A Quick Run Around The Web (October 13, 2020)

 

VIDEO: "Why Metal Magazines are Better || DURAMag"--The VSO Gun Channel (13 min.)

He raises some points that preppers ought to consider.

Firearms/Self-Defense/Prepping:

• "Gun Retailers See No End in Sight to Sales Surge, No Matter Who Wins in November"--The Truth About Guns. One gun store owner reports that his gun sales have gone from one per month to a woman to where women represent about a third of his sales.
• If you get involved in a scuffle, there is a good chance that you will fall or be pushed or knocked to the ground. A couple articles on this eventuality: 
• "Fall without breaking things"--Tactical Professor. Urging his readers to learn the breakfall.
• "Standing Up"--Active Response Training. Instructions on the best way to stand back up in a fight if you have fallen or been knocked to the ground.
• "Is Running Natural?" by Mike Sheridan, Toni Gentlecore. By running, the author means jogging or long distance running. The author contends that it is not--that hunter-gatherers conserved energy by walking slowly (approximately 6 miles per day), and only running (quickly!) to escape danger. He notes:

The same conclusion is reached when looking at early childhood movement prior to instruction from parents and coaches.  If you take a look at children playing in a park with no constraints, you’ll notice that they run and play with intensity for short bursts, and follow it up with ample recovery before running again.

He also adds: "Ask any rehabilitation specialist (physio, chiro, masseuse) and they’ll tell you how detrimental chronic repetitive movements can be on muscles, joints, bone, cartilage, ligaments, and tendons." I would also argue that our shift to heel-first walking and jogging after the advent of hard-soled footwear is also responsible for a lot of problems.

• Speaking of running: "'He stabbed me in the neck!' Moment Florida deputy is knifed after chasing down fleeing suspect"--Daily Mail. The embedded video starts where the officer had apparently already chased the suspect and the suspect had stopped. The officer tries talking to the suspect to calm him down, apparently not noticing that the suspect came his left arm straight and slightly behind him to hide a knife in his hand. (I'm surprised because people don't naturally stand that way, so he obviously was hiding something). After the officer tells the young man that he is going to be handcuffed and approaches the suspect, slightly turning him, the suspect suddenly twists and stabs the officer in the neck. This is a good example of why you, as a regular citizen, do not generally want to attempt to hold a suspect for the police. 
• "Understanding The Grand Jury's Decision In The Breonna Taylor Case" by Massad Ayoob. Short take: "The law essentially says, 'You don’t have to be right, you have to be reasonable.'"
• "4 Great Dynamic Shotgun Drills" by Jeff Johnston, Shooting Illustrated. I think that the drills place an unwarranted amount of attention on reloading. But one of the drills is for learning to shoot around and use cover/concealment. And then there is this one, which the author refers to as the Snake Shoot:

    Plenty of people who have experienced real-life shootouts report having to shoot from awkward positions as they used the only cover or concealment they could, such as firing under a bed or  automobile. Therefore, you should be adept at shooting your shotgun while lying down. There are many ways to accomplish this, depending on the cover at hand, your body type, nimbleness and your gun, but you need to figure out what works best for you. For this drill, a huge cardboard box, a wooden pallet or even an old door, held 1 foot off the ground by two bricks or target stands on either side will work.

    Place small targets at 1 yard, 5 yards and 10 yards from the obstacle so you can get an idea of your sight pictures from various shot angles. (I lay down a blanket to keep dirt and ants at bay.) Near the cover, practice going prone and shooting by whatever technique works best for you and your shotgun so you can hit all three targets. Some shooters prefer to roll on their left- side/shoulder while resting the elbow of the support arm (for right-handed shooters) on the ground, while other shooters prefer to roll on their right shoulder to shoot the gun with the right elbow on the ground.

    Others might prefer their belly squared on the ground. Spend 5 or 10 minutes figuring out what works for you and make sure whatever position you choose does not cause your shotgun to malfunction. Then, start the drill from a standing position behind the cover, get into a prone shooting position quickly and shoot three shots at each target before reloading and standing back up to repeat the drill.

