I already gave an overview of the Dallas Blogshoot, so this will be a photo essay. The first rule of a blogshoot is to bring guns. The four on the left are mine, the four on the right are Southern Belle's and kx59's.
Click to biggify - all 7 MB of shooty goodness
And more guns:
Trinity River in background
And more guns - The Redneck Engineer brought his .50 caliber project rifle, which dials "respect mah authoritah" up to eleven ...
Protection against runaway dump trucks
Machine guns (you have to turn the crank, Gatling gun style, but that makes it not Class III). Yes, it's belt fed.
A John Moses Browning (PBUH) design, with a turn crank
US Citizen brought a full auto Thompson. That's waving red meat to this crowd. Including me ...
The fantasy of every boy who grew up in the '60s ...
The second rule of blogshoots is to invite chicks, because who doesn't like chicks with guns? The Enfield sure seems to be a hit with the fairer sex.
The rifle of Empire
Oh, did I mention the "bring guns" part? US Citizen also brought a Kriss Vector, which looks pretty cool. Where's Robb?
Careful, this opens up portals to other dimensions
Kevin Baker brought his "beater" rack grade Garand. Like George Washington's axe (it had a few new handles, and a replacement head, but it's still the same axe), he put in a new stock which was so pretty that he refinished the metal. But it's the "beater" gun. Got to get me some of that ...
The greatest battle instrument ever devised
The third rule of blogshoots is that you need targets. The venue came with one that was new to me - but celebrate diversity, right?
Don't worry, I'm sure that will buff out
But you have to bring your own, too. It's a blogshoot, and so stuffed children's toys must needs be sacrificed to the Blogshoot Ghods. Hey, I don't make the rules, but rules are rules.
Friendship is magic. So is toy sacrifice.
Zooming in shows you interesting exit wounds. I was worried that the staple gun wouldn't hold it to the backstop. The threads from the stuffing driven out through the exit wounds essentially glued it to the backstop. As usual.
How am I supposed to heal your soul when you shoot off my unicorn horn?
I didn't take pictures of the bayonet charge because I was, well, charging. Hopefully someone has video because it was a hoot. Some pix in yesterday's post.
Sure was fun. Now we need an Atlanta blogshoot. Got to be a car in the Chattahoochee somewhere ...
The good: we were seated right away.
The bad: After 10 minutes, I asked the hostess to find our waiter. After 20 more minutes we left, margarita-less. Don't know if the food is any good, although it seems they don't have any.
Go to Casa Rio.
I love the composition of this picture. Notice Mrs. McQueen's hair blowing forward. Notice her casually crossed ankles. Admire her abs, which were doing a lot of work keeping her balanced in this position. But whatever you do, don't copy her gun-handling skills.
You've come a long way from 1963, baby.
Carol is an author and a shooter. Pretty interesting stuff over there, in a literary-but-dangerous way. Rather a good combination, actually. You used to get more of that, back in the day.
This will be a short update because it looks like I didn't bring the cable that plugs my camera to my laptop when I came back to Austin.
Quick thoughts:
Huge turnout. We had nearly twenty people show up - wow. Everything's bigger in Texas, including the number of people who want to shoot guns all day. The ladies were there in force as well which is always nice.
Guns. Lots of guns. Boy, there were a lot. May have been over 100. I got to shoot four new calibers: .410 shot shell, .357 SIG, .30 Carbine (from a revolver - wow!), and .50 BMG (thanks, Redneck Engineer!). As at all the blogshoots I've ever been to, people were delighted to share their guns with other folks who want to try them out. Bob S has some pictures up for you.
I think I need an FAL.Weer'd sings their praises, and Rabbit brought his. It was like driving tacks at 150 yards. That's one heavy rifle, but if you're like me and enjoy hitting what you're aiming at, this should be on your list for consideration.
US Citizen found a spectacular venue, a lightly wooded park-like range overlooking a river. Think National Forest with shooting benches. A HUGE thank you for getting a big crowd in there for all day.
Kevin Baker in person is exactly like you would imagine. Kevin Baker in person with his guns contains so much awesome as to threaten to warp the very fabric of space and time.
The charity raffle was a great success. People opened their hearts and their gun safes to donate their pre-ban magazines for our brothers and sisters trapped behind enemy lines in Massachusetts (thanks for the "Assault" Weapons Ban, Mitt Romney!). We have ten magazines that I'll send north to JayG in Yankeeland for the New England blogshoot this summer. Solidarity!
Oh yeah - shooting things is fun:
Say what you will about the Taurus Judge, but one of the lady blogshoot attendees took off the horn with her Judge at 30 yards. I guess in the HopeNChange™ War On Women® the women shoot back.
Bayoneting things is fun, too. The traditional day-end bayonet charge was the biggest I've ever seen. Here's Nick the Blogless triumphant on the, err, field of battle. He had help from a half dozen enthusiastic fellow stabby-stabby types. I'll see if I can scare up video.
By the power vested in me by, well, nobody, I've deputized Bob S as blogshoot community organizer for Dallas. It was an insanely great time, and hopefully he'll get a tradition started.
Many thanks to everyone who showed up - it was great to meet in Meat Space. And thanks once again to US Citizen without whom we wouldn't have had the outstanding location.
Man, that was fun, but leaving before 0700 and returning a bit before 2300 made for a long day. Bloggy later, with details.
UPDATE 22 April 2012 10:33: There was a discussion at the blogshoot regarding "eat what you kill". I firmly believe that fresh is the tastiest, but there's always canned for when Unicorn isn't in season. Or for filling your prepper storage shelves. Just because there's a Zombie Apocalypse, you can still have your daily allowance of HopeNChange™!
