Posse Incitatus

Wikipedia gets the bullet bubble wrong

As is my wont, I sometimes wander through Wikipedia and see where the articles take me.

Generally speaking, the historical entries are pretty good.  The rule seems to be:  the more remote the event, the more accurate (and less biased) the information.

Contemporary events are much more suspect.

So it was that I stumbled upon this article about what we at the Posse have long called the "bullet bubble" but what Wikipedia terms "2008–13 United States ammunition shortage."

For those of our readers who have been waiting for a mea culpa regarding my predictions, this is your big moment:  I was wrong about the bullet bubble.

Then again, so is Wikipedia.

What I interpreted as a surge in panic-driven demand was actually a shift in the demand curve itself.  People weren't making panic buys so much as simply favoring new calibers.

As I noted at the time, the bigger calibers were quick to replenish themselves.  The shortage persisted longest in .22 Long Rifle and smaller self-defense rounds.

This wasn't because of "panic buying" but rather a long-term shift in buying habits.  As more women entered the firearms marketplace, those calibers that best suited them started feeling a surge of demand.  Concurrent with this was the widespread introduction of sporting rifles in the .22 LR caliber.  These "AR-22s" offered the look and feel of iconic weapons with the simplicity of blowback operation and minimal recoil.

You can even use them at indoor handgun ranges.

It's also worth noting that shotgun ammunition was never scarce.  The shortage - such as it was - was confined to specific calibers.  It appears that manufacturers have at long last adjusted their production to popular demand.

Of course, the advent of the The Trumpening also is pushing ammo prices downwards.  It is ironic that Barack Obama - who clearly loathed firearms - was the greatest firearms salesman in history.  One of his last acts of defiance was to try to ban lead bullets on federal land.  Needless to say, the regulation died a much-deserved death.

All across our great land, people are breathing a sigh of relief.  The right to self-defense is secure again.  

Scaramucci Scaramucci Will You Do the Fandango

Okay, let's address this right off the bat: I have often harshly criticized liberals and progressives for being foul-mouthed, unhinged and lacking in substance with their rants. I would be remiss -- not to mention a hypocrite -- if I didn't also chastise President Trump's new communications director, Anthony Scaramucci, for his late-night meltdown with a reporter for The New Yorker.

I hesitate to describe what Scaramucci said regarding Reince Priebus, who got sacked the following day as chief of staff. Let's just say it involved the "appendage" part of a man's anatomy, and an oral sexual act. Suffice it to say, the rude & crude New Yorker did not use the scientific term for the male organ. The next day, Scaramucci came up with a lame excuse about trusting a reporter with off the record comments. Come again? A member of a Republican administration trusting a left-wing journalist when the reporter says something is off the record? Surely Scaramucci cannot be that naive. That is why alcohol may be the culprit.

Look, Big Tony might be an effective guy in the long run. He's certainly accomplished, having earned a Harvard law degree and made millions of dollars as a big-wig Wall Street investment banker. Trump has made his share of mistakes, but he has surrounded himself with plenty of what I believe to be excellent leaders -- Priebus' successor as chief of staff, Gen. John Kelly, is a prime example. Then there are the cabinet secretaries such as Gen. James Mattis (Defense), Rex Tillerson (State), Dr. Tom Price (HHS), and Attorney General Jeff Sessions as well as EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt. All solid individuals who are infinitely better than the statists and hacks of the Obama administration.

So Scaramucci, despite his shortcomings and apparent short fuse, might well right the listing White House communications ship. But to do so, the president himself needs to learn to tamp down his undisciplined, loose-cannon impulses manifested by his middle-of-the-night and early morning tweets. And that's asking a lot.

On the positive side, Gen. Kelly may be just what the doctor ordered as far as imposing greater discipline and a deliberate, methodical approach on the Trump White House. If he and Scaramuci lock horns, I hope Trump gives the upper hand to Kelly, and that seems probable since Trump has repeatedly shown that he respects the military and its leaders.

But moving away from communications, Trump needs to get more engaged and be a salesman for his initiatives. During the past few months, he did not appear to make any effort to understand or articulate the complex issues of health care reform. I believe if he had gone out on the road and rallied support for Obamacare reform by staying on message with cogent, powerful talking points, he might have generated sufficient momentum to begin dismantling the Obamacare behemoth.

Yes, he may have had to cut some backroom deals with a couple of Republican senators to grease the skids, but he ought to know by now that he will never be able to avoid the sleaze or be entirely upright to get things done. After all, if you're going to drain the swamp, you'll have to wade into the murky water with the yucky algae, leeches and bloodsuckers. It ain't a pretty job.

