Happy New Year?

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and hopefully a safe one.



Just a comment or two on my previous post on Entitlement Mindset. Look at the picture and ask yourself, how did we get here? Young people rioting, looting, pillaging, throwing firebombs. Not for a righteous cause or liberty. It is, after all, their liberty that allows them to do this and not be shot and killed. Look at the police geared up like storm troopers ready to bash in heads, hidden aggression and violence, masked behind armor and face shields. Is this the way we really want our lives to be? Any of us? How have we degenerated to this? How do we reverse this trend, how do we back down the angst and hatred? This is what we need to concern ourselves with in the coming year lest we devolve into anarchy, and serfdom. Let us all pray for an end to this insanity and for lasting peace.

Just Die Quickly?

Remember Congressman Grayson's description of Republican health care? Well maybe he had it all wrong. Merry Christmas from the Obamanation. Just when you thought it was safe to grow old or get sick, along comes the 2011 Obama death panels. Behind everyone's backs the president (aka the annointed one, the exhalted Sureme ruler) has reinstated (by use of Presidential Rule, bypassing the congress) the end of life counselling on an annual basis, paid for by tax-payers money. This was thrown out of the official Obamacare plan by congress. I wonder what other good news the new year will bring? Once Obama's FCC Czar takes control of the internet and the News media you will never hear when these type of benevolent Presidential Rules are instituted.

Merry Christmas

As we approach this most holy day may we remember the sacrifice of the Son of Peace and His message. I don't care what you call Him, or what faith you follow or your creed. This is a time to extend a hand of peace and friendship, not the mailed hand of violence and hate. Give peace a chance, try giving love instead of hate, violence and murder. May God bless you and keep you and your family safe throughout the coming year.

Entitlement Mindset

Remember the old time Christmas tree lights, where if one bulb burned out they all went out, keep that thought in mind. Growing up around a bunch of western NY Scots Highlanders I developed a different perspective on life. Those bonds of clanship remain strong today. Your familial clan is important but even more important than birthright is what you have done with your life and how you live it. Arrogance is looked down upon, but pride is considered a positive and valuable trait. Pride in your lineage, pride in your work, and blended with a certain amount of humility, pride in who you are. Now this has little or nothing to do with what you might own or how much wealth you have accumulated. In fact, you are more respected for what you have built than what you have bought. Amongst our people virtues come mostly from sweat and tired muscles, not bundles of cash or government handouts. The movie “Rob Roy” with Liam Neeson will give you some sense of what I mean.

It is with a great sense of relief that I saw the one trillion dollar plus omnibus bill go down in flames. I think if the budget isn’t passed then the congressional paychecks ought to just stop. If they load the bill up with pork again I think we need to have a referendum and remove from office every person whose name is attached to an ear-mark. Yes I know that is cold hearted, and people will be dying in the streets for lack of medical care and food. We all know that’s liberal left wing BS. When was the last time you heard of anyone in this country being denied life saving services? Do you know that a high percentage of the people sleeping on the streets are armed forces veterans whose service a nation has forgotten while catering to the never employed?

This is the season to be charitable but I want you to think for a moment about the difference between charity and entitlement. Someone asked me, “Don’t you get money from HEAP to help pay your heating bills?” They were dumbfounded that I had not applied for it. When for most of your life you receive assistance to pay for your food, heat, housing, free cell phones, medical assistance, unemployment, welfare, or disability payments, I suppose it is hard to understand the concept of working for everything you have. I am not opposed to giving a helping hand, God only knows how many charities my wife sends donations to. I am OK with that, except, when it turns into a way of life, and the recipients forget to be thankful and instead begin to demand what is “rightfully theirs.”

Call me Ebeneezer if you will, but when there are three people on the government payroll or welfare dole for every single working person, it is like a pack of wolves shredding a lone sheep. In the end the sheep is dead and there is not enough meat to feed all of the wolves. And that my friends, is how the lights flicker and slowly go out, in a dying civilization. The light in Greece is going out, the light in Ireland, Portugal, and Britain is flickering.

