Hornady Mfg Company is recalling one (1) lot of 9mm 135gr +P Hornady Critical Duty™ Ammunition, Item#90226. This lot was shipped between the dates of 6-5-14 and 7-16-14.
Item number 90226 LOT # 3141635
If you own this Lot # or have any questions regarding this recall, please call 800-338-1242. Hornady Mfg Company will make all arrangements associated with this return and replacement of the product.
Sunday, August 3, 2014
Prelude to the Guns
On August 3rd, 1914, Germany declared war on France.
Other than a skirmish the day before, things got going when the Germans invaded Belgium on August 4th as part of their Aufmarsch West II plan. The British had a treaty with Belgium, so they demanded that the Germans march the hell back out. Which the Germans declined to do, so the British Empire entered the war.
Imperial Germany had declared war on Imperial Russia on August 1st. The monarchs of the German, British and Russian empires were all related, which made the First World War a very bloody family fight (except for the French and the Americans, which were republics, and the Japanese Empire, whose monarch was likely not related to anyone outside of Japan).
Other than a skirmish the day before, things got going when the Germans invaded Belgium on August 4th as part of their Aufmarsch West II plan. The British had a treaty with Belgium, so they demanded that the Germans march the hell back out. Which the Germans declined to do, so the British Empire entered the war.
Imperial Germany had declared war on Imperial Russia on August 1st. The monarchs of the German, British and Russian empires were all related, which made the First World War a very bloody family fight (except for the French and the Americans, which were republics, and the Japanese Empire, whose monarch was likely not related to anyone outside of Japan).
Saturday, August 2, 2014
OK, Mr. President. Now, What Are You Going to Do About It?
The answer is most likely "not a fucking thing."
The President of the United States has admitted that people working for the United States government committed war crimes. But he's also signaled that that, unlike those who committed war crimes without approval, that those who committed approved war crimes won't be held accountable.
We'll be like the Germans, in that if any of those clowns are still alive in 2070, then they'll be prosecuted.
Count on this: There will be more outrage on Capitol Hill over the CIA confessing to having spied on them than there will be to the unsurprising revelation that the CIA and the DoD committed war crimes.
By sweeping our own war crimes under the rug, we have lost the moral high ground. Much in the same way that the Catholic Church did.
President Barack Obama on Friday starkly criticised the CIA’s past treatment of terror suspects, saying he could understand why the agency rushed to use controversial interrogation techniques in the aftermath of 9/11 but conceding: “We tortured some folks.”People committed war crimes. People very high up, including George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Condoleeza Rice, John Ashcroft, Donald Rumsfeld, and a whole host of lesser included players, all knew that people were being tortured. They did nothing and worse, they approved of it.
In some of the most expansive and blunt remarks on the CIA’s programme of rendition and detention he has made since coming to office, Obama said the country “crossed a line” as it struggled to react to the threat of further attacks by al-Qaida. However, he also said it was important “not to feel too sanctimonious”, adding that he believed intelligence officials responsible for torturing detainees were working during a period of extraordinary stress and fear.
The President of the United States has admitted that people working for the United States government committed war crimes. But he's also signaled that that, unlike those who committed war crimes without approval, that those who committed approved war crimes won't be held accountable.
We'll be like the Germans, in that if any of those clowns are still alive in 2070, then they'll be prosecuted.
Count on this: There will be more outrage on Capitol Hill over the CIA confessing to having spied on them than there will be to the unsurprising revelation that the CIA and the DoD committed war crimes.
By sweeping our own war crimes under the rug, we have lost the moral high ground. Much in the same way that the Catholic Church did.
Caturday; Guest Critter Edition
A snowy owl at VINS:
If you find yourself near the junction of I-91 and I-89, go up I-89 a short jaunt to Quechee, Vermont and visit VINS.
If you find yourself near the junction of I-91 and I-89, go up I-89 a short jaunt to Quechee, Vermont and visit VINS.
Friday, August 1, 2014
Thursday, July 31, 2014
A Timely Lesson from the Great War?
Adam Hochschild, in an op-ed piece in the New York Times, argues that one of the reasons why the First World War was as bloody as it turned out to be was because the British, French, and German senior officers cut their military teeth on colonial wars. The British, at the Battle of Omduran, had machine guns and artillery to use on a force armed with swords, spears and blackpowder muskets.
They were all used to having massive fire superiority against underarmed and often poorly disciplined native forces. They went into the war convinced that things would be no different.
But they weren't. The Reichsheer wasn't a bunch of "Fuzzy-Wuzzies" or Boers. They had Maxim guns and heavy artillery. The British Army, still, maintained three cavalry divisions, when cavalry had been shown to be worse than useless against troops with machine guns and that the only useful purpose for horse flesh in France was as draft animals. And even though it had long since been shown that German soldiers weren't going to panic and flee, the British insisted on mass charges.[1]
But has the lesson of the First World War been learned? It was been nearly seventy years since our nation has faced, on the battlefield, a foe as equally capable. One of the lesser-known historical points from the Second World War was that, until later in the war, the Japanese pretty much kicked our asses in surface ship actions. They had better gunnery, better powder for night gunnery and their Long-Lance torpedoes cut through American destroyers like sabers through a wheel of cheese.[2] The mass daylight bombing raids, until the arrival of large numbers of long-range escorts, were turkey shoots for the Germans.