• "How To Avoid Revolver Forcing Cone Failure" by Brad Miller, Ph.D., Shooting Sports USA. An excerpt:

    The forcing cone is the place most susceptible to breakage. The forcing cone is the rear entrance of the barrel where the bullet transitions from the cylinder to the barrel. It protrudes into the cylinder window a little, how much varies depending on the model. Gas pressure is extremely high here, a fact you’ll learn the hard way if your hand is anywhere in line with the barrel cylinder gap when the gun fires and gas pressure blasts out from the gap.

    Thinner than the barrel, hot gas can gradually eat away at the forcing cone and the high pressure puts tremendous strain on it. Combine the wear and high pressure, and the result is the forcing cone can crack. Some guns are known for being subject to cracked forcing cones. Smith & Wesson K-frame guns, such as the .357 Mag. Model 19, are guilty of this. A steady diet of magnum ammunition takes a toll on them, though a cracked forcing cone is a rare event. Cracked forcing cones are not unique to Smith & Wesson revolvers. An internet search shows the same failure with Ruger, Colt and Taurus wheelguns, too.

    A frequent location of cracked Smith & Wesson K-frame forcing cones is a flat-spot machined into the bottom that allows for clearance of the yoke (cylinder) gas ring. This results in a thinner forcing cone wall, making it prone to failure.

• "Tactical Training Scenario- Fire as a Weapon"--Active Response Training. If you had a normal childhood--especially if you are male--you undoubtedly burned a lot of things. And, at some point, you probably combined a can of flammable substance with a lighter to make a mini-flamethrower (although you hopefully didn't have to do so to kill a poisonous snake like James Bond did in this scene from Live And Let Die). My favorite was copper spray paint because it made a green flame. In any event, in his post, Greg Ellifritz notes a recent incident where a crazed man entered an Asian tea house in California using such a setup (a can of WD-40--a lousy choice, really--and a propane torch) and attacked customers, and gives some recommendations on defending yourself against such an attack. 
• "The Pressure For A Good Grip: Grip Tips To Shoot With Speed And Precision" by Paul Carlson, Mag Life. The author explains that "[w]ith a proper grip, you will stop excess movement before, during, and after the trigger press and you will minimize the movement of the gun in recoil." The author recommends a strong squeeze, but it will be different for each hand:

With your strong hand you need to be squeezing with the same type of action that you would squeeze a pair of pliers or a grip strengthening spring. The pressure should be focused from the front strap of the gun to the backstrap. 

 

And:

Your secondary hand is going to have more to grasp because your primary hand is under it. This allows for a more circular pressure and you should take advantage of that and compress the entire grip. If you have larger hands or you are shooting a thinner gun, you may be better off by focusing the pressure from side to side. Just think of squeezing your fingertips hard against the heel of your hand.

I generally use a thumbs forward grip with a handgun, and have found that a little pressure from my non-dominant thumb against the frame does wonders to steady the firearm. Melody Lauer shares other tips for getting a good grip on a handgun in this exhaustive article at Lucky Gunner. If you want a good guide for gripping a handgun, this article is one of the best I've come across. Another good article is this one from Shooting Illustrated specifically on the thumbs forward grip. (See also this article on the biomechanics of the thumbs-forward grip). I would note, however, that Duane Thomas is of the opinion, in this 2010 article, that the thumb over grip (aka captured thumb grip or interlocking thumb grip) is better for newbies because the thumbs forward grip generally feels "weird" and they have problems keeping their grip from coming apart. And another author indicates that this latter grip is better for some people with wrist or shoulder issues.