I know that this qualifies as a ZOMG Arsenal!!!eleventy!! in the People's Republic of Massachusetts, but this is the Lone Star State. The other, lesser States can do how they please, but a firearms collection this small in Texas is likely only owned by liberal gun banners.
Yeah, this is a repeat. This song is hereby declared the Official Blogshoot Theme Song. We're meeting up today to do just what you see here, only maybe with more guns. Makes me think that the only thing more awesome than a blogshoot would be a blogshoot with a band like Hogjaw playing.
While there's a lot of discussion about what "the real country music is", pretty much everyone grants "southern rock" honorary membership in the club. That's a Good Thing, because otherwise country music fans might not hear Hogjaw. And that'd be a cryin' shame.
Especially if you like shooting your guns.
Hogjaw does, unapologetically and with what's it to ya? gusto. Oh, and with some good guitar riffs. And extra points for filming the Moisin-Nagant at dusk, when the fireball at the muzzle is simply spectacular.
What more do you need?
Gitsum (Songwriters: ??? Dudes, set up a Wikipedia page for Discography)
Some say they wanna take my guns away
They will find to rue that day... yes they will
Blame it on the villain in the street
Truth is they wanna herd us like sheep
Come on, bring it on
Just getting started, I ain't done
Come on, bring it on
Step right up and get yourself some
Come on, bring it on
Seen you before, ain't gonna run
Come on, bring it on
Standin' right here, come get you some
We hold our rights and values dear
Your laws don't mean nuthin to us here
Come on, bring it on
Just getting started, I ain't done
Come on, bring it on
Step right up and get yourself some
Come on, bring it on
Seen you before, ain't gonna run
Come on, bring it on
Standin' right here, come get you some
I remember real clear, years ago in the swamps of South Georgia
Cane pole and Crossman in my hands was all I need to be growed up
Home made ice cream and BBQ and the family on Friday nights
Ten lane ramp on Saturday right before the morning light
There came a time I's old enough and learned about the gun
And every night at suppertime I'd answer to what I'd done
Folks today plum forgot about the way it used to be
Got no respect and no cold steel, just games on TV
And I'll burn in hell before I sell my rights away from me
It's high time we embrace the tool that keeps all men free
Come on and get you some
Come on
Come on and get you some
Come on
Come on and get you some today
Come on and get you some
Come on
Come on and get you some
Come on
Come on and get you some tonight
This is at the intersection of I-45 and Beltline Rd.
Rendezvous time is 10:00 AM, 21 April 2012. The range has a gate, and we will all convoy there. Email me and I'll send you my cell phone number if you'd like.
Bring water, sunscreen, boots (it's been raining), food items, and guns. Lots of guns.
There are two things I miss from New England: shooting with the New England Gunbloggers, and NESN television for all your Red Sox watchin' needs. I was going to drop my fiber-to-the-curb and get Dish Network, which lets me get NESN, even in Atlanta.
And then John Henry and the Red Sox owners went and screwed over Terry Francona and brought in the worst manager since Joe Kerrigan. Here's a little Red Sox history quiz for Henry and the money boys: name a manager who won more World Series for the Sox than Francona. It's a trick question; none of the 43 other managers won more World Series for the team.
And so I figured that my blood pressure was already high enough, and I'm not getting NESN. Great work, owners. Makes me long for the days of Buddy LeRoux.
Off topic but important: if you're a Red Sox fan, you should be reading A Large Regular.
It is astonishing that they'd admit it, but this is entirely true. Entirely.
The only thing I'd change is that their phone is also a beta test. All high tech products are a beta test. The product planners go by the mantra "go ugly early" - get to market and let your users tell you what to change. So it's never ready for Prime Time, by definition.
Even the Nanny State is throwing in the towel on "renewable" wind power, realizing that expensive, intermittent power requiring massively polluting backup coal plants and which is only "sustainable" by continuing and ever increasing subsidies is a brain dead idea.
It looks as though the wind energy boom is over. UK energy minister Greg Barker has hinted at a significant change in government strategy - cutting subsidies for the deployment and operation of environmentalists’ favoured technologies.
...
Consumers bore the cost of wind’s intermittency and operators were paid when not producing any electricity. In one case an operator asked to be paid ten times as much to close the turbines as they would have received operating them for contributions to the National Grid. Those payments, hidden until this year, rose 13,733 per cent in 2011.
Other than that, it's awesome.
A reasoned presentation on dealing with global warming
No, really. I'm pretty skeptical of the whole ZOMG Thermageddon thing, but there is actually an interesting case to be made about how to address the public policy aspects of the issue. Srlsy.
Climate Scientist Roger Pilke Jr has a very interesting presentation on how the current warming debate has utterly failed, and what issues need to be addressed head on if there's any hope at all of action. Proposals that will reduce GDP, people's standard of living, or condemn the developing world to poverty are, according to Pielke, immoral and counter productive. Actually, you can count me in that camp, too.
Pielke thinks we should do something about CO2, but his presentation is entirely sensible and worth your time. I'm still not convinced on the recent warming claims (I think there are terrible quality problems with the temperature databases), but if every warmist was a sensible as Pielke, the world would be a better place. Recommended.
Having trouble getting peer-reviewed research linking global warming and tornadoes?
Climate Science has jumped the shark - Science by Press Release has been replaced by Science by Telephone Poll. Reprinted in full here at the invitation of Anthony Watts. Next time anyone tells you that "the science is settled", mock them.
