Assange is being charged with espionage for publishing information that the government deems sensitive. The government responds by insisting Assange is “not a journalist.” I disagree. The government does not get to decide who is and who is not a journalist. For the government to have such power would render the First Amendment meaningless. Imagine a President who can simply declare that some news organization or another is not the press that is entitled to First Amendment protections, and simply shuts them down.
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Teacher arrested for gun in class
A Pinellas county teacher was arrested for having a gun inside of her backpack, which was in her classroom. She had recently been told that her contract for teaching with the county would not be renewed for the coming school year.
When she was asked why she had the weapon, she replied, “Ask your Governor.” The woman has a concealed weapons permit, so she was charged with carrying a firearm in an unauthorized location, a misdemeanor. Read the comments. The readership of the anti gun Tampa Bay Times is all over this, saying that this is why the law arming teachers should never have been passed. So a woman who was breaking the law by illegally carrying a weapon somehow means that the teachers who want to do so lawfully are to blame?
It seems that, like all anti gun media, the entire story is not being told. As far as I know, this is not being reported anywhere else.
1 She is registered to vote with no party affiliation.
2 She is the membership director of a left wing, racist socialist group called the “Black is back coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations,” whose motto states: There is no peace: Africa and Africans are at war! U.S. to the world Comply or Die!” Here is a screenshot from their Facebook page:
3. This group (Soto is on the steering committee) has a list of demands that includes:
We declare our human right to armed self-defense from the violent attacks by white citizens and the assaults and murders by the domestic military occupation forces that include various police organizations. We fully recognize that in a struggle for self-determination any act of resistance by the oppressed is an act of self-defense. (emphasis added)
This, in my opinion, is a domestic terrorist organization, and this arrest may very well have prevented a terror attack on that school.
4. The group recently had a meeting where they had this to say:
Our Coalition has concluded that elections are not the only method of struggle and we have responded to the 1963 declaration by Malcolm X of “the ballot or the bullet,” with the timely refrain that it will be the ballot and the bullet.
5. Soto has been the owner of a Florida corporation since 2012. That corporation is listed as a non profit and is doing business as USB HOOD APPRENTICESHIP ACADEMY FOR GIRLS and is apparently doing business out of Soto’s house, which is located a block from the school.
There is a lot of suspicious activity here.
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Sexcapades
Kim has posted on his blog about a scandal involving Navy sailors’ ranking female sailors on their sexual desirability. During my six years in the US yacht club, there were quite a few incidents along these lines. We referred to women as “split tails” and nothing would ruin a career faster than having a woman report you for harassment.
There was a scandal in 1988, I think it was on the USS Yellowstone, where more than 30 female crewmembers were engaged in lesbian relationships with other members of the crew.
We had a reserve unit onboard my ship once, and that unit had females aboard. We avoided them as much as possible, because they were nothing but courts marshal bait. For example, we had to post a sentry outside of the berthing space that had been assigned to them, whose job was to prevent any males from entering the space unless they were on official business. One of these sailors was standing his watch when a buddy walked by and asked him what he was doing standing in the passageway. The sailor replied, “I am on the pussy watch.” A female overheard him through the door, and reported him.
When he went to his Article 15, the Captain asked him why he said that. The sailor replied: “When I am guarding the brow, I am the brow watch. When I am watching the ship’s generator, I am the ship’s generator watch. I was guarding the pussy, so I was on pussy watch.” The man’s naval career was ruined when the Captain threw the book at him.
On 1988, there was the famous “Tailhook” scandal where a bunch of pilots were accused of debauchery that some women found offensive. I spoke with a couple of people who were there. The women who were there were not blameless. In one case, several women were competing in a “bikini line shaving contest” where the judges would run their tongues down the bikini lines of the competitors to see who had the smoothest, closest shave.
This is what happens when you pile thousands of healthy young adults in close proximity to each other. It isn’t unique to the military.
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Walking away
This past weekend, my wife and I were in Orlando for a bit of a staycation. We were staying at a hotel in the tourist district. We were about to cross a busy street and pushed the button for the crosswalk. The button causes lights embedded in the street and on roadside signs to begin flashing. There is a sign right there that says that all cars must stop while lights are flashing. The cars that were approaching stopped, but as we got halfway across the street, a car started to jet by and almost hit us, except that he jammed on the brakes at the last second. My wife pointed at the sign.
The man leaned out of his window and yelled “I stopped to be nice. You don’t have to give me attitude.”
I replied, “No, you HAVE to stop, it’s the law.”
Driver: “Fucking asshole tourist. Come over here and I will kick your ass, you fat fuck. You and your fat assed fucking wife.”
