This gun case was a waste of time

This gun case was a win for the gun owner, but a waste of time. A teacher in Florida was told that he could not have a gun in his car because the school district forbade it through a rule that had been adopted by the school board. Someone had anonymously informed the school on several occasions that he had a gun on campus, the school had searched him and his vehicle several times without finding a gun.

State law generally prevents people from carrying guns on school grounds. But the law has exceptions, including allowing people to have guns in cars if the firearms are secured. However, school districts can approve policies that prevent guns in campus parking lots, as long as that policy is in accordance with state law. The teacher argued that the rule as adopted by the board was not in compliance with the law, and filed a lawsuit. He specifically said that the rule, which stated that:

“No person except law enforcement and security officers may have in his/her possession any weapon, illegal substance, or dangerous substance.”

Was vague and did not specifically prohibit firearms.

The trial court agreed that the rule was not in compliance with the law, but also ruled that the teacher was not entitled to damages or relief because he had not suffered any damages, since he hadn’t been fired, suspended, or otherwise disciplined.

The state’s Fifth District Court of Appeals ruled that the “courts generally have not required individuals to subject themselves to penalties to establish an adverse effect” in order to be able to challenge a law. The court went on to say that “[the teacher] was an employee of the high school and subject to the challenged policy. Furthermore, [the teacher] actively sought to keep a firearm in his vehicle. However, [the teacher] refrained from doing so because his employer informed him that the policy was enforced and a violation of the policy would subject him to discipline, up to and including termination. Under these facts, [that teacher] was affected by [the rule against firearms in a vehicle], and adversely so.

So now the school board has been told that the rule in place that prohibits, expect them to rewrite it to specifically include firearms. I don’t really understand what this win accomplished. It seems like it was a complete waste of everyone’s time and resources. It’s almost like the lawsuit was filed by an SJW who wanted to make sure the rule against guns was improved.

China

The claim was made in comments that China can’t engage in carrier flight ops. Here is a video from Chinese sources to refute that:

Yes, I understand that this video is from a Chinese source. Where else is a video taken from the deck of a Chinese warship going to come from? Still, here is a video, taken from the deck of a fishing boat which shows a Chinese carrier recovering aircraft. Here is footage taken from a US destroyer that also corroborates both videos.

So there is no doubt that the PLAN can successfully carry out carrier flight ops. Next year, the latest carrier, which has catapults, will take to sea. The US has satellite images of the ship under construction.

I point out that every single conflict that the US military has engaged in since 1955 has not been against peers. It has been a large military beating up on irregulars and militias. The last time that the US faced a peer in warfare was WW2, and we only won that war because we were capable of producing insane amounts of military hardware, a feat which we cannot repeat because we no longer have that capability. We don’t have the manufacturing capability, nor will the American people stand for a long war with large amounts of casualties. A war with China hasn’t even begun yet, and the US is already “rethinking its East Asian commitments to reduce the odds of going to war with China

If there were a battle like Operation Iceberg on Okinawa that saw over 12,500 killed in action and 50,000 wounded, the US public would scream for an end to the war. Don’t think for a second that once polls show that a war is unpopular that the politicians don’t run scared.

The comment also referenced (as proof that the US military is filled with Rambo badasses) the Battle of Kasham, where he claimed “To get a true example of American fighting prowess, we need only look at Syria. In 2018 hundreds of Russian mercenaries—many of them Spetsnaz trained—took on forty US soldiers in a four-hour firefight. The Russians lost almost every man; the Americans lost none. “

That isn’t how it went down. The battle was 500 Syrian militia men supported by some obsolete Syrian armor and a short artillery barrage of “20-50 shells” engaged 100 Americans of the 75th Ranger Regiment. Yes, the US forces won, but they were supported by nearly 100 aircraft who carried out 4 hours of airstrikes over a battlefield where they had complete air superiority. That won’t happen in a war with China.

I used to say that the biggest reason why China won’t invade Taiwan is that it didn’t have the amphibious capabilities it needs to do that. That is not the case any longer.