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Since warming hasn’t been cooperating lately, in desperation, Yale and George Mason University are trying to use a poorly worded and loaded poll to convince us that “weather is climate”. Problem is, the data does not support it.
Here’s the poll released today:
Just looking at the cover tells you a lot, it’s about the imagery of fear and terror, not facts.
“Most people in the country are looking at everything that’s happened; it just seems to be one disaster after another after another,” said Anthony A. Leiserowitz of Yale University, one of the researchers who commissioned the new poll. “People are starting to connect the dots.”
Well by all means, let’s “connect the dots”, but let’s use history and data rather than sloppy questions like this:
What’s hilarious about this question is that the memory of such events is aided by the stories in the mainstream media, and what we are seeing is a positive feedback loop. More on that below.
These are probably the most pointless and loaded questions ever to be put into a poll about weather, why? because short-term memory is better than long-term, and they play into this fact, biasing the results strongly. Plus, it has been shown that bad weather itself affects memory:
“We predicted and found that weather-induced negative mood improved memory accuracy,” he wrote in the study, which is published in the current Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.
Forgas speculated that a worse mood helps us to focus our attention on the surroundings and leads to a more thorough and careful thinking style, while happiness tends to reduce focus and increase both confidence and forgetfulness.
Yale makes no mention of this psychological tendency to remember better in bad weather in their study, nor do they correct for it. So then, it is no surprise to see results like this for weather in the last year:
(Update: in comments, Thomas has this to say:)
According to the poll 21% of respondents experience a tornado in the last year. Extrapolating that out to the U.S. population, that would mean that over 60 million Americans were affected by tornadoes in 2011.
That strikes me as wildly inaccurate and falls into question whether this poll has any validity at all.
I’d really like to see what the last 10 years looks like in a similar question…but they wouldn’t dare do that, because it would not give the results they seek. Plus, the type of severe weather events listed above, have regional distributions. For example, the south far more likely to have tornadoes and hurricanes that the Pacific Northwest. And in any given year, a strong wind and a strong rainstorm are common events just about anywhere, yet they try to make normal weather part of the “extreme” weather pattern, without defining what “extreme” weather is to the person being polled.
But, by saying “we are taking a poll about extreme weather” and then including winds, rain, snowstorms, heat waves, cold snaps, etc, which are regular occurences, lumping them with tornadoes, hurricanes, etc…they bias the poll by association. It’s a clever trick, and it is also dishonest.
And in a hat tip to the slimy “forecast The Facts” campaign against TV weathercasters that don’t “toe the line” on saying garbage like this, here’s the poll’s hat tip to that paid political ploy run by the Center for American Progress:
In stark contrast the agenda filled Yale poll by Anthony A. Leiserowitz, a Gallup poll from last week says that American don’t seem much concerned about global warming at all. In fact it is dead last in the concerns. They are getting desperate, in fact MSM coverage of climate issues has dropped significantly, according to Media Matters:
A Media Mattersreport released this week found that broadcast news coverage of climate change has dropped significantly since 2009, despite a series of key developments in climate scienceandpolitics.
This is why warmists need a new ploy, if they can make global warming about everyday weather, they’ll have a golden hammer. In my opinion, it is psychological terrorism.
Ok let’s look at that positive feedback loop of opinion aided by the MSM I mentioned earlier. For that, I’m reposting portions of:
Bouziotas et al. presented a paper at the EGU a few weeks ago (PDF) and concluded:
Analysis of trends and of aggregated time series on climatic (30-year) scale does not indicate consistent trends worldwide. Despite common perception, in general, the detected trends are more negative (less intense floods in most recent years) than positive. Similarly, Svensson et al. (2005) and Di Baldassarre et al. (2010) did not find systematical change neither in flood increasing or decreasing numbers nor change in flood magnitudes in their analysis.
Note the phrase I highlighted:“Despite common perception”. I was very pleased to see that in context with a conclusion from real data.
That “common perception” is central to the theme of “global climate disruption”, started by John P. Holdren in this presentation, which is one of the new buzzword phrases after “global warming” and “climate change” used to convey alarm.
Like Holdren, many people who ascribe to doomsday scenarios related to AGW seem to think that severe weather is happening more frequently. From a perception not steeped in the history of television technology, web technology, and mass media, which has been my domain of avocation and business, I can see how some people might think this. I’ve touched on this subject before, but it bears repeating again and in more detail.
Let’s consider how we might come to think that severe weather is more frequent than before. Using this Wikipedia timeline as a start, I’ve created a timeline that tracks the earliest communications to the present, adding also severe weather events of note and weather and news technology improvements for context.
Prior to 3500BC – Communication was carried out through paintings of indigenous tribes.
1520 – Ships on Ferdinand Magellan‘s voyage signal to each other by firing cannon and raising flags.
1776 The Pointe-Ã -Pitre hurricane was at one point the deadliest Atlantic hurricane on record. At least 6,000 fatalities occurred on Guadeloupe, which was a higher death toll than any known hurricane before it. It also struck Louisiana, but there was no warning nor knowledge of the deaths on Guadeloupe when it did. It also affected Antigua and Martinique early in its duration.
1780 – The Great Hurricane of 1780, also known as Hurricane San Calixto is considered the deadliest Atlantic tropical cyclone of all time. About 22,000 people died when the storm swept over Martinique, St. Eustatius and Barbados between October 10 and October 16. Thousands of deaths also occurred offshore. Reports of this hurricane took weeks to reach US newspapers of the era.