• More: "Understanding and Applying a Proper Pistol Grip" by James Warnet, Tactical Hyve. Another detailed article on how to properly grip a pistol.
• More: "Thumbs Up… Er, Forward!"--American Shooting Journal. Another article on how to properly form the thumbs-forward grip.
• More: "A Basic Checklist and Suggestions to Help Your Handgun Grip" by Ben Findley, USA Carry.
• More: "How To Grip A Pistol: Proper Technique For Shooting Accuracy"--Everyday Concealed Carry.
• More: "Our Guide To Finding Your Best Pistol Grip & Stance" by Chris Christian, Shooting Sports USA.
• More: "Back to Basics: 'Get A Grip!'"--Civilian Gun Fighter. 
• More: "Proper Gun Grip" by Carrie Lightfoot, The Well Armed Woman.
• More: "Handgun Grips: What Works, What Doesn't" by Stacy Bright, Range 365. This article looks at gripping for both the pistol and the revolver.
• More: "Pro-Shooter Advice: Proper Handgun Grip" by Maureen P. Sangiorgio, American Rifleman.
• More: "Thumbs Forward Grip with a Revolver"--Reflex Handgun.
• "Geissele Super Stabby Bayonet Mount Looks Sharp" by Joe Kriz, Guns Magazine. This aluminum bayonet adapter uses a standard Picatinny rail, covering five rail sections, for mounting a bayonet on your rifle’s handguard. However, an MSRP of $165 makes these a little pricey.
• I didn't think anyone made anything smaller than the .9 mm: "US Coast Guard Selects, Fields Glock 19 Gen5 MOS Pistols for Service"--Tactical Life. The article doesn't say what they are replacing. The UPI, though, reports that the Glock "will replace the .40mm [sic] Sig Sauer P229 DAK which the Coast Guard has used since 2006." So another agency rids itself of the .40 S&W. 
• "This Old Gun: Martini-Henry Cavalry Carbine" by Garry James, American Rifleman. A look at the cavalry (short) version of the venerable Martini-Henry rifle (made famous in the motion picture, Zulu). 
• Another great historical weapon: "The SVD Dragunov Rifle" by Martin K. A. Morgan, Shooting Illustrated. The Soviet Union's designated marksman rifle before the concept had even been adopted in the West. The author indicates:

The SVD Dragunov was born out of necessity when the Soviet Army identified a need for an infantry weapon that could “close the gap” in ranges that existed between belt-fed machine guns and assault rifles. A scoped, semi-automatic rifle capable of at least 2-MOA accuracy out to 800 meters would be able to do what the Kalashnikov could not and would provide an infantry squad something it badly needed, so a specification was issued in 1958 for design submissions.

• "What's in a Name?"--Tin Can Bandit. A look at some firearms companies that have appropriated the names of old military armories or long defunct firearms manufacturers. 
• "In the Future: Your Deer Cartridge Will Be Plastic"--Outdoor Life. The Army's quest for a lighter, but more powerful round, for its assault rifles and machine guns has already led to three different cartridges, including a brass and steel cartridge, and two that incorporate polymers. From the article:

    The Textron team’s contribution is also built around a groundbreaking cartridge design. Called a case-telescoped (CT) cartridge, the technology uses an enclosed plastic case to contain the propellant and bullet, achieving 30 percent weight reduction while also dissipating the heat of rapid-fire operation. Wayne Prender, Textron’s senior vice president for applied technologies, declined to comment on the specifics of the firing system or on the design of the rifles that chamber the new ammunition, which is being manufactured by Olin Winchester.

    “What I can tell you is that we threw out the rule book when it came to this ammunition design,” Prender says. “We did not try to refine or to tweak an existing platform, but instead we took a new approach with the plastic polymer. Some of the advantages are in weight, but at higher pressures, plastic simply performs better than brass or other metals. We measure that performance advantage in increased rate of fire, muzzle velocity, and extended range. Now, each of those is relatively easy to maximize individually, but our challenge has been to maximize them collectively, while also significantly reducing the weight of the firing system.”

