Red Gauntlet , SASS 60619

While we think of the Vikings as Atlantic raiders mostly, at the same time they were heading down the Eastern European rivers en masse. Usually called Varangians in that context. Russia ultimately was founded at Kiev by Rurik, a Varangian. Scandinavian soldiers guarded the Emperor at Constantinople. There is famous Viking rune graffiti in Hagia Sophia. They could have come into contact with Moslems in many ways in those times.

What I would like to see soon would be an article in the next American Rifleman, or maybe the next after that, that has a full account of the facts; honest, detailed, without embellishment, rationalizations, or spin; one which also might point the way forward. And which contains no plea for funds whatever. Won't hold my breath. But something like that should happen soon.

Exactly. It's the board that really failed; they ignored their responsibility to the organization and its members. NRA revenue fell 40% in the last couple of years because of the refusal of the membership to continue down the path. Yet LaPierre remained in charge throughout. What ordinary board of directors would keep an executive after that? What board would ignore the exec's filing a bankruptcy petition without board approval or even knowledge? Yet they did. So a new board is needed and the NRA can move forward to strength again. A lot of goodwill and prestige has been lost and some hard thinking is required.

Good cast at any rate....

I still do some backpacking and we always boil or filter the creek water. Most of it where we go is probably fine but it's unwise to assume it. After dinner we'll boil a couple pans of water, cover to cool and refill the water bottles in the morning.

It's a not-for-profit corporation. As such, entitled to significant tax advantages. The tax advantages arise from the idea that such corporations serve a social or public interest. State laws allowed the creation of non-profit corporations to serve public causes of all types, often charitable. They do not have stockholders who can provide ultimate oversight. There have long been statutory mechanisms that allow state review of the operations of non-profits, to see that they do not deviate from the purposes that allowed them to solicit tax-free contributions on the basis of those purposes in the first place. Thus if they divert contributed money to improper purposes not in accord with their misson, they can be subject to legal 'correction'. The sad part is that it was left to an anti-gun leftist AG to do what the board in particular, as well as the membership, should have done long ago.

If you've been buying into the NRA's endless chicken little fundraising stuff, apart from the basic membership, this is what you've been paying for for years.

Yes.

There were many advanced biplanes designed in the interwar years, and several gave valuable service in WWII despite being 'obsolete'. An airplane, like a firearm, can be both obsolete and very effective at the same time. In 2002 I personally met Air Commodore Sir Archie Winskill DFC*, who was a Spitfire ace in the War. He personally shot down two Fiat CR-42 Italian airforce biplanes in the late days of the Battle of Britain. The Italians had believed their German comrades' lies that the Brits had been beaten, and wanted to be 'in at the kill'. Sir Archie told me that the CR-42 was relatively slow, but had a tight turning radius and was dangerous in combat. One of them shattered his canopy with machine gunfire, and could easily have killed him, but it ended the other way.

Why would we have done that? To help conquer France...?

Used to be a Pineapple Express. And 'heavy rain' isn't very catchy..

There were many stories arising out of the situation, some very bad, some good. A great many of the Japanese Americans hereabouts were truck farmers in the Puyallup Valley. In many cases, their neighbors worked their farms, paid their property taxes, and thus preserved their family farmland. In many other cases, people bought their land at tax sales; in effect stealing the land the internees couldn't pay taxes on because imprisoned. As a kid, I remember this especially striking me-- the government interns you for no crime, but no provision is made for pausing tax liability, so you lose not only your freedom, but your property.

My dad was in high school here in Tacoma at the time and had several friends and classmates interned. He used to point out that being of German descent was no problem, because they couldn't tell that by looking at you. Interestingly, not only were Japanese and Japanese-Americans in Hawaii not interned, neither were many of those who lived away from the 'coast'. I know of one family from Moses Lake, Wa, in central/eastern Washington who were not interned.

Even given this, one wonders why he said he was hit, when he wasn't!

I like the big knives with the pot metal dragon hafts, where the dragon is clutching a glass sphere.

Perhaps because our Constitution contains deliberately non-democratic features, while always retaining a representative character. The biggest example is probably the Senate, the more powerful of the two houses (except in its inability to initiate appropriations), which gives each state, regardless of size, two senators. This well-known feature really gripes modern lovers of 'democracy'. To them, democracy itself is the ideal. To our Founders, liberty is.

Jiminy Cricket taught me how to spell 'encyclopedia'....

Never a bullet fragment, but I've bitten into a lot of shot in a lifetime of eating pheasant, ducks, and geese!

But she appeared to have no idea who or what she was shooting at. Another discussion going here. See "mag dump because of acorn"

A painful video to watch....

What would be wrong with putting them into the garbage, where they end up deep in the landfill? I would have thought of that before the idea of flushing them. Flushing seems non-obvious to me....

My youngest granddaughters are making 20 bucks per hour to babysit. Things have changed a lot since we last hired babysitters.

Fingerprints and DNA are very useful evidence in many cases. I was collaterally involved, after the fact, in one case where a man spent 15 years in prison for a rape he did not commit. He always maintained his innocence; refusing 'sex offender' counselling that would have required he admit the crime, and which would have led to earlier release.He was eventually exonerated by DNA, both by defense and State testing (the rape kit had been preserved). He'd been convicted on 'hair comparison' evidence, which, under the particular circumstances, amounted to junk science. The original prosecutors, police, and the original State forensic 'expert' would not accept that they had been wrong, though they could do nothing about it. Turns out that denial is not uncommon in such cases.... Then, ten years after the man's release, the State got an exact DNA hit on a guy who had a low-level record, but had never had DNA test before.. He confessed to the old crime. Interestingly, he looked a lot like the guy who'd been convicted. Unfortunately, the statute of limitations on the original crime had expired.

Probably none would be my guess.

If it's being recited still it's good enough for me, whatever the cadence.