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May 2017
The Supreme Court appears to have a dry sense of humor!
Checking out today's List of Orders from the Supreme Court, I was struck by two at the top of the list, in which the Court rejected petitions for certiorari "because the Court lacks a quorum" (which is six Justices, BTW). The first one ended: "The Chief Justice, Justice Kennedy, Justice Thomas, Justice Ginsburg, Justice Breyer, Justice Alito, Justice Sotomayor, and Justice Kagan took no part in the consideration or decision of this petition." That's eight Justices, I guess they had to leave Justice Gorsuch, as the junior Justice, to enter the order.
I checked and yes, these were two cases where someone needed meds more than judicial remedies. One was captioned to include as petitioners "and all other allies of the United States of America," and as respondents "BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, 7+years Imperial Administrations and Expulsions Fuzes of President Barack Hussein Obama and Vice President "Joe" Biden, JOSEPH "JOE" BIDEN, 7+years Imperial Administrations and Expulsions Fuzes of President Barack Hussein Obama and Vice President Joseph "Joe" Biden, S. BREYER, Scoutus Dictum Expulsion Fainaiguing Fuzes and others."
Hackers steal IDs from FLA gun permit database
Story here. Apparently they got 16,000 files, which is described as 1% of the total (1.6 million permits?)
Interesting....
Local news
The FBI has arrested a man (a school security monitor, no less) for threatening the life of U.S. Representative Martha McSally. Local "protests" against her have focused on her support for Donald Trump's proposals, and that support was the motive for his death threats. So much for Tucson's Revive Civility Month.
I wonder how much publicity this would get if political roles were reversed.....
Murder is a concentrated event
John Lott points out that in 2014, 54% of American counties had zero murders, and 69% had either zero or one murder. In comparison, the 1% of counties with the worst murder rates contributed 37% of the total murders nationwide, and the 5% of counties with the highest murder rates contributed 68% of the murders nationwide.
Answering the questions that need to be asked
Is your meth gluten-free? I trust the offer of free testing is tongue-in-cheek.
Scope sights in 1775?
Clayton Cramer finds a 1775 reference to a firearm "with a Telescope sight." This does push the dating back quite a bit; from what I can find, most sources put the origins of scope sights no earlier than the 1830s.
H&K Stopping American sales?
An FFL has sent me a notice alleged to come from H&K (in Germany) saying that it has ceased supplying the domestic US market as of May 1, owing to some general BS, and asking the FFL to respond to a survey giving his location and how many various types of H&K arms he has sold (period of the sales not specified). The response is to be mailed to H&K at Str. 1, 78727 Oberdorf aN. The FFL enclosed an image of the alleged notice.
It sounds like BS to me, although I cannot figure out a motive.
This is the mass media to which I am accustomed
After running a column comparing NRA members unfavorably to ISIS members, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch suspends a columnist who wrote a response. Free marketplace of ideas, no way!