• "11 Uses for Dryer Lint in and Around the House"--The Survivalist Blog. Its good for more than just tinder.
• "How To Make Flat Springs" by Christopher Mace, Guns America. Most antique guns used flat-springs, and it can be hard to find replacements should you have one break. The author describes a method of making (mostly, tempering) springs on your own. I would note that Bob's Gun Parts, carries an extraordinary amount of parts for antique guns, including springs.
• "Flip Your Backstrap Every 20 Seconds (and More Venison Cooking Tips from an Expert Chef)" by Joe Genzel, Outdoor Life. Advice from Jess Pryles of Hardcore Carnivore.
• "Water development for the homestead: Ponds, cisterns, and tanks"--Backwoods Home Magazine.
• "Old Medical Kits and Their Uses"--Blue Collar Prepping. The author's employer recently replaced old medical and first aid kits on the premises, and the author scrounged them for items to add to his preps. Obviously, some of the ointments and creams deteriorated (one of the kits was from the 1960s), and adhesive or latex products are suspect, but the gauze and some of the shelf-stable chemicals (iodine, for instance) are probably still good. Mike's Militaria periodically stocks used Czechoslovakian Vz.80 Field Medical Kits (one of which I purchased a couple months ago) which are nice for giving you a container in which to carry medical supplies, and have A LOT of gauze and dressings. They appear to currently be out of stock, but I would suggest you check back from time to time.
• "Clotting Agents"--Blue Collar Prepping. A look at the three most popular clotting agents, how they work, and how well they will store.
• "Reduce Your Footprint"--Beans, Bullets, Bandages & You. Some good ideas from Jim Cobb on not sticking out post-SHTF, but blending in with others. I still think that smells from cooking and/or a fire are going to be hard to hide, as well as using emergency lighting. 
• "Louisiana’s back-to-back hurricanes: Future unsure for many"--AP. The basic takeaway from all of this is that each major hurricane drives people away from the Louisiana coast and bayous that don't return, reducing the population. 
• Don't be this guy: "Police: Boise man pulled a handgun at a group of kids after getting upset with them during an argument at Caldwell haunted house"--KTVB. The man has been charged with five felony counts of aggravated assault and one count of carrying a concealed weapon while under the influence.
• Bwa-ha-ha: "Close and Personal: The Trench by American Tomahawk Company"--The Firearm Blog. It looks like someone took a sprocket and attached it to a handle. But that isn't the part that made me laugh. That, instead, was this comment from the author describing the weapon as less-than-lethal: "Sometimes lethal force isn’t always necessary and as an added bonus, clubs are essentially force amplifiers for your hands." I can guarantee that the soldiers in WWI that used such weapons in the trenches weren't looking for a non-lethal weapon.
• WROL: "Fingerprints?"--Second City Cop. This post from August of this year relates a crime victim who was irate that the police would not send an evidence technician to collect a perfect set of fingerprints left on his car window by the criminal. The author--a Chicago police officer--explains:

    Here's a dirty secret that not many people outside of the Department seem to know about:

•  95 times out of 100, an ET will not come out unless there is someone in custody

You would think that was counter-intuitive - you need evidence to convict someone of a crime, right? But that isn't how the Department works any more. There's no money to process prints for mere property crimes like burglary, thefts, many robberies. Unless you're raped, shot or deceased, you shouldn't ever count on an ET being dispatched.

    We call Citywide all the time for ET's so victims feel like we're doing something. It almost never works, and we put the beat number of the refusing ET sergeant in every report. This also is an explanation for the miserable clearance rates (and conviction rates, too).

I think the most important thing to learn about "without rule of law" is that it doesn't generally mean that there is no law enforcement, but that there will be no law enforcement to your benefit.

• They've been lying to you: "Comparing the Global Rate of Mass Public Shootings to the U.S.’s Rate and Comparing Their Changes Over Time" by John R. Lott. From the abstract:

    The U.S. is well below the world average in terms of the number of mass public shootings, and the global increase over time has been much bigger than for the United States.

    Over the 20 years from 1998 to 2017, our list contains 2,772 attacks and at least 5,764 shooters outside the United States and 62 attacks and 66 shooters within our country. By our count, the US makes up less than 1.13% of the mass public shooters, 1.77% of their murders, and 2.19% of their attacks. All these are much less than the US’s 4.6% share of the world population. Attacks in the US are not only less frequent than other countries, they are also much less deadly on average. Out of the 101 countries where we have identified mass public shootings occurring, the United States ranks 66th in the per capita frequency of these attacks and 56th in the murder rate.

    Not only have these attacks been much more common outside the US, the US’s share of these attacks has declined over time. There has been a much bigger increase over time in the number of mass shootings in the rest of the world compared to the US.

VIDEO: "'Stand Your Ground' Laws: Self-Defense or License to Kill?"--Cato Institute (1 hr 10 min.)

The Current Unrest:

• The lead up to a civil war: "Whitmer says Michigan won't rush to get results on Election Day, calls it an ‘artificial deadline’"--Fox News.

