About Gun Control...

Looks like I'm on a roll today.  I've been tossing around and working a post about the whole mess going on back home right now, but I kept getting sidetracked, frustrated, and just plain tired of explaining the same things over and over again to people, and never got it finished.  Luckily for me though, Larry Correia (A pretty darn good author you should check out too btw) beat me to it, and wrote it out a lot more eloquently than I ever could have.  It's well thought out, with just about every argument I've heard touched on and dissected, and I highly recommend it.

Larry Correia - An Opinion on Gun Control

For the TL;DR... gun control won't work for a multitude of reasons and is bad, mmmkay?

Again, Merry Christmas! (or your winter holiday of choice)

Shhhh I see stupid people...

Ok, lately I've been avoiding the whole Pro-gun/Anti-gun thing like a live third rail after swimming in the ocean.  We're hearing enough about it as it is, and my Facebook friends are getting bitchy.  But I have to point out some stupidity from some 31,000+ of my countrymen.

Pro-gun rights US petition to deport Piers Morgan

You are aware that there is a Constitutional amendment that comes before the 2nd that says something like: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." (emphasis mine)

This means that, just like they have to listen to us remind them that "Assault Weapon" isn't the same thing as "Automatic Weapon" every chance we get, we have to listen to their sanctimonious drivel too... orrrrrr, you could turn off the TV and go to the range and actually enjoy your day instead.

Merry Christmas To All! ...even the militants.

Well, Christmas has found it's way here to Nigeria, and as I look at the weather outside it's definitely less than frightful.   It's a balmy 82º and there are dust storms in the air here (Harmattan season you know).  Sadly, over here this is also the prime season for kidnappings and hijackings at sea, since one good ransom can feed a village for most of a year.  In the past week there have been at least four vessels attacked with crew taken hostage.  If it were any other time of year, I'd say that the pirates were stepping up their game, but this is about average for the "Silly Season."

Anyway, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all, and I'll be thinking of you as I wear flip flops and shorts here while you're bundled up for the worst weather winter can throw at y'all. ;)

Shameless Blog Advertising

Ok, I try and avoid shamelessly plugging other blogs, but I'm rather fond of this one after just having found it today.  If you're like me, the terms "Republican," "Democrat," "Liberal," and "Conservative" have no relevance in your political leanings.  Calling us "Moderates" kind of feels like a slap in the face though, since most of us feel rather strongly about political issues.  We just can't get pigeonholed into any simple category, and that frustrates the people that make studies.  So when I find a blog that's very like minded, I'm rather elated.  In fact, it makes my whole day.

So here's Classically Liberal to make you happy or mad, I don't give a rip, but I hope it makes you think.

I'm Baaaaaaaaaaack!

After several months now with no internet (aside from what I could get with my phone) I'm finally back... and guess what? I've got another "fun" experience from here in Nigeria to get things started right.

So the other day, we were on standby for the rig, when I hear a really disturbing radio call of, "What do you mean they're shooting at you?" Well of course, being a sailor (we're all nosy by nature btw) I had to turn up the radio to hear this one.  Apparently, a supply boat was refuelling a security boat (names withheld to protect both the innocent and guilty) and started bumping into it in the heavy seas.  This "upset" the Nigerian Navy detachment on board and they shut down the operation.  Then, the supply boat was halfway untied and "wasn't moving fast enough" so they decided to hurry them up by firing rounds off to get them moving.  What happened next? Well, of course they all ran inside to get away from the hail of gunfire, leaving the boat tied up, at which point the Navy detachment sent a few rounds past the wheelhouse.  Needless to say, the Navy guys had to toss off the lines themselves at that stage, and there's a lot of paperwork and reprimands going around now.

So on that note, anybody know a good supplier for bullet proof vests and strike plates to stop AK-47 rounds?

Wanted Dead or Alive? Really people?

