Mark Twain’s adage

Posted on May 1, 2018 | 2 comments

“…there is no discernible class of criminals in America with the notable exception of Congress.”—commenter John Butler at WSJ.

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Posted in History, Library, Political corruption

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Blue Origin’s highest yet

Posted on April 29, 2018 | 2 comments

The New Shepard capsule soared 347,000 feet Sunday above West Texas, about 66 miles, her planned operating altitude. Sixty-two miles is the accepted boundary line for space.

“Another spectacular test mission,” Ariane Cornell of Blue Origin said during a launch webcast. “Everything looks nominal from here.”

For now the capsule holds only a dummy astronaut and some commercial experiment packages. Ultimately billionaire Jeff Bezos intends to send six passengers for a spectacular suborbital ride to space. Then the capsule will land back near the launchpad near Van Horn on three parachutes while the reusable booster rocket lands vertically on the pad.

Via Space dot com

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Posted in Science/Engineering, Space, Texana

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Still at ’em

Posted on April 28, 2018 | Comments Off on Still at ’em

What a delight. A Republican president who fights back against the Mediacrats and their fake news garbage.

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Posted in Mediacrats, Trump

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No more launching

Posted on April 27, 2018 | 5 comments

You know you’re getting old when you can’t launch anymore. Launch yourself up and away from a sitting position, I mean. Like the young do. Without thinking about it.

Can’t do it anymore. Fall on my face if I try. No, I have to slowly stand up and let things settle. Let gravity adjust itself. Then I can start walking, slowly usually, is the safest way.

Happy to say I can still stand erect though. I am not bent over like some in their seventies. And my legs are pretty strong from the treadmilling and the squats I do six days a week. I won’t need a walker anytime soon. Or a cane, either.

But I can’t launch. No more launching for me.

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Posted in Aging

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Souls on board

Posted on April 26, 2018 | Comments Off on Souls on board

There are many reasons given for why passengers and crew of airlines and ships are referred to collectively as “souls on board.”

But one that’s not mentioned is the fact that the 19th century age of the steamship, when the practice seems to have originated, was much more religious than now.

People believed in souls then as they pretty much do not now. At least not officially or in the news media. So it was likely more than convenience sake in radio procedure to refer to passengers and crew as souls on board.

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Posted in History, Mediacrats, The Culture

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Why Trump’s travel ban is unconstitutional

Posted on April 25, 2018 | Comments Off on Why Trump’s travel ban is unconstitutional

You can find out some wonderful things at the Volokh Conspiracy. For instance I always thought that foreign terrorists didn’t deserve due process or any other provision of the Constitution because they weren’t, you know, citizens. That the pols clamoring for same were merely obstructionists.

Turns out I was wrong. “The Founding generation routinely applied the Bill of Rights as a constraint on U.S. government actions abroad, including those directed at non-citizens. For example, it was taken for granted that suspected pirates captured at sea, whether U.S. citizens or not, were entitled to the ‘due process of law’ guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment.”

Which makes Trump’s travel ban on certain Muslim countries unconstitutional. Even though Bronco Bama got away with it.

Via Volokh Conspiracy

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Posted in Blogosphere, Bronco Bama, The War, Trump

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Image

Rule 5: Plus-sized girl with gun

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Posted on April 25, 2018 in Guns, Plus-sized models, Rule 5

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