Airborne Combat Engineer

Mini metal chocolate ammo boxes

Give your firearm loving friends these little mini ammo boxes with chocolate cartridges [$12.95]. They can reuse the boxes for real ammo or whatever:

The Gun Source

Thanks for donating to Animal Action Rescue (AAR)

Sixdegrees.org (the brilliant charity format set up by Kevin Bacon) and Hanes are sponsoring a matching grant contest for worthy charity groups.

The ten groups which obtain the most unique donors of $10 or more will receive a grant matching the amount they raised via donors (up to $10K) from the Hanes Corporation.

Animal Action Rescue (AAR) of Scottdale, GA (an Atlanta suburb) -- see and read about the dogs currently needing homes at the site -- has raised almost $2500, and is (as of this post) ranked SECOND among those competing with 89 donations (vs. 107 for the top group). [Click here for the current top ten]

Please click on "video" at the top of this badge and watch at least part of the before and after shots to see the amazing job these people are doing in saving dogs from what has to be hell for them and placing them with loving, caring people. If you're not compelled to donate $10, you're heart has been unduly hardened, or you need help yourself.

[I've personally seen the dramatic transformation in physical appearance and demeanor in a number of them, after medical help (when needed), proper nutrition and shelter, and a lot of TLC.]

Thanks to Nicholas (a frequent commenter here) and to anyone else who has already donated, and thanks in advance for any who will donate.

If you have or will donate, please comment, giving feedback on whether these posts are doing some good.

Please e-mail a link to this post to your friends. If you have a blog, please link to it.

I thank you, and my friends Aaron and Chrissie (a couple of the TLC givers, who typically have several of these dogs at home) thank you even more! When you check in at the Pearly Gates, this little act of kindness will be on the plus side of your ledger. Who among us couldn't use more check marks on the good side?

Help those who help abused animals

Acquaintances in Decatur, GA help save abused pets. I've seen a number of badly abused and/or neglected dogs brought back to good health and placed in good homes. The transformation in physical condition and temperament is amazing. But, it takes a lot of TLC.

For a $10 donation, you might help their organization win a grant.

Please read the continuation, watch the compelling video, and help if you can. Even if you can't, please e-mail this to as many of your friends as you can.

Fourth of July roundup

This is the day that is so special in our American history. On 04 JUL 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted. The battle for independence started earlier at Lexington, with only 77 minutemen standing up against the British troops.

We invite anyone, anywhere to share in the celebration of the concept of free citizens.

Annotated links to Fourth of July posts will be added in the continuation during the morning.

No more receipts for EFT transactions $15 or less

Banks will no longer be required to provide customers with receipts for electronic funds transfer (EFT) transactions of $15 or less under a new rule to be implemented by the Federal Reserve Board of Governors.

The banking industry requested that small EFT transactions be excepted from this requirement due to the costs involved with installing and maintaining receipt printing equipment at locations that handle mainly small-dollar amount transactions, like vending machines and public mass-transit ticket sales stations.

The Board also received comments from individual consumers who objected to the proposed rule change altogether, citing a need for receipts for various reasons, including account management, fraud detection, and reimbursement and income tax substantiation purposes.

RL/About.com

George Jensen, Chairman and CEO, USA Technologies Inc. “Cashless has become the preferred method of payment in the US, and we believe the decision will lead to an acceleration in adoption of cashless technology, driving greater convenience for consumers and opening up new business opportunities for vending and the self-serve market.” [Businesswire]

Calling Janet Reno

The Brown's in New Hampshire are making a stand, which could lead to a Waco-like confrontation.

Calling the federal agents surrounding his fortified compound "guns for hire," a New Hampshire man convicted of tax evasion vowed today that he and his wife would fight U.S. marshals to the death if they tried to capture them. [ABC News]

Randy Weaver, the symbol of everything the government hopes to avoid with convicted tax evaders Ed and Elaine Brown, offered advice to the fugitives and warnings to federal agents at the Browns' fortified home on Monday. Weaver's wife and son and a deputy U.S. marshal were killed during the infamous Ruby Ridge shootout with federal agents in Idaho in 1992. [AP]

Pro Libertate has more (see the comments there).