Ok, I've really been trying to keep out of the whole Martin / Zimmerman thing, but this one... I've got to step up to the plate and say that there are going to be serious repercussions if this line of thought continues: 

Wanted Dead or Alive Poster Issued for George Zimmerman by New Black Panther Party

That's from the caring and loving people of the New Black Panther Movement.  I don't really have much to say on this, other than America as a whole needs to get their head out of their collective ass and deal with this case.  One way or the other, get it settled, due process it, put it before the grand jury, let them throw it out or try it (which, with all the media attention, Zimmerman's going to have to get a trial outside of the US to manage to get an untainted jury now).

The more I hear about it, the less I'm sure of either side's story in it.  Which, if I was Dictator... errr, President Obama, I'd do my best to pull the plug on the media in this case before we wind up with a full fledged race war here in America.  But then... it's an election year.  Nothing better to polarize voters than a little racial violence.  [sarcasm intended]  Far be it for me to pull a race card since I'm a true all American mutt (literally a bit of every race in my blood) but why has this been a black/white issue in the first place???  Frankly I'm rather amazed that the conservative press haven't tried to paint Zimmerman as an illegal alien or some other ridiculousness like that.  And the liberal media... they're too busy with the "Guns are bad... m'kay?" line right now to get beyond that. 

So here we are, left with a 17 y/o boy that may or may not have attacked Zimmerman, was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and is now dead.  Let's take a moment and remember, the gun didn't kill him, the man behind the gun did, and whether it was self defense or not, remains to be determined by the courts.  Let's just all take a deep breath and go from there...

#2 Behind... THAT?! #EFAD

Wow... While I'm impressed with the meteoric rise to #2, I'm slightly (ok, HIGHLY) disappointed that it hasn't quite beaten out "Divorced, Desperate and Delicious" for the #1 spot yet.  I would go ahead and make with a conspiracy theory here that the anti-gun crowd is keeping the download numbers up on that one... but I actually did the research and found that Ms. Craig happened to do the same thing with the free deal on her book a couple days before #EFAD hit, so we can't really blame her on that.  We'll just have to keep sharing/retweeting/liking/+1'ing or whatever and persevere.

Amazon: Enemies Foreign and Domestic ...Come on... download it... you know you want to. ;)

I've been dealing with some... issues... here at work lately, so I haven't really been able to blog as much as I'd like.  But when you have militants attacking ships close enough to see... yeah, my attention's been elsewhere.  Promise to make it up to you guys soon though.

Free Kindle Book!!! #EFAD

I don't know about you, but I always like just about anything free... so how about a free book?  I'll let the Author do the explaining though in a second, but from what I've heard it's pretty good. No, I didn't write it, so it's actually possible to be good. ;^)

Here's the Amazon page for it: Enemies Foreign and Domestic
Here's the author's website: Matt Bracken

And here's the info from his page on why he's giving it away free... and hoping that it goes viral --





Want to join a beat-up old ex-Navy SEAL, ocean sailor and book writer on a real-world covert cyber operation?

I knew you did. So here's the deal. The idea is a national clandestine psyop, using my first novel as a vehicle.

On Thursday, March 1, Enemies Foreign And Domestic will be put into Amazon Kindle's free library.

Where EFAD's free download promotion will be different from those of the thousands of fantasy/romance/vampire novels currently offered on Kindle, is that I'm simultaneously coordinating a mass plan to ensure that Operation EFAD goes hyper-viral on all constitutionally-oriented, freedom-loving, and Second Amendment websites and blogs at the same time.

Or on at least on as many as I can reach, and that is where you come in. There are literally hundreds of patriotic websites and blogs, and I can only reach a few. You can reach them all, every last one. And then some. More about this in the next communiqué on D Minus Six.

Despite its many limitations, Twitter will be useful for rapid tactical coordination. Operation Enemies Foreign And Domestic will be code-named #EFAD, in order to use Twitter as an always-open back channel for project updates and participant feedback. By typing #EFAD into the Twitter search field, you will find every new message related to the operation. I am @MattBracken48 on Twitter, I am Matt Bracken on Facebook, and I can be reached by email at steelcutter48 at gmail.com.

