February 7

1301 – Edward of Caernarvon, son of King Edward I (known as Longshanks), later King Edward II of England, is invested by his father as the first English Prince of Wales and heir to the throne.

1497 – In Florence, Italy, supporters of Girolamo Savonarola burn cosmetics, art, and books, in a “Bonfire of the vanities”.

1795 – The 11th Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified.

1812 – The strongest in a series of earthquakes that began the previous December, strikes New Madrid, Missouri.

1894 – The Cripple Creek miner’s strike, led by the Western Federation of Miners, begins in – you guessed it – Cripple Creek, Colorado.

1900 – A Chinese immigrant in San Francisco falls ill to bubonic plague in the first plague epidemic in the continental United States.

1904 – A fire begins in Baltimore, Maryland, destroying over 1,500 buildings in 30 hours.

1943 – Imperial Japanese Navy forces complete the evacuation of Imperial Japanese Army troops from Guadalcanal, ending attempts to retake the island.

1962 – The United States bans all Cuban imports and exports.

1979 – The body of fugitive war criminal, Josef Mengele is found in the waters off the coast of Bertioga, Brazil, purported drowned after suffering a stroke while swimming.

1984 – On Mission STS-41-B,  aboard Shuttle Challenger,  Astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert Stewart make the first untethered space walk using the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU).

1991 – USAF Air Combat Victories: Rick Parsons-1 SU-7, Randy May-1 Mi-24, and Anthony Murphy-2 SU-22s

1992 – The Maastricht Treaty is signed, leading to the creation of the European Union.

1995 – Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, is arrested in Islamabad, Pakistan.

2001 – Space Shuttle Atlantis is launched on mission STS-98, carrying the Destiny laboratory module to the International Space Station.

2013 – Mississippi officially ratifies the 13th Amendment, becoming the last state to approve it after Mississippi in 1995.

2016 – North Korea demonstrates it ability to launch to orbit by launching the Kwangmyŏngsŏng-4 reconnaissance satellite, in violation of multiple UN treaties.

Man dead in shooting at Randall dog park in Yakima

A man shot and killed another man who threatened his child on Sunday afternoon at the Randall dog park in Yakima, police said.

Multiple people called 911 around 2:30 p.m. to report a man was acting erratically at Randall dog park, 1399 S. 48th Ave., according to a Yakima Police Department news release.

The man, later identified as Daniel Ortega, 22, of Yakima was interacting with another man and his child at the park, and “attempted to endanger the life of the small child with his words and actions,” the police news release said.

The father told Ortega to leave his family alone, and attempted to leave the park, the release said. When his attempts to de-escalate the incident failed, the 28-year-old Yakima man “discharged his legally owned firearm in defense of himself and his child,” the release said.

The man who fired the weapon was protecting himself and his son, and was not the aggressor, said Yakima police Capt. Shawn Boyle. Ortega and the man didn’t appear to know each other and Ortega died at the scene, Boyle said.

The 28-year-old man cooperated with detectives, and interviews with witnesses corroborated his account, the release said.

After consultation with the Yakima County prosecutor, police released 28-year-old, the news release said.

The Washington State Patrol and Yakima County sheriff’s deputies also responded.

It was the second homicide investigation in less than 24 hours for Yakima detectives. They responded to a home invasion shooting early Sunday morning on East Beech Street.

Randall Park, which is a distance away from the dog park and separated by a creek, remained open

February 6

1778 –In Paris, the Treaty of Alliance, and the Treaty of Amity and Commerce are signed between the United States and France

1788 – Massachusetts becomes the sixth state to ratify the United States Constitution.

1820 – The first 86 African American immigrants sponsored by the American Colonization Society depart New York to start a settlement in  Liberia, Africa

1899 – The Treaty of Paris between the United States and Spain, is ratified by the United States Senate officially ending the Spanish American War.

1919 – The American Legion is founded.

1922 – The Washington Naval Treaty is signed in Washington, D.C., limiting the naval armaments of United States, Britain, Japan, France, and Italy.

