From 1608 when it was first invented, and for over 200 years thereafter, the flintlock was the firing mechanism of choice in the design of muskets, rifles and pistols. Nothing more advanced was around when the Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution. Flintlocks were the only models that James Madison, the Congress of the USA and the legislatures of the several states could have had in mind when the Second Amendment was drafted, debated and ratified.
Today, of course, we have progressed mightily. The traditional flintlock is still prized by hobbyists and reenactors. And it can kill, as a recent TV murder drama has reminded us, but modern American mass killers have better options for offing a few baker's dozens or so of victims and themselves before official bullets can end their slaughter of the lambs.
These random slayings occur with some frequency, as we all have had occasion to know. No need to repeat the litany of the killing fields fresh in recent memory.
Here's how to fire the flintlock. This is advice easily found on the Internet for today's affectionados:
"Load the barrel in the ordinary way [ramming it home with an oiled patch and the ramrod stored beneath the gun barrel], depending upon what type of gun you are shooting, rifle, smooth bore or pistol. Brush the pan free of all residue from the last shot, using your pan brush. If residue remains, wipe it out with a moistened cloth, then a dry one. Include the frizzen face and the edge of the flint in this wiping. Prick the touch-hole, to make certain it is clear. Place a few grains of priming powder into the pan, not more than 1/3 full, probably less. Close the frizzen, cock and fire.
"If you will make each of these steps a routine part of the procedure, and if you keep an eye on the flint edge for sharpness, the gun will fire every time. You'll notice after a few shots that your frizzen, flint and pan are getting pretty fouled, and inconsistent ignition will surely be the result. A small cleaning patch dampened with rubbing alcohol is best for wiping the face of the frizzen, flint and pan to prevent the buildup of soot that would dull your sparks. A good wipe down every few shots is all that's needed." ©1997 Brad Finch
Why am I telling you this? Because no mass killer worthy of the name would rely on such an awkward contraption today. He or she would be better off with a couple of box cutters. Yet our laws for the regulation of guns and ammunition are all descendants of the mindset behind the Second Amendment formed by the flintlock.
These days any blithering fool can legally, freely and instantly buy at gun shows his own miniature Gatling gun and spray a screaming, terrorized crowd in a mall, school, auditorium or stadium with several score bullets, optimized for best lethal effect, in the time it took one of General George Washington's patriotic soldiers of the Revolution to get off a single lead shot at a Red Coat and prime his weapon for the next "round."
It is deadly folly -- even though a generation of conservative jurists have argued otherwise-- to find that the original intent of the Founding Fathers was to have such lethal potential in the pocket or purse of every man or woman on any Main Street. To repeat, the most that our famous ancestors could have had in mind was the arming of every able bodied citizen with a Kentucky long rifle, powder,shot, an oilded patch and a ramrod.
Not a bad idea, that, although concealed carry might be difficult in Florida in the summertime. At least the wild animals and civilized humans targeted would have a modest chance on a partially leveled sporting ground.
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Monday, December 10, 2012
The Coming Evolution of Obamacare
Updated August 30, 2013.
Florida and Texas are the largest of 27 states that either have said they won't establish a state run medical insurance exchange or have yet to decide what they are going to do about that pivotal part of the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," now and forever nicknamed Obamacare.
Another part of the act, Medicaid expansion, finds the states even more conflicted The Supreme Court has ruled that part of Obamcare is voluntary. Florida and Texas lead the south in near solid opposition, and most states haven't decided, despite the generous terms on offer if they do. The 17 million Americans now without health insurance, who would be newly eligible for Medicad, will have to cool their heels in emergency rooms a while longer.
On another front, over 1,700 businesses have received waivers postponing their participation in Obamacare until 2014. It seems clear that its roll out will be slow. Even after tardy businesses begin to comply it is quite possible that many will opt to pay a fine rather than offer their employees health plans that conform to Obamacare regulations.
Far from being dismaying, these developments are just what the doctor ordered for we who advocate a single payer federal system. They will let Obamacare evolve as follows:
1) Employers, already disposed to do so, will continue to shed or emasculate employee medical benefits the better to compete locally and globally. The penalties for not complying with Obamacare are not apt to rise at all, while the costs of health insurance will continue up. In time paying the fines will be the more sensible route.