    The Democratic governor made the comments during an appearance on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” while discussing the election’s expected surge in mail-in votes amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

    Asked by host Margaret Brennan how long it will take Michigan to declare the winner of the race, Whitmer would not give a definitive timeline.

• You may have read (see also here) or heard of Politico's article suggesting that both sides of the electorate increasingly believe that political violence is acceptable if the "other side" wins. However, if you go to the Politico site, about half-way down the text (long after most people will have stopped reading), you will find that they have essentially retracted the basic thesis of the article. Their correction reads:

[Update: Since this article published, we’ve received new polling data that strongly suggests the trend is not as large as originally thought. On the question of justifying violence, new data from the same source as the 2017 to 2019 trend suggests there has not been a significant shift in attitudes since December 2019, though there is still a notable increase from 2017. On the question of justifying violence in the event of losing a presidential race, there has been a small increase but not as large as the one we originally described. We’re reviewing the new data and will update further.]

• "About that so-called 'security guard' who gunned down a Trump supporter in Denver" by Monica Showalter, American Thinker. The shooter--the "security guard"-- is Matthew Dolloff. He ostensibly was a non-employee "contractor," supposedly connected to the Pinkerton agency, and hired to protect 9News reporters, according to 9News in Denver. But Dolloff was not licensed as a "security guard", he was not employed by Pinkerton, and "he's got quite a past as a rabid radical leftist in his Occupy! Denver days in 2011, his attendance at Bernie Sanders rallies, and his social media posts of anti-Trump political cartoons." In addition, one of the news station's reporters is affiliated with Antifa. The news station and Pinkerton will undoubtedly be sued, and the discovery should be interesting.
• "Why Democrats Can’t Have Nice Things" by Peter Van Buren, American Conservative. The author predicts that Trump will handedly win the election in part because "[a]fter four years of complaining Trump is an old, white, draft-dodging man linked to corruption, the best the Dem process could cough up was an even older, white, draft-dodging man linked to corruption." He also notes that the Democrats' insistence in referring to Hispanics as "Latinx" and "people of color" has alienated many Hispanics who object to both terms.
• "Wisconsin blocked from accepting mail-in ballots after Election Day"--Fox News. The 7th Circuit reversed the decision of a federal district judge granting an extension. The article indicates that the Democrats may attempt to appeal this to the U.S. Supreme Court.
• "Supreme Court tells Trump administration it can end the Census count NOW in defeat for Democratic states and cities"--Daily Mail. And another slap-down of the Ninth Circuit. The only reason for extending the census was to include as many illegal aliens as possible to inflate numbers in Democratic controlled states. 
• They're lying to you: "BLM Supporter Tied to Michigan Gov. Whitmer Kidnapping Plot. Demands Grow for Her to Apologize to Trump"--PJ Media. This is in addition to the anarchists in the group. But the initial reports that the group was "right wing" are all people are going to remember.
• "The Only Thing Systematic Is The Destruction Of America – Part 2"--The Burning Platform. From the article:

The masking of the masses has been, and continues to be, about despotic politicians and arrogant bureaucrats demanding obedience as a mechanism to judge their ability to shame the masses into submission. It has nothing to do with health or protecting others. The health “experts” like Fauci, the Surgeon General and CDC director actually told the truth back in March when they told everyone masks didn’t protect you from viruses. When the powers that be decided this flu needed to be hyped and blown out of all proportion, mask wearing was used as the symbol of fear necessary to panic the public into submission.

• Related: "9th Circuit Upholds California's COVID Restrictions On Religious Services"--Religion Clause. This is just an appeal of a denial of a temporary injunction, so it is not the end of the litigation. 
• "An underappreciated threat to the global economic system"--Live Wire (h/t KA9OFF). Discussing the decline in value of the American dollar in international trading, and the possible impact on world trade and financing government debt. Per the article, "[a]s measured by a basket of major currencies, the greenback declined 10% from its COVID-19 era peak and 5.4% from its 2019 average." Back in the early 1980s, when the dollar had steeply declined, I remember seeing a cartoon in the Sunday "funny pages" of a pickpocket returning a wallet to an American tourist in Paris, explaining that he didn't realize it had been filled with dollars.
• The hypocrisy of the Left: "Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban admits he's fine doing business with China despite their human rights abuses, saying 'we have to pick our battles'"--Daily Mail. Cuban is a supporter of BLM and its protests. So, he's all for "equality" and "civil rights" as long as it doesn't jeopardize his lucrative Chinese market.
• The stupidity of the Left: "Are These the Last 25 Days of American Democracy?" by Umair Haque, Medium. There is a lot of stupidity here, but the one that I particularly want to mention is the diatribe about the Electoral College. Haque (appropriately pronounced "hack") writes: 