My goal is to make the spike in the number of free Kindle downloads for Enemies Foreign And Domestic so dramatic, that the national media will notice the passionate interest in this "dangerous and seditious" novel among the bitter clingers. But this is just the first step of a jiu-jitsu move. The light thrown on EFAD's sudden nationwide surge in popularity will then be mirrored back onto the federal government's most egregious usurpations and abuses, and on the mainstream media itself.

The idea is to force open a long overdue national conversation that the elite MSM very much wants to ignore. In large strokes, it is about our federal government morphing into a socialist tyranny before our eyes, a tyranny that is no longer soft, but getting harder with every passing month. Which is it to be: freedom, or tyranny?

The first step in forcing open this dialogue will be to explore the mainstream media's active collusion in the cover-up of a scandal that is demonstrably orders of magnitude worse than the worst previous scandals, such as Watergate, which was "a third-rate burglary" where nobody was killed. To date, the DOJ's Operation Fast And Furious has resulted in hundreds of murdered Mexicans and at least two dead U.S. federal agents. But instead of providing real news coverage, the MSM feeds America the pabulum of celebrity worship and an artificially-contrived debate about artificial birth control.

Imagine for a moment if President Nixon's men, when called before the congressional committees invistigating the Watergate scandal, had provided nothing but thousands of pages of fully blacked-out paper. In effect, a giant, bored, "F--- you, what are you going to do about it?" to Congress. Then imagine if the Washington Post, the New York Times and the television networks never mentioned Watergate or the hearings, except rarely, and then only to call the congressional investigators partisan hacks who were bent on destroying our beloved President Nixon.

Reverse the party polarity, jump forward through the time warp, and you have the current reality, where gangsters rule the federal government from the White House, the Fast And Furious congressional investigators are impotent buffoons, and the MSM is fully in on the cover-up. Nobody died at the Watergate, but recall what the hysterical 24-7 news coverage of the Watergate scandal and hearings accomplished: the end of a presidency, pronto. And an Attorney General in prison.

In the modern case of Operation Fast And Furious, hundreds of Mexicans were murdered as the result of a diabolically evil plot laid with the sole purpose of discrediting the Second Amendment, by deliberately funneling semi-automatic rifles to known drug cartel killers and assassins. Their goal was to bury our Right to Keep and Bear Arms beneath a mountain of Mexican corpses.

Folks, it doesn't get much more evil than that.

And we know why these socialist dictators-in-waiting want us disarmed.

In 2012, the fictional premise of Enemies Foreign And Domestic, that a small clique of senior BATFE officials might conspire to arrange a mass shooting into a packed football stadium (also with the intention of discrediting our Right to Keep and Bear Arms), suddenly seems much less far-fetched.

So here's the plan: on Thursday, March 1, we will engineer a stratospheric spike in the number of free Kindle downloads of Enemies Foreign And Domestic, and continue this operation for up to five days, the max allowable under the terms of the free download program. Then we will sit back and watch the bewildered and alarmed MSM explore this sudden and frightening phenomenon erupting among the unwashed gun nuts and wild-eyed Constitution fanatics. You know, us. Real Americans, out here in fly-over countery.

And when they predictably condemn EFAD for its fictional assassinations of government officials, and the rest of the story that they will pretend to find so abhorrent, we will shine their own spotlight right back on them, and yell Fast And Furious in their faces!

"Really? Enemies Foreign And Domestic is a terrorist manual? Well, I'll see your fictional stadium massacre, and raise you a real-world conspiracy to murder hundreds of Mexicans for political purposes. If you would ever cover the story, instead of covering it up!"

And this can all happen by getting a million or so gun owners and other freedom lovers to download EFAD, totally for free, beginning on March 1st. This will be a coordinated "time-on-target" fire mission. Further communiques will be forthcoming from EFAD HQ. Search keyword #EFAD on Twitter for other operational updates, including links.

If you email me (steelcutter48 at gmail.com) , please include #EFAD somewhere in the subject line, so that I will know that you have been briefed to this point and are up to speed. And keep in mind that while you are all my patriotic friends and loyal readers, at various time I may know you by a screen name, a real name, a website name, or an email address name. It gets mighty confusing, so forgive me if I can't keep all of your various handles straight. And remember: D-Day is March 1.