2) In tandem with the decline in employer medical benefits, iinsurance exchanges -- whether federally, state or jointly run -- will gradually become the market places where most Americans buy health insurance.
3) Medicaid will expand gradually, but inevitably, as state intransigence wanes in the face of withering public outrage. This will save the Feds gobs of money in the near term while laying the blame for heartlessness where it belongs.
4) Gradual Medicaid expansion will buy the medical professions time to recruit and train caregivers from around the world to meet the expanding need. This would alleviate what could have been a biding war for suddenly scarce skills and a consequent steep rise in medical costs that might have proved fatal to Obamacare while in its cradle.
5) Medical insurance offerings will become standardized into a menu of plans easy to understand and compare, leading to markets competing predominately on price like retailers at Christmas time. This will squeeze profits more effectively than any number of costly regulations, and will lead the insurance industry to depart the medical insurance business except as contractors for the Feds.
6) As with flood insurance, hurricane insurance in Florida and earthquake insurance in California, government will fill the vacuum by popular demand. The five medical insurance programs -- Medicaid, Medicare, Obamacare, Tricare (for the military) and the Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan (Civilcare?) -- run by the Federal Government will thus come to insure nearly all Americans.
This outcome may not be called "a single payer system," but it will look, act and quack like one. In a generation these systems will converge and a Health Security Administration will take its place along side the Social Security Administration within the Department of Health and Human Services. This will be called socialism, more black UN helicopters will be seen patroling our boarders and we will be accused of being just like Europe. And not a moment too soon.
Of course it will be far from socialism. Most of us will still have to select a plan from among insurance company offerings. Most of us will choose among benefit plans offered at work either as primary insurance or as a suplememt to Medicare. Others will shop through state exchanges especially if you work for a comany with fewer than 50 employees.
Doctors and other medical providers will still practice separately or in privately organizaed groups. Hospitals will still be free to be non profit or for profit corporations. We will still be constrained by which doctors and hospitals are acceptable to (cozy with) our insurers. The system will look a lot more like Germany's, which also keeps a role for insurance companies, than England's, in which medical resources are deployed by the state.
Obamacare will also like a Republican proposed plan, which was developed by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in response to Hilliary Care/. Yes, you understood right: Obamacare was first proposed by the Republicans under a different name. Wonder what happened? Join the crowd.
Florida and Texas are the largest of 27 states that either have said they won't establish a state run medical insurance exchange or have yet to decide what they are going to do about that pivotal part of the "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act," now and forever nicknamed Obamacare.
Another part of the act, Medicaid expansion, finds the states even more conflicted The Supreme Court has ruled that part of Obamcare is voluntary. Florida and Texas lead the south in near solid opposition, and most states haven't decided, despite the generous terms on offer if they do. The 17 million Americans now without health insurance, who would be newly eligible for Medicad, will have to cool their heels in emergency rooms a while longer.
On another front, over 1,700 businesses have received waivers postponing their participation in Obamacare until 2014. It seems clear that its roll out will be slow. Even after tardy businesses begin to comply it is quite possible that many will opt to pay a fine rather than offer their employees health plans that conform to Obamacare regulations.
Far from being dismaying, these developments are just what the doctor ordered for we who advocate a single payer federal system. They will let Obamacare evolve as follows:
1) Employers, already disposed to do so, will continue to shed or emasculate employee medical benefits the better to compete locally and globally. The penalties for not complying with Obamacare are not apt to rise at all, while the costs of health insurance will continue up. In time paying the fines will be the more sensible route.
2) In tandem with the decline in employer medical benefits, iinsurance exchanges -- whether federally, state or jointly run -- will gradually become the market places where most Americans buy health insurance.
3) Medicaid will expand gradually, but inevitably, as state intransigence wanes in the face of withering public outrage. This will save the Feds gobs of money in the near term while laying the blame for heartlessness where it belongs.
4) Gradual Medicaid expansion will buy the medical professions time to recruit and train caregivers from around the world to meet the expanding need. This would alleviate what could have been a biding war for suddenly scarce skills and a consequent steep rise in medical costs that might have proved fatal to Obamacare while in its cradle.
5) Medical insurance offerings will become standardized into a menu of plans easy to understand and compare, leading to markets competing predominately on price like retailers at Christmas time. This will squeeze profits more effectively than any number of costly regulations, and will lead the insurance industry to depart the medical insurance business except as contractors for the Feds.
