Free State of Jones

Free State of Jones is a movie that came out last Friday (June 24th). Based on the box office so far, I expect it'll disappear from the theaters in short order.

It has some fairly horrific battle scenes in it, including a man who appeared to have taken a small cannon ball to the face. The hospital scenes are not for the squeamish.

There is one shot of the interior of a mansion in which one can see a round thermostat. But I digress.

I wouldn't expect it to receive wide play in the South, for the tale that the move tells is far different from the "Noble Cause" bullshit that is the duty legend in Dixie.

The story of Newton Knight is very much in opposition to the encrusted mythology of the South, especially the fact that Knight had far more support from the local community than modern folk in the area would care to admit.

Secure Your Wireless Networks, People

A convicted British paedophile has been sentenced to 85 years in an American prison for running an online exchange of child abuse images while he was on probation.

Domminich Shaw used the unprotected wireless internet connections of his neighbours in west London to traffic in dozens of videos and pictures of babies and toddlers being sexually abused.

Comcast, in particular, will give out wireless modems that have two networks: One private one for your use and one general one for "xfinity". If your modem has two such networks, you can shut off the public one.

And you should. Make it harder for assholes like that to do their evil work.

Brexit, or "What Happens When the Dog Catches the Car?"

With their giddy celebrations of “independence day” having given way to political and economic turmoil, one thing has become especially clear about the former London mayor Boris Johnson and other leaders of the successful campaign to vote Britain out of the European Union: They had no plan for what comes next.

In the days since Britain voted to leave the bloc, the movement’s leaders have often appeared as if they had not expected to win and were not prepared to cope with the consequences. Faced with the scope of the decision, they have been busy walking back promises they made during the campaign and scaling back expectations. They have failed to show a united front or to answer basic questions.

I don't suspect that there is any "appeared as if they had not expected to win"-- they didn't expect to. They expected to lose, but not by a lot, and then use it as a cudgel to gain seats in Parliament where the local reps were pro-EU and the vote was pro-Brexit.

Now they have to face up to their lies and hype. The EU is signaling to the Brits that they should go sooner rather than later, and if they expect to be allowed to continue to be part of the EU single market, they're smoking crack.

The pro-Brexit folks are saying that Britain should have the same sort of access that Norway has. Which probably won't happen. Norway never fully joined the EU, they are sort of "friends with benefits", if you will. Britain has told the EU that they want a divorce; the formal triggering of Article 50 will be like filing for divorce.

In this case, it'll be more like a contested divorce, in which the EU and the Brits will fight over the terms, especially since the EU will want to signal to other countries contemplating leaving that future divorcées of the EU will pay a heavy price. Contested divorces are often nasty as all fuck, as "Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned." There will be large amounts of butthurt on both sides that will take decades for both sides to get over.

In advance of Article 50 being triggered, look for the EU to freeze the Brits out of almost all participation in whatever passes for bureaucratic and political processes in Brussels.

John Oliver on this.

Booze Review

Skyy Raspberry-Infused Vodka.

"Vile" doesn't even begin to describe it. It's probably too weak to use for stripping paint or cleaning parts.

Stories that Sank like Stones, and More

November, 2015:

CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, Va. -- Federal court documents provide some disturbing details about an apparent plot by white supremacists in Chesterfield to incite a race war. They include plans to bomb and shoot up black churches and Jewish synagogues, as well as a plot to kill a local jewelry dealer, and rob an armored car, among other crimes. The crimes were to provide the proceeds to purchase land, weapons and training for the so-called coming race war. But they were apparently foiled by the FBI.

They all pleaded guilty.

June, 2016:

SALT LAKE CITY — A Stockton man described by prosecutors as the "commander of a citizen militia group" was indicted Thursday after allegedly trying to blow up a Bureau of Land Management cabin in Arizona.

William Keebler, 57, was indicted in U.S. District Court on one count of attempted damage to federal property by means of fire or explosive. He was arrested Wednesday in Nephi by combined forces from the FBI and BLM.

Neither one of these stories will rate more than a brief mention. But you can bet the ranch that if either one of the stories was about perps with brown skins, there would be wall-to-wall news coverage.