1951 – Travelling at 50 mph, twice the speed limit for the location under repair construction, The Broker # 733, a Pennsylvania Railroad passenger train, derails on a curve near Woodbridge Township, New Jersey, killing 85 passengers and injuring over 500 more. The wreck is still to date one of the worst rail disasters in American history.

1952 – Elizabeth II becomes Queen of the United Kingdom and her other Realms and Territories and Head of the Commonwealth upon the death of her father, George VI. The longest reigning monarch, so far, of the UK.

1959 – Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments files the first patent for an integrated circuit.

1976 – Lockheed Corporation president Carl Kotchian,  in testimony before a Senate subcommittee, admits that the company had paid out around $3 million in bribes to the office of Japanese Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka.

1978 – The Blizzard of 1978, one of the worst Nor’easter storms in New England history, hits the region, with sustained winds of 65 mph and in snowfall of 4 inches an hour, dropping from 20 to 27 inches of snow over the region and causing the deaths of over 100 people.

1991 – Over Iraq, USAF Pilots Thomas Dietz and Bob Hehemann, each flying F-15 fighters, shoot down 2 MiG-21s and 2 SU-25s. USAF Pilot Robert Swain, flying an A-10 attack jet, shoots down a Messerschmitt B0-15 helicopter and USN pilots Stuart Broce and Ron McElraft flying an F-14 fighter shoot down a Mil Mi-8 helicopter.

1998 – Washington National Airport is renamed Ronald Reagan National Airport.

2018 – SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy, a super heavy launch vehicle, makes its maiden flight.

Moderna Booster Vaccine Singled Out for Chronic Hives
— Chronic spontaneous urticaria more frequent when compared with Pfizer’s mRNA vaccine

The monovalent Moderna COVID-19 booster vaccine may be associated with an elevated risk for new-onset chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU), or hives lasting more than 6 weeks, according to a Swiss study.

Among people who got an mRNA COVID vaccine booster and had new-onset hives reported to local allergists, 90% had vaccination precede CSU in the canton of Vaud during the study period, as did 81% of patients in the nationwide cohort, reported Yannick Daniel Muller, MD, PhD, of the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, and coauthors.

Crude incidence rates of CSU following a booster dose in the two cohorts was 1.9-2.1 per 100,000 doses of Pfizer’s vaccine and 30.8-43.9 per 100,000 doses of Moderna’s product, according to their research letter in JAMA Network Openopens in a new tab or window.

This difference translated to a relative risk with the Moderna booster dose of 20.8 (95% CI 6.5-66.0) for the Vaud cohort of 80 people, and 16.1 (95% 10.8-24.0) in the Swiss cohort of 782 individuals.

“These data should not discourage patients from being vaccinated,” Muller’s group concluded. “However, guidelines defining the eligibility and dosing for upcoming mRNA-based boosters are needed for patients with CSU after an mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine.”

The reason behind the possible association are unclear, and warrant further study, according to the study authors.

“As a potential contributing mechanism warranting further investigations, our group previously showed that the Moderna vaccine had a greater association with positive skin and basophil activation tests results compared with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine,” wrote Muller and coauthors.

“Alternatively, with the Moderna vaccines containing a higher dose of mRNA and being more immunogenic than the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, one could speculate that the booster non-specifically triggered CSU in predisposed individuals,” they added.

Notably, the current bivalent boostersopens in a new tab or window from Moderna and Pfizer were introduced in late 2022, after the conduct of the present study. After their introduction in the U.S., the original monovalent products were phased out for booster doses.

Just last week, the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee unanimously endorsed the FDA’s plan to harmonize COVID-19 primary and booster vaccines to contain a bivalent compositionopens in a new tab or window with components targeting BA.4/5 and the original SARS-CoV-2 strain, meaning the original monovalent products will be eliminated from the market altogether going forward.

For their study, the researchers estimated the incidence of vaccine-related CSU locally in Vaud and nationally across Switzerland, where 3,278,808 and 298,813 individuals, respectively, had received a COVID mRNA booster dose from Dec. 1, 2021 to Aug. 31, 2022.

Eligible patients were identified by local allergists and sent an online questionnaire from the Lausanne University Hospital from April to August 2022.

