Politics, done right

This went through Team Discussion on ArfCom earlier today. Original writer lists location as "Missouri". I haven't gone digging too hard for confirmation yet, but I'd love to find it.

Our Chief of Police of many years retired about four months ago. Instead of promoting a local guy, who most of the community really wanted to be the new Chief, the city council in a lame duck bout of stupidity (Those in favor of not promoting the local guy have since all been voted out of office) decided to hire a recently retired State Highway Trooper. He spent 99% of his career working in and around St. Louis and rubbed a lot of locals the wrong way almost immediately with some of his new BS policies.

Today in a special council meeting where the new Chief asked for an ordinance, punishable by fine and CONFISCATION, against OC and visibly displayed weapons (no rifles or shotguns in the window rack of a pickup anymore) he was fired. I guess he no more got through making his presentation for all the new ordinances he wanted than the Mayor, and several of the council, including our lone council woman, produced hand guns and laid them on the table in front of them. From what I heard a motion to terminate his employment was made within seconds, seconded, voted on and, POOF, the Chief was the ex-Chief. The vote was 6 to 0, with the Mayor not voting since there was no tie, in favor of immediate termination. The City Attorney accepted his immediate resignation on the spot and had a letter of resignation ready for him to sign!

The guy had to call his wife to come get him since they took his City property, including his badge and the keys to his City car, from him right then and there. From what I've heard he was not at all prepared for this kind of reaction. During his little presentation he said some of them might not happy with what he saw as necessary steps to control "unacceptable behavior" in our town. Apparently there weren't!

Serving at the will of the people...

ETA: I'll reiterate that I have *no* confirmation of this. And the city council going group-Cletus with their heaters kind of twitches the smell test... but I'm keeping an eye on the thread to see if something new shows up. Lots of people have asked for verification from an independent source.

Huge news

If you have a Dragon Leatherworks holster, you're a lucky one. If you've got one ordered, you're still in luck. If you were planning to order one, you're going to be waiting a bit.

No, they aren't closing up shop - at least not permanently.

Dragon is packing up shop and fleeing New York!

This is wonderful news for him, and I am jealous in ways that are hard to describe. It's not in the cards for me just yet, but someday...

The family and I (wife and kids) are moving out of New York State. Its too expensive here...taxes are onerous, and the only places where the cost of a home approaches something that could be construed as reasonably affordable are so far from the population centers that pay on the highest scales, that you need to live 70+ miles away, and commute to the better paying jobs.

Which I have done for the past 13 years...each day is an 80 mile commute ONE WAY (yes, you read that right...its a daily round trip of 160+ miles each and every day) just to get a paycheck. The costs of gasoline alone tops $600 a month. Add in the state income taxes paid to NY (for the *cough* privilege *cough*) to live here, and the state income tax paid to NJ for the *cough* privilege *cough* to be allowed to work in *that* state, and my monthly outlay in terms of net dollars topped $1000 a month. And thats not even considering the costs of tolls, monthly maintenance on the vehicle, insurance costs, etc...

Congratulations, Dragon! (Keep the beer cold for me, will ya?)

Flashlights

Linoge mentions the CDC and FBI being at odds about a few things - particularly flashlights.

Look, flashlights are a tool. A damn useful one. Human eyes are actually pretty good at low-light vision, but your imagination is NOT always the worst thing in the woods. Having a decent light makes all kinds of things a lot easier.

I've always liked flashlights. They multiply like rabbits. Little ones run by a button cell. Big multi-D-cell nightsticks. Cheap $3 hardware store specials. $90 do-it-all-but-the-coffee models.

The cheap ones get tossed everywhere - closets, drawers, toolboxes, gloveboxes, etc. The good ones I tend to be a bit more particular with. That said, I'm always on the lookout for something different. I happened to see these at work the other day.

Floating (and therefore waterproof). Includes a battery. 65-hour runtime. $5 - and therefore darn-near disposable, since a replacement battery is almost $4. Bright enough to be useful, long enough runtime to let the kids play with it. Beam quality isn't superb, but it's fine for general use.

Thumbs up.

Photos - Pull For Patriots

I mentioned that I'd shot a course of sporting clays two weeks ago. Since it was a benefit event, they did take some pictures, and these were passed along. I look like I have half a clue what I'm doing! (Tip o' the hat to Yellowfin for taking the pictures!)

Definitely on my "do it again" list.

Prepper Challenge

Challenge, kids:

You have $200 in disposable income to spend any way you like on preparedness items. Any items. Presume you already have a basic amount of food, ammo, firearms, etc.

What do you get, and why?