Author: Bear

…government.

I see some folks are getting excited over the fact that the IRS is stockpiling guns and ammo. I’m not sure why it’s such a surprise, because they been doing that at least since the days of Clinton’s “kinder” IRS.

That’s a problem, yes. But of somewhat more significance to me is this:

Two questions:

1. Why in the hell does the National Institutes of Health have its own police department? What part of seeking “fundamental knowledge about the nature and behavior of living systems and the application of that knowledge to enhance health, lengthen life, and reduce illness and disability” requires police power and guns? Are they going arrest that fundamental knowledge?

2. And why the hell does the NIH refuse to tell an arm of Congress — their boss — how many guns and how much ammo it has?

You know, if I were to magically become president, every fed agency with its own pocket police would lose ’em. Need someone with a badge? Call the Marshals Service.

And yeah, that would include the FBI.

An oldie, but goodie.

Hat tip to David Codrea.

Which I wish they’d do soon; we could use the free advertising.

Via Mom-At-Arms:

I have my issues with JPFO under Gottlieb. But antisemitism isn’t one of them.

Now try us.

I saw this headline and knew there was about a 98% chance it was wrong.

New Hampshire hiker dies of injuries after high-risk snow rescue, officials say
A New Hampshire hiker, who ran into severe weather and texted his wife he would die without help, has succumbed to his injuries after rescuers located him on a mountainous trail in a hypothermic state Saturday night, authorities said.

I lived in New Hampshire for several years, so I kept reading for what I knew I’d find.

The hiker, later identified as 53-year-old Xi Chen, of Andover, Massachusetts…

Yep. Not a New Hampshire hiker. Those lost and injured winter hikers needing rescue were almost always from out-of-state. This part is fairly typical, too.

Officials said that multiple other hikers ignored the forecasted weather conditions and instead of turning back or bailing to safer elevations, they pressed on and ultimately called 911 expecting a rescue.

Ignoring forecasts, insufficient gear, no food or water, At least this guy was in an area that has cell coverage. A lot of city folk are shocked to discover no signal in the mountains.

Apparently because “The Nineteenth of June” is too many syllables for people celebrating the announcement in one Texas city that, “By the way, Lincoln emanicpated the slaves two and a half years ago. Thought you’d like to know.”

Why not May 20th, when emancipation rolled into Florida? Hell, why not January 1st, for the Emancippation Proclamation was issued?

But if we’re going to have national observance of local events…

Battle of Athens: August 1, when pissed off citizens took up arms against corrupt, Democrat — but I repeat myself — government officials.

Burning of Washington: August 24, when the Brits engaged in a bit of early urban renewal (possibly inspired by Nero). We could hand out celebratory Molotov cocktails.

More suggestions?

Well, no effin’ shit.

EXCLUSIVE: Former St. Louis Police Sergeant Ann Dorn Warns About Status of St Louis Police
The city is corrupt and some of it is going to shock you.
They’ve been embezzling for years.

It might be a shock to anyone who never spent much time there. But I used to live in St. Louis. It’s hardly a surprise to me. Hell, twenty years ago, in my novel Net Assets, I included several cracks about St. Louis’ government.

“Kristi, about the only things San Angelo doesn’t have that Saint Louis does is too damned many people, the noise” – as if to make his point, the roar of traffic westbound on I-70 seemed to reach a crescendo – “and one of the most corrupt city governments in the country; I think Chicago sends its aldermen here for advanced training.” Hank wondered cynically if that might even be true.

Seriously, those folks made Memphis pols look honest in comparison. To be fair though, that’s partly because the Fords were so damned psychotically incompetent. But don’t get me started on them…

More than a a year ago, when the FDA expanded the Emergency Use Authorization for the Pfizer pseudovaccine (to 12 year-olds) wrote:

Scare stories about long-term adverse effects on male fertility are still just scare stories; but I think it’s worth watching for.

Just in case, ladies: I am not pseudovaxxed. And I am available for personal sperm donations. Send pictures.

Long-term effects still aren’t really known, since it the Pseudovax hasn’t been fielded for a long time (and remember that they scrapped the human trials control group). But this paper, published two days ago, is interesting.

Covid-19 vaccination BNT162b2 temporarily impairs semen concentration and total motile count among semen donors
Repetitive measurements revealed -15.4% sperm concentration decrease on T2(CI-25.5%–3.9%, p=0.01) leading to total motile count 22.1% reduction (CI-35% –6.6%, p=0.007)compared to T0.
[…]
T3 evaluation demonstrated overall recovery. Semen volume andspermmotility were not impaired.

