Reaching out…

Posted on by June 19, 2013

From a friend who knows this lady-

Help if you can…

I know there are a lot of blegs out there right now for a number of good causes, but this one touches all of us that are shooters/sportsmen.  I’m doing a Cabela’s gift certificate, FWIW…

Friends –

I’m not sure if you’ve had a chance to see my recent blog post regarding the fire in our city. This last week has been quite the emotional roller-coaster ride. I’ve witnessed family and friends be evacuated from their homes as we watched the forest nearby go up in flames. As of right now the fire is about 85% contained – Praise The Lord. The bad news is that over 500 homes were burned up in the fire. The town in the forest is practically gone. I’ve seen pictures and heard eye-witness reports from my husband since he personally battled the flames alongside fire fighters from all across the country. The sheriff said it looks like a nuclear bomb went off. I have been driving around the forest all week to get to town so I have yet to put eyes on the devastation – I’m still in a little bit of denial.

We have dear friends that had their home burned to nothing but ash, and when I say ash, I mean ash. The fire burned at 2,500 degrees which is enough to melt his “fire-proof” gun safe. All this to say… Troy and I have felt led to try and help Vance and his family. They have 7 kiddos and I know it is going to take awhile to rebuild their lives and get back to “normal.” While I’m sure they have insurance (I haven’t asked), I am hoping to provide them with a care package to help them out a bit during this difficult time.

Vance is a duck-hunter and elk bowhunter. He brings along his sons on his hunts each year. I know they would appreciate being able to get back in the woods this Aug / Sept! 

So…… I’m wondering if you have any extra gently used or new gear that you would be willing to donate. I know as bloggers we often get gear to review and sometimes it is duplicate of what we already have. Or maybe your company is able to pitch in with a small donation. Please think / pray about it and let me know if are able to help. I also have some people sending gift cards to cabellas and/or Bass Pro which is totally awesome.

Here is what we have so far:
*Vortex and another binocular company considering donating binos and a rifle scope (we are waiting on confirmation)
*Gift cards to Cabelas / Bass Pro
*Beef Jerky
*Kifaru Backpack
*Camping supplies

I also have contacted PSE and Hoyt to see if they are willing to donate equipment. We are REALLY hoping that one of these companies steps up to the plate.

Here is my blog post if you want more details:
http://www.fromthedraw.com/2013/06/black-forest-fire-opportunity-to-give.html

I’m planning on posting a follow-up post once we deliver the gear to Vance and his family. I’d love to give a shout-out to each company and person that donated something. (If you want to be anonymous that is cool too!)

Again – Thanks for considering helping us out. I totally understand if you are unable to at this time.

If nothing else, let them know we are thinking of them…

Executive actions…

Posted on by June 18, 2013

Well, it appears there are things going on ‘behind teh curtain’ so to speak…

From the Washington Times…

The White House on Tuesday is touting a progress report on President Obama’s pledge to combat gun violence, in the wake of December’s school shooting, that says the administration has “completed or made significant progress” on 21 of 23 executive actions Mr. Obama laid out in January.

/snip

The executive actions the administration is acting on range from ending a “freeze” on gun violence research, to making sure federal law enforcement agencies trace guns recovered in investigations, to addressing issues with the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), the report said.

For example, the Justice Department announced in March that it plans to invest more than $20 million for actions such as improving access to and reporting of mental health information and felony convictions to NICS in hopes of keeping guns out of criminals and the dangerously mentally ill. Mr. Obama has also proposed $50 million for this purpose in his fiscal 2014 budget plan.

Read the full article HERE.

And Joe Bite Me’s comments can be read HERE.

And there is this from the CEO of Bushmaster via Emily Miller at the Washington Times…

George Kollitides, the CEO of Freedom Group, which owns Bushmaster, was blamed by some as being complicit in the killings. He has not commented on the controversy, until now. “It’s very easy to blame an inanimate object. Any kind of instrument in the wrong hands can be put to evil use. This comes down to intent – criminal behavior, accountability and responsibility,” Mr. Kollitides said in an exclusive interview last week. The killer’s mother, Nancy Lanza, taught her son to shoot and is said to have given him access to the gun safes.