The participating Vaud cohort was 70% women, with an average age of 41 years. The national cohort was 58% women and their average age was 39 years. In Vaud, 14% of participants reported previous experiences of urticaria and 95% reported taking antihistamines, the majority daily.

Limitations of the study include the lack of available Swiss data regarding CSU incidence within the general population. Moreover, confounding factors tied to the Omicron variant of COVID-19 could affect the findings, as 31% of CSU-Vaud cohort members reported infection. Also, incidence rates could not be adjusted, as individual data on vaccine brand tied to age and sex were not unavailable.

Live long and prosper. If they will let you.
Longer lives, society, and freedom.

Longer, healthier lives: A disaster for humanity? To hear some people talk, yes.

Harvard aging researcher David Sinclair has managed to regulate the aging process in mice, making young mice old and old mice young. And numerous researchers elsewhere are working on finding ways to turn back the clock.

This has created a good deal of excitement. We’ve seen these waves of antiaging enthusiasm before: There was a flurry of interest in the first decade of this century, with news stories, conferences, and so on. That enthusiasm mostly involved activating the SIRT-1 gene, which is also activated by caloric restriction.

You can buy supplements, like resveratrol or quercetin, that show some evidence of slowing the aging process by activating that gene, or by killing senescent cells. Drugs like rapamycin and metformin have shown promise as well. And diet and exercise do enough good that if they were available in pill form, everyone would be gobbling them.

But while pumping the brakes on the process of getting older and frailer is a good thing, being able to actually stop – or better yet reverse – the process is better still. If I had the chance, I’d be happy to knock a few decades off of my biological age. (Ideally, I think I’d be physically 25 and cosmetically about 40.)

But does this mean we’re looking at something like immortality? Well, not really.

Even a complete conquest of aging wouldn’t mean eternal life. Accidents, disease, even death by violence will still ensure that your time on Earth – or wherever you’re living in a century or two – eventually comes to an end. Still an end to, or even a dramatic delaying of, the process of decay and decline would be nice. As Robert Heinlein observed in the 1950s, you spend the first 25 years of your life getting established, then the next couple of decades striving to get ahead, and then by age 50 your reward for all that is that your middle is thickening, your breath is shortening, and your aches and pains are accumulating as the Grim Reaper waits around the corner.

Continue reading “”

Does Birdshot Overpenetrate? Home defenders sometimes opt for birdshot, thinking it won’t overpenetrate. We put this concept to the test.

“I’ll just use birdshot.”

I hear it all the time when people talk about shotguns and overpenetration. It’s as if there is nothing to debate, as if there is only one type of birdshot. Rather than use buckshot—which is proven to be a better defensive option—they cling to the notion that birdshot will magically stop at certain barriers.

While it’s entirely possible folks like us overthink this stuff, that’s what we do here at SI. So, let’s part the weeds and delve in.

First, what exactly is birdshot?
Traditionally the term means any low-brass (or standard-velocity) shell containing small shot sizes of around No. 8. Plenty of hunters shoot small upland birds with Nos. 6, 7.5 and even 9 shot, but No. 8 tends to be the most popular. Why? It’s likely because quail and dove hunters find it to be the best combination of energy vs. pattern density for taking these flighty creatures at common wingshooting distances (10 to 40 yards).

Regarding 12-gauge birdshot loads, typically they come in two versions: 2 3/4-inch “light” 1-ounce loads and 2 3/4-inch “heavy” 1 1/8-ounce loads, although you can often find even heavier 1 1/4-ounce, No. 6 shot loads commonly used for squirrels and pheasants. The weight refers to the amount of shot, or payload, each shell contains. As with all ammunition, the more massive the payload and the faster it goes, the more damage it does to the target.

Why Birdshot for Home Defense?
The main reason given for opting for birdshot over buckshot is because birdshot isn’t as powerful downrange. (After all, buckshot is called buckshot because its load of nine, .33-inch-diameter pellets are each individually capable of killing a deer out to 50 yards or so.) The theory is that birdshot will stop an attacker near the end of the sofa, but won’t blow through both sides of a sheetrock wall and accidentally injure a family member on the other side. But, is that true?

