June 15

1215 – King John of England signs the Magna Carta.

1752 – Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity

1776 – Delaware votes to suspend government under the British Crown and separate officially from Pennsylvania.

1804 – New Hampshire approves the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratifying the document.

1836 – Arkansas is admitted as the 25th U.S. state.

1846 – The Oregon Treaty extends the border between the United States and British North America, established by the Treaty of 1818, westward to the Pacific Ocean.

1849 – James K. Polk, 11th President of the United States dies at his home in Nashville Tennessee.

1864 – Arlington National Cemetery is established when 200 acres of the Arlington estate, confiscated from Robert E. Lee are set aside as a military cemetery

1916 – President Woodrow Wilson signs a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America

1944 – The United States invades Saipan

Not really. All it does is provide for forming a commission, which is nothing much more than a study group. If that commission recommends nothing?


Senate Armed Services Committee Approves NDAA Amendment To Rename Military Bases

The Senate Armed Services Committee voted Wednesday night to approve an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would require the Department of Defense to rename military bases, buildings, locations and other assets named after Confederate leaders. The amendment was offered by Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, and was passed by voice vote.

summary of the NDAA released on Thursday states that the amendment in question will add provisions for:

“Establishing a commission to study and provide recommendations concerning the removal, names, symbols, displays, monuments, and paraphernalia that honor or commemorate the Confederate States of America, addressing an implementation plan, cost, and criteria for renaming, among other procedures. The implementation plan is to be implemented three years after enactment.”

AfD Spokesman: Trump Needs to Go After Antifa Internationally

US President Donald Trump announced his intention to designate “Antifa” as a terrorist organization. Petr Bystron, on the Foreign Policy Committee of the German Bundestag, commented:

“Donald Trump is doing the right thing in designating these violent extremist groups as terrorists. Antifa is an anti-democratic hate group whose radical left-wing ideology rejects the free market and freedom of speech. The Alternative for Germany applauds President Trump’s announcement and urges the EU and German government to follow suit and finally act against these openly violent and extremists gangs.

Well, I guess that didn’t work…..or did it?


Gun-related Crime Up in New Zealand Despite Gun Ban

Gun-related crime and fatalities are up in New Zealand, according to a detailed report from Radio New Zealand (RNZ), despite last year’s crackdown on gun ownership following the March 15 attacks on two mosques in Christchurch.

The report noted the violent crime rate went up in both 2018 (before the mosque attacks) and in 2019. RNZ quoted Auckland City councilor Alf Filipaina, who blamed gangs for much of the rise in gun-related crime.

“I don’t know whether it’s about the accessibility to firearms … all I know is that we need to get the details behind the offences,” Filipaina said. “It’s hard to pinpoint, [if] it’s because of the gangs or because of drugs, or domestics, without knowing the details behind.”

What is clear to American gun rights activists is that gun control has failed again as a response to a violent crime. That is, disarming law-abiding citizens hasn’t had an impact on criminals using firearms……..

Canada Watch: Non-Compliance Is Trudeau’s Gun Ban Problem

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s recent announcement banning some 1,500 models and variants of firearms, announced in reaction to the murder rampage in Nova Scotia, has a problem Canadian anti-gunners and their counterparts in the United States have habitually ignored because it is an inconvenient truth.

It is likely a majority of Canadian gun owners will do what they did during the country’s multi-million-dollar gun registration debacle, and simply ignore it. Criminals, of course, will do likewise, as detailed in an eye-opening essay published by Reason online and authored by contributing editor J.D. Tuccille. He reminds readers that “gun policy expert Gary Mauser estimates that registries usually achieve only about one-sixth compliance.”

TGM traded email with Mauser regarding this estimate. It refers to a 2007 report published by the Fraser Institute headlined “Hubris In The North.” Found on Page 31 of this report is a footnote that says this:

“There is some evidence from a number of countries over a substantial time period that roughly a sixth of guns will find their way into the registration system in exercises such as this. When military-style, semi-automatic rifles were restricted in Canada in 1991, the RCMP estimated that approximately 12% of the firearms imported were actually registered [Mauser, 2001a]. Australia tried to introduce a gun registration system during colonization in 1796, and about a sixth of the known guns were registered. The Federal Republic of Germany began a registration system under the Baader-Meinhof threat in 1972; the government estimated there were 17 to 20 million guns in the country but only 3.2 million were eventually registered. In the 1980s, when the English authorities tried to register pump-action and semi-automatic shotguns, only 50,000 were ever brought forward out of the 300,000 shotguns that were known to have been imported. Again, in New Jersey, USA, registration requirements were handed down for so called “assault weapons.” A minimum of 100,000 firearms were included under the legislation (probably many more, but there were difficulties with the wording of the legislation). Fewer than 2,000 of these firearms were offered for registration [Kopel, 1992].”

