Thursday, December 03, 2015

The reality of why gun control...even tightened background checks will never pass under Obama...

I was watching coverage of the terrorist attack in California and the issue turned away from this insider attack back to guns...in particular gun control.

It will never happen under this President.  The reason is really quite simple.  The games that the President and his democrat colleagues played after Sandy Hook.  Let's take a trip down memory lane, with a quick down and dirty.  The tragedy hit and the President started talking about gun control.  Senator Diane Feinstein got with her allies in the ATF and drew up a plan to reinstate the Assault Weapons Ban.

The push was on and it took a hellacious push by the Gun Owners of America, note that the NRA was on the verge of rolling over.  But the effort to reinstate the AWB was killed.

Then stepped in the traitor Senator Joe Manchin and he put forward a bill to increase background checks.  That too was defeated and many people wondered why.  It was really very simple.  We saw how things played out in California. The gun control zealots started off with background checks to get their nose under the tent.  Next thing you know we see magazine size limitations, a de facto state ban on assault weapons...essentially the most rigorous gun laws in the US.  On top of all of this we see a competition in liberal states to see who can pass the most restrictive laws possible.

For those of us that live in free states (yeah...the irony of that is both personally ironic and chilling...many of the first "gun control laws" were aimed at freed blacks) we've seen the playbook and will not be fooled.

Until the govt shows a bit of competence and until trust is restored, it will be impossible to pass any form of gun control.  The current President is too polarizing an individual for a compromise to happen.

The only thing this push is going to do (and it will fail) is to spur more gun sales.

Side Note:  Lets go into fantasy land.  Lets say that a gun ban is put in place tomorrow.  Can you imagine the black market that will pop up?  How about the mass public disobedience that will happen when calls to turn in your weapons are ignored?  This is the USA not Australia or Britain.  I know I would ignore the call to turn in my gear and would  bet money that they wouldn't be able to track me down (ok they probably could but that's alot of door to door work...plus I'd lie my ass off and say that I sold them and then dig them up once the authorities left).  The perfect utopian world that the gun grabbers want just can't happen.  At least not  in my lifetime.

Dahir Insaat - Russia Deployable Anti-Tank HE Missile Rounds Combat Simulation (Vid)

If the Russians could actually get this to work then this would be devastating...but one question.  Why would they use American C-5's as the deployment vehicle and then have Russian tanks as the aggressor force?

McCain gives the F-35 program the bad news.



via Bloomberg (this is an interview with John McCain read it all here)...
“That leaves well over 2,000 to complete the program” so “we would have to purchase 100 F-35s per year for more than 20 years at a cost of $10 billion to $12 billion a year,” said McCain, an Arizona Republican. “That seems unlikely, and all that assumes the F-35 will provide the necessary capability.”
This is the most damning indictment of the F-35 and the Pentagons plan I've heard yet.  McCain is a hawk of hawks.  There isn't a military program that he doesn't like but he says "100 F-35s per year for more than 20 years at 10 to 12 billion per year"...in essence he's saying that they won't be able to push the cost curve down.  In other words the Pentagon and Program Office is feeding us bullshit.

But that's not even the worst of it.  Read it and weep fan boys...
"...assumes the F-35 will provide the necessary capability."
That should be chilling for F-35 supporters.  McCain has the secret information.. gets to peek behind the curtain and he is telling us that the F-35 isn't all that it's cracked up to be.  If you take the time to read the entire article, he makes a cleansing statement toward the end but those with eyes to see and a willingness to accept reality know the truth.

Critical mass has finally arrived.

The F-35 program isn't in a death spiral...it's in a flat spin headed out to sea.

Underreported Side Note:  We have word that the Singaporean Air Force has decided to upgrade its fleet of F-16s.  Story here.  This is another "admission" that the F-35 will not deliver on its promise.  Singapore is extremely frugal and are resistant to any pressure that LM might apply.  They're also brutal when it comes to dealing with corrupt officials...with the news that the Australian Senate is going to investigate the efficacy of purchasing the F-35, its turning into a terrible week for the airplane.

Wednesday, December 02, 2015

A little levity after today's madness. Batman vs Superman is gonna be good!



Awesome!  I might actually have to see this!

Stop calling the California incident "Domestic Terrorism"!

via Wikipedia.
Domestic terrorism in the United States consists of incidents confirmed as or suspected to be terrorist acts. These attacks are considered domestic because they were carried out by U.S. citizens or U.S. permanent residents.[1]
That is how its defined in the US by code of law.  This is how its defined in the rest of the world...again via Wiki...
Homegrown terrorism or domestic terrorism is commonly associated with violent acts committed by citizens or permanent residents of a state against their own people or property within that state without foreign influence in an effort to instill fear on a population or government as a tactic designed to advance political, religious, or ideological objectives.[1]
Its nuanced but the details make the difference.

The incident in California cannot be called domestic terrorism if it can be reasonably assumed that the terrorists were influenced by ISIS.