Recently I tested an average, 1-ounce, No. 8 load against an insulated, sheetrock wall using cylinder choke. Here’s what I found:

At 20 yards, No. 8 shot did not penetrate both sides of the wall. At 10 yards it penetrated the wall and went on to strike a cardboard mannequin wearing a T-shirt. The pellets only made slight indentations in the cardboard, indicating it would likely not cause severe harm to a human. At 5 yards it penetrated both sides of the wall and the cardboard mannequin. Now, unless your last name is Bezos, you’re unlikely to have a 20-yard stretch in your house; 5 yards is far more common for a defensive distance in the home. Knowing this, do you still think birdshot won’t pose a danger?

Continue reading “”

1 dead after alleged home invasion near Bullard

SMITH COUNTY, Texas (KLTV) – A homeowner allegedly shot a man who is accused of unlawfully entering his house and threatening his fiancé.

At approximately 11:30 a.m. Saturday, Smith County deputies were dispatched to the 15,000 block of Treasure Cove near Bullard in reference to a suspicious person, according to a release from Smith County Sgt. Larry Christian. While en route to the location, deputies were informed that a white male had entered a residence unlawfully and confronted the homeowners, insisting that the homeowner’s truck belonged to him, Christian said. The homeowner reportedly forcefully removed the intruder from his residence and was able to lock the door.

Before deputies arrived, the homeowner, armed with a shotgun, went outside to check on his truck; the suspect then returned to the property and the homeowner informed him that police were on the way and instructed him to sit down, the release said. The homeowner reported that he believed the suspect was having a mental episode, as he was shouting an unknown female’s name. During this time, the homeowner’s fiancé came outside, and her presence seemed to agitate the suspect, who came toward them aggressively, according to Christian. The homeowner reportedly warned the suspect several times to stop walking toward them or he would shoot, but the suspect allegedly refused and made death threats toward them; as the suspect charged toward the homeowner and his fiancé, the homeowner shot the suspect once in the chest, Christian said.

Upon arrival of deputies, the suspect was found unconscious in the front yard of the residence. Deputies initiated CPR on the suspect prior to the arrival of EMS. UT Health East Texas Paramedics arrived on location a short time later and confirmed the suspect was deceased, according to the release. Smith County Investigators and the Crime Scene Unit responded to the location and are currently conducting their investigation. Christian said the suspect has been identified as 50-year-old Mark Anthony Correro of Houston, Texas.

Precinct 2 Justice of the Peace Andy Dunklin arrived on location for the inquest. He ordered an autopsy and the body was transported to Forensic Medical in Tyler.

This is an ongoing investigation and more details may be released as they become available.

UPDATE: Intruder shot and killed at Fort Smith home

FORT SMITH, Ark. (KNWA/KFTA) — UPDATE: Feb. 4 Police have identified the 29-year-old male who was killed as Jacob Andrew Webb.

Jacob Andrew Webb, 29 was killed trying to break into a 58-year-old man’s home (Fort Smith Police Department).
The investigation is still ongoing, according to Fort Smith Police.

FORT SMITH, Ark. (KNWA/KFTA) — UPDATE: 10:57 a.m. Police say a man shot and killed an intruder trying to enter his home near the corner of 18th and N H streets.

Police identified the homeowner as a 58-year-old male and the victim as a 29-year-old male. The homeowner was taken to the hospital for non-life-threatening injuries.

Police believe this to be an isolated incident with no danger to the public.

February 5

1576 – Henry of Navarre rejects Catholicism at Tours, France and rejoins the Protestant forces in the French Wars of Religion.

1597 – A group of Japanese Christians are killed by the new government of Japan for being seen as a threat to Japanese society.

1849 – University of Wisconsin–Madison’s first class meets at Madison Female Academy.

1862 – The voivode of Moldavia and the warlords of ancient Wallachia formally unite to create the Romanian United Principalities with Alexandru Cuza as Domnitor.

1907 – Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland announces the creation of Bakelite, the first synthetic plastic.