Matt Bracken---Out.

Smoking Blunder Vs. Smoke and Thunder

For those folks that read this that don't follow other "gunny" blogs... a guy, who will remain nameless (mainly because it was never worth learning his name in the first place) created a "Gun Enthusiast's Social Network" called Smoke and Thunder.  He'd said it wasn't a blog and that all gun blogs should be shut down because there were too many of them... things like that.  Might have been interesting, except he created fake profiles for just about every gun blogger he could find.  I was fortunate enough to escape his compilation, so I can just sit back and laugh about the whole thing.  BUUUUUUTTTTT... when said bloggers came forward to claim their profiles and delete their profiles... he threw a hissy and locked it off from outside access and turned it into... wait for it... His personal rant blog.

Now I don't know if the claims that the Brady's and other anti-gunners were behind the whole thing are true or not, so I won't comment on that, but his rants got bad enough that a parody site was created for it... Smoking Blunder... (and no, I'm not putting in links to either of them, but you have google... that's what it's there for.)  Which was a stroke of genius... (ok you talked me into it... Smoking Blunder) and really summed up his attitude when everyone (rightfully) claimed copy write infringement for copying info for the fake profiles.

Anyway... I just went to see if he had any comment on his "personal gun blog" about the parody... and found... THIS!!!

For the record... I didn't do it... don't know who did... and don't want to know who did... but you rock, whoever you are. (even if you're Everett Ladd... I'd still give you props on this one, even if you did ban me on your stupid FB group.)

Tagbacks to the following: The Minuteman, Weer'd World, Gun Free Zone, and No Lawyers - Only Guns and Money (sorry guys, I only know a few of you by name so far)  


PS> If I commented on your blogs and you'd already noticed the hack/takedown and posted a later note... Oops... teach me to check a little better now... and I'm sorry.

Wow...

To put it mildly, I'm a little overwhelmed by the number of page views I've been getting since yesterday.  You guys/gals that have linked to my blog (and all the new readers), Thank YOU!  In the past 24 hours I've had more views than all the days before combined.  Makes me at least feel like I'm getting on the right track here.  I'm still learning about blogging and very much welcome comments from readers.

I'm going start doing a few reviews on stuff in the near future.  Most of it will be kind of a crossover... things I use over here at work that I also use back home.  For examples, The Leatherman MUT, 5.11 ATAC L2 light... Things like that that are handy for both the shooter and the boater.

As a note to the FTC JBT's, at least for now, all the things I review are things I've paid full retail for, there are no gimmies yet.  Well, eventually I'll get around to reviewing a 5.11 knife that I got free because I spent too much money on 5.11 stuff at a local store... But, even though I don't think that counts for a sponsored review, I'll make sure to note that it was a freebie.

Thanks again to everyone that's reposted the link to my blog, and gimmie some suggestions on what I'm doing wrong or right here.  I'm only twenty days in and still, as they say here about the FNG's, fresh fish.

...Sorry, you're stuck with my continuing attempts at a travel guide though.

Anti-Gun Bait and Switch

We'll see how long before I get blocked from viewing a certain Facebook Group for this one, but, just read a very interesting post while doing the old "Keep your friends close, and your enemy closer." thing.  For the record, I'm a VERY strong supporter of the US Constitution (and it's amendments), so anytime people want to infringe on any of the laws set down in that document, I get a wee bit bent out of shape.

Anyway, the NRA doesn't want people to have to register/declare legally owned firearms.  Something we should all agree with for various reasons regarding the security and illegitimate access to these registries.  Apparently the anti-gun crowd feel that denying this declaration/registry is begging for more suicidal soldiers.  While I can't say I agree with their views, I give it this, it's a well written article... except for one small teensy detail.  The numbers quoted in it suggest that guns aren't the big issue in "suicidal actions" and don't really support the writer's story.