Full article HERE.

It’s becoming obvious that the 2nd Amendment IS the third rail in politics, but we can’t give up now, we need to press our congresscritters to NOT GIVE IN…

News of the weird…

Posted on by June 18, 2013

Well, BO did it again…

Two defendants in military sexual assault cases cannot be punitively discharged, if found guilty, because of “unlawful command influence” derived from comments made by President Barack Obama, a judge ruled in a Hawaii military court this week.

Navy Judge Cmdr. Marcus Fulton ruled during pretrial hearings in two sexual assault cases — U.S. vs. Johnson and U.S. vs. Fuentes — that comments made by Obama as commander in chief would unduly influence any potential sentencing, according to a court documents obtained by Stars and Stripes.

Link HERE.

And in the keep digging a hole category…

Eighth-Grader Who Refused to Remove NRA Shirt Could Face Year in Prison

Late last week Marcum “appeared before a judge and was officially charged with obstructing an officer,” reports Fox News. If convicted, he could face up to a $500 fine or a year in prison. He will be back in front of the judge on July 11 if his attorney cannot get the charge dismissed before then.

One can understand this sort of silliness across the border in Maryland (as we have chronicled here and here) — but in West Virginia? This is, after all, the state whose senator’s campaign ad featured him shooting Obama’s cap-and-trade bill. Ah, those were the days.

Link HERE.

And an update on the Cheryl Attkisson hacking story…

Attkisson could not speak about whether the hacking was related to her questions about Benghazi because of “legal counsel,” but she did say her work at that time was primarily on the occurrence.

“Whoever was in my work computer, the only thing I was working on were work-related things with CBS were big stories I guess during the time period in questions were I guess Benghazi and ‘Fast and Furious.’ The intruders did have access to personal information including passwords to my financial accounts and so on, but didn’t tamper with those, so they weren’t interested in stealing my identity or doing things to my finances. So people can decide on their own what they might have been trying to do in there.”

Link HERE.

Gotta end on a positive note, so here’s a GOOD story!!!

MILWAUKIE, Ore. (KOIN) — Neighbors say crime in their Clackamas County neighborhood is getting worse, so they’re taking drastic measures and packing heat for protection.

6-16-13-glock-block

“We’re starting a new group,” said Coy Tolonen, who lives in unincorporated Clackamas County. “We don’t feel neighborhood watch is sufficient, and we don’t feel the Clackamas County Sheriff’s Office is sufficient.”

Tolomon and a group of Jennings Lodge neighbors say they’re responding to escalating crime on their block by also making fliers that read “This is a Glock block. We don’t call 911.”

Link HERE.

Back to the salt mines… sigh…

True???

Posted on by June 18, 2013

This one popped in over the mil-email transom…

MEDIAFLOWCHART

In the last three weeks Chicago has had 25 shot 6 killed, 44 shot 10 killed and this last weekend apparently 37 were shot and 6 killed..

Where is the media outcry??? Or is this (like the flow chart) being buried/ignored since it’s not Whites doing the shooting???

Simply disgusting… Kids who don’t know better, kids getting killed at 10 or younger, WHERE IS THE OUTCRY IN THE MSM?

/crickets/

Sigh…

Fun’s over…

Posted on by June 16, 2013

Sigh…

We had a little get together hosted by the always lovely Phlegmmy this weekend, and it was sorely needed…

The usual suspects were in town, sadly minus a couple… Stingray, FarmFam, Vine and AePilotJim were not able to make it in…  Really hate it when work keeps interfering with life and fun!

However Lawdog, JPG and Holly, Matt, Labrat, Michael and Jenn, AD and his significant other and Katy-Beth, and Rabbit (Frequent commenter) put in an appearance, along with a couple of very nice neighbors!  And for the first time in years, I actually had one of my two daughters with me on Father’s Day.  She quickly picked up the ‘handle’ of PPP… Pissed-off Pregnant Paramedic! 🙂

The conversations as always, ran the gamut, with the usual revolving circles of animals, people and FOOD (talk about target lock, imagine a Jack Russell locked on food!); and firearms were fondled, and Matt did another palm the gun trick (sorry Matt, but that ability is just AMAZING with hands that size…

Guess what’s in the hand…

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M&P 45 compact WITH a laser!!!