It was a relatively small study: 37 sperm donors with 220 samples. They checked the sperm count before pseudovaccination, then three times after vax.

It should be somewhat reassuring that sperm count recover by T3 (which they call “long term”). But considering that it’s still short of two years since the beginning of human trials, there’s really no such thing as long term data on male fertility. This study only covered a six month period.

I’m not making predictions one way or another, but I plan to watch the US birth rate for next few years.

And I’m still not getting pseudovaxxed.

As an aside, one really needs to read these studies carefully. On my first skim over the Methods section, I thought I read that a single donor provided 63 samples, which seemed impressive. You gotta watch those abbreviations; it was one donation center, not one dedicated dude.

You have got to be kidding me…

Another stunning Uvalde development: The door to the classroom where a gunman killed the students and teachers was probably unlocked all along. Footage shows officers didn’t try to open it until SWAT arrived.

The news report the tweet links to is paywalled. But I find the claim highly credible since 1) the killer managed to open the door and walk in, and 2) it would go far towards explaining why the cops think that it would be too embarrassing to release records to the public.

The letter makes clear, however, that the city and its police department want to be exempted from releasing a wide variety of records in part because it is being sued, in part because some of the records could include “highly embarrassing information,” in part because some of the information is “not of legitimate concern to the public,” in part because the information could reveal “methods, techniques, and strategies for preventing and predicting crime,” in part because some of the information may cause or may “regard … emotional/mental distress,” and in part because its response to the shooting is being investigated by the Texas Rangers, the FBI, and the Uvalde County District Attorney.

Since I haven’t heard about an outbreak of remorseful police suicides in Uvalde, I don’t think they’re embarrassed enough yet.

Added: Yep; sounds like the door was unlocked.

The school’s classroom doors are designed so that they lock automatically when they’re closed, and the only way to open them, ordinarily, is with a key, but the surveillance footage shows Ramos was able to open the door into classroom 111 at the school. Another door inside led to classroom 112.

He got into the school at around 11:30 a.m., entering through an exterior door that a teacher had pulled shut, but that door also did not lock automatically as it should have.
[…]
According to officials, three Uvalde police officers chased Ramos two minutes after he got into the school. The video footage shows he fired shots inside the two classrooms, came back out into the hallway, and then went back inside the rooms.

Scumbag went through that door twice. And apparently the second time the cops should have seen him do it. Maybe if the chief had a radio someone could have told him the door was unlocked.

This goes into more detail on the current push to close the alleged “boyfriend loophole that I addressed in my latest TZP column.

Let me tell you, closing that “loophole” defining “boyfriend” — isn’t all that complicated. The complicated part is just how many people they can potentially retroactively turn into prohibited persons without Americans deciding it’s time for proactive politician potshots.

Right to own a gun could hinge on definition of ‘boyfriend’ in ‘red flag’ laws
Senator John Thune of South Dakota said the question behind the definition was surprisingly complex.
“The surface explanation seems like it would be fairly simple, but I know that as they try to reduce it to legislative text, I think it’s gotten a little bit more uncomfortable,” said Thune. The Senator is not directly involved in these negotiations.

We know what they really want to do, because they — repeatedly — tried exactly this already in the Violence Against Women Act: include “dating partner” in the list of qualifying relationships for domestic violence…

…where “dating partner” is anyone who ever dated a person even just once once before realizing the person is batshit crazy and never had a thing to do with them again; even if that was 30 or 40 years ago.

One night stand with a barfly back in your Navy days? That’s a dating partner, and these scumsucking senators want them to be able to red flag you.

The more extreme rights-violators want to go whole hog now. The slightly more clued-in congresscritters want to change the definition gradually in hopes we won’t notice the boiling water.

But they all want to cook us.

…I’ve actually heard of those other comics?

Netflix Settles Racial Discrimination Lawsuit with Actress Mo’Nique: Netflix Has a ‘Race Problem Within Its Upper Ranks’
Mo’Nique accused Netflix of discriminating against her on the bases of race and sex in 2019 following the entertainment company offering her less for a stand-up comedy special than had been paid to A-list comedians such as Dave Chappelle, Ricky Gervais, Chris Rick, and Jerry Seinfeld.

Should I even care who she is?