Delayed posting

Long time commenter Libertyman is visiting Castle Borepatch, and we're off to Gettysburg.  Posting will be sporadic, but he and I will collaborate on a Sunday Classical post for tomorrow.  Back later.

President Trump: NASA rocket launches "40-50 times" the cost of Falcon Heavy

It seems like his numbers hold up: $90M per launch for Falcon Heavy vs. $3B for NASA's new Space Launch System.

We've known since the '70s that NASA would end up like Amtrak if they tried to be StarTrack.  40x more expensive puts Amtrak to shame.

I must give Obama credit where credit is due - he had his administration get pretty much completely out of the way of commercial space exploration.  We are seeing a dramatic reduction is price/pound to low earth orbit, which Trump recognizes.  Maybe Moon colonies are back on the table, with commercial launch taking the well understood portion of the problem and NASA focusing on what they did so magnificently in the 1960s - pushing the technology envelope.

But we've known for a long time that space exploration would have to be done by private commerce.

So a couple of SWAT members responded to the Parkland shooting and they got suspended?

Obviously the answer is more gun control.

Is there anything that the government did right here?

A Sense of Thrift - A Brigid Guest Post

During a fair bit of the last 20 years, I have been a  sponsor or volunteer at local shelters for the physically abused, many also homeless. People ask why I do it, as it is often depressing, and sometimes futile.

The women there who have been abused (though abuse goes both ways, men also a victim of it) present an image to the world that is often one of stone, hiding the pain, hiding the bruises, until eventually, one night, the stone is shattered by the fury of a long fall or a storm surge. Sometimes it's simply eroded away, what is unique, distinct, worn away over time, as if by water, drop by ceaseless drop. Perhaps with those who will listen and support, some of whom have been there, a little of what is left can be reclaimed, still capable of beauty.

Some of them will go back, the fear of the unknown overwhelming, the knowledge that someone, otherwise, will wish them, forever, anything but peace.  Peace is not often plentiful.  I could almost always guess which ones would go back, they wore that quality of outworn violence like perfume, drawn back to the evangelical zeal of their abuser, simply too tired to fight any longer. It was often a fatal mistake, realized too late, as they were borne beyond the hurt and harm of man, into the ground.

Better they said, to go back, then live homelessly. Some escape, but live for years with their scars.  Those scars are apparent to some, who try and offer a healing balm, but to others, they are but a rattlers warning, a bite to those that don't understand their pain.

Many of us already live homelessly. Not in our dwelling, but in the neighborhood of our true self. We spend years trying to change someone, only to realize the only thing that could change was ourselves. We spend so much time chasing after things, that we ignore what we have here now.

Some of the unhappiest people I know have the most expansive and expensive of possessions. I sold or gave away most of mine several years ago, downsizing to a life much simpler. When I had my taxes done today, the tax guy said "congrats, you are now in the 33% tax bracket, and then looked out on my 12-year-old rusty truck with a wry smile.  After doing my taxes for years, he understands why we live as we do, giving generously to non-profits and veterans groups, helping those in need who after years of hard work, have a family disaster, and giving joyfully to our church. I don't miss the days of big house and BMW, and not an extra cent for anyone but myself.  I have all I need, a family, a warm house, enough food to eat (OK, and a nice collection of Single Malt)

I sometimes look at pictures of that former McMansion home, the two-story entryway, the three car garage, and have a twinge of regret, but it's rare. I could have stayed in that house and my world would have revolved around its upkeep while its value just went down in a crashing marketplace and the people that might have been impressed by it weren't worthy of the efforts.  Or I could pay off debt, learn to do the things to sustain, not just consume. I  could ensure Dad could stay in his home with a nurse as his health declined. I could spend time with people who were important, not just labor for the upkeep of those walls.  It was an easy decision.

I don't own a lot, but if the world falls to ruin tomorrow, I will have enough to survive and the knowledge and means to know enough to protect it.
My parents always helped those that help themselves. Dad, getting his CPA after the military, did income taxes for free for the elderly. He was active in the church and in other organizations, living his life in a brotherhood of man under the fatherhood of God, as he would say if you asked him. Mom, as well, volunteered at the church and at the local hospital.