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Sadly, as always the weekend ended way too soon, but the respite was needed by all, and I think we all got at least a little chance to recharge our batteries.  And now it’s back to the damn diet… Sigh…

And one more video for y’all, bring a kleenex.  h/t to JP for this one

The Delta folks did ALL of this as volunteers, including the painting and care for the fallen during transport. Kudos to them!

In Memoriam…

Posted on by June 16, 2013

30 years ago today, June 16, 1983, “Yankee Bravo Zero Six” was on a submarine-hunting training mission north of the Hawaiian island of Kauai.The Orion’s radar was off, in order to be undetected by the submarine. The night and overcast sky made for zero visibility.

At just after 4 a.m., the aircraft hit a steep ridge on the Na Pali Coast of Kauai.
All fourteen Shipmates were lost.

In memory of the 14 men aboard U.S. Navy P-3 Orion YB-06 of VP-1 that crashed on the ridgeline between Honopu and Kalalau valleys on June 16, 1983.

Squadron VP-1
Lt. Cmdr. J.R. Moseley, Macon, Georgia
Lt. M.E. Gallagher, Pensacola, Florida
Lt. j.g. R.L. Coulter, Glendora, N.J.
Lt. j.g. R.W. Bruno, Mojave, Calif.
Lt j.g. M.R. Lunde, Arlington, Texas
S.A. Phipps, Monticello, Ky.
B.M. Sparrow, Westland Michigan
B.D. Sunde, Erie, Pa.
R.C. Wilson, Fresno, Calif.
A.S. Castillo, Hollister, Calif.
Ronald Lipschutz Jr., Elverta, Calif. hometown Southington, CT.
L.A. Roth, Oxnard, Calif. and Houston
C. Chambers, Houston, Texas
D. Stringer, Eau Claire, Wis.

RIP all, we carried on and your loss was NOT in vain, RIP…

For those who take trips to DC…

Posted on by June 15, 2013

If you are from D.C. or the surrounding area, you’ll understand these rules. If you are coming here, you’ll learn these rules. If you are just going to visit, give up. Read, enjoy and then destroy them.

1) First, you must learn to call it by its rightful name. It is D.C., or “the District”. Only tourists call it Washington.

2) Next, if your road map of Montgomery County is more than a few weeks old, throw it out and buy a new one. It’s obsolete. If in Loudoun or Fairfax County and your map is one day old, it’s already obsolete.

3) There is no such thing as a dangerous high-speed chase in D.C. It’s just another chase, usually on the BW Parkway.

4) All directions start with “The Beltway”…whic*h has no beginning and no end, just one continuous loop that locals believe is somehow clarified by an “inner” and ‘outer loop’ designation. This makes no sense to ANYONE outside the Beltway.

5) The morning rush hour is from 5 to 11 AM. The evening rush hour is from 1 to 8 PM. Friday’s rush hour starts Thursday morning, especially during the summer on Route 50 eastbound.

6) If there is a ball game at the FedEx Field, there is no point in driving anywhere near PG County.

7) Tip: Never say PG County to anyone from Mitchellville, Upper Marlboro or Fort Washington. They’ll blow a vessel in their neck and go into a seizure.

8 ) If you actually stop at a yellow light, you will be rear-ended and shot at. If you run the red light, be sure to smile for the $100 picture you will receive courtesy of DMV. (However, if you don’t go as soon as the light turns green, you will get cussed out in 382 languages, none of
them English.)

9) Rain causes an immediate 50 point drop of IQ in drivers. Snow causes an immediate 100 point drop in IQ and a rush to the Giant for toilet paper and milk.

10) Construction on I-270 is a way of life and a permanent source of scorn and cynical entertainment. It’s ironic that it’s called an “Interstate” but runs only from Bethesda to Frederick. (Unless you consider Montgomery County another state, which some do). Opening in the 60’s, it has been torn up and under reconstruction ever since. Also, it has a “Spur” section which is even more confusing.