A Snub-nose and a Snake

For a good back up nothing beats a small snub-nosed revolver. I know that small semi-autos are very popular right now but I prefer the reliability of a revolver. Too often small equates to cheap when it comes to semi-autos. A lot of guys will spend a princely sum on their main gun but go cheap on a back-up. Well if your back-up fails to feed or stove-pipes a round what good is it? This early Smith and Wesson Model 36 only holds five rounds of 38 special but that is a lot more wallop than a .380 or a .25 ACP automatic. Having only a 1.5 inch barrel and small fixed sights does not prevent this handgun from being sufficiently accurate out to 10 yards, even in my hands. If you are down to your back-up, things are happening at close range, or your primary weapon is down for some reason. For commonality of ammo, this gun can be paired with any of my 357 magnums since they can shoot .38 special in place of .357 magnum rounds. If you pack any of the popular 9mm, then your primary weapon does not have a lot more muzzle energy than your back up, and maybe less than this snub nose.

The knife would be a good one to take to a gun fight. It is an early Blackjack Mamba modified by Wayne Goddard in an attempt to streamline the original Mike Stewart design. I rather like this version, it being sleeker and more sinuous than the hard lines found on the original recipe. I thought these two looked good together, sharing similar textures. The S&W is wearing its new Hogue grips, that I wrote about a few blogs ago. The Mamba is decked out in its original kraton with snake scale texture. The handle scales are held in place by six screws. The original versions had glued on scales that quickly fell off. This caused no end of grief for Blackjack knives and the terrible publicity nearly destroyed the company. The simple addition of the screws quickly fixed the problem but the design was so maligned as to never recover its popularity. I always felt Blackjack was dealt with unfairly by the staff of Fighting Knives magazine. So enjoy this Chief’s Special and Mamba. Like the old song about John Henry the coal miner; “One fist of iron, the other of steel, If the right one don’t get you then the left one will.”

TAX BS

The senate and congress cannot figure out how to compromise on tax cuts so Obama appoints who else but a tax CHEAT, Geitner to help sort it out. Maybe if we all paid our taxes when it was convenient like Geitner or Rangle then it would solve the problem. Only a liberal could view reduced taxes as "giving money to the wealthy." This is like a crook saying, by not robbing you I have gifted you. Seriously, and how can obama say that maintaining the taxes as they are is costing the american people Trillions? His spending is costing us trillions, not maintaining the taxes status quo. We all have to live within our budget and so should the govt. Maybe if he parked airforce one for a few weeks and stayed at home where he belongs, he could reduce the debt! I hope the republicans stand their ground and do not give in. When ever was it right to give some Americans tax breaks and not others, this is nothing less than class warfare.

Fox Knives Panga XL

Panga XL:

After a very long wait, I finally received my Fox Panga XL. I am not a patient man by any means, but it was worth the wait. Now if I had been shipping out to Borneo or Haiti and I had to wait over two months for a commercially made knife I would be less enthused. Hopefully they will be shipping on a more regular basis henceforth. First impressions are very important, or that’s what my mother said when I went on my first date. Well it wasn’t exactly a date, but anyway, first impressions are important. Out of the box the Panga seemed a bit too light. I had expected something more like my native-made Barong, which in today’s economy probably isn’t going to happen. Does a Panga need to have a blade as hefty as my 3/8 inch thick Barong? Maybe not, it depends on how much chopping you are going to do and how heavy the undergrowth is. Still the overall blade shape and size is very nice and could be easily packed on the side of a backpack.

Some extra meat in the blade would have been handy for splitting firewood or batoning it through if necessary. It’s all a trade-off. The lighter machete-weight blade will make it a formidable, fast handling, fighting blade. I was disappointed that the handle material is a hard plastic, not the nice material Fox Knives used on the Kukri. Also the screw holes in the handle slabs have sharp little burrs around them that will need sanded off to prevent raising blisters. Not a BIG deal, and I would suggest wearing gloves for any serious chopping anyway.

The sheath is similar to the one that came with the Kukri, made of Cordura and other miscellaneous synthetic materials. Not bad, but if I were going off to a third world country somewhere I’d have a kydex replacement made for it. Unfortunately since it took so long to get here I will most likely not be using this Panga XL for camping chores until next Spring. I am getting too soft for Winter camping.

Dimensions: OAL 17 inches
Blade length: 10.5 inches
Blade Width:2.25 inches widest part
Blade thickness: just over 1/8 inch