America’s ranked as a flawed democracy precisely because it’s obscure “electoral college” system at this point, a remnant of slavery and segregation, designed to empower wealthy landowners, stands against the wishes of the majority — who want a society more like Canada or Europe than the failed state of Texas.

    Funny thing is that the Electoral College was enacted to preserve the independence of the various states. Specifically, there was a fear by the smaller states that populous states such as New York, Massachusetts, and Pennsylvania would dominate the smaller states, whereas the more populous states believed they were entitled to greater representation because of their population. Thus, the Great Compromise (aka, the Connecticut Compromise) incorporating both a House of Representatives (where representation was by population) and a Senate (where representation was per state). The Electoral College reflects this great compromise: each state has a number of electoral votes equal to their representation in Congress as a whole. Without this compromise there would have been no Constitution and no United States. 

    But since Haque points to Europe, lets examine what Europe, or more specifically, the E.U., has done. (I don't believe that Haque has any idea of how the E.U. government is organized, but I will extend him the benefit of the doubt). The E.U. has three legislative branches: the European Parliament, the Council of the European Union, and the European Commission (which is really the executive branch, but also is the primary originator of legislation). As Wikipedia explains, "[u]nder the Lisbon Treaty, seats [in the European Parliament] are allocated to each state according to population and the maximum number of members is set at 751 (however, as the President cannot vote while in the chair there will only be 750 voting members at any one time)." Its members are chosen by popular election. Thus, it is similar to the U.S. House of Representatives.

    The Council of the European Union is akin to the U.S. Senate as it was originally envisioned: each member state gets one seat on the Council regardless of population, represented by a minister appointed by the individual state governments rather than popularly elected. 

    Per Wikipedia, "[t]he European Commission (EC) is the executive branch of the European Union, responsible for proposing legislation, implementing decisions, upholding the EU treaties and managing the day-to-day business of the EU." There are currently 27 members of the Commission, one for each member state. Again according to Wikipedia, "[t]he Commissioners are proposed by the Council of the European Union, on the basis of suggestions made by the national governments, and then appointed by the European Council after the approval of the European Parliament." Commissioners historically have only included people with extensive experience working within the E.U. bureaucracy or other international European bodies. As for the President of the Commission, her or she is a member of the Commission who "is nominated by the European Council and formally elected by the European Parliament, for a five-year term." In short, there is no direct election of Commissioners or the President of the E.U. 

    So what Haque suggests is a better "democracy" is one that looks sort of like the U.S. Congress and Executive Branch, but without direct elections of the "senators" or the "President". In short, it is less democratic than the U.S. But, since the bureaucracy determines who gets into the most important positions, I suppose that the E.U. member states can always be sure that the "right" or "correct" people are in control, and don't have to bother with troublesome populism. Basically, a tyranny by committee. That is what Haque proposes as a better democracy.

 

VIDEO: "The M1 Helmet"--The History Guy (15 min.)

Miscellany:

• "OSU: Derogatory terms against Whites 'do not have the same impact' as on minorities"--Campus Reform. Ohio State University apparently thinks using racial slurs to refer to whites is okay.
• Diversity is a strength: "French mob attacks police station with fireworks, metal bars"--Fox News. 

    A mob armed with metal bars and fireworks attacked a police station in the Paris suburbs Saturday night, officials said.

    The group of about 40 people attempted to storm the Champigny-sur-Marne station, about nine miles southeast of central Paris, according to Reuters.

According to the article, the reason for the attack was that locals blamed police for a scooter accident.