I really hope The Donald will get passionate about tax reform, which, if implemented, can give a badly needed shot in the arm to our sickly economy and get his presidency back on track. Cutting the corporate and individual tax rates is, in my estimation, even more critical than building the wall on the Mexican border. Failure to do so will surely be a death blow to the GOP's 2018 congressional hopes, and probably to Trump's presidency.

The past six months have been rocky, just as my co-blogger and I knew they would be. But much of the sturm and drang is agitated and stirred up by a corrupt press that is dying to see Trump fail and wants him gone yesterday. Some of it, too, is due to disloyal members of the Trump team who care more about their own self-serving purposes more than they do about being loyal to Trump and helping the nation.

It may be a clown show full of drama queens, bad actors and a second-rate script. But it's not Hillary Clinton. Even if Trump's administration did absolutely, literally NOTHING for four straight years, it would be infinitely better than the lying, corrupt harridan and the catastrophe her policies would bring: Opening up the floodgates to non-assimilating, Third World immigrants, an increase in terrorism, left-wing Supreme Court justices, restrictions on free speech and firearms ownership, abortion on demand, higher taxes, "green" policies that would spike electricity rates and force us all to drive clown cars... The list goes on. So no matter how bad or inept Trump is, I will never doubt that Hillary would be far worse.

Obama's stupid Libyan adventure continues to haunt us

Reading the grim news that North Korea continues to refine and improve its missile technology, one can't avoid reflecting on how disastrous Obama's foreign policy really was.

It's a rich topic for discussion and I could do a whole series of blog posts trying to sift through exactly which blunder was the worst, but let's just content ourselves with examining the many ways his decision to embark on an unauthorized elective war in Libya has made the world a more dangerous place.

The first and most obvious effect was that it turned Gaddafi's oddball kingdom into a failed state.  Daffy Gaddafi was eccentric and obnoxious, but he also kept a lid on the place.  He was a thorn in our side until the invasion of Iraq, when he decided that it was a good time to come clean with his WMD programs.

After that, he was quite reasonable and kept his nose clean.  Traditional diplomacy teaches us that enemies who lay down their arms and agree to cooperate should be treated with the utmost courtesy as an object lesson to others.  Gaddafi could have been a shining example that abandoning WMD research is a path to acceptance in the global community and removes the target that might otherwise be on your back.

Hillary's stupid "We came, we saw, he died," quip did just the opposite.  It sent a clear and unmistakable message that the United States cannot be trusted.  If you if you switch sides, we might arbitrarily overthrow you at any point in the future.

The only sure way of keeping our random military might away from you is to get working nukes as soon as possible.  Hence North Korea and Iran both racing to get the bomb.

Libya is now a haven for ISIS and the constant flow of migrants - a flow Gaddafi controlled while he was in power - is destabilizing Europe. 

For all the Democrat snark that George W. Bush had no exist strategy in Iraq, their acquiescence to the Libyan debacles shows they have zero credibility.  Dubya at least could claim that his planners told him it would work and he trusted them.

The Obama administration has no such excuse.  They ran for office largely by hammering Iraq as a disaster and then made a bigger one.

Trump faces many daunting challenges, and Libya is a big one.  If would be nice if the Principled Foreign Policy Geniuses of the Vichy Republicans would give up on their childish antics and start helping Trump solve the messes Obama left behind.

Trump’s Trans announcement shows his adaptive tactics

Great strategists often make mistakes.  What sets them apart is that they rarely make the same mistake twice.

Stepping away from the now-all-to-normal sound and fury, Trump’s decision to announce the new military transgender policy demonstrates how much of an adaptive tactician his is – and why his opponents should never underestimate him.

Before going further, it’s important to map out the political terrain he was working with.

Despite much hoopla at the time (and screeching now), the Obama policy didn’t actually change anything when it was announced – it was merely a statement that things would change later, after Obama left office.  It was typical progressive virtue signaling – Obama got the credit, but his successor would have to figure out how to make it work.

This is a key point lost on people who ought to know better (cough – John McCain – cough).

Then-SecDef Ash Carter’s announcement was that the service chiefs had to figure out a policy to accommodate transgenders one year later – that is July 1, 2017.

McCain of all people should have been aware that even with a year of lead time, the military leaders couldn’t do it.  They asked for more time, and were given a six-month extension by our current SecDef, James Mattis.

A key part of the equation is that Mattis is virtually alone at the Defense Dept.  Very few of Trump’s people have been placed, so as we have seen elsewhere, Trump had every reason to expect damaging leaks if it looked like the policy was going to change.