11) All unexplained sights are explained by the phrase, “Oh, we’re in Takoma Park or Greenbelt”.

12) If someone actually has their turn signal on, they are by definition, a tourist. Car horns are actually “Road Rage” indicators. Heed the warning.

13) All old ladies in Buicks have the right of way in the area of Leisure World.

14) Many roads mysteriously change their names as you cross intersections. Don’t ask why, no one knows.

15) If asking directions in Arlington, Langley Park, Wheaton or Adams Morgan, you must know how to speak Spanish. If in PG County, Ebonics will be your best bet. In Annandale, a Cambodian or Vietnamese dialect will come in handy. If on Dupont Circle, Capital Hill or U Street, a gay dialect helps.

16) If you stop to ask directions in Southeast… well, just don’t.

17) A taxi ride across town will cost you $12.50. A taxi ride two blocks will cost you $16.75. (It’s a zone thing, you wouldn’t understand) (Oh, and if you are in DC and want to go to MD, don’t tell them until you get in the car…they won’t take you otherwise)

18) Traveling south out of DC on Interstate 395/95 is the most dangerous, scariest thing you will ever do and when you hit it, you will wonder why the section of this road called “the Mixing Bowl” is so named. After all there is no mixing there, heck, there is no movement at all.

19) There is nothing more comforting than seven lanes of traffic cruising along at 85 mph, BUMPER TO BUMPER!!!

20) The minimum acceptable speed on the Beltway is 85. Anything less is considered downright sissy.

21) The Beltway is our daily version of a NASCAR reality show. Strap up and collect points as you go.

22) The open lane for passing on all Maryland interstates is the far right lane because no self-respecting* Marylander would ever be caught driving in the “slow” lane. Unofficially, both shoulders are fair game also.

23) The far left lanes on all Maryland interstates are official “chat” lanes reserved for drivers who wish to talk on their cell phones. Note: All mini-vans have priority clearance to use the far left at whatever speed the driver feels most comfortable multi-tasking in.

24) If it’s 10 degrees, it’s Orioles’ opening day. If it’s 110 degrees, it’s the Skins opening day.

25) If the humidity is 90+ and the temperature is 90+, then it’s May, June, July, August and sometimes September

And there will be MOAR than one case of this…

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Recall Alert…

Posted on by June 15, 2013

Daddy Bear has a recall alert up HERE.

Appears Thompson Center has some problems.  Read and pass along to any users you know of.

Posted from my iPhone.

Off with friends…

Posted on by June 15, 2013

It’s going to be ONE of those weekends, I can see it coming…

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Light blogging and commenting, go enjoy the folks on the sidebar!

Oh, and talk about double entendre advertising…

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No other comment needed… 😀

Two Commentaries worth reading…

Posted on by June 13, 2013

GEN Brady and ADM Lyons speak out on the current state of our military…

Niether gent is politically correct, they just call it as they see it…

First GEN Brady-

Maj. Gen. Patrick Brady, retired from the U.S. Army, is a recipient of the United States military’s highest decoration, the Medal of Honor. He is the author of “Dead Men Flying: Victory in Viet Nam The Legend of Dust Off: America’s Battlefield Angels.”