• Life in a black-majority country: "South Africa lays out conditions to seize land, says investors will be reassured"--Reuters. "The law would allow land to be confiscated without reimbursement in certain cases if it is unused, abandoned or poses a safety risk, Public Works and Infrastructure Minister Patricia de Lille told a news conference." The "abandoned" clause will embolden attacks against white farmers to drive them off their land so the land can then be classified as abandoned.
• Related: "Rhodesia and white supremacists"--Bayou Renaissance Man. The relevant bit:

Basically, Rhodesia was doomed by demographics.  In 1969, white Rhodesians formed less than 5% of the population;  black Rhodesians, 95%.  Whites were outnumbered 19 to 1 - and the situation got steadily worse during the 1970's, due to an exploding black birth rate and the emigration (first a trickle, then a flood) of whites who saw the writing on the wall.  Those who left were derisively referred to, at first, by those who stayed, as "taking the chicken run" - until the end drew near, when attitudes among the remaining whites suddenly changed.  Earlier departures were now said to have "taken the owl run", acting out of wisdom rather than cowardice.  In trying to hold onto power, white Rhodesians were "farting against thunder".  Demographics are inexorable.  There was simply no way they could possibly succeed.  (South Africa went the same way for the same basic reason, although there whites formed up to 10% of the total population during the 1970's, almost double Rhodesia's ratio).

• "Washington emergency responders first to use SpaceX’s Starlink internet in the field: ‘It’s amazing’"--CNBC. From the article: "'I have never set up any tactical satellite equipment that has been as quick to set up, and anywhere near as reliable' as Starlink, Richard Hall, the emergency telecommunications leader of the Washington State Military Department’s IT division, told CNBC in an interview Monday."
• Returning to the topic of the timing of the Exodus: "Pinpointing the Exodus from Egypt"--by Israel Knohl, Harvard Divinity Bulletin. Basic thesis:

    The first thing to know is that a great famine—like that mentioned in the Joseph story—occurred around 1200 BCE, give or take 25 years. To anchor the Joseph story in historical fact, we must assume that he was active during this period, around 1200 BCE, during the great famine crisis.

    When Joseph’s brothers arrive in Egypt, Joseph discusses with Pharaoh where they should live. Genesis 47:11 says, “And Joseph settled his father and his brothers, and he gave them an estate in the land of Egypt in the best of the land in the region of Ramses.” Scholars usually repudiate the notion that Israelites settled in the region of Ramses, since he would not rise to power for many years. However, new evidence shows that the Israelites actually did come to Egypt during the reign of Ramses II, due to a great famine around 1225 BCE; those at the time of Joseph who settled in the region of Ramses, however, can be correlated with the Jacob-el people from Edom. There is Egyptian documentation about a group from Edom who migrated to Egypt because of famine, starvation, and thirst.1 The migration of the Jacob group to Egypt was similar to this episode.2 In both cases, migrants whose vocation included shepherding were despised by the Egyptians because the latter deified the ram as a holy animal, symbolizing the Egyptian god Amon. Thus, it seems logical that the Egyptians would conscript these starving migrants as lowly physical laborers to build the city of Ramses.

But the author also looks to other Egyptian records that seem similar to the Joseph and Exodus accounts:

Thus, we have three groups of different kinds of sources. We have Manetho, whose story is preserved in Josephus, we have the biblical book of Exodus, and we have Egyptian documents from the twelfth century BCE. I would argue that the same basic story recurs in all three: A group within Egypt that despises Egyptian ritual brings in reinforcements from abroad, from the region of Canaan and Syria. They come to Egypt and join the local group, but the pharaoh, who remains faithful to the old Egyptian religion, manages to defeat them and drive them out of the country. There is also mention of silver and gold given to the foreigners by Egyptian citizens. Manetho says this pharaoh had a son called Ramses, as did Senakhte, whose son Ramses III succeeded him on the Egyptian throne.

My problem with this theory is that it necessarily ignores the majority of the Biblical account. In fact, it is so different, that it could fairly be said to describe different events altogether.

• "Pregnant women with COVID-19 don't pass the virus to their newborns, study finds"--UPI.
• "Asteroid Bennu Carries Organic Materials Consistent With Ingredients For Life"--Science Alert. And more, as some of the material incorporated into the asteroid must have once been part of a larger body with flowing water:

    But the asteroid's carbon content has a more detailed story to tell. A close spectral study has revealed bright veins of carbonate material running through a number of boulders.