1812 – The Aug. 19, 1812 New Orleans Hurricane that didn’t appear in the Daily National Intelligencer/(Washington, DC) until later September. Daily National Intelligencer. Sept. 22, 1812, p. 3. Dreadful Hurricane. The following letters present an account of the ravages of one of those terrific storms to which the Southern extreme of our continent is so subject. Extract of a letter from Gen. Wilkinson, dated New Orleans, August 22.
1906 – Reginald Fessenden used a synchronous rotary-spark transmitter for the first radio program broadcast, from Ocean Bluff-Brant Rock, Massachusetts. Ships at sea heard a broadcast that included Fessenden playing O Holy Night on the violin and reading a passage from the Bible.
1914 – teletype intrduced as a news tool The Associated Press introduced the “telegraph typewriter” or teletype into newsrooms in 1914, making transmission of entire ready to read news stories available worldwide.
1920 – The first radio news program was broadcast August 31, 1920 by station 8MK in Detroit, Michigan, which survives today as all-news format station WWJ under ownership of the CBS network.
1928 – NBC completed the first permanent coast-to-coast radio network in the United States, linked by telephone circuits
1935 – Associated Press launched the Wirephoto network, which allowed transmission of news photographs over telephone lines on the day they were taken.
1946 – The DuMont Television Network, which had begun experimental broadcasts before the war, launched what Newsweek called “the country’s first permanent commercial television network” on August 15, 1946
1947 – July 27th. The WSR-1 weather surveillance radar, cobbled together from spare parts of the Navy AN/APS-2F radar was put into service in Norfolk, NE. It was later replaced by improved models WSR-3 and WSR-4
1948 – Network TV news begins. Launched in February 1948 by NBC, Camel Newsreel Theatre was a 10-minute program anchored by John Cameron Swayze, and featured newsreels from Movietone News. CBS soon followed suit in May 1948 with a 15-minute program, CBS-TV News, anchored by Douglas Edwards and subsequently renamed Douglas Edwards with the News.
1948 – The first successful “tornado forecast” issued, and successfully predicted the 1948 Tinker Air Force Base tornadoes which were two tornadoes which struck Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma on March 20 and March 25.
In 1953, Donald Staggs, an electrical engineer working for the Illinois State Water Survey, made the first recorded radar observation of a “hook echo” associated with a tornadic thunderstorm.
1957 the WSR-57 the first ‘modern’ weather radar, is commissioned by the U.S. Weather Bureau
1967 – The National Hurricane Center is established in the Miami, FL National Weather Service Forecast Office.
1969 – The first hosts of ARPANET, Internet‘s ancestor, are connected.
1969 – August 14-22 Hurricane Camille, a Category 5 storm, gets widespread network news coverage from correspondents “on the scene”.
1969 – Compuserve, and early dialup text based bulletin board system is launched in Columbus, Ohio, serving just that city with a
1971 – Erna Schneider Hoover invented a computerized switching system for telephone traffic.
1971 – Ray Tomlinson is generally credited as having sent the first email across a network, initiating the use of the “@” sign to separate the names of the user and the user’s machine.
1972 – Radio Shack stores introduce “The Weather Cube”, the first mass marketed weather alert radio. (page 77 here) allowing citizens to get weather forecasts and bulletins in their home for only $14.95
1974 the WSR-74 the second modern radar system is put into service at selected National Weather Service office in the United States and exported to other countries.
1975 – The Altair 8800, the world’s first home computer kit was introduced in the January edition of popular electronics
1975-1976 NOAA Weather Radio network expanded from about 50 transmitters to 330 with a goal of reaching 70 percent of the populace with storm warning broadcasts.
1977 – Radio Shack introduces a weather radio with built in automatic alerting that will sound off when the National Weather Service issues an alert on the new expanded NOAA Weather Radio network with over 100 stations. Page 145 here
1977 – The Apple II, one of the first highly successful mass-produced home microcomputers was introduced.
1978 – NOAA Weather Radio receivers with automatic audio insertion capabilities for radio and TV audio began to become widely installed.
1979 – The first commercially automated cellular network (the 1G) was launched in Japan by NTT in 1979, initially in the metropolitan area of Tokyo. Within five years, the NTT network had been expanded to cover the whole population of Japan and became the first nationwide 1G network.
1980 – Cable News Network (CNN) is founded by Ted Turner.Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States.
1980 - A heatwave hit much of the United States, killing as many as 1,250 people in one of the deadliest heat waves in history.
1981 – Home satellite dishes and receivers on C-band start to become widely available.
1981 – The IBM Personal Computer aka IBM model number 5150, and was introduced on August 12, 1981, it set a standard for x86 systems still in use today.
1982, May 2nd – The Weather Channel (TWC) is launched by John Coleman and Joe D’Aleo with 24 hour broadcasts of computerized weather forecasts and weather-related news.
1983 – Sony released the first consumer camcorder—the Betamovie BMC-100P
1983 America Online (then as Control Video Corporation, Vienna, Virginia) debuts as a nationwide bulletin board system featuring email.
1983 – The first 1G cellular telephone network launched in the USA was Chicago-based Ameritech using the Motorola DynaTAC mobile phone.
1984 – The Apple Macintosh computer, with a built in graphical interface, was announced. The Macintosh was introduced by the now famous US$1.5 million Ridley Scott television commercial, “1984“. The commercial most notably aired during the third quarter of Super Bowl XVIII on 22 January 1984 and is now considered a “watershed event”.