There are those who claim that every traffic disagreement will result in a shooting. They claim that “Stand your ground” is a license to kill. I proved them wrong. I replied, “I am not going over there, and I am not going to fight you.” The guy may have been armed, but I definitely was. My pride at being called names is not worth someone getting shot. The wife and I both walked away.
Nearly all concealed weapons permit holders feel the same way.
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Mass shooting
Here is another one of those mass shootings that anti gunners claim only happen in the US.
This time, the shooting was in Brazil and left 11 dead. The gun laws are very strict. You need a license to own a gun. That license expires every three years and you must be 25 to get one. Handguns are illegal. Most firearms in Brazil are illegally owned.
Brazil has a homicide rate that is 6 times higher than the USA. When guns are outlawed, only outlaws have guns. This is why gun laws don’t work.
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A Florida Secret
When a nuisance gator is caught, they always say that it was relocated. The truth is that they are killed. The trappers are not actually employees of the state. They are contracted to serve a certain area, and their pay is that they can legally sell the meat and hide any nuisance gator they catch. If the relocate the animal, then they have just given away their fee.
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Teacher pay
Another popular legend is that the average teacher makes $48K a year in Florida. It amazes me that there are so many gun owners who claim that the press lies, but then take this pile of garbage as gospel. Let me show you why this is wrong:
Here is Lake county’s teacher payscale. Note that a teacher needs 18 years on the job in order to get to $48k. I doubt that the average teacher has been teaching for 18 years. The same story is in Polk county, where a teacher needs 15 years on the job to hit $48K.
I initially thought that this $48K number was caused by the counties down south making more. However, looking at the page, they claim that the average pay for Lake and Polk counties are $44,600 and $45,200, respectively. Classroom teachers don’t come close to that.
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Teacher workdays
One of the things that I hear all of the time about being a teacher, is how nice it must be to get summers off. Then the conversation usually drifts into how teacher pay is so great, because we get paid a full year’s pay, and how summer is basically a paid vacation. Let’s take a look at that:
Teachers are contracted to work 196 days per year. In addition, we are also required to be at school for events outside of the 196 days of the contract. Events like graduation, open house, and even to staff the different extracurricular events like sports, grad bash, prom, and school dances.
During those summer breaks, teachers are required to do things. One of them is training to comply with Federal and state law. For example, I have to attend 120 hours of training on educating students who do not speak English as a primary language. Last year, it was 60 hours on special needs students, and another 24 hours on school security. On top of that, many schools have training requirements of their own. My wife (who works at a different school) has a reading list of books that each teacher must read during the summer. For example, last year’s book was “Find a way.”
It can be difficult to add up the hours, because teachers are salary, and each school and teacher has different requirements. Here in Florida, every teacher has a contract of what they must do, and this contract lays out the minimum. My wife and I are high school teachers, so I am going to use that as an example.
To begin, each teacher is contracted to work an 8 hour day for 196 days a year. That covers the 6 classes per day that we are with students, plus the planning period. That comes to 1568 hours.
We are also required to provide course materials like power points, worksheets, and tests. You either create them or pay for them out of your own pocket. I also have to grade student papers. I have 140 students a year, so any time there is an assignment, those papers take time to grade. My school requires that I have my students complete a minimum of 3 graded assignments a week. Some classes are harder to grade papers than others. Essays and complicated physics problems take longer to grade than a multiple choice quiz, for example. A new teacher spends about 4 hours each of the 180 workdays where we have students on this. More experienced teachers can do it in about 2 hours. There goes another 360 hours or so.
In addition, we are required to attend 5 events each year. Those events include prom, sporting events, etc. On top of that, you have to attend the awards banquet for your students. There are two of them (9th & 10th grade, and another for 11th & 12th). There is also graduation, baccalaureate, and others. In all, these events add up to another 40 hours or so.
Last year, every teacher in the state had to attend a 120 hour class on sensitivity to illegal alien students. That was in addition to our regular in service training. Same goes for the 60 hour special needs training we did this year, and the Guardian training that will be required, if they ever establish that. If you want summers off, then you have to find a way to take those classes at night or on weekends during the school year. These trainings usually come to another 100 hours or so,on average.
Total it up: 1568 + 360+ 40+ 100. That is about 2068 hours. That pretty much equals the 2080 hours that you work in a 40 hour a week job.
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Too much
I donate to pro gun causes. The NRA, Second Amendment Foundation, and I even used to give money to Florida Carry. About two months ago, I gave a modest donation to the Firearms Policy Foundation, I can’t even remember how much and I am too lazy to go look it up. I know it was between $100 and $250.
Ever since, I have been getting an email EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. asking for more money. I am about three emails away from putting them in the SPAM filter.
This is the kind of behavior that makes me believe that progun organizations are in favor of gun control because it increases profitability.