6) As with flood insurance, hurricane insurance in Florida and earthquake insurance in California, government will fill the vacuum by popular demand. The five medical insurance programs -- Medicaid, Medicare, Obamacare, Tricare (for the military) and the Federal Employee Health Benefit Plan (Civilcare?) -- run by the Federal Government will thus come to insure nearly all Americans.
This outcome may not be called "a single payer system," but it will look, act and quack like one. In a generation these systems will converge and a Health Security Administration will take its place along side the Social Security Administration within the Department of Health and Human Services. This will be called socialism, more black UN helicopters will be seen patroling our boarders and we will be accused of being just like Europe. And not a moment too soon.
Of course it will be far from socialism. Most of us will still have to select a plan from among insurance company offerings. Most of us will choose among benefit plans offered at work either as primary insurance or as a suplememt to Medicare. Others will shop through state exchanges especially if you work for a comany with fewer than 50 employees.
Doctors and other medical providers will still practice separately or in privately organizaed groups. Hospitals will still be free to be non profit or for profit corporations. We will still be constrained by which doctors and hospitals are acceptable to (cozy with) our insurers. The system will look a lot more like Germany's, which also keeps a role for insurance companies, than England's, in which medical resources are deployed by the state.
Obamacare will also like a Republican proposed plan, which was developed by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in response to Hilliary Care/. Yes, you understood right: Obamacare was first proposed by the Republicans under a different name. Wonder what happened? Join the crowd.
Monday, December 3, 2012
An Atheist For Jesus At Christmas
I hate the word, "atheist," perhaps because I am occasionally called one. Once I decided to think about important questions as if I was a scientist, holding all conclusions open to change as the facts change, I could not be a Christian in any orthodox sense. This despite a conventional and comfortable upbringing as a Methodist in a Protestant world. Nor does "agnostic" work because I will only believe posthumously and in the Presence, and what I seek is a way to knowledge, and a way to live, here and now on earth.
But I am not hostile to religion as the anti-science, as many atheists are, nor do I think I am superior morally and ethically to people afflicted by faith rather than doubt. Indeed I adhere passionately to the cause of freedom of -- and from -- religion. I am more than willing to tolerate the many kinds of folk myth and nonsense that infect and roil the world even unto these days. Indeed, as I found out yet again on one recent day, the music, the words and the pageantry of a Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus have emotional power that reason cannot explain. I suspect that all ancient and rooted religions so affect their apostates.
Picture a choir, voices filling a chapel built in accord with scientific acoustics and festooned with greenery, candle light and stained glass. When the choir bursts into the music of Bach, Beethoven, Brittan and Handel -- Handel above all -- my eyes and sinuses testify to the mind's response. Perhaps also it is the Christmas hymns of childhood that fire the emotions. Who would not wish "Joy to the World?" To please Jesus with your drum? To go tell on a mountain a tale of servitude and redemption found, ironically, in the faith of oppressors?
More prosaically, Stetson University is a small faith founded college of our Florida neighborhood, now grown to university sized sophistication, that harbors an accomplished faculty and curricula for the musical and lively arts. That chapel is theirs. Students and teachers annually stage a Christmas show, which most years we attend with friends. The program is resolutely non-denominational: only the hard pews deliver a stern Calvinism. (Veterans bring pillows, and do not share.) Applause, like commercials on public television, has its appointed place.
More specifically, the moral teachings of Jesus are hard to ignore and harder to beat. If you do what Thomas Jefferson did and strip away the embroidery of miracles most certainly woven centuries later to warm the gullible, you are left with a set of simple, yet profound, rules for a moral life. They are easy to say and fiendishly difficult to live by. Jefferson's life, famously ambiguous, attests to this. Fluent in Greek, Latin and French and a master of English, Jefferson cut up new testaments in these languages and pasted together a version of his own containing only the sermons, parables and other teachings. Versions of it, with commentaries, are still around (search for "The Jefferson Bible" on Google, amazon.com or abe.com).