There, she was the Tel-Med operator, where people could call and request recordings on medical topics from a published directory that had the topic by number. There was everything from child illnesses, cancer screening, nutrition and baby care to several on sexual issues and other embarrassing personal topics people might be too shy to ask the doctor about.  Dad would disguise his voice and call when she was there and request those "special" numbers just to hear her stammer "thank you" as she was turning red, then she'd exclaim "Bud, it's you isn't it!" and they'd both laugh. But I know he respected her for that volunteer work, even as she herself was battling cancer.

 

My early career days were such I couldn't volunteer but I did sponsor a child through one of the Christian children's charities, just enough to provide for some schooling and at least one hot, nourishing meal a day. Sponsors were allowed to give extra money, with the stipulation that it would meet a specific need, not to be squandered. So one time, when bills were light, I sent a few hundred dollars I had saved up, with a specific need in mind.

I got a letter back from the little girl I sponsored in Africa, Louise Marie, handwritten, with colorful crayon drawings of a little house with a roof and a door, with little Crayola cartoon chickens and smiling children gathered around.  You see, before the gift, her family had been living on the ground, in a lean-to, her widowed mother's $50 a month income as a sustenance farmer not enough for real shelter. With the money and the assistance of the charitable foundation, they built a house.  It wasn't a house like you and I expect to live in. But it was a grand house to them, with four walls to protect them from those that would rob or hurt, a floor and a real roof to keep the water and elements out.
Some folks would say I spend too much money on firearms or tools. I don't mind spending money on something that has a use, retains its value and can be passed down to generations. I have absolutely no issues with spending money on those tools that can protect my life and others.  I have a hard time spending money on just "stuff". A woman I knew from a community organization, proudly showed off her $500 designer purse one day.  She has about 20 purses (I'm not kidding), but this one was special because, well. . . . it was $500!

I don't have a $500 purse. Until I was in my late 20's I didn't even have a $500 car.  But I have friends that share my table that would take a bullet for me to keep me safe. I have the openness of the horizon and the strength of my free will. I have freedom,I have my faith in God, I have balance and I have people that share my life that totally understand this. For this, I am grateful and try to do what I can to give some of that back.

Hopefully, most of you won't ever get to the point where you have nothing left of yourself but the letters of your name and what you can shove in a suitcase. Most of you won't give away most of your stuff and totally change how you live when you don't have to. But when you do pare down, by circumstance or by choice, it is quietly liberating, as you discover just what it is that was, still is, precious to you, what is worth your time and attention.

Thoreau once said, "The cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run.". That meant little to me when I first read it in English class. It would mean little to people who have had everything handed to them, with little effort,  the cost of their education, their sustenance, their lifestyle. After years of sweat, tears and hard work, I understood, having long ago severed ties with things, even people, who gave me only pain for my efforts, for, in the end, such things, by their exchange, violated my sense of thrift.

As snow clouds gather on the horizon, I look out towards the trees, to the chattering of birds as I step outside with a furry little Rescue dog.  On the ground two doves, who when Abby approaches them, run, don't fly away, their brain not sensing the danger.  Fortunately, she shows no interest in their harm.  Above, two cardinals flutter like two tiny flags amongst the branches, then fly away, as if the wind dispersed them like small scraps of cloth.  On the railing, a small sparrow, looking a little worse for wear, looking at the empty feeder, watching me carefully, wondering if I will harm or help. On the air, the echo of all of their cries, mournful and plaintive, barely heard above the wind.

I think of the Bible Verse "Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?"  I look at the fridge, as I enter my home, to a little picture, drawn with the colors of hope.

Today, I live so much more simply, surrounding myself with those with whom I share a personal history as well as those possessions which I know serve a useful function.  On days where doubt raises its head, as to my worth, as to my place in the world, I simply look at that little picture and smile broadly, no longer hearing the echo of invisible bruises. Life is a risk, never a possession, live, and love, accordingly. - Brigid

Cats and dogs, living together

You can download Kali Linux from the Microsoft Windows Store.

Man, it sure is a long, long way from the Halloween Documents.

Quote of the Day, Snowflake edition

Chris Lynch brings the LULs:

Article argues "social scientists and humanities experts" will be in demand in the coming age of robots and artificial intelligence. I remember seeming similar articles in the 80's and 90's - I'm reminded of those articles every time a barista at Starbuck's asks me for my order.

