A Quick Run Around the Web -- March 13, 2016

Pianist and keyboardist Keith Emerson died the other day. Above is an excerpt from his "Piano Concerto No. 1" from Emerson, Lake & Palmer's Works Vol. I album.

• First up, of course, is Active Response Training's Weekend Knowledge Dump for this weekend. While you are there, also read Greg Ellifritz's article: "The Lisa Mearkle Police Shooting- 7 Lessons to Learn." Lisa Mearkle was a police officer that shot and killed a middle-aged drunk man that, while on the ground, nevertheless was not responding to all her commands. He was unarmed. She shot him twice in the back. She was charged with murder, but acquitted by a jury. She resigned from the police force, receiving a $120,000 severance payment. Mr. Ellifritz has provided his own thoughts about what led Mearkle to panic and use lethal force, which I encourage you to read. However, the take away is this: "As I have said many times before, you can’t depend on a competent police force.  You are truly on your own in a violent encounter."
• "IV8888’s Piston AR Meltdown"--The Firearms Blog. "The LMT [Lewis Machine Tool] upper receiver’s mechanism failed at a count of 833 rounds, suffering a bent operating rod and a heavily peened bolt carrier." The test was conducted shooting the weapon in full automatic mode. The author opines: 

The only theory I can grasp is that the heat from the barrel was close enough to the piston to damage its rigidity, causing it to warp, which subsequently deformed the bolt carrier extension. This seems like it could be a quirk of the gas operating rod AR-15’s “retrofitted” nature; the carrier extension is small, so a strike from the piston hitting anywhere other than its direct center could weaken and peen it. Likewise, due to the small space in the AR-15’s upper receiver – originally designed for a compact gas tube – once this deformation occurs, the firearm ceases to function properly.

• "All-Around Rifle Cartridges" and "Medium Bore All-Around Rifle Cartridges"--Chuck Hawks. 
• "Handgun Self-Defense Ammunition Ballistics Test"--Lucky Gunner. Covers .380, 9 mm, .40 S&W, and .45 ACP.
• "Thoughts on Camouflage Clothing"--Max Velocity. "You can have just as good a result with ‘earth tone’ clothing, some dirt and good fieldcraft, in reality."
• "How to Improve You Shooting Without Really Trying: Guns for Beginners"--The Truth About Guns. The author offers three tips for improving your acuracy: (1) load and shoot only a single round at a time (i.e., magazine dumps don't teach you how to shoot more accurately), (2) ask an expert for ONE tip, (3) move the target closer (when I've been assisting a new shooter, I, too, recommend moving the target closer because I believe success is important to the new shooter).
• The Anonymous Conservative has had several articles recently addressing how hacking and spying techniques that at one time would have been limited to only the richest countries, are increasingly available to lesser governments, organizations, or simply wealthy individuals. His articles:

• "CEO Drives Car Straight Into Embankment."

• "The Internet Of Things Is Dangerous."

• "Push Button Wet Work – The Internet Of Things Will Kill You."

And, although not pertaining to targeted assassinations, these are related:

• "Donald Could Lose – Voting Machines Can Be Reprogrammed."

• "Pirates Use Hacking To Target Shipping Containers."

He warns, in the first article cited above, that:

The real problem with the government taking so much control over everything is that they will not be the only people who will wield it. I could envision a future where the government’s tech-specialist wet-work guys quietly enter the private sector, hiring out to produce deaths like this for any hedge fund guy afraid of seeing his return diminished by an inconvenient investigation, or any rich executive who wants his CEO dead so nobody will follow the path of investigatory breadcrumbs that leads back to him. With this guy dead, who knows who will now escape investigation.

• Related: "Sidestepping Apple dispute, Obama makes case for access to device data"--Reuters. "U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday made a passionate case for mobile devices to be built in such a way as to allow government to gain access to personal data if needed to prevent a terrorist attack or enforce tax laws."

• "How Bernie Sanders Supporters Shut Down Donald Trump's Rally in Chicago"--NBC News.

Protesters interrupt virtually every Trump speech. But what made Chicago different were its scale and the organization behind the effort. Hundreds of young people, mostly minorities, poured in from across the city, taking over whole sections of the arena and bracing for trouble.

And as the repeated chants of "Ber-nie" demonstrated, it was largely organized by supporters of Sanders, the Democratic presidential candidate who has struggled to win over black voters but whose revolutionary streak has excited radicals of all racial demographics.

• Related: "‘We shut Trump down!’ Admitted terrorist [Bill Ayers] cheers on anti-Trump protesters in Chicago"--Twitchy.

• Related: "Billionaires Battle for America's Soul"--Roger L. Simon at PJ Media.

They are Peter B. Lewis of Progressive Corp., Linda Pritzker of Hyatt Hotels, and, of course, George Soros of practically everything.  These three billionaires are the principal backers of MoveOn.org, an organization whose devotion to our constitutional republic, specifically its first amendment, is somewhere between suspect and non-existent.  It is MoveOn that has instigated many of the demonstrations against Trump and may be inspiring "lone wolves," one of whom may sooner or later do what "lone wolves" are prone to do.

These supporting billionaires are fueled by a moral narcissism that knows no bounds, so convinced are they that they are "right" on practically everything.  They have enabled the (most often) young people at MoveOn who undoubtedly believe that they too are "right" and have the "right" to suppress the speech of those with whom they disagree.   They behave as if they think it their noble duty. This is the not-so-royal road to totalitarianism and is the tragic consequence of the miseducation of our young for which those billionaires are also, in part, culpable.

• Related: "Chicago"--Richard Fernandez at PJ Media.

Still, it is doubtful the Left has actually shut The Donald down.  They've most likely supercharged him. Saul Alinsky taught his disciples that confrontation -- of precisely the kind that just transpired in Chicago -- radicalized people far more efficiently than speeches, and exhorted organizers to seek every opportunity, not to "get along", but to let it all hang out.  By that standard the Trump supporters have been given a master class in radicalization.  Because the rally has merely been postponed or relocated, it's better than even odds that tonight's fireworks will attract as many people for the rematch as it repels.