So he pre-empted it.

His decision to tweet out a formal policy statement completely check-mated the Obama Deep State operatives in the DoD.  As Commander-in-Chief he gives the orders.  Generals who don’t like it can either toe the line or quit.

Such orders need not be printed on stationary.  They could be verbal and relayed by phone or radio.  Trump's decision to use a 21st Century platform merely shows that despite his age, he remains far more up to date than many of his critics.

In one bold move, he completely changed the dynamic within the bureaucracy. 

Contrast this with the clusterfark in the Justice Dept., packed with Obama loyalists who rejoice in violating professional rules of conduct.  It is a felony to leak classified information, or information related to an ongoing investigation, but this happens so often as to be unremarkable. 

The lesson Trump learned is this:  the federal bureaucracy believes it can act with impunity, utterly ignoring the law.

Had he done what the neutered Quisling Never Trumpers demanded, his policy change would have been beset with calculated leaks, lies and sabotage.  News stories would feature quotes from anonymous insiders who insist that the generals are so into having trannies in the military, they can't wait to begin their own transition.

Trump knew that he had to assume sabotage within the DoD, so he pre-empted it.

A lot of the anger over his move is because it was so effective.

Whats going on with the Dem Congressional tech support staffers?

From the way the media is covering it, one would think that the Russian FSB has its own branch office in the West Wing.  One of my frustrations with the whole sordid exercise is that there is no underlying crime, let alone a coverup.  “Collusion” in the criminal sense refers to businesses attempting to fix prices and establish a monopolistic marketplace.

Transient political alliances during campaign season are as old as our Republic and yes, they often involve foreign entities trying to influence US policy.  You know, nation of immigrants and all that.

Meanwhile, the press has shown vanishingly little interest in the curious case of the House Democrats’ Pakistani information technology specialists, one of whom was arrested Tuesday while trying to flee the country.

Everything about this is fishy, from their background to their lifestyle and the pathetic Democrat attempts to cover everything up.  You’d think rogue IT staff would fill the Dem leadership with outrage and alarm, leading to swift demands for a full investigation.  Yet they are doing the exact opposite, trying to smother the story and even threatening the police for moving forward.

The guy trying to flee had been barred from using the Congressional computer network, yet he was still on the payroll.  Nice work if you can get it, but again:  why? 

Trump dumps trans in military, GOP establishment recoils in horror

As everyone knows by now, the president issued a rather formal tweet this morning reversing the Obama administration policy on transsexuals serving in the military.

What caught my attention is the fact that once again the Staunch Conservatives^TM of the GOP Establishment have fallen over themselves to denounce it.

Well of course.

Conservatism, Inc. always talks the good game about principles and traditional values, but they never, ever try to reverse a gain of the cultural left.  It simply isn't done.

Had Jeb Bush somehow slithered into the White House, he would have let the Obama policy stand because to do otherwise would be "bigoted."

And that's the way it always goes.  National Review hammered home the need for a Constitutional amendment to protect traditional marriage, but as soon as the Supreme Court imposed same-sex marriage by judicial fiat, they practically wept with relief, claiming that the issue was now off the table.

Just to review for the learning impaired (by which I mean the staffs of the Weekly Standard and National Review), Trump won the primary because unlike the singing eunuchs of Conservatism, Inc., he fights.

The Vichy Republicans talk a lot about fighting, but they drop their rifles as soon as the battle is joined.  Once again, Trump has revealed them for the gutless poseurs they truly are.

Lay Off Jeff Sessions!

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is a good man. His conservative bona fides are beyond dispute, and he was one of President Trump's earliest and most loyal supporters going back to the 2015 Republican primaries.

It is disgraceful the way President Trump has been trashing Sessions' name in public the past couple weeks, saying he's angry and disappointed that Sessions recused himself from any Department of Justice investigation into alleged ties between Trump's campaign and the Russians. It is absurd for Trump to claim Sessions should have informed him prior to his nomination that he would recuse himself from a Russian investigation, since, at that time, we didn't know there would be a special prosecutor or that this whole charade would blow up like it has.

But just as important, it would have been perceived as a blatant conflict of interest if a Sessions-led Department of Justice investigated the Russian matter. Trump ought to know by now that he's damned if he does, damned if he doesn't when it comes to getting more positive coverage from a thoroughly corrupt and compromised news media, or getting the benefit of the doubt from Democrats (fat chance!).

