Personal Review: Kershaw Half Ton Pocket Knife

Blogger Header Image

I took a glance at my header a couple days ago, and I realized that it looked ridiculous because it did not go entirely across the top of the page. So set about trying to fix it.

I went through multiple suggestions on other blogs. None worked. And I messed up my blog for a few hours.

Then I stumbled across Yoboy's solution at Southern Speakers. His "Method 1," where you go in and edit the width in the dashboard, didn't work. "Method 2," where you go into to the template and add html to the CSS, did. I had to tweak alittle, but I really appreciate the solution.

The Myth of Negative Rights

Those opposed to freedom, civil rights, constitutional rights, and civil liberties often call the Bill of Rights "negative rights." The Bill of Rights lays out basic rights of the people that the government is not allowed to infringe upon. So:

There Ought To Be a Law?

It used to make sense when someone said, "There ought to be a law." I'm not saying the sentiment made sense - just the logic. 

Now if someone says, "There ought to be a law," it's nonsensical in logic and sentiment. There is already a law for everything. And we should have figured out by now that that is the dumbest thing in the world.

Toshiba Satellite A105 Fan Maintenance 1.0

This laptop started overheating a few months ago, when I was using it to stream Netflix. So, I raised it on, essentially, stilts so that air could circulate under it. I could tell it was still getting too hot, but I continued using it for Netflix until it shut off a couple times. So I stopped steaming videos and I got a Roku. I also got a tabletop laptop fan to put it on

Power

Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority, still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it.
- Lord Acton, from letter to Bishop Creighton

The Natural Rights to Keep and Bear Arms

I don't know if I "chafe" at the prospect of making my blog have a political taint. We're all political; we all channel Machiavelli when we really want something. And writing a blog about being a gun enthusiast invites a politically motivated attack.

That all has the potential to be true, as long as I know the definition of politics. Well, at least this disclaimer is halfassed. 

I'm concerned that the leading defenders of our Second Amendment rights are painting us into a corner. Our Second Amendment rights to keep and bear arms are actually our natural rights. And that appears to have been the view of the original representatives that debated the inclusion of Bill of Rights in the Constitution to be ratified by the states. Many of the representatives felt the Bill of Rights were not needed, because the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights were self-evident natural rights that every person was not "entitled to," but owned outright. The Bill of Rights was included to limit the power of government, not to entitle citizens privileges.

By treating our rights to keep and bear arms as a legislated right and therefore a privilege, we lower our moral platform to the level of the misguided statist socialists who are attacking our natural rights.

Applied Fun

The .22 LR .380 ACP and The Baking Powder Can

Millions enjoy the shooting sports. We run and gun, bullseye shoot, hunt, plink, reload, modify, design, and sometimes earn a living with guns. We have fun, we bond, but we are doing something that applies to darker circumstances. For example, when we run and gun we are preparing for a fight that someday might require us to defend ourselves, our family, or someone we have never met (where allowed by law, of course). That preparation also is focused on ending someone else's life immediately, or potentially by putting that person out of that fight - with deadly force. Our fun has an element of pain that we make into abstractions (e.g. the zombie-talk epidemic), or we avoid really thinking about it.

One fun area is ballistics. There are endless arguments and comparisons about downrange effectiveness. But how many people are going to actually shoot someone - or get shot. What percentage of the population has dropped something on their feet? 100%? I dare say.

A few weeks ago I reached into the fridge and a dinky little can of baking powder fell out and landed on my bare foot. It hurt a lot - figured I might have bruised a bone - and, not to be dramatic, but in the interest of full disclosure, I had trouble walking for a week. I didn't break out a pair of crutches and start calling for my wife to get my beer, but I noticed it every time I took a step.

I couldn't curl my toes all the way for a couple weeks, and the bones in my foot still hurt. I was amazed at how such a little thing falling such a short distance could cause so much distraction over a protracted period of time. So I did some calculations on line (Force, gravitational acceleration, etc.), and then I quadruple checked the calculations.

The can fell more than 5 feet (I used 5 feet to calculate), and I entered a generous half inch deceleration distance. When the can hit my foot it generated 239 ft-lbs of force. That bests most .380 ACP rounds!

Of course the force was spread out over a larger area compared to the maximum frontal area of an .380 ACP bullet, but maybe not a fully expanded hollowpoint!

Did I apply the fun I've had with ballistics? Yeah. Will I apply the fun I had dropping a baking powder can on my foot? Well, a .380 ACP doesn't fully expand until it has penetrated something, usually. So I won't be traded in my 9 mm ammo for a case of baking powder.

Ruger Fanboy?

I like Rugers. I've liked Rugers for year. I like the name, I like the logo, I like their style (seriously), and I like the guns' claimed durability.

I owned a 2" SP101 .357. Great gun. Well balanced, loud, fun. I owned a 10/22 with several "high capacity" mags. They are the Hotlips design, so I quickly destroyed the feed lips on one. I sold those guns when I moved to NYC. I wished that I had stored them with a relative instead, because I really miss them.

Since I moved to the relatively gun-friendly state of North Carolina, I bought a P95. Though I have problems with the grip, I really like it, too. The only reason I didn't also buy a Ruger shotgun is that they don't make a pump action. And of course the Remington 870 is "legendary."

Am I Ruger fanboy? I doubt it. I might be a Ruger loyalist, or a Ruger enthusiast. But if they don't have the tool I want or need at the price I'm willing to pay, then I'll get it somewhere else.

The Gun Review Is Dead

Long Live The Gun Review

I have mixed feelings about gun reviews. I love and hate the following parts and qualities of gun reviews, and I love and hate when they are missing: technical evaluations, ergonomics, concealability, range reports, photos, and, subjectivity. And that's the problem.

Gun reviews take into account so many subjective and "mission critical" factors that the reviewer often loves, hates, or grows to love or hate the same gun based on his (her) changing experience, skills, and the company he keeps. This parody of a Nutnfancy "Tabletop" comparison of a couple guns is a good illustration:

As I have stated, I like subjectivity in gun reviews - or I hate it. But a review of the Wilson ADP a few years ago in American Handgunner magazine was a good example of how objectivity can somehow get ridiculously lost in subjectivity.