1985 – Panasonic, RCA, and Hitachi began producing camcorders that recorded to full-sized VHS cassette and offered up to 3 hours of record time. TV news soon began to have video of news and weather events submitted from members of the public.
1986 July 18th, KARE-TV in Minneapolis dispatches a news helicopter to catch live video of a tornado in progress, live at 5:13 PM during their news broadcast.
1988 – Doppler Radar goes national – the construction of a network consisting of 10 cm (4 in) wavelength radars, called NEXRAD or WSR-88D (Weather Service Radar 1988 Doppler), was started.
1989 – Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Cailliau built the prototype system which became the World Wide Web at CERN
1989 – August Sony announced the Sony ProMavica (Magnetic Video Camera) electronic still camera, considered the first widely available electronic camera able to load images to a computer via floppy disk.
1991 – Anders Olsson transmits solitary waves through an optical fiber with a data rate of 32 billion bits per second.
1991 – The 1991 Perfect Storm hits New England as a Category 1 hurricane and causes $1 billion dollars in damage. Covered widely in TV and print, it later becomes a movie starring George Clooney.
1992 – Neil Papworth sends the first SMS (or text message).
1992 – August 16-28 Hurricane Andrew, spotted at sea with weather satellites, is given nearly continuous coverage on CNN and other network news outlets as it approaches Florida. Live TV news via satellite coverage as well as some Internet coverage is offered. It was the first Category 5 hurricane imaged on NEXRAD.
1995 – DSL (Digital Subscriber Line) began to be implemented in the USA
1996 – Home satellite service Dish Network launched on March 4th
1996 – Fox News Channel was launched on October 7, 1996 with 24 hour news coverage
1996 – The Movie “Twister” was released on May 10, showing the drama and science of severe weather chasing in the USA midwest.
1999 – Dr. Kevin Trenberth posts a report and web essay titled The Extreme Weather Events of 1997 and 1998 citing “global greenhouse warming” as a cause. Trenberth recognizes “wider coverage” but dismisses it saying: “While we are indeed exposed to more and ever-wider coverage of the weather, the nature of some of the records being broken suggests a deeper explanation: that real changes are under way.”
2002 – Google News page was launched in March. It was later updated to so that users can request e-mail “alerts” on various keyword topics by subscribing to Google News Alerts.
2004 – December: A freak snowstorm hits the southernmost parts of Texas and Louisiana, dumping snow into regions that do not normally witness winter snowfall during the hours leading up to December 25 in what is called the 2004 Christmas Eve Snowstorm.
2004 – DSL began to become widely accepted in the USA, making broadband Internet connections affordable to most homes.
2004 – On November 19, the Website “Real Climate” was introduced, backed by Fenton communications, to sell the idea of climate change from “real scientists”.
2004 – December The website “Climate Audit” was launched.
2005 – August, Hurricane Katrina caused catastrophic damage along the Gulf Coast of the United States, forcing the effective abandonment of southeastern Louisiana (including New Orleans) for up to 2 months and damaging oil wells that sent gas prices in the U.S. to an all-time record high. Katrina killed at least 1,836 people and caused at least $75 billion US in damages, making it one of the costliest natural disasters of all time. TV viewers worldwide watched the storm strike in real time, Internet coverage was also timely and widespread.
2006 – Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth premiered at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival and opening in New York City and Los Angeles on May 24. It went on to limited theater release and home view DVD. It was the first entertainment film about global warming as a “crisis”, with hurricane Katrina prominently featured as “result” of global warming.
2006 – The short instant message service Twitter was launched July 15, 2006
2006 – November 17th, Watts Up With That was launched.
2007 – The iPhone, with graphics and Twitter instant messaging capabilities was released on June 29, 2007.
2007 – The reality show “Storm Chasers” debuts on the Discovery channel on October 17, 2007, showing severe weather pursuit as entertainment.
The 2008 Super Tuesday tornado outbreak was a deadly tornado outbreak affecting the Southern United States and the lower Ohio Valley from February 5 to February 6, 2008. With more than 80 confirmed tornados and 58 deaths, the outbreak was the deadliest in the U.S. since the May 31, 1985 outbreak that killed 76 across Ohio and Pennsylvania. It was widely covered live on US media.
2011 – On January 4th, the Pew Research Center released a poll showing that Internet had surpassed television as the preferred source for news, especially among younger people.
2011 – March, notice of an Earthquake off the coast of Japan was blogged near real-time thanks to a USGS email message alert before TV news media picked up the story, followed by A Tsunami warning. A Japanese TV news helicopter with live feed was dispatched and showed the Tsunami live as it approached the coast of Japan and hit the beaches. Carried by every major global news outlet lus live streamed on the Internet, it was the first time a Tsunami of this magnitude was seen live on global television before it impacted land.
Compare the reach and speed of communications and news reporting at the beginning of this timeline to the reach and speed of communications and news reporting technology around the beginning of the 20th century. Then compare that to the beginning of the 21st century. Compare again to what we’ve seen in the last 10 years.
With such global coverage, instant messaging, and Internet enabled phones with cameras now, is it any wonder that nothing related to severe weather or disaster escapes our notice any more? Certainly, without considering the technological change in our society, it would seem as if severe weather events and disasters are becoming much more frequent.
Which speaks to the phrase: “Despite common perception” which I highlighted at the beginning. The speed of weather tracking and communications technology curve aids in our “common perception” of severe weather events. The reality of severe weather frequency though, is actually different. While we may see more of it, that happens because there are millions more eyes, ears, cameras, and networks than ever before.