So FUCKINIG STOP calling this domestic terroristm.  ITS NOT.  This is plain and simple terrorism.  ISIS successfully hit us.  Deal with the reality and stop playing word games!!!

NOTE:  After thinking about this a bit more not only is this terrorism (without the caveat of being called "domestic") but it also bears all the hallmarks of "Insider Attacks" that our forces experienced in Iraq/Afghanistan.  So called naturalized or 2nd gen citizens that go on a rampage on behalf to ISIS?  Yeah.  A terroristic insider attack is a much better definition of this and the Boston Bombing.

14 dead, 14 wounded in Inland Empire, CA.

 I'm waiting to see on this one.  Of course we have the usual parade of officials on camera talking alot but saying nothing...

Three guys in military garb carrying rifles?

Yeah...I'm waiting for the next shoe to drop.

NOTE:  Don't jump to the conclusion that this is ISIS.  Sovereign Citizen Movement, White Supremacists, even Mexican Drug Cartels could be involved.  The only thing that throws this into the realm of an organized group is the fact that three guys wearing military type garb hit the community center.  With the rise of the internet, we could easily be seeing the first of a new type of mass murder scenario.  Guys get together that just want to go on a killing spree.

NOTE 1:  I hate to go here but I have to keep it real.  We're talking about a mass shooting.  We're talking about a man hunt.  We have no description of the dead shooters and no indication of the race of the guy they might be looking for.  Surely this info has to be in the hands of LEOs.  Why aren't they telling us anything on that?  Yeah.  I despise racial politics but in the case of identifying a threat to the public it only makes sense.

BREAKING! Kendall says production of the F-35 may be slowed to meet budget caps!

Thanks to CharleyA for the great news!

via Reuters.
Dec 2 The Pentagon's fiscal 2017 budget plan may slow production of key weapons programs, including Lockheed Martin Corp's F-35 fighter jet, in order to meet budget caps imposed by an agreement with Congress, the Pentagon's chief arms buyer said Wednesday.
Frank Kendall, undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, told reporters after a speech at an industry conference that the new radar-evading F-35 fighter was the Defense Department's "most cutting-edge capability," but other priorities needed funding as well.
"Dollar for dollar it probably gives us more combat capability than any other investment that we're making, but we've got a lot of other things that we need to do as well," he said. "It's not entirely fenced." Kendall gave no details on the likely scope of the expected cuts in production of the F-35 fighter jet, which is already cleared for combat use by the Marine Corps.
(Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
Absolutely fucking awesome.

U. S. Marine Corps Research Findings: Where is the Case for Co-Ed Ground Combat?

Many thanks to Stuart for sending me this link!

No commentary on this one.  Take the time to read it for yourself.  To say that it's eye opening is an understatement.  

Is the F-35 as stealthy as we're being led to believe?

We talk about the F-35 alot on these pages because I believe its destroying the defense budget, hindering needed modernization of our ground forces and will fail to deliver what's being promised.

If you've monitored the conversations here, you'll notice that proponents no longer talk about the F-35 being able to fly as fast, as high or be as maneuverable as our current fighters.  They say that its not necessary because the F-35 is stealthy.  It will see the enemy first, shoot first and leave the area before its detected.  Lets assume that argument has merit.  The next question becomes...is the F-35 as stealthy as we're being led to believe?  Do an eyeball test.  Below are pics of the X-35....




This airplane has the look that we've come to associate with stealth aircraft.  To be quite honest in this form it actually does look like its stablemate, the  F-22 (pic below).


But look at what the F-35 has turned into now?  Does it meet the eye test?




I don't know what happened between the X-plane and the production version but to this aviation neophyte the plane has lost its stealth characteristics somewhere along the way...at the very least it doesn't appear to be as stealthy as the original design.

What say you?  Am I way off base and the eye test doesn't apply or could I actually be onto something?  Oh and consider this.  If the F-35 has seen even a modest reduction in its stealth profile then the argument that it will get first look, first shoot suddenly loses alot of steam.  Against a near peer foe, we will see radars that are equal to our own....and against a networked air defense complex these planes will be sitting ducks.

Carter Hits Gulf Allies for Prioritizing Air, Not Ground, Forces

via Defense News.
"I'm going to be very candid with you: Many of the Gulf States weigh air capabilities, air forces and so forth over ground forces and special operations forces," Carter said.
"If they want to — as we would wish them to — wield more influence in the Middle East and do more to secure this part of the world in which they live, they're going to need to do more of that on the ground," he continued. "Buying our airplanes is fine, and we provide them, but when it comes to ground forces and special operations forces, there is no question they need to build those forces and wield them."
"They frequently complain to me, for example, about how capable the Iranians are, to which I say 'yes, and you're not in the same game, an effective game on the ground,'" he said.
WOW!

Mr Sec how about you fix your own house first before you complain about what others are doing!  The USMC is headed down the road of being aviation centric, the F-35 is raping the defense dept and even the US Army is buying more helicopters...all while we're shedding ground combat power.

Simply amazing.