It's funny because it's true.

Eddie Vetter - A Room At The Top

This is a touching tribute to the actors we lost last year.  Eddie Vetter brings a great performance of the song from Tom Petty (we lost him, too).



I'm typically pretty impatient with the Hollywood Bravo Sierra that you get at the Oscars, but this was Hollywood at its finest.

Rest in peace.

Actually, this is exactly right

Offered without comment

I agree

Keith Richards could not be reached for comment.

Dolly Parton - Coat Of Many Colors

Dolly Parton has donated 100 Million books.  At the Library of Congress, they call her the "book lady".  It all started in Sevier County, Tennessee when she founded the Imagination Library.  Families that sign their child up get a book each month from birth until kindergarten.  It is giving away a million books each month.

Dolly started it in honor of her father, who never learned to read or write.

She is a great performer, one of our greatest songwriters, but is also a national treasure.  This is said to be one of her favorites of all the songs she's written.  She said that the song just came to her; not having any paper, she wrote it down on the back of Porter Wagoner's dry cleaning receipt.  He had the receipt framed.



Coat Of Many Colors (Songwriter: Dolly Parton)

Back through the years 
I go wonderin' once again 
Back to the seasons of my youth 
I recall a box of rags that someone gave us 
And how my momma put the rags to use 
There were rags of many colors 
Every piece was small 
And I didn't have a coat 
And it was way down in the fall 
Momma sewed the rags together 
Sewin' every piece with love  

She made my coat of many colors 
That I was so proud of 
As she sewed, she told a story 
From the bible, she had read 
About a coat of many colors 
Joseph wore and then she said 
Perhaps this coat will bring you 
Good luck and happiness 
And I just couldn't wait to wear it 
And momma blessed it with a kiss 

My coat of many colors 
That my momma made for me 
Made only from rags 
But I wore it so proudly 
Although we had no money 
I was rich as I could be 
In my coat of many colors 
My momma made for me 

So with patches on my britches 
Holes in both my shoes 
In my coat of many colors 
I hurried off to school 
Just to find the others laughing 
And making fun of me 
In my coat of many colors 
My momma made for me 

And oh I couldn't understand it 
For I felt I was rich 
And I told them of the love 
My momma sewed in every stitch 
And I told 'em all the story 
Momma told me while she sewed 
And how my coat of many colors 
Was worth more than all their clothes 

But they didn't understand it 
And I tried to make them see 
That one is only poor 
Only if they choose to be 
Now I know we had no money 
But I was rich as I could be 
In my coat of many colors 
My momma made for me 
Made just for me

Snerk

pic.twitter.com/eF33eogwam

— Sal the Agorist (@SallyMayweather) March 2, 2018

I love me some Sal the Agorist.

A Gun Rights Mind Virus

You meet different sorts of people who advocate for gun control.  Some of them are hard core control freaks who just want to crush flyover country, but if you're like me you don't run across them very often.  Mostly you run across people who aren't shooters or gun owners, who haven't thought about the issue very much, but who are disturbed about the constant media drumbeat about shootings and who just want to "do something".

We need these people on our side, or at least standing on the sidelines.  How do we separate them from the gun control pack.

My last post was how I approach this: I'm not opposed to gun control, I'm opposed to stupid and useless gun control.  This is a mind virus that I'm trying to infect them with.  I want to sow seeds of doubt in their minds to get them out of the gun controller's camp and onto the sidelines.  Hopefully (if the virus really takes) it will begin the process where they actually start to think about things and they may even end up on our side.

It's a battle for the (very large) middle ground.  In the long run, we're not viable without it.

My experience has been pretty good with this.  Most of these folks are decent people.  They want to be fair, and they know that they don't know much about this topic.  My mind virus is a challenge to them - is what you're proposing dumb?  Will it work?  Is it fair?  Nobody wants to be dumb, or unfair.

This is especially true with the sentence that has had more impact than any other I've used with folks like this.  When they say (and they will say it) "But we have to do something", I reply:

Do you want to do something stupid and useless?  That doesn't sound right.

Quite frankly, our choice is to build bunkers or to convince the middle.  Building bunkers makes us look like the dumb (and dangerous) ones.