1. There are less Tornadoes in the USA
2. Global tropical cyclone activity, as measured by frequency and ACE is at the lowest in 30 years, despite 2010 being claimed as the warmest year ever:
Global Tropical Cyclone ACE (Dr. Ryan N. Maue, FSU)
3. And now, back to our original seed for this long thread, no effect in global flooding events:
Destructive floods observed in the last decade all over the world have led to record high material damage. The conventional belief is that the increasing cost of floods is associated with increasing human development on flood plains (Pielke & Downton, 2000). However, the question remains as to whether or not the frequency and/or magnitude of flooding is also increasing and, if so, whether it is in response to climate variability and change.
Several scenarios of future climate indicate a likelihood of increased intense precipitation and flood hazard. However, observations to date provide no conclusive and general proof as to how climate change affects flood behaviour.
Finally, this parting note.
While our world has seen the explosion of TV news networks, Internet News websites. personal cameras and recording technology, smartphones with cameras, and the ability to submit a photo or movie or live video feed virtually anywhere, anytime, giving us reporting of weather and disaster instantly on the scene, where tornadoes live on TV is becoming a ho-hum event, there’s one set of elusive phenomena that still hasn’t seen an increase in credible reporting and documentation:
UFO’s, Loch Ness monster, and Bigfoot.
We still haven’t seen anything credible from the millions of extra electronic eyes and ears out there, and people still marvel over old grainy images. You’d think if they were on the increase, we’d know about it. ;-)
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And this article is also germane: The Amazing Decline in Deaths from Extreme Weather in an Era of Global Warming, 1900–2010
Proponents of drastic curbs on greenhouse gas emissions claim that such emissions cause global warming and that this exacerbates the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, including extreme heat, droughts, floods and storms such as hurricanes and cyclones. But what matters is not the incidence of extreme weather events per se but the impact of such events—especially the human impact. To that end, it is instructive to examine trends in global mortality (i.e. the number of people killed) and mortality rates (i.e. the proportion of people killed) associated with extreme weather events for the 111-year period from 1900 to 2010.
This is due to better warnings, and yes, the MSM (especially TV and radio) is key to getting those warnings out.
1. When using our dataset, it is best to use the damage numbers as tabulated by the US NWS as they are consistent over time
2. That said, 2011 damage is qualitatively indistinguishable from 1974 and 1954 1953 at >;$20B
3. That would give a simple baseline expectation of 1 in 20 for 2011, but half or twice that would not be implausible given the uncertainties, so between 1 in 10 and 1 in 40
4. For 2012 and looking ahead there are two big question marks, one more certain than the other. Urbanization is increasing, which means that the chance of large losses increases (somewhat at the expense of smaller and medium losses of course). And there has been a notable and significant decline in the incidence of strong tornadoes in recent decades
Here’s the summary from the report: The decades leading up to 2011 convinced many that the tornado threat had been reducedto the point that 100 fatality tornadoes and 500 fatality years were in the past. After all,neither figure had been exceeded in the U.S. in over 50 years. The National WeatherService implemented a nationwide network of Doppler weather radars in the 1990s.Warning lead time doubled, and then almost doubled again, providing sufficient timefor families to receive a warning and take shelter. Television stations used sophisticatedgraphics to cover tornadoes with ever-increasing accuracy. Street level tracking softwareallowed TV viewers to know the exact location of a tornado and how close it might getto their home.
In this environment, a tornado that killed 10 or more people was national news and could grab the attention of the public for days and perhaps weeks. In 1999 oneof the most powerful tornadoes ever documented struck a metropolitan area and resultedin 36 deaths, which while tragic, was only a fraction of the toll that might have beenexpected from a tornado like this at the start of the 20th century. The benchmark for whatconstituted a major tornado event was much different than 1974, when the 3-4 April“Super Outbreak” killed over 300 people. Things were different now, or so many peoplethought.
We begin by summarising the damages and fatalities from U.S. tornadoes in 2011. Next,we examine the tornado outbreak as it relates to the historical record. The next sectionlooks at the role that extreme weather played, followed by a discussion of some of thevulnerabilities that are known to increase fatalities from tornadoes. We then considerwhat can be done to limit damages and fatalities from future tornado outbreaks. Finally,we discuss whether or not this was an event that can be expected to occur again and thenwe conclude.
… Three previous seasons—1953, 1965 and 1974—now rival damage in 2011. Normaliseddamage exceeded US$20 billion in 1953 and 1965 and exceeded US$10 billion in1974. The 1953 season provides perhaps the best historical comparison with 2011, as much of the damage in 1965 and 1974 occurred in just one outbreak. Damage in 1965is attributable to the Palm Sunday outbreak, while damage in 1974 occurred in the 2-3April “Super Outbreak”. 1953 had multiple damaging outbreaks in different parts of thecountry. One of the worst tornadoes of 1953 occurred in Worcester, MA, and ranked firstin normalised damage until the Joplin tornado of 2011.
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Here’s another: “…it would be a mistake to blame climate change for a seeming increase in tornadoes”
“If you look at the past 60 years of data, the number of tornadoes is increasing significantly, but it’s agreed upon by the tornado community that it’s not a real increase,” said Grady Dixon, assistant professor of meteorology and climatology at Mississippi State University.
“It’s having to do with better (weather tracking) technology, more population, the fact that the population is better educated and more aware. So we’re seeing them more often,” Dixon said.
But he said it would be “a terrible mistake” to relate the up-tick to climate change.
Full story here.