A fictional case of the profoundly simple in Jesus' teachings is found in "The Answer," a slight modern parable by the late writer, Philip Wylie. Set, and written, in the cold war era of the 1950's when hydrogen bomb testing was in vogue, it concerns the deadly fate of two angels urgently bearing identical golden books directly into the sites of thermonuclear tests, one in Siberia and another on an expendable Pacific island. One book, its dead bearer and its peasant discoverer are destroyed by a Stalin figure with patented cruel efficacy by another thermonuclear blast. The other angel's book is hidden by a young lad on a nearby island, where the angel crashed to earth, before investigators can find it's fatally stricken bearer. Subsequently, the plane carrying the American angel's body to Washington is unaccountably lost at sea.
The scene is set for Russian and American leaders to do what they do best: say nothing and hope nothing comes of it. But the American general in charge of the bomb test, who is the book's protagonist, is ordered back to the island of the stricken angel to conduct another nearby test. He encounters the boy and by a plausible plot twist or two knows to ask him what he is hiding.
"I never meant to keep it! But it is gold! And we were always so mighty poor. . . I hid it under an old rock. Come on, I'll show you." He did.
Then the author wrote: "[In the book] there was one message only, very short, said again and again, but [the general] did not know what it was until . . . he found the tongues of Earth. . . For the message of icy space and flaring stars was this: '---- --- -------'."
If you cannot easily substitute the proper letters, one per dash, you will never be sure of the answer to that half ironical, ubiquitious question of our day: What would Jesus say? Merry Christmas.
'
But I am not hostile to religion as the anti-science, as many atheists are, nor do I think I am superior morally and ethically to people afflicted by faith rather than doubt. Indeed I adhere passionately to the cause of freedom of -- and from -- religion. I am more than willing to tolerate the many kinds of folk myth and nonsense that infect and roil the world even unto these days. Indeed, as I found out yet again on one recent day, the music, the words and the pageantry of a Christian celebration of the birth of Jesus have emotional power that reason cannot explain. I suspect that all ancient and rooted religions so affect their apostates.
Picture a choir, voices filling a chapel built in accord with scientific acoustics and festooned with greenery, candle light and stained glass. When the choir bursts into the music of Bach, Beethoven, Brittan and Handel -- Handel above all -- my eyes and sinuses testify to the mind's response. Perhaps also it is the Christmas hymns of childhood that fire the emotions. Who would not wish "Joy to the World?" To please Jesus with your drum? To go tell on a mountain a tale of servitude and redemption found, ironically, in the faith of oppressors?
More prosaically, Stetson University is a small faith founded college of our Florida neighborhood, now grown to university sized sophistication, that harbors an accomplished faculty and curricula for the musical and lively arts. That chapel is theirs. Students and teachers annually stage a Christmas show, which most years we attend with friends. The program is resolutely non-denominational: only the hard pews deliver a stern Calvinism. (Veterans bring pillows, and do not share.) Applause, like commercials on public television, has its appointed place.
More specifically, the moral teachings of Jesus are hard to ignore and harder to beat. If you do what Thomas Jefferson did and strip away the embroidery of miracles most certainly woven centuries later to warm the gullible, you are left with a set of simple, yet profound, rules for a moral life. They are easy to say and fiendishly difficult to live by. Jefferson's life, famously ambiguous, attests to this. Fluent in Greek, Latin and French and a master of English, Jefferson cut up new testaments in these languages and pasted together a version of his own containing only the sermons, parables and other teachings. Versions of it, with commentaries, are still around (search for "The Jefferson Bible" on Google, amazon.com or abe.com).
A fictional case of the profoundly simple in Jesus' teachings is found in "The Answer," a slight modern parable by the late writer, Philip Wylie. Set, and written, in the cold war era of the 1950's when hydrogen bomb testing was in vogue, it concerns the deadly fate of two angels urgently bearing identical golden books directly into the sites of thermonuclear tests, one in Siberia and another on an expendable Pacific island. One book, its dead bearer and its peasant discoverer are destroyed by a Stalin figure with patented cruel efficacy by another thermonuclear blast. The other angel's book is hidden by a young lad on a nearby island, where the angel crashed to earth, before investigators can find it's fatally stricken bearer. Subsequently, the plane carrying the American angel's body to Washington is unaccountably lost at sea.
The scene is set for Russian and American leaders to do what they do best: say nothing and hope nothing comes of it. But the American general in charge of the bomb test, who is the book's protagonist, is ordered back to the island of the stricken angel to conduct another nearby test. He encounters the boy and by a plausible plot twist or two knows to ask him what he is hiding.