Yes, the people at the heart of the gun control battle are, well, evil.  No getting past that.  But we don't win without the vast middle.  We don't win by starting from "Gun controllers are evil" (they are wishy-washy gun controllers after all).  We don't win from "Molon late, bitches!" (this seems to make people nervous.

We win from a mind virus that starts to get them to ask themselves the right questions.  Truth is on our side; we can lead others to truth if we want.

I confess. I'm not opposed to gun control.

Confession, they say, is good for the soul, so I confess.  Man, I feel better all ready.

I don't object to gun control.  What I object to is stupid and useless gun control.

Unfortunately, all we seem to hear are stupid and useless gun control proposals.  As a public service, here are two simple rules you can use to figure out whether a gun control proposal is stupid and useless:

Rule #1.  Can the person proposing the law state what they think the law will accomplish?  Most of the time it seems that they can't.  For example, what good would banning bump stocks do?  They were (maybe) used in one crime in the Republic's history.  Is the goal really to prevent something that has only happened once?  Really?

Rule #2.  Can the person proposing the law state how likely the law is to accomplish the goal from Rule #1?  Considering that you can make a bump stock from a string and a key ring, is it rational to ban bump stocks?

That's it - two simple rules to identify non-stupid and non-useless gun control laws.  So let's use these rules to look at some gun control laws and see if they're stupid or not:

1994 Assault Weapons Ban.  Stupid.  The law was supposed to stop people from buying military style semi-automatic rifles.  It didn't.  The AR platform is likely the most popular rifle in America, and was so during the "ban".  The Department of Justice said that the ban had precisely zero effect on gun crime.

Gun Free School Zones.  Stupid.  It was supposed to stop people from taking guns into schools.  That sure worked great, didn't it?

I could go on with this, but you can add your own.  My point, though, is that the gun control proposals (magazine size restrictions, one gun a month purchase limits, etc.) are stupid and useless.  I'm willing to leave open the possibility that some gun control proposals could be non-stupid, at least in theory.  But I sure haven't seen any yet.

pic.twitter.com/UmgyK9ZjMD

— Sal the Agorist (@SallyMayweather) February 28, 2018

UPDATE 2 March 2018 12:45: This line of reasoning continues in a second post.

Brigid's Thoughts on Arming Educators

Hey Hollywood, listen up! - A Guest Post from Madame Anonymous

Hey Hollywood!

Many of you promised to leave if Trump were elected president. He was (that was reason enough to vote for him!) but you didn’t leave.

You said you were smarter than the rest of us because you’re rich and famous. You were wrong.

You said Hillary was the best candidate for president but you ignored the people that are no longer living because of her and all the shady dealings of the Clinton Foundation (among others!)

You said Trump spoke poorly about women but thought nothing of Bill Clinton cheating on his wife in the oval office and then lied to the entire world about it.

You thought the blacklisting started by McCarthy during the 50’s was terrible but you’ve done exactly the same thing to actors like Tim Allen when he disagreed with you. (and your total lack of common sense and logic)

You paraded around Washington DC in vagina hats and called for the assassination of our newly elected president just ONE DAY after he took office but insisted he was the divisive element in our country.

You claim the rest of need to be more mindful and protective of our natural resources while you drive your ridiculously priced, gas guzzling cars and limos and fly around in your private jets because you’re too good to be in the presence commoners.

You preach about how we need to allow illegal aliens into our country but lock yourself behind gates with armed guards. You tell us how we should accept illegals into our cities and continue allowing our hard earned tax dollars to be spent on people who are in this country illegally and don’t contribute one cent to the tax base they so freely take from, but you wear dresses, tuxedos, and jewelry worth thousands of dollars all free of charge to one special occasion just for naming the designer. You parade around with $5000 purses given to you just so they’ll be seen, expect independent store owners to give you drastic discounts just for shopping in their stores, receive thousands of dollars of tax free swag just for showing up at a party, and yet you have the audacity to accuse political candidates that you disagree with (like our president) of not paying their fair share of taxes.

You hate it when people criticize pro athletes for take a knee instead of standing for our National Anthem but you criticize Tim Allen and other conservative actors when they say things they believe.  And while freedom of speech is great, we're not buying tickets for these games to listen to those knuckleheads spout their political philosophy.