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Every time warmist academics try to push these ridiculous opinion polls as proof of “global warming makes weather more severe and more frequent” all it takes is a casual look at the data to know they are blowing hot air.
I give carte blanche permission to repost this article far and wide, bloggers, have at it.
CHEYENNE — State lawmakers are drafting legislation that would prevent local governments in Wyoming from passing any gun control laws, under penalty of heavy fines or even removal from office.
...
Casper City Councilman Paul Bertoglio, who was mayor when the City Council acted, opposed the ordinance against weapons in city government meetings. But he defended the City Council’s right to pass such an ordinance, citing a provision in state law stating local governments can pursue laws not addressed by the state. [That's the whole point of the proposed legislation now isn't it, punkin? - Borepatch]
Bertoglio also said the punishments laid out in Kroeker’s proposal are “excessive,” especially the threat to have a court remove elected officials from office.
I guess we know all we need to about how City Councilman Paul Bertoglio rolls. Sounds like a great justification for "there ought to be a law". And how about we send a ninja SWAT team to kick in his door at 0200 to see if he has any contraband gun control laws?
By the time you read this, I should almost be to Alabama, wheels pointed west towards FOB Borepatch. Two days from now is the Dallas Area Blogshoot, and I need to announce a special guest:
Needless to say, I'm pretty psyched to meet Kevin In Real Life, since he's the only one on the 'net who writes posts (almost) as long as mine. He's not only a Wickid Smaht Bastid, but he's bringing an arsenal big enough to invade Canada. Of course, he's bringing it to Dallas, so I expect that all y'all will bring something to add to the big ol' shooty pot luck.
Saturday, 10:00 AM until we get tired or run out of ammo. Details on the blogshoot here.
Hmmm ... the whole situation makes me imagine the following conversation:
Super Smart™ Progressive: But why do you need to cross state lines to go shooting?
Me: It's quite simple, really. The answer is @#$% you*.
See all y'all there.
* Thanks to Tam for many things, but especially for this line which I find gratifyingly useful.
#2 Son's JROTC Awards Ceremony was tonight, and so I went. I mean, I've missed pretty much everything like that this school year, being (mostly) 900 miles away down that Highway 20 Ride. And so I wasn't about to miss one more.
I'm glad that I went. The Major used an interesting expression in describing the attributes of each of those Cadets: "lead from the front". I looked sideways at #2 Son and realized with sinking heart that he learns from example, too, and my example has been away for too long.
And so at the reception following the awards, I introduced myself to the Colonel. I offered to come in and give a talk to the Cadets on information warfare, the field of cyber defense, and what the DoD is trying to do that might be of interest as a career path to High School JROTC Cadets. Might even be able to turn it into a seminar series.
His eyes lit up. I think that we have a plan, or at least a discussion.
Because it wouldn't hurt for #2 Son to see his old man do some leading from the front. You do what you have to do to keep hearth and home whole, but now that I'll be home regularly it's time to set an example by actions. So he sees that if you want to do something, own it.
So I'm really not sorry at all that I was late posting tonight. No offense.
The Obama campaign looks like the magic smoke is coming out, which is too bad because that will leave us with President Slick Willard. That is likely to be a disaster, but that will be a post for another day. For now, here are some musings about the next six months.
1. Romney will continue to ignore conservatives and the Tea Party.
There's little down side in this for him - most conservatives and Tea Party types hate Obama with the fire of a thousand suns, and would gladly crawl across broken glass to vote against him. They're the opposite of the cheerleader dating the dreamy quarterback - they're the cheerleader going out with any old shmoe to get back at the quarterback. I fear that this will not end well for them, but it is what it is.
2. This will not be a blow out election.
Don Surber is calling 40 states for Romney, which is courageous. Not happening, though. Obama is no Mondale, and the symbolism of the first black President will shore up the Democratic base and keep turnout high in African American communities. That gives Obama a starting point of a solid 25% to build on - that's half way to victory. For Romney to win in a landslide he will have to way over-perform with Moderates and Independents. It's possible, but would take a compelling and bold message to do so - "compelling" and "bold" are not adjectives commonly used to describe Mitten's campaign.
3. Obama's fund raising problems will hurt the Democratic down-ticket races.
Remember the Billion Dollars that Obama's campaign used to boast that they'd raise. How's that working out for them? Not go well, actually. Fund raising efforts are way behind projections. Combined with a campaign staff sized suitably for the First Ego, the Obama burn rate is high enough that they have a shockingly low cash on hand balance - actually not much more than Romney. But the First Ego will take his typical "me first" approach, and so promising but poor new Democratic candidates will go begging. Obama has no coat tails, either political or financial.
4. Romney has no coat tails, either.
Sure, he's Mr. Establishment, but he doesn't have star power. He also doesn't have a message beyond "vote for me, my name isn't Barack Obama". As a result, it's hard to see him have the money or the draw to help the Republican down ticket races much. It may not matter much as the Republican base will be energized to vote for "Mr. Not Barack Obama", but they'd vote for Mussolini instead of Obama.
Net/net, Romney will owe the establishment, big time. Congress won't owe (or fear) him much at all. He'll be a weak President the day he takes office.
5. Most voters will make up their mind on the way into the voting booth.
Most people are entirely sensible, in that they''re not political junkies. As such, they'll make up their mind in the last week of the campaign. The Democrats will, as they like to do, try to run some sort of "October Surprise" around Halloween, although since Romney is squeaky clean, it's hard to see what that might be. But polls before mid-October will be essentially only of interest to the political equivalent of sabremetricians.