1918 – West Plains, Missouri native, Lt. Stephen W. Thompson, flying with a French squadron as a bombardier/gunner, shoots down a German Albatros D.III over Saarbrucken, the first aerial victory by the U.S. military.
The British Anchor Line SS Tuscania is torpedoed off the coast of Ireland, the first ship carrying American troops to Europe to be torpedoed and sunk.

1919 – Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, and D. W. Griffith launch United Artists.

1924 – The Royal Greenwich Observatory begins broadcasting the hourly time signals known as the Greenwich Time Signal.

1958 – Off Tybee Island near Savannah, Georgia, a US F-86 fighter collides mid-air with a US B-47 bomber carrying a Mark-15 thermonuclear bomb. While there are no fatalities or injuries, the crew of the bomber jettisons the bomb,  which has never been recovered, into the water near Wassaw Sound

1971 – Apollo 14 Astronauts Alan B. Shepard Jr. and Edgar D. Mitchell undock from the Command Module Kitty Hawk piloted by Stuart Roosa and land the Lunar Module Antares on the Frau Mauro highlands on the mission originally planned for Apollo 13.

1985 – Ugo Vetere, the mayor of Rome, and Chedli Klibi, the mayor of Carthage meet in Tunis to sign a treaty of friendship officially ending the 3rd Punic War which lasted 2,131 years.

1988 – Panamanian military dictator Manuel Noriega is indicted by federal grand juries in Miami and Tampa on drug smuggling and money laundering charges, eventually leading, in large part, to the U.S. invasion of Panama in late 1989.

2008 – A major tornado outbreak of 87 tornadoes across the southern U.S. and the lower Ohio Valley kills 57 people across four states and 18 counties, with hundreds of others injured.

2020 – President Donald Trump is acquitted by the United States Senate in his first impeachment trial.

Store Owner Shoots, Kills Suspect During Attempted Armed Robbery in East Hartford

One suspect in an attempted armed robbery in East Hartford is dead after a store owner who was shot during the ordeal shot back, according to police.

Police said two people wearing black ski masks went into Humble & Paid Co. at 1285 Main St. just after 10:30 p.m. Thursday, intending to rob the business.

The store owner struggled with one of the suspects, who pulled out a firearm and the suspect shot the owner in the back, police said.

The owner returned fire with two of his legally registered firearms, striking one of the suspects several times, according to police.

Officers who responded treated the suspect, identified as 26-year-old Jashar Haslam of Hartford, until the East Hartford Fire Department arrived and the suspect was transported to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead, police said.

The owner was also treated at the scene for a gunshot wound to the lower back and was transported to the hospital. His injuries are not life-threatening, police said.

The other suspect remains at large and ran out of the building during the initial struggle, police said.

Yeah, that’d really cramp the style of the Holiday.

New Mexico: Radical Gun Restrictions on Deck in Committee Next Week: Magazine Limits, Waiting Periods, Semi-Auto, Suppressor & NFA Bans

On Monday, February 6, the New Mexico Senate Health & Public Affairs Committee will hold a public hearing on Senate Bill 171 by Sen. Bill Soules (D-Las Cruces), legislation that attempts to supersede federal law and make it a FELONY to manufacture, sell, transfer, or acquire a firearm sound suppressor and other National Firearms Act items, as well as certain semi-automatic pistols. Please contact members of the Senate Health & Public Affairs Committee and urge them to OPPOSE SB 171. Also, make plans to attend this hearing in-person, on Monday, at 1:30pm, in Room 311 of the State Capitol in Santa Fe, and testify against this misguided proposal. You may also participate in this hearing via Zoom or phone, but the best way to make sure your voice is heard (as the committee almost always decides to limit testimony) is to be present in the hearing room!

ZOOM WEBINAR: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/9124526531
or via telephone at 1 253 215 8782 Meeting ID: 912 452 653

On Tuesday, February 7, the New Mexico House Consumer & Public Affairs Committee will hold public hearings on three extreme gun control proposals:

House Bill 50 by Rep. Patricia Roybal Caballero (D-ABQ) makes it a FELONY to transfer or possess any standard capacity magazine capable of holding 10 or more rounds of ammunition. The 9-round limit would be the lowest in the nation and would effectively ban the use of some of the most popular pistols and rifles purchased and owned by law-abiding New Mexicans.