Here is my prediction: China will invade Taiwan at some point in the near future. When it happens, the US will not do anything but ineffectively protest to the UN and to the Chinese government. This nation, and especially this president, will NOT go to war in order to save Taiwan or any other Polynesian country.

The Chinese won’t mess with Russia or India, because the war plans for both of those nations include the use of nuclear weapons in the event of a Chinese invasion. The haven’t messed with the US, because the PLAN hasn’t been able to project power effectively. That is changing. The US is weakening, while China is getting stronger.

PLAN still getting stronger

China just commissioned three ships on the same day: A Ballistic missile submarine, a cruiser, and an amphibious ship/baby carrier.

The baby carrier displaces around 35 to 40 thousand tons, which puts it on par with the Wasp class LHD. The US Navy has nine of these ships, with 5 of them in the Pacific theater.

The cruiser is equivalent to the Aegis cruiser, with phased array radars and 128 VLS missiles.

This newest submarine boosts Chinese to 6 ballistic missile subs. Now these subs are noisier than either their Russian or American counterparts, but they don’t have to be as quiet, because they are staying close to the Chinese coast, where they can be defended by shore based assets.

The current Chinese sub launched missile, the J-2, has a 4500 mile range. This means that only Alaska is within range of these missiles, but that will change in 2025, when the new J-3 missile goes into fleet service with their newest submarines, set to enter the fleet in 2023. The worrisome part here is that the Chinese will more than triple the number of nuclear warheads in their arsenal from 300 to over 1,000 within the next 8 years. Some reports estimate that the number of warheads may be significantly higher- as many as 3,000 warheads.

The Chinese are engaged in a MASSIVE military buildup at a time when the US Navy is weak. Granted, Chinese spending is less than a third of US spending, but the US spending is disproportionately spent on pay and boondoggles like sex changes and promoting more women, while the Chinese are using the money to build more platforms and weapons systems.

The Chinese are increasing military readiness across the board, while the US is decreasing readiness. Within the next decade, the US Navy will be outnumbered and outclassed by PLAN.

Disagreeing with Dave Ramsey

Dave Ramsey famously forces all of his employees to sign a morality clause as a part of their employment agreement. One unmarried woman who works for him applied for maternity leave. Since her pregnancy is proof that she engaged in sex before marriage, he fired her. She is suing.

I hope she wins.

Not because I am in favor of extramarital sex, nor am I opposed to Christians. The reason is that I do not feel like an employer should have the ability to fire you for what you do while you are ‘off the clock’ unless it has a direct effect on the business. That goes for all businesses. That means the cop who donates to the Rittenhouse defense fund is safe to speak his mind while not at work. That means a person can go to a Trump rally without being fired. As long as it is on the employee’s own time, the boss should have no say in that employee’s business.

Unless it has a DIRECT tie to the business.

For example, an employee of McDonald’s who stands outside of a store in a company uniform and complains about the food being unhealthy. The employer can discipline him, because it is directly in opposition to the business.

I have spent most of my life working for employers who claim that their employees must he held to a higher standard, whatever that means. What it means in practice is that the employees can be fired for things that are none of the employer’s business. Imagine a workplace firing you for being an NRA member, or for being a Republican and you understand why I am opposed to this.

An employee who has sex outside of work with another employee, especially if there is a subordinate relationship can be fired, but other than that, it should not be any of the employer’s business.

Not THAT SCOTUS case, the other one

I want to talk about a Supreme Court case. Not the one every other Conservative is talking about, but the other one. The one where the Democrats are fighting to expose the names of political donors.

There will be plenty of time to talk about the gun case, but this case already had oral arguments on Monday, and the ruling will come out in June. If the court decides to rule in favor of California, names of political donors can be released by Democrat politicians. We all know why

Dogs Lives Matter (DLM)

A trainer in New Zealand was arrested because a greyhound he had trained for a race was found to have high levels of methamphetamine in its blood. Officials claim that they tested the dog because they were concerned about track safety and cited “far too many incidents” recently where dogs had died or been injured.

