Federal military commanders have the authority, in extraordinary emergency circumstances where prior authorization by the President is impossible and duly constituted local authorities are unable to control the situation, to engage temporarily in activities that are necessary…to quell large-scale, unexpected civil disturbances…

Excuse me, but if the president is indisposed, doesn’t the military have to go through the vice president, the secretary of defense, and — before all of that — doesn’t it require the authorization of the Congress, as per the 1807 Insurrection Act? (Yes…yes, it does.) Furthermore, wasn’t the military barred from military action in support of police due to massive corruption and civil rights violations during Reconstruction? (Yes…yes, it was: Posse Comitatus.)

If you can’t see how bad this is, or where this inevitably leads, you might want to look at the history of Rome, or any medieval period European country, 1660 Britain, 1917 Russia, 1920 Italy, 1930s France, Germany, Hungary, and Spain, and time during the early  20th Century China and Japan, or any of the other innumerable examples where the military decides to be the final arbiter of law, order, and power.

Contact the worthless windbags that allegedly represent you in Washington — remind them that military coups don’t just target the people, but also the worthless windbags that are in charge. If it’s their life and power on the line, they might shift their asses.

And just in case you thought they were applauding his ejection…

They were continuing to turf people out after they “cut off debate” over their gun bills:

This is your police state at work. Don’t agree with what they are doing to you? They shut down debate and sic the police on you. And as far as they are concerned, “You can’t stop government…” But don’t worry there, Mr. and Mrs. Jersey Shore…I’m sure they won’t be coming for you in the future…

Now, if only the Republicans could stop viewing this through a partisan lens and start seeing this through a legal or ideological one — to whit, this isn’t a bunch of incompetents who screwed up…well, it is a bunch of incompetents, but they had every intent of acting illegally, unethically, and unconstitutionally because that’s who they are.

This is the perfect chance to rail against statism, but I wouldn’t hold your breath to be seeing any of your elected officials making a real effort to shut down the IRS and institute a simple, fair, flat tax; they won’t be hitting Holder with a “contempt of Congress” citation for his “forgetfulness” over the AP scandal; and they won’t be impeaching the president for his twice-now-ruled unconstitutional recess appointments, his illegal running of guns to Mexico and Honduras.

But it’s nice to see our would-be aristocrats twist a bit.

In the latest James Bond offering Skyfall, the classic anti-hero is toting a new Walther PPK/S — already showing you the filmmakers aren’t thinking beyond fan service and product placement…it’s a terrible firearm, compared to the PPS or PPQ — that is “coded to his palmprint” to prevent anyone from Bond using the jammin’est gun MI6 ever issued.

Here’s why it’s a stupid idea: 1) Fingerprint and palmprint technology is finicky even when not attached to a device is essentially a container for a controlled explosion. There’s a reason it didn’t catch on with laptops — it doesn’t recognize you half the time. You look like a new cash register jockey running the pack of gom over the laser scanner for twenty minutes.

2) One of the issues with the sensors is they are highly prone to dirt and fouling…something firearms produce in spades. The recoil of the .380 is not especially vicious, but fragile electronics run through the frame of the pistol would be prone to failure from normal usage. Imagine the effect of a 10mm 1911 running “hot” loads…. In the cold, in the heat, what would be the effect? How about if, in the middle of a tussle, the police officer armed with one of these turds dropped it and it stopped functioning?

3) The battery technology is not adequate to the task of allowing the firearm to be ready at all times. You would have to switch it on and off…and if the battery is dead, would the firearm lock down? That could be damend inconvenient if, say, you needed it suddenly. If it did work with the sensors off, then what’s the damned point; you’d just flip the switch to “off.”

That’s just the practical  issues…

The lesson here is “movies aren’t reality.”

Here’s Brazil’s Rio Civil Police shooting wildly at what they thought was Marcio “The Mathematician” Pereira’s car. Note the FLIR allows you to see them engaged in “disproportionate” (according to Martha Rocha, head of the RCP) collateral damage…

Officials at Bartow High School decided to panic and call the police, then — despite said officials, fellow student, and even the police admitting there was no malice, criminal intent, or injury/damage caused — she was arrested and charged with felonies as an adult.

A massive backlash against the school, school district, and stupendous idiocy of the police is appears that Wilmont will be allowed to avoid criminal charges if she attends a diversionary program (the specifics undisclosed.) So a curious, and apparently intelligence, school-minded minority girl gets to go to a useless program run by the Department of Juveniles because…she was a good student who went out of her way, when she got curious and decided to experiment, to try her chemical curiosity in an outdoor location away from others.

This is the state of our nation.

Whence does [the State] draw those resources that it is urged to dispense by way of benefits to individuals? Is it not from the individuals themselves? How, then, can these resources be increased by passing through the hands of a parasitic and voracious intermediary?

Frédéric Bastiat

1) What’re you 150? Slavery didn’t affect you in any way, Miss “Rich Enough to Owe a Million in Back Taxes”, so shut your facehole.

2) Join the f’ing club, sweetheart — I don’t know anyone that growing up said, “You know what? I want the system to steal a quarter of my crap so they can misuse it.

3) If any system is destroying the urban black population, it’s the welfare state that was supposed to help them, and continued by wealthy black politicians and activists who get rich off of conning their demographic into supporting policies that keep them unemployable and subservient.

Angelina Jolie is being hailed as either a heroine of Olympian proportions, or a deluded and dangerous example to the women of America, for having had a double mastectomy on the off chance she might get cancer. (It’s nice to be rich enough to do a DNA scan that can give you a percentage that you might get cancer…) Is it heroic to cut off your own tits? Sure…but maybe waiting for early detection and nipping it in the buds would have been a good idea. After all, you have a 20% of not getting breast cancer. Knowing it was an issue meant she could have monitored herself for signs much more regularly and effectively than poor folks.

But hey….they’re hers; she can do what she wants with ‘em.

I wouldn’t be surprised if President Obama learned Osama bin Laden had been killed when he saw himself announce it on television.

Jon Stewart

…on how the president always seems to be the last to know what’s going on when a scandal arises.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the president purposefully keeps himself out of the loop to avoid blame.