March 24, 2017 -- A Quick Run Around the Web

"VIDEO: Florida mom pulls shotgun on burglar"--WorldNEWS (41 sec.)

More information here.

Firearms/Self-Defense/Survival:

• TGIF: This week's Weekend Knowledge Dump from Active Response Training.
• "Analysis- Scout Sniper Basic Course Failure Rate Part One" and "Part Two"--The Firearms Blog. The Marines are having trouble graduating enough Scout/Snipers: only around 40% graduate the basic course. The idea currently being floated is to split the basic course in half; the candidate would take the first half, deploy with a sniper platoon essentially to get some "on the job training," then return to finish the course. The author then goes on to describe why he doesn't think this is a good idea.
• "Bullet Construction, Shot Placement, and Killing Ability"--Peterson's Hunting. Different bullets (within the same caliber) for different purposes. Essentially a discussion of designing bullets to provide good expansion and the trade off with penetration, and some methods devised to try to provide both. Obviously, with light skinned game such as deer, fairly rapid expansion is good; with larger game, you need better penetration.
• "The incredible survival story of woman who ran out of gas near the Grand Canyon and used her wits to stay alive while she was stranded for FIVE DAYS"--Daily Mail. She had a breakdown in a remote area, with no cell-phone service. She did most of what you are supposed to do in that situation (except, perhaps, letting someone known where she was going and when she was expected back): stayed with the vehicle, built a large sign for "HELP" using rocks. However, she also realized after a few days that no one was looking for her, so she hiked back to where she was able to get a partial signal with her cell phone and call for help.
• "Inside a prepper's 'end-of-the-world closet' that holds $10,000 worth of doomsday supplies"--Business Insider. Medications and first aid supplies, food, water, stoves, body armor, gas masks, and some weapons (mostly blades since he lives in New York). All of this in an apartment.

• Related: "Inside the New York City prepper community that's amassing supplies to prepare for the apocalypse"--Business Insider.

• The deadlier weapon: "The shocking moment an Oklahoma cop runs over and KILLS a fleeing gunwoman after she fired at fellow officers"--Daily Mail. Dashcam footage showing the officer driving after the armed woman (after she had already exchanged shots with other officers) and running her down with his patrol car. 
• "The Combat Handgun Grip"--Handguns. Pros and cons of two different methods of gripping a pistol: the thumb-over-thumb grip and the straight thumb method, with some discussion of how hard to grip the pistol.
• For you fishermen: "How To Tie A Dropper Loop"--Wide Open Spaces. 
• "7 Must-Have’s When Cooking Wild Game in the Field"--Peterson's Hunting. A little seasoning or spices can make a huge difference. One point in particular, that should be on the minds of preppers, is the need for some type of cooking oil or grease: 

Unless you like boiled food or feel like roasting everything on a stick, oils or fats are a must. Olive oil will keep in a dark place for a year, so having some handy will make your life in the field a lot easier. Skip the cooking fats, like butter and lard, as they can go rancid quickly.

• "New 'Preppers' Strategize To Defeat Genocide"--WND. The preppers in question are the the Suidlanders, or "Southlanders": white "Afrikaners" and Boers who describe their organization as “the world’s largest non-state civil defense organization.” While compared to preppers in the United States, the group faces a more imminent threat: genocide.

       South Africa appears to be on the brink of collapse, even though the mainstream media has done little to report on the looming doom.

       Infrastructure is crumbling, racial tensions and genocidal sentiments are being whipped up by political leaders, land grabs are accelerating, attacks on free speech are ramping up, university campuses are burning, and the economy is in complete disarray.

       And even before the latest developments, the country was swirling around the drain, according to many experts who have spoken to WND over the years.

       This month, the normally soft-spoken former South African President F.W. de Klerk, who along with Nelson Mandela oversaw South Africa’s transition from apartheid to “Rainbow Nation” democracy, sounded the alarm.

       Specifically, the Nobel Peace Prize recipient who shared his prize with Mandela, blasted South African President Jacob Zuma, the current South African leader, who famously went on national television and sang a genocidal song advocating the slaughter of the European-descended Afrikaners, for his increasingly dangerous actions.

        “President Zuma is determined to accelerate our descent along the road to state capture, economic crisis and racial confrontation,” De Klerk said at a conference marking 27 years since he announced the release of Mandela from prison.

       The current rulers are contributing to the nation “stumbling aimlessly down the road to societal collapse,” said De Klerk on February 2.

Other Stuff:

• "Rex Tillerson: North Korea Threat Is Imminent, Strategic Patience Is Over"--Austin Bay at  the Observer.  After discussing the history of the Korean conflict, including the limited and periodic attacks upon South Korea over the past several decades, the article goes on to describe North Korea's quest to have nuclear weapon tipped ballistic missiles: a goal it is has or will soon attain. Thus, Tillerson has indicated that North Korea presents an imminent threat, and that responses may include South Korea and Japan obtaining nuclear weapons to act as a deterrent. (Not that they would deter a suicidal regime). Bay concludes:

       The Trump administration is clearly pressuring China. I guarantee Beijing gulped when Tillerson suggested that South Korea and Japan might acquire nuclear weapons—and it was supposed to. China has regarded the presence of U.S. forces in Japan as a brake on a revival of Japanese militarism. ...

       Japan doesn’t really want nuclear weapons, and China definitely doesn’t want Japan to acquire nuclear weapons.

