Lying Liberals and the 50 Caliber Boogyman

I was listening to "loveline" on Kroq tonight, and one of the guys (yes, I don't even know their names) made an outrageous statement. Pardon me for my poor aural memory, but it was something like: "95% of Americans don't want just anybody to be able to buy a rifle that could shoot down an airliner". Wow. Now I know a thing or two about guns, so it made me instantly angry that someone could say something so stupid. But then I sadly realized that because so many Americans don't know anything about guns, the anti-gun cult has a willing audience to whom they can peddle this kind of nonsense.

So lets learn about guns. :) First, what gun was loveline's "political savant" refering to? As you've probably guessed from my title, the 50 caliber bmg. It's a rifle with usually a single shot, five shot, or ten shot capacity that shoots 1/2 inch diameter rounds. The extreme range of such a gun is approximately 1.5 miles (that means unless you are a skilled sniper, good luck hitting anything that far away). I believe the average accurate range of the gun is about 1000 yards. Now in order to shoot down an airliner, how far would the gun have to shoot? Airliners usually fly at about 30,000 feet, which is about 5 1/2 miles up. The fifty caliber rifle on a good day would fall 4 miles short. Oops, can't kill an airliner there. Secondly, lets say someone manages to hit an airliner in flight (because you can't "shoot down" one that's on the ground) they will make a giant 1/2 inch hole in the plane. Yes, as logic would have it, the plane would keep flying. A single 1/2 inch hole just isn't enough to stop a 155 ft long, 41000lb airliner (the size of a 747). Now even if the bullet did penetrate the pressurized cabin, the airliner would have a leak. It would not decompress in a huge fireball like Hollywood wants you to think. The worst thing that would happen is the pilot would have to take the plane down to 10000 ft and fly the rest of the way to the airport. A short quiz: if someone wanted to take down an airliner, would he: A) buy a stinger missile and shoot it at the plane, B) buy a $4000 50 cal rifle and plink at it, C) sneak a bomb on board or, D) either A or C. If you picked A, C, or D, you are correct. The reality of it is you can't shoot down an airliner with a 50 caliber rifle. It only happens in movies, if that. Incidentally, one of the greatest fighters in the history, the F-86 Sabre, was armed with six 50 caliber machine guns, and most of it's pilots considered to be lacking in the firepower department. In fact, many pilots ended up shooting all eighteen hundred rounds of ammunition on board at a single target without scoring a kill. Now if eighteen hundred rounds of 50 caliber ammunition has trouble taking down a Mig-15 (much smaller than a 747), how do you think someone armed with ten 50 caliber rounds is going to fare against an airliner? Only a liberal would be stupid enough to think they have a chance.

So, the next time a liberal tells you about the dangers of 50 caliber rifles to airliners, give him a lecture on the boogyman in his bedroom closet. After all, both subjects are in the same catagory: absurd fantasy.

Unrelated

Tonight, I had the patience to wait through the ads and watch "The Siege" on TNT with Denzel Washington. I've watched it before, but tonight it just struck me how out of touch hollywood is with reality. For those of you who haven't watched the movie, the plot is simple: terrorists start bombing New York on a massive scale, the fbi tries to stop the bombings, fails, and the army is brought in. Obviously, this movie is pre-9/11, and it's plot loosely resembles the situation in post-9/11 New York... Terrorist attack by Muslims on the terror watch list that made it in anyways, young arab muslim bombers, lots of Americans killed, yada yada... Anyhow, the movie makes several assumptions (about America) that, with the advantage of hindsight, we can compare to reality.

1) Assumption: Massive hatecrimes against Muslims. Reality check: there was something like ONE vigilante killing against a Muslim after Sept 11.
2) Assumption: Muslim groups (specifically in the movie, the "anti-defamation league"), despite so-called "discrimination" against them, would largely denounce the terrorist attacks and support our continued war on terror. Reality check: Muslim groups were largely mute (of course there where a few exceptions, the "anti-defamation league" not one of them) and continue to work today to question the validity of the war on terror.
3) Assumption: The American people would call on the president to impliment marshal law after a large attack. Reality check: It didn't happen. And no one even considered it.
4) Assumption: It's more effective to fight terror at home as a police operation than to go abroad and find the instigators. That's right, Hollywood really thinks this. In the movie, during a "meeting" of top cabinet members and senators (what are senators doing in a cabinet meeting anyways?) the idea of finding those responsible abroad was dimissed with the lame excuse of it being "too hard to find out who really responsible". Reality check: OBVIOUSLY this adminstration's policy of decapitating the terrorist leadership has worked well, because despite frankly dismal security here at home (the open border with mexico as an example), we still haven't had another major attack.
5) Assumption: The president would order the military to occupy New York, the military would really follow that order, detain large numbers of people, and summarily execute suspected terrorists. Reality check: not only has it not happened it will not happen in the near future. Who do you think the military is made of? Your neighbor's son, that's who. The military is pretty close to the people, and from the stories I've seen coming out of Iraq and Afganistan it is composed largely of men who hold their duty and honor to protect America, it's people, and their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness in a much higher regard than many of the people here in America who get to enjoy those rights every day.

Well there you go, Hollywood out of touch again. But I'm sure it's obvious to most. :)

Btw, sorry about the spelling and any gramatical errors. It's late so I'm going to look it over in the morning.

Pongyang's New Communist Paper

It's called the LA times.

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/la-fg-chat3mar03,1,567032.story?ctrack=2&cset=true

Barring the New York Times, this is the more outrageous non-sense I've seen printed in a major newspaper. Excuse me, a "North Korean Businessman"??? Is Mrs. Demick that stupidly naive? A businessman who calls himself "Mr. Anonymous"? His comments were personal? He says this: "We Asians are traditional people," "We prefer to have a benevolent father leader." Yea, let me go knock on my neighbor's door. I'm sure being a "traditional asian" he would prefer a "benevolent father leader" like Kim Jong Il any day over you know, a democratically elected one. You know, it's not like it's possible this "businessman" could you know, could work for the North Korean government... I'm sure all those people in the gulags really agree with him. "Yea, my benevolent father leader executed my son, ordered my wife raped, and condemned the next three generations of my family to life in the gulag. I just really love it here in North Korea..."

And the "businessman" continues : "Is there any country where there is a 100% guarantee of human rights? Certainly not the United States," "There is a question of what is a political prisoner. Maybe these people are not political prisoners but social agitators." Excuse me, but someone really believes this crap? This is communist propaganda right from the horses mouth and the LA times is eating it up like it's mommy's special recipe for apple cream pie.

While Westerners tend to stress the rights of the individual, he said, "we have chosen collective human rights as a nation…. We should have food, shelter, security rather than chaos and vandalism. The question of our survival as a nation is dangling." Wow. Anyone else here want to be on the "collective rights" boat? Jump right in, I'm sure the LA times will make room.

"There is love. (For the great "father leader") There is hate. (for anyone that speaks against the government) There is fighting. (In the gulags for food) There is charity… (Meaning, the government lets "businessmen" who kiss up to Kim Jong Il live). People marry. They divorce. (When their spouse gets labeled an enemy of the state) They make children (When the power's out for 18 hours a day)," he said.

Anyone who still subscibes to the LA times, now's the day to pick a new paper. The OC Register is an excellent choice for people in this area, or the Wall Street Journal is always an option.