The trainer in the case has denied that the drugs caused the dogs’ deaths. He claimed that dogs had done methamphetamine plenty of times without dying, and that the death of the dogs during races were probably caused by pressure placed on the back of the dog’s neck by the racing collars. They lined up several witnesses to show that a ‘blood choke’ caused by neck pressure was the likely cause. He called them out for race-ism and threatened to burn down all of New Zealand if they didn’t rule his way.

It is doubtful that this tactic will be successful, since there aren’t enough dog trainers in New Zealand to make a threat realistic enough to scare a jury into voting his way.

In case you missed it, this entire post is satire.

Aw, Craps

If you have read this blog for any time at all, you know that one of my vices is that I like to gamble. It all began when I had to take statistics in college, where my professor used casino games to teach us statistics. For that reason, I learned several casino games, and the one that really stuck was Craps.

It is a straightforward game of math, and once the rules are understood, fairly easy to play. The math can be done in your head pretty quickly. I get tired of always talking about the decay of our society, so I thought that I could do a few posts that were more fun (for me) to write to break things up a bit.

The rules for Craps are easy, but since it is a fast moving game and there are lots of bets that can be made, people who watch the game get easily confused and are often scared away from the game. Let me tell you though, that a busy table with a hot shooter is pretty exciting and makes for a fun game.

The rules are simple: The shooter picks up two sixed sided dice and rolls them to the other end of the table. (Most casinos have the rule that the dice must hit the wall at the opposite side of the table.) The first time the shooter rolls is called the “come out roll.” If the dice show a 7 or 11, the shooter wins. If the dice show a 2, 3, or 12, the shooter loses. Any other number becomes the “point” and the shooter continues to roll until they either roll a 7 (which causes the shooter to lose) or again rolls the point (for which the shooter wins). As long as the shooter continues to win, they continue to roll the dice. If the shooter loses on the come out roll, they can try again, but if they lose by rolling a 7 after the point is set, the dealer passes the dice to the player on the losing shooter’s left, and that person becomes the new shooter. That’s it for the rules of the game.

Everything else that happens on the table is betting that the shooter will win or lose, or is a bet on what numbers will appear on upcoming rolls of the dice.

Upcoming posts will deal with the math of the game and what the odds are for different outcomes.

Let me close out this post by pointing out something which many people will try to lie about: The only winner in casino gambling is the owner of the casino. The math is set up so that the longer you play, the more likely you are to lose. It’s math- there is no way around it.

Even games like blackjack, where people try to convince you that they “count cards” and have a system to always win, are set up so the casino comes out ahead. If it weren’t, everyone who plays in the casino would soon adopt this system and the casino would go out of business. I don’t play to make money, I play because it entertains me. I also know that over the long term, I lose money in the casino. I just try to maximize gains and minimize losses. Here are my rules for gambling:

  • 1 I know that I will lose money over the long term. It is mathematically certain. So budget your gambling and stick to it.
  • 2 I gamble because it is fun and entertaining. If I ever find myself gambling while desperate to win because I need the money, it is time to quit.
  • 3 Don’t ever gamble with money you can’t afford to lose. If you are gambling your rent or grocery money, that isn’t entertainment, it’s desperation.

My wife initially didn’t like it, but then she came to realize that I Am responsible with it. Although the first time she came to the table and saw that I was making individual bets of over $100 and had more than $1200 on the table, she was a little nervous. At the time, she didn’t realize that it wasn’t my money I was gambling with. More on that in a future post.

Training materials

BCE has a post about training manuals. Please remember that the link at the top of this page, labelled “Training Manuals” has a lot of pdfs, including copies of The Soldier’s Manual. Now, some of them are worthy of buying in hardcopy, and I would use his link to do so (might as well have him get some coin out of the deal). But there are plenty of training manuals and technical manuals on that page, and I will add more to them as I get time.