March 22, 2016 -- A Quick Run Around the Web

"Home Defense AR-15 (How to Setup Yours!)"--CaptainBerz (16 min.)

A good, no-nonsense video on the subject. Basically, though, it should be a quality rifle (dependable), and mount a flashlight. An optic is nice, but not necessary. However, if you have an optic, it needs to be one of those that can be left constantly on without running down the battery, such as an Aimpoint (switch the battery once per year); or, if a scope, have a permanently etched reticle.

Firearms/Self-Defense/Prepping:

• "The 'Big One' will be deadlier than thought: A massive earthquake could plunge large parts of California into the sea INSTANTLY"--Daily Mail. The gist of the article is that after studying the Newport-Inglewood fault (which from the Westside of Los Angeles to the Orange County coast), researchers have concluded that an earthquake involving the fault could cause the land west of the fault (i.e., toward the ocean) to drop between 1.5 and 3 feet--enough to cause large portions to be inundated by the ocean. This is not an unprecedented finding: there are many historical accounts of cities or portions of coastlines sinking below sea level as a consequence of an earthquake, including the 1692 earthquake that destroyed most of Port Royal, Jamaica. 
• Ol' Remus released a new Woodpile Report yesterday with some advice for preppers and shooters, including this bit: 

Your battle rifle deserves the simplicity treatment. It can be optimized for only one thing and that thing should be gunfights at medium range. Fit it with a low power, wide field scope that can survive the jackhammer test, backed up by iron sights you've zeroed-in and practiced using. Put together a rifle for precision work at long range if you must, don't compromise your battle rifle, it should be simple, absolutely reliable, and never need batteries.

• "Reloading 101: Introduction to Hand Dies"--Rifle Shooter. The author observes: "Years  ago they were thought of as an entry level reloading tool (you’d actually hit them with a hammer).  Over time hand dies have grown in sophistication and now represent the pinnacle of reloading technology.  They work so well that they are often encountered in use by bench rest shooters." I have, somewhere, an old set produced by Lee that used a mallet to provide the necessary work. The model that the author is reviewing, however, uses dies with micrometer adjustments for seating, and the work comes from a small arbor press. 
• But I like slapping the side of my AR: "New Strike Industries Extended AR-15 Bolt Catch"--The Firearms Blog. This one should make it easier to operate the bolt catch to manually lock open the bolt.
• "Gun safety best ever, accidental deaths at new low, 0.3% of all in 2015"--Washington Examiner. "In its annual 'Injury Facts' report, the [National Safety Council] put accidental gun deaths in 2015 at 489." According to the group, "That's about three-tenths of 1 percent of the 146,571 total accidental deaths from all other listed causes." This is after 8 years of record breaking gun sales.
• "223 Remington/ 5.56mm NATO barrel length and velocity: 26 inches to 6 inches"--Rifle Shooter. The difference in velocities between 24 and 26 inches is negligible, which suggests that 24 inches is probably the longest a barrel need be. The loss between 24 and 20 inches was larger than the loss from 20 inches to 16.5 inches. The velocity loss between 20 and 18 inches was generally minimal--less than 100 fps in most cases, and much closer with certain of the ammunition tested.

Other Stuff:

• Argentina is building a wall between it and Paraguay. "Separation Anxiety: A wall goes up in Argentina and then anti-immigrant rhetoric spreads. Will it change the course of a region bent on tearing borders down?"--Buzz Feed.
• "They're building a wall"--Vox Popoli. A source has told Vox Day that as part of the solicitations for a border walls, bidders will construct a 100 yard long section of wall as a "test wall" to be evaluated. These test sections will apparently be built along segments of the border.
• Just two of Obama's Dreamers: "Two immigrant high school students who 'raped a fourteen-year-old girl in a bathroom' arrived in America just months ago from El Salvador and Guatemala"--Daily Mail. Note that the perpetrators, aged 18 and 17, where enrolled as freshmen (i.e., 9th graders) and put into classes with other 9th graders.

• Related: "Graphic details emerge of violent sexual assault of girl, 14, 'who was raped and sodomized in a school bathroom by an illegal immigrant and his friend'"--Daily Mail.

• Related: "Rape focuses critical attention on 'sanctuary' states"--Fox News.

• "Few Teenagers Radicalized Into ISIS Are Truly Loners"--War Is Boring. From the article:

       The Islamic State, or ISIS, has found growing success recruiting teenagers and pre-teens in the West to plot and carry out attacks, according to CTC Sentinel, the Combat Terrorism Center at West Point’s monthly newsletter.

       More curious, very few of these plots are planned by “lone wolves,” or self-radicalized terrorists who do not have any contact with a larger network or group. In fact, more often than not, the teenagers are not “self-radicalizing” but are being lured directly by members of the terrorist organization.

They want to be heroic; and, per their religion and culture, being heroic means being a terrorist.

• Another BLM myth destroyed: "Black Egyptians"--West Hunter.  From the article: 

They [Johannes Krause et al] say “ancient Egyptians shared more Near Eastern ancestry than present-day Egyptians, who received additional Sub-Saharan admixture in more recent times.” Today Egyptians, most of them, have around 20% sub-Saharan ancestry. Apparently it used to be less than that – how much exactly we’ll see when the article comes out, probably. Copts might give you a rough idea of what Egyptians used to be like – whatever the SSA fraction is in modern Copts [probably lower than in typical Egyptians], it was probably lower still 2500 years ago. In particular I would expect that the West African component just wasn’t there yet, although some of the East African component probably was.

• "Gut bacteria play a role in long-term weight gain"--The Conversation via Yahoo News. According to the article, "[o]ur latest research, published in the International Journal of Obesity, shows that people who have a stable weight over nine years or lose weight, have a larger number of different types of microbes in their guts, eat more fibre and have a higher abundance of certain types of gut microbes." It also notes that people on a "yo-yo diet," had higher weights than people fed the same calories under a steady diet, but the "yo-yo" diet resulted in less diversity among the gut bacteria.
• Let me count the ways: "Seven Ways China Conquers The Philippines"--21st Century Asian Arms Race. 
• "FBI Investigates Online Right For Russia Ties"--Anonymous Conservative. Just an excuse to surveil conservative bloggers. AC observes:

       Our government has forked. There is the openly acknowledged government of the Constitution, with all of its rules, regulations and laws, and then there is the shadow government which rolls under the radar, and does what it wants. Periodically the forks end up on the same lines when leftists control the open government as well as the shadow side, but the shadow government is run by the rabbits constantly – at least until Trump manages to repopulate it with his people.

       This excuse is the machine covering its ass for eight years of aggressively targeting the online right. Either the government thinks we are all Russian deep cover spies, targeting America for destruction on behalf of our comrades in Moscow, or they are full of shit and scrambling to explain something that is about to come out. It is interesting, because I never thought anything about our targeting would ever become public, but it seems as if the machine is now laying the groundwork to explain what exactly the reasons were for its interest in the online right.