House Bill 100 by Rep. Andrea Romero (D-Santa Fe) expands New Mexico’s so-called “universal background check” law to include a mandatory 14-day waiting period on all firearm purchases. This criminal protection bill would delay your ability to exercise your Second Amendment right to defend yourself, your family and your property.

House Bill 101 by Rep. Andrea Romero (D-Santa Fe) bans the manufacture, possession, purchase, sale or transfer of countless commonly-owned semi-automatic rifles, pistols and shotguns dubbed “assault weapons” under the act and standard capacity magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition. Current owners would be required to move them out of state, sell them to a federal firearm licensed dealer or surrender them to a law enforcement agency prior to July 1, 2023 – or face FELONY charges.

Please contact members of the House Consumer & Public Affairs Committee and urge them to OPPOSE HB 50, HB 100 & HB 101. Also, make plans to attend this hearing in-person, on Tuesday, at 1:30pm, in Room 317 of the State Capitol in Santa Fe, and testify against this misguided proposal. You may also participate in this hearing via Zoom or phone, but the best way to make sure your voice is heard (as the committee almost always decides to limit testimony) is to be present in the hearing room!

Please click the link below to join the webinar: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89037370054 
Or One tap mobile: US: +13462487799,,89037370054# or +16694449171,,89037370054# 
Webinar ID: 890 3737 0054 

February 4

1555 – John Rogers is burned at the stake, the first English Protestant martyr under Queen Mary I of England.

1703 – In Edo, Japan, all but one of the  47 rōnin commit seppuku to atone for avenging their master’s death. The one who didn’t had been sent by the band to inform the lord of the area, at his capitol at Ako, of their act before turning themselves in to local authorities, and was later pardoned, but still buried with his companions when he died 44 years later.

1758 – The city of Macapá in Brazil is founded by Sebastião Cabral.

1789 – George Washington is unanimously elected as the first President of the United States by the U.S. Electoral College.

1801 – John Marshall is sworn in as the 4th Chief Justice of the United States.

1825 – The Ohio Legislature authorizes the construction of the Ohio and Erie Canal and the Miami and Erie Canal.

1859 – The Uncial Codex Sinaiticus version of the Bible is discovered in Egypt.

1861 – In Montgomery, Alabama, delegates from the first 6 seceded U.S. states, South Carolina , Mississippi , Florida, Alabama, Georgia and Louisiana, meet in convention to form a new union.

1899 – The Philippine–American War begins with the Battle of Manila, resulting in a U.S. victory with light casualties on both sides.

1941 – The United Service Organization (USO) is created to entertain American troops.

1945 – The Manila Internment Camp on the campus of the University of Santo Tomas in Manila is liberated from Japanese authority by troops of the U.S. Army 44th Tank Battalion.

1967 – NASA launches Lunar Orbiter 3 from Cape Canaveral’s Launch Complex 13 on a mission to identify possible landing sites for the Surveyor and Apollo spacecraft.

1974 – The Symbionese Liberation Army kidnaps Patty Hearst in Berkeley, California.

1976 – In Guatemala and Honduras an earthquake kills more than 22,000 people, leaving over a million homeless.

1977 –  The Lake-Dan Ryan line train, of the Chicago Transit Authority elevated train, rear ends a Ravenswood line train on the northeast corner of the Loop at Wabash Avenue and Lake Street and derails, killing 11 passengers and injuring 180 more, the worst accident in the agency’s history.

1999 – Being mistaken for a suspected criminal, immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot 41 times and killed by plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake out, who are charged with murder, but acquitted at trial.

2004 – Facebook is founded by Mark Zuckerberg and Eduardo Saverin.

Close to Missouri’s SAPA with some pretty stiff penalties for violating it.

Second Amendment Preservation Act would limit enforcement of federal gun laws in Nebraska

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – The Second Amendment Preservation Act, which would nullify some federal gun laws in Nebraska, got a hearing Thursday before a legislative committee.

If the bill is passed, law enforcement would be prohibited from enforcing federal firearm laws if they conflict with Nebraska law.