    This, according to a team of scientists led by Hannah Kaplan of NASA-Goddard, is consistent with carbonates found in "aqueously altered carbonaceous chondrite meteorites" - carbonates that formed through interactions with water.

    Some of these veins are metre-length and several centimetres thick. This, the researchers say, is evidence that water once flowed freely over the rocks, an asteroid-scale hydrothermal system that was once present on the parent body that went on to later birth Bennu.

    "Fluid flow on Bennu's parent body would have taken place over distances of kilometres for thousands to millions of years," the researchers wrote in their paper.

• "Scientists call for serious study of 'unidentified aerial phenomena'"--Space.com. From the article:

    The U.S. Navy recently admitted that, indeed, strangely behaving objects caught on video by jet pilots over the years are genuine head-scratchers. There are eyewitness accounts not only from pilots but from radar operators and technicians, too. 

    In August, the Navy established an Unidentified Aerial Phenomena (UAP) Task Force to investigate the nature and origin of these odd sightings and determine if they could potentially pose a threat to U.S. national security. 

    The recently observed UAPs purportedly have accelerations that range from almost 100 Gs to thousands of Gs — far higher than a human pilot could survive. There's no air disturbance visible. They don't produce sonic booms. These and other oddities have captured the attention of "I told you so, they're here" UFO believers. 

    But there's also a rising call for this phenomenon to be studied scientifically — even using satellites to be on the lookout for possible future UAP events.

I'm old enough to remember luminaries such as Carl Sagan belittling UFO claims. So, again I ask, why the sudden change? 

• Related: "Harry Reid: U.S. Government Withholding Evidence of UFOs, Which May Have Interfered With American Weapons"--The Daily Wire. 
• Related: "‘The Truth Is Out There,’ And, If Actually True, It Scares The Hell Out Of Me!" by  Brad Schaeffer, The Daily Wire. The author explains that if UFOs are truly extraterrestrial, they would necessarily be so far in advance of us technologically that they could easily destroy us. 
• "U.S. Army to start testing high-tech combat goggles"--UPI. Supposed to give individual soldiers a heads up display. We'll see if they work any better than a prior test of a competing system.
• Just like a big brother watching out for you: "The Average American Is Recorded 238 Times A Week"--Loose Rounds.
• "God is in the machine: Carl Miller on the terrifying, hidden reality of Ridiculously Complicated Algorithms"--TLS (via Google Cache). The key point of this 2018 article is that computer algorithms have become so complex that no one really understands how they work:

Algorithms have changed, from Really Simple to Ridiculously Complicated. They are capable of accomplishing tasks and tackling problems that they’ve never been able to do before. They are able, really, to handle an unfathomably complex world better than a human can. But exactly because they can, the way they work has become unfathomable too. Inputs loop from one algorithm to the next; data presses through more instructions, more code. The complexity, dynamism, the sheer not-understandability of the algorithm means that there is a middle part – between input and output – where it is possible that no one knows exactly what they’re doing. The algorithm learns whatever it learns. “The reality is, professionally, I only look under the hood when it goes wrong. And it can be physically impossible to understand what has actually happened.”

• A reminder that we live in the 21st Century: "Twitter to fix AI system that cut black people from photos"--New York Post. 

    Twitter is making changes to its artificial intelligence system as it investigates why it sometimes cut black people’s faces out of photos.

    The social media giant said in a blog post this week [end of September] that it was “committed to following the ‘what you see is what you get’ principles of design” after users discovered that the cropped previews of photos that users see when they scroll through their feeds often hones in on white faces when they’re pictured in the same image as black faces.

• Another reminder we live in the 21st Century: "U.S. Transportation Command to study use of SpaceX rockets to move cargo around the world"--Space News. From the article:

    The U.S. military command that oversees logistics operations has signed an agreement with SpaceX and XArc to study the use of space launch vehicles to transport supplies in an emergency.

    Army Gen. Stephen Lyons, commander of U.S. Transportation Command, announced the agreement Oct. 7 at a National Defense Transportation Association virtual conference. 

    “Think about moving the equivalent of a C-17 payload anywhere on the globe in less than an hour,” Lyons said.