"I never meant to keep it! But it is gold! And we were always so mighty poor. . . I hid it under an old rock. Come on, I'll show you." He did.
Then the author wrote: "[In the book] there was one message only, very short, said again and again, but [the general] did not know what it was until . . . he found the tongues of Earth. . . For the message of icy space and flaring stars was this: '---- --- -------'."
If you cannot easily substitute the proper letters, one per dash, you will never be sure of the answer to that half ironical, ubiquitious question of our day: What would Jesus say? Merry Christmas.
'
Saturday, December 1, 2012
On Winning The Lottery
An Indulgent chapter from my rich fantasy life circa Christmas, 2012.
"I'd say $588 million is just about right. We could help the kids and do everything we want to," I told my wife at breakfast. "Why share? Let's buy a ticket and win the whole enchilada!"
Well, we didn't and we didn't, but that doesn't stop the fantasy reel from spooling its story through my head. As a film it could win Sundance.
Damn! Two other people, just as normal as we are, just won.
Power Ball! The name itself lights up the mind's eye. It conjures riches, dominance, a delightful, willful dance through life, clad in pearl drenched raiment, while riding a chariot of gold to the ends of the earth and back as the seas and the people part abjectly as you pass, offering you delicacies of food and drink for a coin or two from your endless purse.
Take a cruise! Hell, buy a yacht! Ride a Gulfstream! Go Express to the Orient! Break Monte Carlo! Impress Paris! Take London by storm and meet the Queen! Elect a President and sleep in Lincoln's bed! Address (and admonish) Congress! Proclaim world peace before the UN!
"First we should pay off the mortgage. And make a dent in the credit card balances. Could we have a live tree this Christmas? What about college for the grandchildren?" My wife is ever the practical one, even when dreaming.
"What about a new home for us and the live tree?" Overlooking the sea and the 18th green at Pebble Beach?" My reel is still running.
"We ought to do our best to lead a normal life," she said. "That's what real winners always say."
"Not til the money's gone," I said. "Mitt's not busy now. "He could help do a private equity fund, so the money will never run out. We could round up to a billion. Sounds normal enough for me."
"Wouldn't you rather do philanthropy with Warren and Bill? We have 23 children, grand children and great grand children, remember."
"Be practical. And remember whose fantasy this is."
Her voice turned flat. She said matter of factly, ending the dream, "All I remember is what you always said when I wanted to buy a lottery ticket."
"What?"
"If you don't play you can't lose."
"I'd say $588 million is just about right. We could help the kids and do everything we want to," I told my wife at breakfast. "Why share? Let's buy a ticket and win the whole enchilada!"
Well, we didn't and we didn't, but that doesn't stop the fantasy reel from spooling its story through my head. As a film it could win Sundance.
Damn! Two other people, just as normal as we are, just won.
Power Ball! The name itself lights up the mind's eye. It conjures riches, dominance, a delightful, willful dance through life, clad in pearl drenched raiment, while riding a chariot of gold to the ends of the earth and back as the seas and the people part abjectly as you pass, offering you delicacies of food and drink for a coin or two from your endless purse.
Take a cruise! Hell, buy a yacht! Ride a Gulfstream! Go Express to the Orient! Break Monte Carlo! Impress Paris! Take London by storm and meet the Queen! Elect a President and sleep in Lincoln's bed! Address (and admonish) Congress! Proclaim world peace before the UN!
"First we should pay off the mortgage. And make a dent in the credit card balances. Could we have a live tree this Christmas? What about college for the grandchildren?" My wife is ever the practical one, even when dreaming.
"What about a new home for us and the live tree?" Overlooking the sea and the 18th green at Pebble Beach?" My reel is still running.
"We ought to do our best to lead a normal life," she said. "That's what real winners always say."
"Not til the money's gone," I said. "Mitt's not busy now. "He could help do a private equity fund, so the money will never run out. We could round up to a billion. Sounds normal enough for me."
"Wouldn't you rather do philanthropy with Warren and Bill? We have 23 children, grand children and great grand children, remember."
"Be practical. And remember whose fantasy this is."
Her voice turned flat. She said matter of factly, ending the dream, "All I remember is what you always said when I wanted to buy a lottery ticket."
"What?"
"If you don't play you can't lose."
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