6. The Media will shamelessly (and hysterically) shill for Obama. Won't matter.
The only people who still trust the media are Obama's base anyway. So the MSM can dial the Obamessiah Love up to 11, and the Romney 2 minutes of hate up to 13, and it won't move the needle. The old days of the media being worth 5-15 points are gone, and not coming back. It's arguable, in fact, that the one sided media love fest actually produces negative results for Democrats, as the whole "Ann Romney never worked a day in her life" kerfuffle suggests. Sure, the comment was idiotic. What's interesting is why a Democrat thought she could get away with saying it. MSM FTW!
7. A Romney Administration will be a disaster for America, for freedom, and for the Republican Party.
There, I said it. That's a post for another day, but all the cheerleaders thinking that dating the President of the Chess Club will "show" that dumb old quarterback need to think how that particular date is likely to end up, and whether they want to end up married to this particular nerd. More on this in a future post.
Last week, Apple released two urgent updates to Mac OS X to:
1. Remove the Flashback malware about which we have already written
2. Automatically deactivate the Java browser plugin and Java Web Start, effectively disabling java applets in browsers
Particularly, the second step shows the severity of the CVE-2012-0507 vulnerability exploited by Flashback to infect almost 700,000 users via drive-by malware downloads.
Actually, it was the right decision because we can confirm yet another Mac malware in the wild - Backdoor.OSX.SabPub.a being spread through Java exploits.
This new threat is a custom OS X backdoor, which appears to have been designed for use in targeted attacks. After it is activated on an infected system, it connects to a remote website in typical C&C fashion to fetch instructions. The backdoor contains functionality to make screenshots of the user’s current session and execute commands on the infected machine.
Apple has been pretty immune to this sort of thing in the past, while their market share was too small to attract the attention of the Bad Guys. Those days are over. loadlin, baby!
Malware in Androidland
Borepatch's First Law of security is "free download" is Intarwebz speak for "open your mouth and close your eyes". We've seen malware in the Android app store, and that doesn't look like it's changing:
Recently we discovered a new Android Trojan in the official Google Play market that displays a video downloaded from the Internet–but only if some sensitive information is previously sent to a remote server. The malicious applications are designed for Japanese users and display “trailers” of upcoming video games for Android.
It grabs the Android device ID, the phone number, your contacts list, etc, and beams it to somewhere on the 'net. Seems over 70,000 people have downloaded it. Me, I don't use apps.
Malware in Google Chrome browser extensions
Google has a web store for extensions to their Chrome browser. Guess what showed up in the store?
Crooks have found a new venue to push malware: the official Google Chrome Web Store. It was recently used to hawk Chrome browser extensions secretly hijacking users' Facebook profiles.
According to Kaspersky Lab expert Fabio Assolini, one malicious extension hosted on Google's own servers contained hidden code that "can gain complete control" of the user's Facebook profile. The extension then used that access to spread malicious messages and register Facebook Likes for certain items, also inviting fellow users to install it. The same operators advertised a service that delivered Likes of companies looking to promote their profiles. It costs about $27 per 1,000 Likes.
Notice a common thread here? Security - it's not just a good idea. It's Borepatch's Law.
Congratulations to blogfriend Lissa and husband Mike, who are expecting! Lissa actually told me this when we met in Orlando a couple weeks ago, but I was sworn to secrecy - but since she's just declassified the information, public congratulations are in order!
I hope that you and Mike love being parents as much as I have. But I have to warn you - it gos by in a flash. One day, you're bouncing them on your knee:
The next day (it seems), they're in their Class A:
It's been the best thing I've done. I hope you find that same joy, and heartache, and joy. I know that it's cliché:, but this has stuck with me since we were expecting #1 Son. The older I get, the more it speaks to me, whispering words straight to my soul in the dark of the night.
On Children (Kalil Gibran)
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.
The Archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
and He bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the Archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
Oh, and some day you'll be able to go away again with just you and Mike. That will be nice, too. Until then, I hope it's like this at the Raj Mahal:
Packing up to head back to FOB Borepatch. The Dallas Blogshoot is this Saturday, and so I find that my checklist includes items not seen before on other Blogshoot dates:
Rifle? Check.
Other rifle? Check.
Other other rifle? Nah, don't need it.
Other other other rifle? Nah.
Pistol? Check.
Other pistol? Check check.
Win. Mass.Gov gun grabbers could not be reached for comment, because who cares what they think. Win win.
Maybe I'll bring those other rifles, just because. ZOMG, he has an arsenal!!11! And a thousand rounds of ammunition!!!eleventy!!
Win win win.
Like Tam says, Why do I need it, Mr. Mass.Gov Gun Grabber? Because @#$% you.
Win win win win. That's a lot of win, right there.
I came across the phrase ‘leapfrogging’ only a few days ago — apparently meaning the Leftist practice of ignoring experience — the concrete, obvious and near at hand; and leaping over it to the ideology — abstract, remote and far away (usually only experienced via the mass media).
...
(Soviet Communism made a core principle of leapfrogging — it was the true Communist’s duty not to alleviate specific instances of distress or injustice, since this might delay the revolution which would end all distress and injustices.
For extra credit, apply the Leapfrogging analysis to libertarian philosophy.
Doubleplusundead has the funniest BAG Day post you'll read today, talking about great guns and great movies. That is one funny dude:
8.Top Break/Schofield used by Sam Elliot in Tombstone. Great movie, possibly the best Wyatt Earp movie. Mostly because of Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday and Kurt Russell’s mustache. That’s one impressive mustache, even John Bolton is a little jealous of it.