Anyway, here's the article:
http://mediamatters.org/blog/201202230005

Did you catch that too?
Hemenway and Miller explain that firearms availability increases the risk of suicide for three reasons. First, "many suicidal acts -- one third to four fifths of all suicide attempts, according to studies -- are impulsive," with the vast majority of survivors waiting less than 1 hour between the decision to commit suicide and the attempt. Second, many suicide crises are temporary, which is why "more than 90% of people who survive a suicide attempt... do not go on to die by suicide." Third, guns are extremely lethal; "A suicide attempt with a firearm rarely affords a second chance. Attempts involving drugs or cutting, which account for more than 90% of all suicidal acts, prove fatal far less often."

Let's read that last sentence again... "Attempts involving drugs or cutting, which account for more than 90% of all suicidal acts, prove fatal far less often."   So guns are used less than 10% of the time... and they're the biggest problem? Interesting...

As the "Coffee Talk" lady used to say on SNL... "Talk amongst yourselves."

Edit- And... After < 8 hours with my comment pointing this out I've been blocked from commenting on the CSGV Facebook group now.  Sadly... I can't even see the nasty comments I gained for pointing this out to them. *shrug* Oh well... I can still do the "share and comment" trick :D

Darwin Award Candidates Wanted

Ok, I kind of made an unspoken vow to myself that I wouldn't crosspost from other blogs (too much), but this one is worthy of an exception... Coming from Tam over at View From the Porch comes this little gem:

FAKE BULLET PROOF VESTS NOW IN FASHION

Anyone want to take any bets on how soon some "gang-banger" thinks it's real and has his buddies try it out?

A Little Explanation

Wanted to clear something up here for those of you just clicking in.  The main idea for this blog is to kind of be a travel guide for people working in the oil field, or those adventurous souls that want to visit places REALLY off the beaten track. 

I will be doing some other subjects too following my interests, but I wanted to point out that I will have everything tagged as to whether it's the travel advice, reviews, rants, etc.  Your best bet is to use those tags to your advantage if you're looking for something in particular once I really get a feel for blogging and pick up the pace here.

Thanks for stopping by!
JB

"You Are Welcome"

These are likely to be the first words you hear when you are going to Nigeria.  Whether it's on the plane en-route, or at customs and immigration, somebody will tell you "you are welcome." This is one of the wonderful things about Nigeria.  The people are for the most part very friendly and warm, and will greet perfect strangers with open arms.  Your first experience with Nigerian food probably has already happened on the plane if you flew Delta, so we won't get into that yet.  Let's start with getting through the airport (Murtala Muhammed in Lagos).

Shame on you National Geographic!

This isn't going to be a regular type of posting on here, but for the few people following this blog so far that might not have heard about it otherwise, I thought I'd bring up the craziness surrounding "Doomsday Preppers."

An Introduction to Nigeria

So, I get a lot of questions from friends about working in Nigeria.  "Is it safe?" No, not really.  "What's it like?" Kind of like being in Joseph Conrad's writing.  But I digress, the following is the beginning of a more complete account of what life Nigeria is like.

Why? ... and who the heck am I?

Ok, I admit it, I looked at the comments when one of my friends on a social site "pimped me out" to her circles (BTW, thanks L!) and a really good question was asked. "Where is he going with it?"

Even guards need sleep...

For reference... this would be the man with the AKM... protecting YOU! 

Welcome Aboard... Ignore the man with the AKM there. He's here for your protection.

Oh sweet mother of God, what have I done? A blog you ask? Why? Well, there are definitely plenty of "Gun" blogs... but how many by ship Captains dropped into some of the most inhospitable places on earth?  I mean, how many bloggers (aside from you guys serving in the military) are actually surrounded by people that are annoyed by your very presence in their country and would LOVE to take you for a scenic jungle tour in return for your company paying them lots of money to bring you back?

Yup... so that's why I'm writing a blog... That and my draft copy of a travel guide for people in the oil industry got wiped out when my hard drive crashed and I learned the hard way that not paying attention when formatting a drive can be disastrous when you wipe your backup drive instead of the main drive. (OOPS!)

So sit back, pull up a spool, or hose, or something to sit on, and I'll call the canoe girls to bring the beer.  I might have a good story to share, or this may be a fantastic waste of bandwidth.  We'll see.