As incompetence, deception, duplicity and dishonesty become the hall marks of the Obama administration, it is important that we not lose sight of the greatest danger posed beyond these serial scandals: the feminization, emasculation and dismantling of our military. The two most important elements of national survival are the media and the military; one keeps us free and the other keeps us secure. We know the media are failing ˆ God help us if the military does also. We may be able to fix the government in 2014. Fixing the military is more problematic.
Let‚s begin with Benghazi. It is incomprehensible that any commander, let alone the commander in chief, would go AWOL during a crisis such as Benghazi, but he was. In the midst of the massacre of our ambassador and three heroic Americans, President Obama was nowhere to be found. He did manage to surface, too late for the massacre, to meet a campaign commitment the next day. But, before retiring, we are told he turned the crisis over to his underlings, including the military. What we learned about our military leadership during that crisis should alarm all Americans.
The demise of our military of course begins with the commander in chief, but he can‚t do it alone. He has to have willing sycophants and he has had them in the civilian and military leadership at the Department of Defense. The indifference of the people and military inexperience in Congress are contributing factors. The military disasters are a form of gradualism. Look at the changes under Mr. Obama. We cannot focus on these changes enough.
Our military is suffering unprecedented rates of suicide and PTSD. Obama‚s sequestration will cut benefits to veterans as well as damage readiness. (There has been a 2000 percent increase in backlog for veteran assistance in four years!) We now have a quad-sexual military with all the health, readiness and moral issues that come with exalting sodomy. Sexual assault is at an all-time high. Women will be tasked to lead bayonet charges. As a result of the sex scandals, Congress is now looking to curtail the military‚s ability to discipline, another tribute to the lack of leadership in the military and lack of military understanding in Congress.
Billions of defense dollars are unaccounted for. Christianity is under military attack, and Bibles have been burned to appease Muslims. (References to God and Jesus are forbidden at Arlington, chaplains will be forced to perform homosexual „marriages,‰ and Bibles and religious item are forbidden to the wounded at Walter Reed, etc.)
We have a new doctrine for crisis: „Don‚t deploy forces into harm‚s way without knowing what‚s going on.‰ Therefore, no Normandy or Inchon. In other words, don‚t go until the crisis/massacre is over. Their default position is don‚t go, period. The military leadership, after the terrorist massacre at Fort Hood, outrageously lamented the effect it would have on diversity ˆ and equally outrageously labeled it workplace violence denying the victims and their families the benefits they deserve.
There have been unprecedented security leaks, and China is electronically in bed with us. They even lost the graves of our warriors at Arlington. I could go on, but it should be clear that all of the above is the result of a leader who knows not the difference between a corps and a corpse and is both indifferent to and unknowledgeable of military readiness. And as bad, the military leadership is complicit in these disasters. (As a further tribute to their ineptitude, they have actually considered combat-level medals for warriors not shooting and desk-bound computer operators, medals that were the laughingstock of veterans.)
But given that the president tasked the military to act in the Benghazi crisis, what did they do? Indefensibly, they did nothing, they did not even try! No obstacle, no doctrine, nothing can defend not trying, never mind the risk, to save fellow Americans. Were they under orders to sit on their aˆ and let their fellow Americans die? In my 34 years of military service involving many crises, I never knew of one without an after action report (AAR), in which each and every action was put under a microscope to identify those responsible for the results be they good or bad. Congress, the media, someone should demand the AAR on Benghazi. It must exist. Who ordered the stand down? Who said sit on your aˆ? Why no hearing on this?
Just as the way forward for America is a return to the morality and values of the past, so too must the military return to the readiness standards and common sense of the past. We can survive in a relatively valueless society ˆ but only with a strong and ready military. Sadly the military is mirroring society ˆ the goal of Mr. Obama and progressives ˆ and will soon be impotent. Once the progressives have a helpless military they no longer need to explain why they didn‚t go; they can say we are unable to go. Progress is not the path we are on; true progress is the path to our past. The other scandals may be more glamorous and outrageous (such as lying about Benghazi before the coffins of those massacred by terrorists, enemies‚ lists and assaults on the First Amendment) but what Mr. Obama is doing to our military is more grave. 
ADM Lyons-
Washington Times
June 11, 2013
Pg. B3