What doomed the Axis, ultimately, was that the Allies had the resources of most of the globe available to them. Germany and Japan only had what its soldiers could see. When the Enola Gay opened its bomb-bay doors over Hiroshima, there was probably about as much aviation gasoline in Japan as there was at the Army Air Force bases in the Marianas.[3]
So what happens, come the day, when our soldiers have to face a foe which is not wearing homespun robes and carrying old AKs? What happens when the enemy has drones and satellite reconnaissance? Will our own generals, then, having cut their teeth beating on Iraqi insurgents and Afghani Taliban, be mentally prepared to take on an equally-matched enemy? Or will they, like the European generals a century ago, think that their technology will be enough?
______________________________
[1] It is an enduring mystery as to why Kitchener and Haig weren't court-martialed and shot.
[2] If the Japanese had used their submarines in the way that we and the Germans did, it would have been a much different sort of war.
[3] And much better gasoline, to boot.
They were all used to having massive fire superiority against underarmed and often poorly disciplined native forces. They went into the war convinced that things would be no different.
But they weren't. The Reichsheer wasn't a bunch of "Fuzzy-Wuzzies" or Boers. They had Maxim guns and heavy artillery. The British Army, still, maintained three cavalry divisions, when cavalry had been shown to be worse than useless against troops with machine guns and that the only useful purpose for horse flesh in France was as draft animals. And even though it had long since been shown that German soldiers weren't going to panic and flee, the British insisted on mass charges.[1]
But has the lesson of the First World War been learned? It was been nearly seventy years since our nation has faced, on the battlefield, a foe as equally capable. One of the lesser-known historical points from the Second World War was that, until later in the war, the Japanese pretty much kicked our asses in surface ship actions. They had better gunnery, better powder for night gunnery and their Long-Lance torpedoes cut through American destroyers like sabers through a wheel of cheese.[2] The mass daylight bombing raids, until the arrival of large numbers of long-range escorts, were turkey shoots for the Germans.
What doomed the Axis, ultimately, was that the Allies had the resources of most of the globe available to them. Germany and Japan only had what its soldiers could see. When the Enola Gay opened its bomb-bay doors over Hiroshima, there was probably about as much aviation gasoline in Japan as there was at the Army Air Force bases in the Marianas.[3]
So what happens, come the day, when our soldiers have to face a foe which is not wearing homespun robes and carrying old AKs? What happens when the enemy has drones and satellite reconnaissance? Will our own generals, then, having cut their teeth beating on Iraqi insurgents and Afghani Taliban, be mentally prepared to take on an equally-matched enemy? Or will they, like the European generals a century ago, think that their technology will be enough?
______________________________
[1] It is an enduring mystery as to why Kitchener and Haig weren't court-martialed and shot.
[2] If the Japanese had used their submarines in the way that we and the Germans did, it would have been a much different sort of war.
[3] And much better gasoline, to boot.
Seven Orbits Around the Sun
For this here blog.
Thanks for tuning in.
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p.s, I'm posting this a long time in advance. So if something's happened in the interim, well, this is going to seem kinda creepy.
Thanks for tuning in.
___________________________________
p.s, I'm posting this a long time in advance. So if something's happened in the interim, well, this is going to seem kinda creepy.
Wednesday, July 30, 2014
Hey, FAA, Foxtrot Oscar Alpha Delta; ADS-B Edition
According to FAR 91.225, the FAA wants me to to equip my old airplane with the crap necessary to broadcast to ADS-B by 2020.
Thing is, I don't fly anywhere that I need to be able to do that. I don't fly IFR and, by my count, I've been above 10,000' MSL exactly once.
In order to comply with the rule, I'd have to put a piece of kit into my airplane that will cost five or six grand or so, and that's just for the box(es). It doesn't factor in the cost of installation.
So the FAA wants me to spend six large or so to install a piece of electronics that does nothing for me.
Here's a better idea: Since I don't fly anyway where I would need ADS-B(out), I also don't fly in airspace where I would need a Mode C transponder. So if I'm not going to install ADS-B, then I might as well just rip out the fucking Mode C transponder. That'll be less crap to maintain.
p.s., AOPA, thanks for nothing.
Thing is, I don't fly anywhere that I need to be able to do that. I don't fly IFR and, by my count, I've been above 10,000' MSL exactly once.
In order to comply with the rule, I'd have to put a piece of kit into my airplane that will cost five or six grand or so, and that's just for the box(es). It doesn't factor in the cost of installation.
So the FAA wants me to spend six large or so to install a piece of electronics that does nothing for me.
Here's a better idea: Since I don't fly anyway where I would need ADS-B(out), I also don't fly in airspace where I would need a Mode C transponder. So if I'm not going to install ADS-B, then I might as well just rip out the fucking Mode C transponder. That'll be less crap to maintain.
p.s., AOPA, thanks for nothing.
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