You have treated the citizens of this country, our military, our first responders, our current president and his family horribly, but now you call on then for stronger gun control laws. You hire armed body guards to protect you, you call the police when you need them, you depend on our military to protect our country, and yet you call for stricter gun laws while you totally ignore all the crimes committed with illegally obtained guns and guns used by felons. Seriously, are you really that ignorant that you think adding more gun laws would change that???

We pay to see you act, dance, sing, tell jokes, or whatever your art is. Instead, you cheat us by forcing us to listen to your political rants instead of doing what we have paid good money for. Shut up and dance, monkey!

Clearly, you’ve been really, really wrong for decades and show no signs of changing that. (Or, you secretly want Trump to be reelected in 2020, in which case you’re doing an AWESOME job – keep up the good work!)

So, here’s my question: Since you’ve been wrong about so much and we’ve all just let you go on with your silliness asking nothing from you, can we just have one thing? Can we please have back ‘Last Man Standing’? After all, cancelling it has done absolutely no good for you!

Moving On As We Remember the Past - A Brigid Guest Post

It was four years ago, this week in late February. I had just gotten off duty and was headed on up to Chicago to join my husband of four months for the weekend. It was a 400-mile round trip I made most every weekend there was not severe weather over several years before we got married, and then again as I waited for a transfer without sacrificing pay grade so we could finally both work and live in the same city.

How this trip was different was that my dog of 11 years, Barkley, was not making the journey with me, only his collar and leash and a few toys in a box that I could not bear to part with. His remains were in the polished box on my crash pad dresser. I laid my hand on it as I left, imagining warmth that was not there and softly said goodbye, telling him I'd be back soon.

It was a solemn drive and a lonely one. You'd think an animal that slept a lot wouldn't be much company on a long drive but he was. He was the reason I'd stop at the rest stops so he could get a little walk; he was the reason we'd sometimes go through a drive-thru where he would get a kid sized burger, no mustard or pickles, and a soft serve cone. I'd take a point and shoot camera and hold it up without taking my eyes off the road. Many of the pictures continue to make me smile to this day.

One more inch and the Cheez-It's are MINE!

That day, I was fixed in the annealed spot that was his fate and mine as outside the miles of cornfields and the steady thump of late night tires flew past me as if I were frozen to the ground. The drive could have been five minutes, it would have been five hours but I remember thinking that if I would stop, he would somehow appear in the back of the extended cab pickup truck as if there was some quality of the eternal in the hushed journey forward. I did make one stop at a long deserted rest area, and of course, he was not there, There was only that box of dog memories and tears that stained the steering wheel. I sat in the truck motionless as outside of me the farmland stretched away from me, merging into the limitless silence of every loss I'd known.

We've all been there, going on about our lives, happy, with a plan, then suddenly, what was mapped out is literally shredded before us, leaving us to pick up the scraps laid down on the floor and move on, that rewind button nowhere in reach. It can be the biggest moments of our lives, it can be the smallest ones. It can be a relationship ended, or a friendship snubbed. It can be simply a day where nothing went as planned, unforecast weather aloft, a cantankerous crew chief, and you really can't complain, as everyone's looking at you for direction as you're the commander; you can simply hunker to the new challenge sobered looking out the cockpit window as you realize your deep dependence upon the invisible.

The key thing is we gather up we have left and look forward. Even more importantly, we do so with a communion of not just saints but of sinners. I remember so many days there after we lost both Barkley and my brother to cancer at the same time when my friends would stop by. They'd talk with cheerfulness of the good things they remembered, we would plan things in the future to look forward to. When they left, with a cheerful wave, it seemed as if they left a bit of themselves with me, some of their stores of strength and hope, renewed affirmation in the promise of life. I realized then just how much I needed them.

I'd always prided myself on being the kind of person that could handle things most people couldn't, so aware of how in those moments when man's bones and flesh are laid upon fate's altar to be torn, there is a moment when that will of bone and flesh to remain alive is almost enough to sustain it. I approached each day with that will, only to find that it took just one act of fate, that neither marked my flesh or my form, to make me as fearful as a child, suddenly left alone.

With my family and friend's help, with their shared stories, memories and laughter, my heart healed. There isn't a day I don't miss my brother, but I feel him close. There are days I still pick up Barkley's collar and tear up but there are as many days as I laugh as I relate a story I never put to paper about Barkley, sharing with the friends that knew and loved him.