As Tuccille notes only six paragraphs into his analysis, “nothing in the ban would have prevented (killer Gabriel) Wortman’s rampage, given that he was already unlicensed, illegally impersonating a cop, and using black-market firearms.”

This reflects something of a pattern of gun control, according to various Second Amendment advocates. The proposed laws would not have prevented the crime for which the new solutions are now being offered, and the same goes for an edict such as the one just handed down by Trudeau.

As explained by Tuccille, “Trudeau’s ban was implemented via an ‘order in council’—a decree that entirely bypasses Parliament. Orders in council resemble the executive orders issued by U.S. presidents, and have been subject to similar mission-creep, long ago evolving from means for settling administrative matters within government agencies into end-runs around normal democratic procedures.”

Longtime rights activists repeatedly contend the sort of reaction now coming from Trudeau transfers guilt from the perpetrator to all gun owners. The gun prohibition lobby consistently tries to penalize all firearms owners for the actions of a relative few people, holding them accountable for crimes they did not commit.

In the process of enacting new gun controls, whether they involve registration or bans, or so-called “universal background checks” as are now required in California and Washington states, Mauser’s estimate of massive non-compliance simply provides the government with more ways to turn those law-abiding citizens into the criminals that anti-gunners want them to be.

And Tuccille noted that whatever new gun controls are imposed, they never seem to satisfy gun prohitionists.

“Sure enough, in 2020, the Canadian prime minister is imposing a ban by decree,” Tuccille writes. “And some gun prohibition fans want him to go even further. The Globe and Mail calls the ban a ‘weak half-measure’ because it doesn’t criminalize the possession of handguns. Former Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe spokesman Michael Bociurkiw wants to seal the vast border with the U.S. to curtail gun smuggling and ‘to make Canadians feel safer.’”

The real problem on both sides of the border is that lethargic gun owners who don’t vote allow people like Trudeau, and anti-gunners in the U.S., to enter public office. Whether that changes in November in the U.S., and at the next elections in Canada remains a matter of speculation.

What is not speculation is that by adopting strict regulations affecting legal gun owners, Trudeau will create the false impression that such crimes will be prevented in the future…right up to the moment they happen.

Trump denies ties to Venezuelan attack with 2 US men jailed

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — President Donald Trump said Tuesday that the United States had nothing to do with an alleged incursion into Venezuela that landed two U.S. citizens behind bars in the crisis-stricken South American nation.

Trump said he had just learned of the detention of the pair, accused by Venezuela of being mercenaries. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro said they were part of an operation to kill him that was backed by neighboring Colombia and the United States.

“Whatever it is, we’ll let you know,” Trump told reporters in Washington before departing from the White House to Arizona. “But it has nothing to do with our government.”

Authorities in Venezuela identified the two men as Luke Denman and Airan Berry, both former U.S. special forces soldiers associated with the Florida-based private security firm Silvercorp USA. Military records show both decorated soldiers served in Iraq.

A third U.S. ex-Green Beret and Silvercorp founder, Jordan Goudreau, claimed responsibility for leading “Operation Gideon,” which was launched with an attempted beach landing before dawn on Sunday. Officials said Tuesday that six suspected attackers were killed, giving a revised figure from the eight previously reported.

The State Department reiterated Trump’s comments that the U.S. wasn’t involved, accusing Maduro of launching a “disinformation campaign” to distract the world from recent events, citing a prison riot that left more than 40 dead and dozens badly injured.

“Nothing should be taken at face value when we see the distorting of facts,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement. “What is clear is that the former regime is using the event to justify an increased level of repression.”

U.S. officials said they are trying to learn more about the events, including the activities of two U.S. citizens as well as Goudreau. Answers will only come out when Maduro’s “regime” has ended, the statement said.

The two ex-U.S. soldiers were detained Monday dozens of miles  from the first attempted beach landing in the fishing village of Chuao. Authorities say they’ve confiscated equipment.

Goudreau has previously said the operation was designed to capture — but not kill Maduro. He said he carried it out on a “shoestring budget” after signing an agreement with U.S.-backed Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó, who Goudreau accuses of failing to pay him.

STAY TUNED

Numerous U.S. Media Outlets Reporting that Kim Jong Un is in ‘Vegetative’ State.

Fox, Reuters and The New York Post are among the major media outlets to report that North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un is currently in a vegetative state.

Reuters reported earlier today that Beijing has sent a group of Chinese medical experts to Pyongyang to consult with his doctors. “According to the agency citing three sources with knowledge on the matter, the team took off to the hermit state on Thursday.”

Japanese magazine Shukan Gendai reports that earlier in April, Kim was visiting a rural area when he clutched his chest and collapsed suddenly. Fox has not been able to confirm this report.

Citing a member of a Chinese medical team in North Korea, the outlet says the North Korean leader was rushed to a nearby hospital, with help from Beijing called it at once.

Jong Un reportedly required a stent procedure — a surgery that involves a tube placed into a congested blood vessel to ensure the blood circulation can continue.

