Sunday, January 31, 2016

UAVS BANNED everywhere at national parks. Unless, I suppose, you fly them below the level of cut grass....
SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN: Secret cold war space project revealed.

Here's more history of early satellite surveillance programs.
JEFF JACOBY: the question not answered:
[J]ust once I would like to hear a debate moderator ask presidential candidates not what they want the government to do, but what they believe the government has no business doing. I got my wish when Bret Baier challenged Governor Chris Christie to "name even one thing that the federal government does now that it should not do at all."

For a split-second I fantasized that Christie, or another candidate, would rattle off some of the countless things the federal government shouldn't do: Legislate minimum wages. Mandate grade-school curricula. Ban incandescent light bulbs. Subsidize dairy farmers. Be in charge of airport security. Decide who qualifies for a mortgage. Force Americans to buy insurance policies.

Christie's answer? He would defund Planned Parenthood. That's all he came up with.

All those Republicans, and barely a drop of righteous indignation at the massive intrusion of Big Brother into virtually every aspect of modern American life.
We should ask for - and demand - an answer from every presidential candidate at every opportunity.
LOCKHEED MARTIN'S C-130: headed for a record 100 years of service?
HEH: New Mexico ready to sue the EPA.
UAV debate: Who owns the air above homes and lawns?
The FAA says that it owns every inch above the ground, but common law has long given landowners rights that went “all the way to Heaven.”
FAA rules notwithstanding, any UAV flying 50' above my house without my permission is going to get a load of buckshot in the wings.
SHOWMAN-IN-CHIEF: Guns and the president’s poses.
WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Harry Reid demands $600K slush fund for his 'retirement'. Examiner readers respond:
Given the level and pervasiveness of corruption prevalent in the Washington cartel, it's chump change. To be rid of this (redacted) it is cheap at twice the price.

Itemize his retirement benefits and compare them to those at his pay scale in the private sector. And while we're at it answer a burning question for the taxpayers who are paying for this: How did he become so rich?

Hey Guys, What's ours is his and what's his is his, so give him what he asks. Those donors paid for their favors, and ole Harry delivered.

Harry Reid has been living off the public dime so long he thinks he can have what he wants. I will bet that he gets what he asked for.
Our ruling class at work....
MICHAEL REAGAN: Joking About Gun Control:
When I was a kid my father gave me three rifles and a shotgun.

First he gave me a single-shot .22 rifle. I was about eight.

Then in 1958, when "The Rifleman" came on, my father gave me a rapid-fire lever-action .22 Winchester rifle like the one Chuck Connors had. I was about 12.

Later, when I was a teenager my father gave me a .243 hunting rifle to hunt deer in Arizona and a 12-gauge shotgun to hunt birds.

He bought all the guns legally. But he gave them to me without first doing a background check to see if I was a criminal.

He didn't even check with my mother to see if I was doing my homework.

That was a joke.
But Obama's emotional grandstanding about gun control isn't a joke; it's a calculated move to gut the Second Amendment.
WORSE. Stupid or ... Worse?
THE MORNING EXAMINER asked what should be the three top priorities for the next president. Some reader responses:
Economy, healthcare, infrastructure.

Revoke Executive Orders, shake up the IRS, revoke recent non-treaties, including the Iran Nuke Fiasco and any Eco-Climate agreement.

Send all Syrian refugees back, rescind all Obama Executive Orders, secure our 2nd Amendment and our borders.

Cancel anything Obama did without Congress approval, secure borders, jail Hillary Clinton.

Abolish: the Internal Revenue Service, the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Education.

National security, national debt, national economy.

End ISIS, get government hands off the economy so it can grow, stop all new illegal immigration and eliminate sanctuary cities.

The safety and wellbeing of its citizens, lower taxes, provide major American corporations with incentives to create jobs.

Get Congress back to budget basics. Reject all unilateral Obama executive actions. Repeal and replace the existing 73,000+ pages of tax code.

Build the wall, institute flat tax, repeal Obamacare - do not replace it.
Not exactly a rousing affirmation of our current President's priorities.
CONTRA 'THE NARRATIVE': The rarely discussed support for gun rights among black voters.
WASHINGTON EXAMINER: the 15 biggest scandals of 2015. Note that 14 of the fifteen involve members of our ruling class. The fifteenth, in my humble opinion, was a scandal only in the sense of trying to cope with a regulation-addled government. Were I Volkswagen, I would have just said "fine, we'll no longer sell our diesel cars in the U.S."
TOO LATE, TERRY; I've already left. McAuliffe retreats on carry-permit reciprocity, restores agreements with 25 states.
SPEAKING OF SCIENCE: Pluto through stained glass.