It will be interesting to see how this is handled.

Has Gazilla been upstaged by Bamzilla, or is it hogwash?

MONTGOMERY, Ala.- Hogzilla is being made into a horror movie. But the sequel may be even bigger: Meet Monster Pig. An 11-year-old boy used a pistol to kill a wild hog his father says weighed a staggering 1,051 pounds and measured 9 feet 4, from the tip of its snout to the base of its tail. Think hams as big as car tires.

If the claims are accurate, Jamison Stone's trophy boar would be bigger than Hogzilla, the famed wild hog that grew to seemingly mythical proportions after being killed in south Georgia in 2004... but not as large as the confirmed 1100 lb. boar killed in Fayetteville, GA in January of 2007.

How big can a big hog get? We've probably not seen the last of these reports.

Miranda Lambert packs heat

The 23-year-old Miranda Lambert writes and sings country songs with a rock edge. Onstage, she's a tough, no-nonsense firecracker. The daughter of semiretired private investigators who followed philandering spouses for a living, she knows her way around firearms. She has a license to carry a gun. In her songs, she defends herself with gunpowder and lead.

"I got spankings, but I also got toys," she says. "I was a really well-balanced kid."

"There is no bad publicity," she says. "Talk about me any way you want to. If you hate me, tell people. Just say my name."

Columbus Dispatch

My kinda gal.

Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) likely to be delayed

EL PASO – The Texas legislature moved closer to blocking the Trans-Texas Corridor last week with a bill that would place a two-year moratorium on all public-private partnerships [PPPs] that would involve the construction of new toll roads financed and operated by private foreign investment groups.

The wide margins by which both measures passed assured seasoned observers of Texas politics that the anti-superhighway, two-year moratorium will likely pass both houses of the Texas legislature with more than enough votes to override a likely veto by Governor Rick Perry, a stalwart supporter of the Trans-Texas Corridor concept.

In the hotly contested summer round of public hearings throughout Texas, strong local opposition was voiced to Perry's plan to build a 4,000-mile system [four football fields wide] throughout Texas over a 50-year period, removing in the process some 580,000 acres of land from public tax rolls and displacing an estimated 1 million Texans from their ranches, farms, businesses, and homes through eminent domain.

[WorldNetDaily]

This is considered the southernmost segment of what some call the NAFTA Superhighway, which might eventually stretch from Mexico to Canada.

Hip-Hop feeling backblast from the "I mess"

Hip-hop has been put on the defensive after Don Imus was fired for using language which is common in its lyrics.

Russell Simmons, Chairman, and Dr. Benjamin Chavis, President of the Hip-Hop Summit Action Network [HSAN] have released a statement regarding the distinction between Don Imus and Hip-Hop, which says, in part:

"Hip-hop artists rap about what they see, hear and feel around them, their experience of the world. Like the artists throughout history, their messages are a mirror of what is right and wrong with society. Sometimes their observations or the way in which they choose to express their art may be uncomfortable for some to hear, but our job is not to silence or censor that expression."

[ThugLifeArmy]

A rapper going by the handle "Wise Intelligent" defends Hip-Hop in Black Star News, shifting the blame on the media:

"We all know that the major media outlets for Hip-Hop art are not controlled by the Hip Hop Community. So, then, the Hip Hop community does not decide what does or does not get played, and therefore, cannot be responsible."

On the other hand, see WSJ, EURweb, Eurweb2, ConservativeVoice, and RenewAmerica [h/t BCR]. (Google for many others)

Imus, in a poor attempt to be humorous to those with minds of 13-year-olds, used Hip-Hop language.

Barack Obama has  said Hip-Hop artists are often "disrepectful of their sisters."

Those who want to censor talk show hosts while ignoring Hip-Hop lyrics are walking a thin, nuanced, line.