Sessions has done some great things during his short time in office, including beginning a crackdown on criminal illegal aliens, stepping up border enforcement and cracking down on sanctuary cities. Should Trump can him, it will be damned difficult for the Donald to get someone as equally qualified and committed to replace him who could secure Senate confirmation in short order. The last thing we need now is more turbulence and instability in the Department of Justice, and an AG seat that goes vacant for months while mindless sniping continues.

On top of all that, Sessions left an excellent, secure seat in the U.S. Senate, where he was well respected and highly regarded on both sides of the aisle, to take this job in good faith. For the Donald to publicly pillory him and leave him high and dry would be a classless and mean-spirited thing to do -- something you'd expect a progressive to do, but not a "man of the people," as Trump purports to be.

I hope and pray Trump doesn't can Sessions. Because, whether the Donald realizes it or not, it's going to be harder and harder to find the kind of loyal soldiers he wants to fight his battles if the perception grows that he's unstable, a total ass to work for, and a job might only last 4-8 months before you'll get the heave-ho.

Drain the swamp, yes, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

 

 

 

 

 

Whither Detroit?

There has always been a tendency to romanticize violence.  The left in particular has made a fetish out of the "wretched of the earth" rising up and attacking their capitalist oppressors.  It pervades their thought and their art.  The epic movie Spartacus was written by noted Communist Dalton Trumbo, who dropped numerous references to class resistance that were utterly out of place in the context of ancient Rome.

(The excellent score was written by Alex North, who was also a Fellow Traveler.)

Reading some of the coverage of the Detroit riots, I'm struck by people who refer to it as a rebellion.  Against what?  Prosperity?  Quality schools?  Safe neighborhoods?

It is heart-breaking to read about black-owned stores that were looted and burned during the mayhem.  Who did this help?

Anyone who has studied the matter can only conclude that the whole episode was a tragedy in the Greek sense - the various parties seemed driven to make a series of bad decisions that piled up, one on top of the other.  The authorities made a total hash of the situation, uncertain of what to do and vacillating wildly between taking a soft touch on one street and opening up with machinegun fire on another.

Marxist theory teaches that declining conditions drive otherwise law-abiding people to acts of violence.  The truth is that revolutions usually start when things are improving, but too slow for everyone's taste.  Rising expectations are far more dangerous than famine or flood.

Detroit's problem was that things had gotten too good too fast - a generation that was raised with noting now saw fast cars on every corner.

The real tragedy came later, of course, when Detroit emptied out and the riots simply continued in slow motion.  Forty-three dead would soon become a few weeks worth of crime as the downward spiral commenced.

We can speak of racial problems, talk of inequality, but how can we explain the wholesale looting of the City of Detroit by those entrusted with its governance?  When school principals participate in the corruption, where is one to turn?

Bankruptcy has helped clean up the financial books, but the next step remains to be seen.  Crime is falling in The D and a tentative urban renewal seems to be taking root.

But this too is a source of contention, as many of the new residents are white.  Gentrification is a dirty word to many black activists. 

So what comes next?   Can Detroit be a racially integrated, world-class city?  It was getting there, long ago.  It failed before I was born.  Can it make it on the second try?

Detroit, 50 Years Later

Fifty years ago this morning, Detroit exploded into five days of rioting that ultimately claimed 43 lives, injured nearly 1,200 civilians, and resulted in more than 7,000 arrests. President Lyndon Johnson ordered in 8,000 National Guardsmen and 4,700 paratroopers to augment local and state police. Damages totaled $289 million.

It was an early morning police raid of an illegal drinking establishment -- a rude interruption of a celebration to welcome back a couple of black Detroiters who had returned from fighting in the Vietnam War -- that set the match to the gasoline. In truth, it was just the straw that broke the camel's back.

The Motor City's riot (not its first -- a 1943 race riot resulted in 34 dead and 433 injured) came 2 years after severe rioting in the Watts section of Los Angeles, and preceded by a year uprisings in Baltimore, Chicago, New York, Washington, DC and other cities.

In many ways the Detroit of 1967 and 2017 represents a microcosm of America. Although the civil rights movement was well underway in 1967 (10 years after the school desegregation ruling Brown Vs. the Board of Education and 3 years after the Civil Rights Act of 1964), conditions were not improving for Detroit's blacks. They faced discrimination in the job market, in housing, and most notably, in abusive practices by a mostly white police force that seemed to relish the opportunity to harass and humiliate blacks.