Sen. Steve Halloran, who introduced the bill, said that Nebraska’s own constitution guarantees the right to keep and bear arms and that this bill would keep those rights from being infringed upon.

Other states have passed similar legislation, and supporters say the bill would help keep the federal government from controlling the guns of citizens in Nebraska.

“The people of Nebraska depend on us to uphold and protect their constitutional rights, which is why LB 194 is necessary,” Halloran said. “At this time, 14 other states have passed legislation, making them a Second Amendment sanctuary state, and it is time for Nebraska to be included.”

Several sheriff’s offices from across the state have said they will stand up to federal overreach and attempts to regulate gun ownership.

Opponents say it would be harder to hold police accountable when they enforce some laws but not others.

Representatives of both the Omaha and Lincoln police departments spoke at the hearing, saying the legislation would create a number of complications for law enforcement and how they work with the federal government.

“We believe LB 194 in its current construct would have unintended consequences, the result of which would negatively impact community safety, more specifically gun violence,” said Matt Franken, vice president of the Lincoln Police Union.

Omaha Police Sgt. Michael Todd Kozelichki said the bill leaves more questions than answers for local law enforcement and their federal partners on what exactly they can enforce.

“LB 194 handcuffs the cooperation between local and federal law enforcement more than it handcuffs the criminals who are out there committing violent crimes,” he said.

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders will BAN drag shows in the state to ‘protect kids’ – after already putting limits on teaching critical race theory in classrooms

  • Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders will sign a bill banning drag shows from areas accessible by minors in order to ‘protect kids’
  • The bill would ultimately do away with drag storytime performances, which sees drag queens reading to students for free at public libraries
  • It’s Sanders’ latest move amid the US culture wars after she issued limits on teaching critical race theory in schools

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders is set to ban drag shows in order to ‘protect’ children after already cracking down on critical race theory in schools.

Sanders and her supporters said the bill, which would re-define drag shows as ‘adult-oriented performances,’ is meant to protect social values as it bans the shows from public areas with children despite outcry from the LGBTQ community.

Alexa Henning, a spokeswoman for the governor, said the bill was not aimed at ‘banning anything,’ but rather about ‘protecting kids’ from ‘sexually explicit drag shows.’

‘Only in the radical left’s woke dystopia is it not appropriate to protect kids,’ Henning told The Washington Post.

Continue reading “”

February 3

1690 – The colony of Massachusetts issues the first paper money in the Americas.

1787 – Militia led by General Benjamin Lincoln defeat forces of Shays’ Rebellion in Petersham, Massachusetts with many retreating to New York, Vermont and New Hampshire to regroup.

1809 – The Territory of Illinois is created by Congress.

1870 – The Fifteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified

1913 – The Sixteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified

1917 – In a 2 hour speech to a joint session of Congress, President Woodrow Wilson announces his decision to sever diplomatic relations with Germany due to the German chancellor declaring the resumption of unlimited submarine warfare.

1918 – The Twin Peaks Tunnel in San Francisco, California begins service as the longest streetcar tunnel in the world at 11,920 feet long.

1958 – The Benelux Economic Union treaty is signed in The Hague

1959 – Rock and roll musicians Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J. P. “The Big Bopper” Richardson are killed in a plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa.

1961 – The U.S Air Force begins Operation Looking Glass, starting a constant 24/7/365  flight of command and control “Doomsday Planes” with the capability of taking direct control of the U.S. nuclear force if necessary.

1971 – New York Police Officer Frank Serpico is shot during a drug bust in Brooklyn and survives to later testify against police corruption.

1984 – Doctor John Buster and a research team at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in the United States announce history’s first embryo transfer, from one woman to another resulting in a live birth.

1994 – Space Shuttle mission STS-60 launches Shuttle Discovery, with Sergei Krikalev as the first Russian cosmonaut to fly aboard the Shuttle.

1995 – Space Shuttle mission STS-63 launches Shuttle Discovery, with Eileen Collins aboard as the first woman to pilot the Shuttle

1998 – A U.S. Marine Corps EA-6B Prowler pilot causes the death of 20 people when his low flying plane cuts the cable of a cable-car near Trento, Italy.