Restoring Military Readiness

A professional fighting force, not diversity, must be the military’s priority

The impact of fighting two wars over the past decade has taken its toll on our military forces. They have been run hard and put away wet. Sequestration has only compounded the problem. Our military services are already reeling from previously approved $800 billion in defense cuts over the next decade and are now faced with $500 billion in additional budget cuts now that sequestration has been implemented.
All this means that we will have the smallest Army since prior to World War II. The Navy, with its anemic shipbuilding program, will most likely be left with the smallest fleet since prior to World War I. The U.S. Air Force will suffer a similar adverse impact. Selected aircraft squadrons from both the Air Force and the Navy have been ordered to stand down and not fly. It will take several months to restore their readiness.
Symbolic of the Navy’s demise are the five aircraft carriers that are currently moored at piers at the Norfolk Naval Base in Virginia for lack of operating and overhaul funds. Clearly, with the escalating civil war in Syria, one carrier battle group should be immediately deployed to the Mediterranean. Such a deployment would dramatically change the strategic equation and counter Russia’s deployment of 11 ships currently there.
The Obama administration’s draconian budget cuts are being made at a time when global instability is increasing. The Middle East continues in a state of turmoil, particularly with the ongoing civil war in Syria. However, the most destabilizing factor in the Middle East would be for Iran to achieve a nuclear-weapon capability. With China and North Korea’s help, they may now have all the necessary elements. In the Pacific, China continues with its massive military buildup. Its cyberwarfare attacks and penetration of our military-industrial complex has, at a minimum, reduced our technology advantage in any future confrontation. This is most serious since our technological advantage was always our force-multiplier.
The one constant that made our military the finest fighting force in the world was the dedication and professionalism of our personnel – our national treasure. The troops took pride in being recognized as the “best and brightest.” It made for high morale and solid unit cohesion. Professionalism was their No. 1 priority. Now with President Obama’s social engineering of our military forces, “diversity” has become the No. 1 priority. It is hard to comprehend how the promotion of the homosexual and feminist agendas contributes to unit integrity or improves combat readiness. Why, then, are these disruptive agendas being forced on our military, particularly when we are being challenged throughout the world? Fulfilling a political agenda is insufficient rationale to deliberately weaken our military forces and national security.
As he was tiptoeing out of the Pentagon, former Secretary of Defense Leon E. Panetta made his ill-advised and irresponsible endorsement of eliminating military women’s exemption from direct land combat battalions. Thirty years of studies and reports in the United States and the United Kingdom have provided more than sufficient empirical data that men and women are not physical equals nor interchangeable in all roles. There is no other nation in the world with a military force comparable to ours that assigns women in direct combat infantry land wars.
When the U.S. Marines conducted an online survey of active-duty personnel in 2012, it failed to show support for women in direct ground combat units. Regrettably, never asked was how would women assigned to infantry and special operations forces affect mission effectiveness? Research done by the Presidential Commission on the Assignment of Women in the Armed Forces, which studied the issue in depth in 1992, determined that a “voluntary” option for women to engage in close combat, but not for men, would not work. In a direct combat environment, women do not have an equal opportunity to survive, or worse, would end up causing fatalities to fellow troops.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff stated that women’s exemption from direct ground combat missions somehow has contributed to the current rise in the sexual abuse we see in our military forces today. This makes no sense. Women are closer to combat today than ever before, but the rates of sexual assault and abuse are soaring with no end in sight.
The rescinding of the Clinton “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy has come at a price. In Volume II of the Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office report, there is no change in “unwanted sexual contact” for women (32 percent in both 2010 and 2012), but an increase among men reporting “unwanted touching” from 31 percent in 2010 to 57 percent in 2012. It certainly calls into question the Department of Defense’s claims that repeal of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy has been a complete success.
What’s most disturbing is the apparent acquiescence to these ill-conceived policies by our top military leadership. In life-and-death situations, you must have the first team in place. Mandates for diversity metrics are no substitute for proven combat effectiveness when engaging the enemy.
Our combat readiness in today’s world must be our first priority. Since our top military leadership is complicit in the administration’s social engineering of our military, Congress must exercise its constitutional responsibility to “provide for the common defense” and make policy for the armed forces. As a first order of business, Congress should reinstate the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.
Retired Adm. James A. Lyons was commander in chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet and senior U.S.military representative to the United Nations.
The question is, “What can we realistically do about the decline of our nation?”
“I” don’t have a good answer, because I don’t know what we can do to resolve the mess in Washington short of starting over…  And the dems have the illustrious 47% who will back them to keep getting their free cheese…
Comments, recommendations, ideas??? ANYTHING???
h/t JP and others