       But the Kim dynasty’s pursuit of nuclear weapons and missiles to deliver them continues unabated and the threat they pose is increasing.

       China must bring decisive pressure on North Korea’s regime. By decisive, I mean pressure that terminates North Korea’s nuclear weapons program.

       Perhaps China can produce a diplomatic miracle and convince Kim Jong Un that ending the program is the only way he and his regime will survive. This diplomatic miracle would deserve a Nobel Peace Prize.

       China may have the covert wherewithal to induce the North Korean military to conduct “regime change from within.” I suspect this fear haunts Kim Jong Un. Kim Jong Nam reportedly had numerous friends in China.

       If China cannot bring decisive pressure, or refuses to do so, then the threat of a high-intensity war fought to determine the Kim dynasty’s fate will eventually become imminent. Should this last phase of the Korean War erupt, it won’t be confined to the peninsula. If nuclear weapons strike cities the casualties will be enormous.

• "Dark Matter – The New Wikileaks Dump"--Anonymous Conservative. A discussion of the latest Vault 7 dump having to do with CIA tools to compromise Apple products, including installation of back doors into the iPhone at the factory (I would note, factories that are in China). Apple claims that the CIA tools revealed by the lease are out-of-date, and that there have been security fixes. But sure as Apple has made patches, the CIA has also come up with newer and more sophisticated tools. 
• Western Rifle Shooter's Association linked to this the other day: "UK and European ISPs Now Blocking Jihad Watch — How You Can Combat Online Censorship"--Free Speech Defense. A discussion of the problem and some work arounds that you can try.
• Heh. "DC Science March Organizers Racked By Infighting Over ‘Diversity’"--Daily Caller. A march that was intended to protest possible cuts to science funding was taken over, at the organizing level, by SJWs concerned more about pushing "diversity" in the STEM fields. According to the article, there was a "wing of conference organizers advocating for scientists and activists to take on broader issues in science, including issues of racial diversity in science, women’s equality, and immigration policy." Other organizers were clearly upset by the subversion of social issues on what was supposed to be march to support science funding:

       “If you’re wondering what this has to do with science, you’re certainly not alone,” Alex Berezow, a senior fellow at the American Council on Science and Health, wrote in a post about why he’s not attending the march.

       “The answer, of course, is nothing. These issues are the primary concern of revisionist historians and social justice warriors, not empirically-minded scientists,” Berezow wrote, pointing to public statements by march organizers.

• "A spiral of despair may be sending more working-class whites to an early grave"--The Charlotte Observer. From the article:

       The two Princeton professors say the trend affects whites of both sexes and is happening nearly everywhere in the country. Education level is significant: People with a college degree report better health and happiness than those with only some college, who in turn are doing much better than those who never went.

       Offering what they call a tentative but “plausible” explanation, they write that less-educated white Americans who struggle in the job market in early adulthood are likely to experience a “cumulative disadvantage” over time, with health and personal problems that often lead to drug overdoses, alcohol-related liver disease and suicide.

See also "The Forces Driving Middle-Aged White People's 'Deaths Of Despair'" at NPR and "Mortality and morbidity in the 21st century" at Brookings, where you can download the full paper.

• "More than 200 civilians killed in Mosul after US-led airstrike against an ISIS truck packed with explosives triggers a massive blast"--Daily Mail. From the article:

       Around 230 people - mostly women and children - who were being used as 'human shields' by ISIS were killed when an airstrike by the US-led coalition triggered a huge explosion in Mosul.

       Civil defence agency officials said three buildings in the Jadida neighbourhood of west Mosul collapsed and it is believed the airstrike set off explosives in a lorry being used by ISIS militants.

If the enemy is going to shelter among civilians, then victory will require civilian casualties. It didn't stop us in World War II, and it shouldn't stop us now.

• "The Political Class Murders Itself"--Z Man. Key portion:

       ... It’s now clear what happened. The Obama people started spying on Trump once he had the nomination or perhaps even earlier. They may have started earlier with an eye on helping the Republicans knock him off in the primary, but that’s not clear. They figured that Clinton was a lock so they were not careful about covering their tracks. The Clinton people are as dirty as it gets so they were not going to be ratting on anyone over it. If anything, they would expand on it.

       This is where the Russian hacking story comes into the picture. Once disaster struck and Team Obama realized they had a problem, they needed cover, so they started with the Russian hacking nonsense. They would then claim that it was all an accident and they were just trying to prevent Boris Badenov and Natasha Fatale from attacking our democracy! It’s also why Obama signed a retroactive Executive Order giving cover to the intel agencies for their domestic spying activities. They were creating a cover story.

       The complication is that it appears that at least one person has perjured himself over this and that one person is FBI Director Comey. There’s no way to square his testimony with these new revelations. The best he can do is split hairs and claim he was not part of the spying effort. Of course, there’s no way to touch him as he runs the FBI. In fact, there’s no way to investigate any of the intelligence organizations. This is the point where many of the robot historians of the future will say the American political class murdered itself.

       Unless there is some will to address it, and that’s highly unlikely, we now have a new normal where highly politicized intelligence agencies are used by both sides to discredit one another and discredit any attempts to reform the system. It’s no longer a game of rules. It is a zero sum  game of power and that cycle only ends one way, with someone marching their army on the capital and taking control. As with Rome, whoever emerges as the dictator will not have murdered the system. The system will have murdered itself.