winded way of saying THANK YOU!