For life does indeed go on.  As I went for a walk earlier at one of the city parks, I watched Abby Lab jaunt joyfully ahead on the leash with my husband. When she was dumped at a high kill shelter, very sick, she likely had no happy thoughts of the future, only fear.  When she was well again and her foster mom from the Lab rescue organization brought her over to meet me I wondered if it was too soon, that perhaps I should have waited to get another dog.  The foster mom said before she drove over that I was under no obligation, there would be other dogs and she would have a good home with someone soon. But then that gentle dog moved towards me, drifting across the parking lot like shadow, to a stranger.  She then leaned lightly against my leg so my hand could caress her head, looking at something only dogs can see off in the distance, vibrating like a released string.  I knew then she was at home. Her trust in me indicated that like dogs will often do, she joyfully mistook the world as a place with a doubtless future. Here she would stay, my not wishing to shatter that illusion.

She's been with us three and a half years now, and she acts as if her former home, the shelter, that great drive for emergency vet care, was all the memory of someone else.  When she bounds up the step from the yard, she pauses at the back door, as if sensing she had gone to sleep in one place and awoken to another. What is painful to her is only a dream.  When I come home at night, she is laying by the back door, rising only on the sound of my voice, as if she had laid guardian to all I held dear in my absence, only relinquishing it, these walls, and windows, and memories of dogs gone before, only when I was safely  home.

I will open the door and she will be there dancing around as if I'd been gone for years, and we'll enter the house together, those three years crowded into one moment, one room, one instant of time so full there is no room for tears, but only breath.

Today, I knew that even if cancer had not come into our lives, Barkley would still be gone. There are some journeys that are inevitable for us all.  Yet as I looked outside, I realized that whatever has happened to me, the world outside was just how we both would remember it. There was motion, there were laughter and tears, there would be new memories and love that ebbed and flowed like the waves upon the lake. As I looked out on the water's surface, the gentle waves swept away vast and drowsy, like a vision of life with a shadowed surface and somber depths. I gave it a defiant smile and ran after the dog, toward a future that sparkled off in the distance like diamonds.

Got to love competition and a free market

So Dick's has (once again?) stopped selling AR-15s (when did they start again).  Wally World won't sell guns or ammo to anyone under 21.  Enter the free market.

Head to a store near you and sign up for your NRA Membership to receive a $25 Cabela's Gift Card! Find a Store: | https://t.co/TchKMnKlvu pic.twitter.com/DUGmD8JjIZ

— Cabela's (@Cabelas) February 9, 2018

Make your own buying decisions.

Heh

Can't argue with this logic.

pic.twitter.com/fRlV1MQq8T

— Sal the Agorist (@SallyMayweather) February 28, 2018

Prediction: no new gun control laws

There is quite a lot of nervousness in our little corner of the 'net, all around Donald Trump's comments about gun control laws and what he'd like to see.

With all due respect to co-blogger and brother-from-another-mother ASM826, it's not going to happen.  Here's why:

1.  Trump understands "Flyover Country" better than any politician today.  That's why he found issues that resonated so strongly with them that (ahem) trumped up scandal after trumped up scandal had absolutely no impact on their support for him.  He knows what gun control means to them, and how they would view him if he supported Chuck Schumer against them.

2.  The school shooting has been on the TV 24x7 for two weeks, as the MSM tries once more to intimidate Republicans into giving Democrats something for free.  There is nobody less susceptible to media pressure than Trump is.

3.  Trump knows how to troll his opponents better than any politician today.  Remember his meeting with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi about DACA and immigration?  How he would "sign anything they sent him"?  Boy, that sure played out great for Democrats, didn't it?

4.  Trump wants the GOP to win the elections this fall, or at least not to lose too badly.  That's goal #1 which sets the stage for a Congress that will implement his agenda which will get him re-elected in 2020.  That's goal #2.  Trolling the Democrats to get them to propose all sorts of heinous gun control laws (that go nowhere) will leave voters with little doubt what the Democrats would do if they win the election this November.

So all that's happening is that he's Trolling the media and the Democrats (redundancy alert!).

Hey, maybe I'm wrong.  I thought I was wrong once, but I was mistaken.