Insert Godfather Quote Here...

Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in...

Sooooo... Anybody still reading this silly blog? Just in case I have any viewers left, after a stint in the Gulf of Mexico, I'M BAAAAAAAACK... working overseas again.   Little different place, little safer in some ways, little more dangerous in others. How will it all play out? Guess we'll just have to see.

Stick around here though, and I'll try and share some of my Middle East adventures with you guys if, or rather when, they happen.

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.

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.

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.

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

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?"

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.