Meanwhile, in Tennessee, some clown is running for Congress with a campaign slogan of "make America white again". The crazies are coming out of the woodwork, thanks to Trump. Trump isn't dog-whistling to the white supremacists, not like Nixon, Reagan or Bush the First. Trump is blowing a steam-whistle.

Idjits With Guns

Three backwoods gun nuts were busted on their way to play vigilante in New York City — while riding in a pickup truck loaded with weapons and plastered with their love of the Second Amendment, law-enforcement sources said.

John Cramsey, 50, of rural Zionsville, Pa. — a militant anti-heroin crusader who is said to have used aggressive tactics to save at least a dozen people from drug dens — claims he was racing to Brooklyn with two pals to rescue a female drug user they believed had been kidnapped.

The gun-range owner never completed his mission. Cramsey — along with his buddy Dean Smith and the supposedly kidnapped woman’s friend Kimberly Arendt, 29 — were stopped by cops on the New Jersey side of the Holland Tunnel for a cracked windshield at around 7:40 a.m. Tuesday.

This is the truck that they were driving:

Those three chuckleheads got into a truck that had pro-gun right stuff all over it and drove the truck into two of the most gun-hostile states in the Union. The only way that it could have been worse is if they detoured through Maryland and ended up in Boston.

They might have well loaded up a car with heroin and wrapped it with a signs that read "Just Say 'Yes' to Drugs". UPDATE 2021: Cramsey went to prison after pleading it out. The other two went into a pre-trial diversionary program.

Brexit, Schmexit

Seems that the referendum is advisory only.

That might sound suicidal, but if the opinion polls flip, their government might risk it. There's even a term for it: Regrexit.

Tab Clearing- Brexit and More

You can read about the mechanism for exiting the EU here.

My gut feeling is that either the EU will try to fast-track it and be has iron-fisted as possible (the "fuck you, you limey bastards, get the fuck out" track), or both sides will slow-walk it and maybe they'll negotiate changes to the terms of the British EU membership and the Brits will reverse their decision (the "kiss and make up" track).

Ultimately, I suspect that Brexit won't happen. But I'm not putting any money on that.

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Remington is just about ready to re-release the R51. If there was ever a gun that demonstrated how much the gun press is more of a PR tool than critical reportage, it was the coverage of the R51 a few years back.

After handling a Sauer 38H, it seems to me that a concealed-hammer DA/SA mechanism along those lines would have been better than the concealed-hammer SA mechanism that Remington designed in. But what the hell do I know.

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If there is one thing that has come to light about Donald the Grifter, it's that he's vindictive and never forgets a slight. If he wins in November, I would expect that Trump will do whatever he can to fuck over the NeverTrump Republicans: FBI investigations, IRS audits, the works. But these folks may be reasonably safe.

Your Sunday Morning Jet Noise

The S-3A Viking, known as "the Hoover":

(H/T)

Petty Pissant Politicos in Texas; Caturday Edition

WHITE SETTLEMENT, TX:

Over children’s petitions and voters’ protests, the City Council has voted to fire Browser the library cat.

But the book-loving feline may yet have another life. His friends and fans vow to take his future to voters in November, forcing an election if necessary on whether the library can keep its six-year reading mascot.

Declaring that “City Hall and city businesses are no place for animals,” Councilman Elzie Clements led what Browser’s fans call a sneak attack on June 14, ending in a 2-1 vote giving the former shelter cat 30 days to find a new home.
...
Mayor Ron White, a nonvoting council moderator under the city charter, supports Browser. He blamed pettiness at City Hall because a city employee wasn’t allowed to keep a pet at work.

“We’ve had that cat five years, and there’s never been a question,” he said.

“That cat doesn’t have anything to do with whether somebody can have their puppy at City Hall. That cat doesn’t hurt anybody. … The council just went out and did this on their own because they don’t like cats.”

So, because some asswipe suffered a case of butthurt because he couldn't take his puppy to work, the City Council decided to get on their high horse and kick out the library cat.

This is one case where the Scorn of the Internet may save Browser his home and job.