While the procedure in question is not too complex, the magazine’s source said, the surgeon was not used to dealing with patients with obesity and was too nervous during the operation, resulting in a delay which left Kim Jong Un in a “vegetative state.”

On Monday, CNN reported that U.S. Intelligence officials were monitoring reports that Kim was “gravely ill” following a cardiovascular surgery. Their source was a U.S. intelligence official with “direct knowledge.” CNN had spoken with a second US official who had said the “concerns were credible but the severity is hard to assess.”

As I mentioned last Sunday, for this year, this Sunday  is the day the Eastern Church celebrates Easter due to the different calendars (Gregorian v Julian) used to calculate the date.
So, to our Orthodox friends:
Χριστὸς ἀνέστη! Ἀληθῶς ἀνέστη!
Христос воскресе! Воистину воскресе!
Hristolu anyie! De alihea anyie!
Kristus vstal z mrtvých! Vpravdě vstal z mrtvých!
ქრისტე აღსდგა! ჭეშმარიტად აღსდგა!

Apologies to those I missed.


 

The Embassy of Switzerland in the United States posted an image of the American flag projection with a message for Americans.

“INCREDIBLE! As a sign of solidarity, the American flag was projected onto the Matterhorn last night. Switzerland is sending hope and strength to the United States of America,”

Image may contain: sky, outdoor and nature

And why should we be concerned?


British Even Take Guns From Royal Bodyguards

By now, we know that the British aren’t fond of guns to any degree. After all, their own police are generally unarmed, something that would never fly here in the United States.

Thankfully.

But just how bad is it? It seems the British government has opted to disarm at least some bodyguards of members of the royal family.

Royal bodyguards responsible for keeping the outcast Prince Andrew and a number of other royals safe have had their guns swapped out for cheaper tasers, it has been reported.

The royal protection officers assigned to Princess Anne and Prince Edward have also allegedly lost their firearms as part of a drive to reduce protection costs for minor royals and politicians, the Sun reports.

The thing is, while tasers cost less, they’re also less effective. Especially if you have multiple attackers, something members of the royal family might well have to face.

Would those who have made this decision think the cost savings are worth it should one of these members of the royal family be kidnapped or murdered because their bodyguards lacked the appropriate tools?

Met Police personal protection officers guarding The Queen, Prince Charles, Prince William and Duchess Kate will still carry pistols.

And it is believed that when Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are visiting the UK from their new home in LA, their officers too will only be armed with stun guns.

The move is reportedly part of a drive to move expenses from protective duties into other departments such as terror and gang crime.

But the cuts – alongside the fact that officers have been told their roles have become more advisory and less active – have not gone down well with senior staff.

Oh, I can’t imagine why. “Hey, I know you’re responsible for protecting these members of the royal family, but we’re going to hamstring your ability to do it by taking away the most effective tool for the job. But at least we’ll save a bit of money!”

Yeah, that’s a winning argument.

Of course, this is the British we’re talking about here. While they may like their royals, they really hate guns and seem to think you can get along just fine without them. Which is why a terrorist with a knife is able to run amok striking fear into many a heart in the city until some dude fights back with a narwhal tusk.

Here, we just shoot the bastard and call it a day.

Remember what happened when terrorists tried to attack an art show in Texas? They never even made it out of the parking lot.

Frankly, protecting royals is the kind of job I wouldn’t do on a bet, and that’s if they armed me for the job. Every one of them is a huge target and everyone knows it. It’s only a matter of time before this results in one of them being killed or kidnapped.

At that point, we Americans are going to shrug and recognize that this kind of thing wouldn’t happen if their bodyguards had the means to put down attackers like rabid dogs.

SEEN ON FACEBOOK:

The debate over immigration is over: restriction wins.

The debate over borders is over: they are needed.

The debate over globalization is over: the era of autarky begins.

The debate over Europe is over: it is a geographic expression, not a polity.

The debate over global warming is over: it is irrelevant.

The debate over international institutions is over: only nations matter.

The debate over the People’s Republic of China is over: it is a menace to the community of nations, not a member in good standing.

Crisis is clarity.

Well, at least someone is taking matters seriously


Gabon bans eating of pangolin and bats amid pandemic.

Pangolins are critically endangered and have long been protected, but they are sold in the markets of the capital Libreville and

Gabon on Friday banned the sale and eating of bats and pangolins, which are suspected of sparking the novel coronavirus in China where they are highly prized in traditional medicine.

President Ali Bongo Ondimba also announced the government was planning to lock down the capital Libreville and unveiled an emergency package for those hard hit by the pandemic.

The novel coronavirus is believed to have come from bats, but researchers think it might have spread to humans via another mammal.

Pangolins are critically endangered and have long been protected, but they are sold in the markets of the capital Libreville, as are bats, and their meat is popular.

The central African nation is 88 percent covered in forest and hunting and bush meat have long been a way of life.