The whites of 1960s Detroit were, I suspect, like many other whites across the nation: Many of them didn't harbor outright hatred of blacks or racist views, per se, nor did they particularly enjoy seeing blacks suffer. But they were complacent and indifferent. Their attitude was one of "I've got mine" and I'm not going to lose sleep worrying about others. And/or, I have enough problems of my own to deal with without being a bleeding heart of empathy regarding the troubles of strangers with whom I'll never interact.

But this is dysfunction at its worst -- like a large-scale version of a bad, abusive marriage. No respect or understanding; poor communication; relationship failure; lack of empathy. Eventually, weariness and outright anger and hatred can set in -- whether you're talking about a two-person relationship, or the interactions of different communities whose backgrounds, races and interests differ.

It may have come as a surprise to white Detroiters that the city boiled over, but most of the blacks probably sensed that it was coming, and may have felt jubilant that they could finally release their anger and frustrations.

Fast forward 50 years, and Detroit, like America, has been through dramatic changes. The city of 1.6 million 50 years ago (about 30 percent black) is now a city of 670,000 (at least 85 percent black). Blacks have run the government, schools and police force for decades. Detroit has struggled through periods of high crime and unemployment, deteriorating neighborhoods, failing schools, drug and gang problems, crumbling infrastructure, massive government corruption, and bankruptcy in 2013.

Thanks to deep-pocketed benefactors who care about the city (Quicken Loans founder Dan Gilbert, the late Tigers and Red Wings owner Mike Ilitch, JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon, the Ford family and the Kresge Foundation, among others), Detroit's downtown is making a remarkable comeback. Also thriving is the Midtown area, home to Wayne State University. The city has a large stock of impressive old homes that need to be fixed up, plenty of beautiful churches and art deco buildings, and a vibrant culture of music and the arts.

But these pleasing aspects are dragged down by persistent poverty, illiteracy, drug and gang problems and horrid schools. Like the African American population nationwide, Detroit has too many individuals who have made poor personal decisions, squandering the freedom and opportunity their parents and grandparents worked so hard to achieve.

Race relations in Detroit and across America are a touchy subject. It's easy for feelings to be hurt and old wounds to be opened. But even many black leaders are not afraid to acknowledge that their people must do right by their families and communities in order for blacks to achieve greater success and fully participate in the American dream.

This means not having children out of wedlock, avoiding drug use and dealing, using alcohol moderately or not at all, demanding accountability of leaders, be they of government, schools, the corporate world or the clergy. It means not being apathetic or ignorant, and not succumbing to the cheap and shallow appeal of $200 Air Jordan sneakers and insolent, in-your-face rap music.

Is it obnoxious of a white guy to be writing these things? Perhaps. Maybe it's not my place. But it sure seems obvious that we're way past the point where blacks can continue playing the race card and must honestly take stock of their problems.

With all of that being said, the black middle class has grown tremendously since the 1960s, and there are many successful, impressive blacks who have contributed greatly to our nation. But there could be far, far more if the obstructive wall of denial were thoroughly broken down and blacks who struggle would adopt a new resolve to live up to their potential.

Detroit, like African Americans, has been through a lot. The Motor City put the world on wheels, served as the arsenal of democracy in World War II, and gave us the wonderful music and artists of Motown Music. It is an important, iconic city. But its failures and disappointments have been as enormous and devastating as its achievements have been impressive. People make up a city, and a nation. As go their fortunes, so go the fortunes of the larger community.

 

A year can be a lifetime in politics

Though I blog about politics from time to time, I'm not as invested in the topic as I used to be.  A large part of that is that so much of the commentary these days is just white noise, devoid of any insight.

I also understand that politics is a volatile thing, always at the mercy of external forces beyond any of the players' control.  A natural disaster, an assassination, a foreign crisis - all of these can upend what appeared to be a stable situation.

Living with uncertainty can be difficult for some people.  I think a lot of the left's appeal comes from its insistence that it can eliminate uncertainty.

The progressives promise that their policies will make war a thing of the past, eliminate poverty, racism, hunger and offer everyone a nice, stress-free job.  In a progressive world, there will be no guns, people can change their sex at will and even the weather will be better.

What's not to like?

Of course the left is always promising heaven on earth, and we have the mass graves to prove just how many people they've sent to the afterlife.

The truth is that we live in a messy world and even the most seasoned political operators are at best partially in control of what's going on.

Making matters worse, our generation is burdened with the most incompetent political elites I've ever seen.  These alleged experts get everything wrong.  Their failed predictions should be the milestones to their public irrelevance, yet they continue to be treated with the utmost respect.

They got Brexit wrong, Trump's election wrong and the British snap election wrong.  I guess that's the only real certainty in these uncertain times - that the elites are always wrong.