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Quote Of The Day

QOTD, The Gun Thing

From Jim Wilson, talking (as we have been doing here for a week or so — and as has this article) about defensive chamberings:

The purpose of a firearm in the hands of a defensive shooter is not to kill an attacker. The purpose of the defensive handgun is to stop an attack and to stop it as soon as is humanly possible. What they seem to not understand is that these small calibers, while perfectly capable of causing death, may cause death hours, sometimes days, after the person has been shot.

And that’s it, right there.  In other words, “stopping power” is the sine qua non of defensive shooting.

Pass The Popcorn, Simon

Business, Gummint

I had to chuckle to myself when I saw this article about Amazon’s proposed new HQ in NYFC:

After months of haggling and wrangling to establish a deal involving major tax breaks and accommodations, Democrats in New York City are complaining that the deal isn’t good enough, the tax breaks are too dangerous, and Amazon’s arrival might be damaging to the social justice crowd because it could lead to further “gentrification” of the area. And that has Governor Andrew Cuomo seeing red and going to war with his own party.

It is, as the kids say nowadays, to LOL.  And needless to say, as the first sod has yet to be turned on the thing:

Online retail giant Amazon is reconsidering its plans to open a headquarters in Queens due to opposition from local lawmakers, according to a new report.
Executives at the company recently met to reassess setting up shop in Long Island City, as pols and activists continue to rail against the controversial new campus, the Washington Post reports, citing two people “familiar with the company’s thinking.”
“The question is whether it’s worth it if the politicians in New York don’t want the project, especially with how people in Virginia and Nashville have been so welcoming,” one of the sources told the paper.

Down here in the Dallas area, our proposals to Amazon were tiny compared to all the others’ offers — mostly because Texas has such a business-friendly climate, we start with a built-in advantage and don’t have to carve out all sorts of exceptions.  And New York doesn’t have a lot of stuff to give away, either:

The deal New York cut with Amazon is far beyond generous, including $2.5 billion in tax credits and $500 million in state construction subsidies. That hollows out the benefits of the new HQ in terms of municipal and state tax revenue considerably.

And of course, where’s there’s idiocy afoot, can Our Little Leninist Darling AOC be far behind?

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez applauded news on Friday that Amazon is reportedly reconsidering its plans to build a second headquarters in New York City as it faces fierce opposition from some state and city officials.
“Can everyday people come together and effectively organize against creeping overreach of one of the world’s biggest corporations?” she wrote in a tweet. “Yes, they can.”
The New York Democrat, who represents the 14th Congressional District, has been a fierce critic of the e-commerce giant’s proposed second headquarters in Long Island City, a neighborhood in Queens.

It makes you wonder why Amazon chose — or even considered investing in — New York at all, despite the bribes incentives.  All I can say is that they all deserve each other.

And if Amazon now comes a-calling on Dallas to re-pitch the area, we should offer them a great big Nada.  Fuck ’em.

Back From The Grave

Drive Time

It appears as though Jeep is going to relaunch their old Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer models in the near future.

Now before anyone starts setting off the fireworks celebrations, let me say up front that the relaunched vehicle will not resemble this, in any way, shape or form.

More’s the pity.  And the odds are good that it will emerge from the wind tunnel looking just like the current Jeep SUV line, or else it will resemble its predecessor in the same way that the New VW Beetle resembled the Old VW Beetle (i.e. not much, and uglier).

I’m taking bets…

And for the record:  when Jeep announced back in the mid-80s that they were going to discontinue the Wagoneer, I came thisclose to getting one.

The Danish Solution

Immigration

I’ve spoken before about how Denmark, surely the most tolerant of countries, has decided to reinforce their traditional Scandi-values on the immigrant population they’ve allowed into their country.  Chief among these, of course, is the little 17-acre island where they’re going to be dumping the ingrates (i.e. criminals) amongst said groups:

Remote, not easily reachable or escapable… sounds a little like Alcatraz, dunnit?  Which is indeed the title of the linked article.

As I was reading the piece, I couldn’t help thinking that the Danes are onto a good thing — which, inevitably, led me into thinking about a similar solution on this side of the Atlantic.

Granted, our little criminal-immigrant problem is somewhat larger than Denmark’s, but then again, we have Catalina Island — all 75 square miles  of it, which could surely be put to better use than it is now.

Considering that California is in large part responsible for a lot of our current immigration problem, I see no reason why the .fedgov shouldn’t ummmm appropriate this real estate, kick out the rich farts and hippies who currently infest the place (most of whom, I suspect, support untrammeled immigration), and dump all the malcontent immigrants (of whatever origin) onto its admittedly-pretty shores.

Then mine the waters around it.

Quote Of The Day

QOTD, The Gun Thing

From Bearing Arms:

[T]he idea of passing a law that won’t likely be enforced through most of the state strikes me as completely stupid.
Then again, this is gun control we’re talking about, so stupid is a given.

From my experience most police departments in New Mexico (the “African” state, as Doc Russia calls it) don’t bother enforcing a whole bunch of laws, not just this bullshit.

Spamming Response

Bad News, Technology

I am totally unsurprised by this situation:

Robocallers and spam callers are getting quite good at masking their identify. They do this partly by “spoofing” local numbers, making it seem like a legitimate local number is calling to increase the likelihood that you’ll answer. That’s the reason, according to Hiya, that around 9 percent of spam calls a month actually get answered by phone owners even though they don’t recognize the number calling.
Nine percent might not sound like much, until you consider the fact that 26.3 billion robocalls were made to American phones in 2018.

Result:

The nearly 50 percent of phone calls that go unanswered jumps way up to 76 percent of calls left unanswered — a little more than three out of every four — when the call comes from an unidentified or unfamiliar number.

In my case, that would be 100 percent.  I never  answer a call if the caller is unidentified (i.e. isn’t among my saved contacts).  As a result, I always tell people to email their phone numbers to me first so I can add them to my contact list.  Otherwise, their calls will be met with indifference.

Sucks, but that’s what happens when people use technology indiscriminately and unprompted.