With apologies to Mr. Zevon.

From the New York Times:

A month ago over lunch at the Four Seasons, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg urged a crowd of wealthy political donors to stop giving to candidates who do not support the city's priorities in Washington, like more money to fight terrorism or for a direct rail link to Kennedy Airport.

But when it comes to controlling the gun trade, an issue Mr. Bloomberg has pushed to the top of the city's legislative agenda, he has not been following his own advice. An analysis of Federal Election Commission filings shows that in recent years he has mostly opened his overstuffed checkbook for pro-gun candidates, often contributing the maximum permitted by campaign finance rules.

According to the filings, which list donations above $200, of the 11 Congressional candidates to whom Mr. Bloomberg has made contributions since 2000, 7 received high marks from the political arm of the National Rifle Association, the country's chief gun lobby. And as recently as 2004, Mr. Bloomberg spread $10,000 among three Republican congressmen, John E. Sweeney and Vito J. Fossella of New York and Harold Rogers of Kentucky, none of whom received lower than an A- from the N.R.A. that year, meaning they had a solid record of siding with the pro-gun lobby.

But does this say more about Bloomberg, or about the persons he contributed to?

Or does it just say that politics is a shady business, not fit for honest folk?

How the U.S. Acquired the SW from Mexico: #1 is a good post at Lest Darkness Fall.

I will be looking forward to #2.

The historical revisionists are very fond of ignoring the little fact that the self-proclaimed dictator of Mexico trashed both the Mexican constitution and the agreement that the colony of Texas had made with Spain.

Based on Santa Ana's later actions, I'd say Austin was lucky that he was only imprisoned, and not simply put before a firing squad.

Received this link by email.  You only get to look at the picture, and you try to guess if the person was a serial killer or the inventor of a programming language.  I got 7 out of 10 right.  I had to guess at all but one.  Everyone should know what David Berkowitz looks like.

Today I've been...doing some research, yeah, that's it...on howdah pistols.

The howdah was an enormous handgun used for last-ditch defense against attacking tigers and the like by African big game hunters in India.  Usually somewhere around .60 to .75 caliber, usually muzzle-loading, I think, and sometimes rifled, sometimes smooth-bored.  I still have a lot of research to do on this one.

Anyway, in my searches I came across this website:  A Purdy Howdah Pistol.  Lots of very good hi-res pix that are worth checking out, especially those beautiful Damascus steel barrels.  Here's one composite that I made, go check them all out for even more higher-res pix.


Wow, that's sweet.

UPDATE:  Thanks to El Capitan for correcting me on the tigers in Africa matter.  I actually do know better than that.  I just wasn't thinking clearly while looking at those barrels.  Slobber.

A few months ago I mentioned that I had a short story that had been chosen for inclusion in a horror fiction collection.

There's another one in the works, this one called Hell's Hangmen. This one will be a collection of horror stories set in the Old West.  The cover art has now been finalized and can be seen here.

Lovecraftian-themed horror set in the Old West is one of my favorite obscure sub-sub-sub-genres.

All my life I thought I had a problem.  The problem was this:  no matter what brand, no matter what size, I could not pour coffee from a coffee-maker pitcher without spilling some of it.

But now I have learned that it is not my fault.

Thank you, Mr. Balko.

Somerville, Massachusetts:

More than $31,000 in drug money seized by Somerville police now is buried forever under tons of garbage in a Rochester, N.H., landfill after officers accidentally stashed the cash in a broken desk drawer that was being discarded.

The drug money went missing after an evidence room technician, who had been cleaning out evidence rooms at police headquarters since last Wednesday, put the $31,535 in the drawer of the broken desk, said acting police Chief Robert Bradley. On Monday, while the technician was out of the office, two other officers involved in the evidence room cleanup threw out the desk, along with broken chairs and furniture for spring cleaning.

[...]

The $31,535, which covers about a dozen investigations conducted by Somerville police since July 1, 2005, was to have been split between the department and the Middlesex County district attorney's office if prosecutors won convictions in those cases.

This one is a counterpart to the previous post.  I've been following this story for a few days but have been waiting to see how the trial turned out.

Milwaukee, Wisconsin:

As a Walgreens security guard for six years, Sam Gwin Jr. wore a gun and a bulletproof vest to work every day.

As a convicted felon, Gwin wasn't supposed to have either of those things.

I still have some questions about this situation.  The article states that "He concealed the gun from customers and store employees."  Did the store management know he carried it?  Was it even an armed station?  Did the security company know he carried it?  Because, on that last question, if they did, they are in serious trouble.  They are probably in serious trouble anyway.

No legitimate security company will hire guards without first performing a background check and making sure they are squeaky clean.  They wouldn't normally hire an ex-felon even for an unarmed station.

In any event, this seems to be a case of a shiny security guard's badge going to someone's head, and he decided he was pseudo-professional enough to whack someone over a pair of sunglasses, which had been dropped before the victim left the store.

But prosecutors noted that Mitchell appeared to have suffered three of his four bullet wounds while he was already on the ground. The angle of each of those shots, Assistant District Attorney John Chisholm said, contradicted Gwin's claim that Mitchell had been coming at him when he fired them.

Shoot to stop.  Don't keep shooting to kill.

Seattle, Washington:

An armed man spoke briefly to Archbishop Desmond Tutu outside a Seattle cathedral and handed him three bullets, police confirmed Friday.

No one was injured.

The retired Anglican archbishop from South Africa had just left St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral after a Thursday night service when the man approached him, Officer Deanna Nollette said.

Tutu handed the .45 caliber bullets to another person and continued to his car. The other person turned and gave the rounds to a Seattle police officer on scene for crowd control, she said.

The "alarmed" officer approached the man who handed out the bullets, patted him down and found a .45 caliber handgun, a fixed blade knife and additional ammunition in the man's fanny pack, Nollette said.

Nollette said the 57-year-old Seattle man, who had no concealed weapon permit, was found to be a convicted felon and was arrested without incident for investigation of a weapons violation.

Bystanders were relieved to see that the .45 caliber cartridges did not immediately burn holes in Tutu's hands or kill everyone within a 10-foot radius, I suppose.

Odd that the name of the (ex-)felon is not mentioned.

This is one dumb stunt, in my opinion.  Unless he is mentally defective, he had to know that this would get him busted.  We'll probably never know what he was trying to prove or what he said to the good bishop.

Maybe he was trying to say something about the South African anti-gun, anti-defense mentality.  Something like, "it's possible to carry a weapon and not commit illegal acts of violence with it, even if one has a criminal record."

I refer to this person as an ex-felon because apparently he is now walking the streets because he served his time for his crime.  If he is not fit to carry a gun for his own defense, he is not fit to be on the streets.  If he is now fit to be loose on the streets, his rights should not be denied him.