When I was working on an Army program at the aerospace mill, my project lead, at the time, was a Major in the California National Guard. He, like me, was a firearms enthusiast, so the topic of our banter often turned to guns. When we spoke about favorite guns, he would often cite his Military-issue Beretta as filling that role for him. He bought one for his personal arsenal.

We always were going to ‘get around’ to going to the range, but things changed - he went to Afghanistan and I went back to satellite systems engineering. We never made the range meeting, but, he always swore by that pistol. I would have liked to fire a few rounds with it and see for myself.

Today, I saw this article in an email from American Rifleman, quoted here in part:

25 Years of Service - The Beretta M9
A U.S. military contract truly did seem an impossible goal for a foreign company in 1978, the year Congress issued its directive to the Dept. of Defense instructing it to search for a new 9 mm handgun to replace the M1911A1.

Although the M1911 was widely recognized as a reliable, powerful and iconic sidearm of American military might, and was a favorite with veterans, soldiers and traditionalists, Congress decided that maintaining the stockpile of M1911s and some 20 other types of military sidearms was impractical. Many of the M1911s were old and in disrepair. Maintaining ammunition and parts supply for the vast array of sidearms incurred unnecessary costs. Also, Congress believed it was imperative that the U.S. adopt the standard 9 mm Luger round so its soldiers could work more closely in the field with its NATO allies. [more…]

Alan Gura, the attorney of record in the D.C. vs. Heller case and now the attorney of record for the Chicago Gun Case, posted a couple of new items today on the Chicago Gun Case website. Just as he did when providing information about the D.C. case, Mr. Gura is keeping the public information flow up to date:

We get questions…

We understand that not everyone will agree with our position in this case. For example, we expect that Chicago’s attorneys will present some alternative constitutional vision that supports their desired outcome. May the more persuasive argument (ours, I should hope) prevail.

But not everyone agrees that the case should or would be based upon the Supreme Court’s views of the law. Prior to the D.C. Circuit’s decision in Parker/Heller, that case was met by many rolled eyes and deep, knowing sighs by Very Smart People. The skepticism had nothing to do with the merits of the arguments on either side, which were entirely beside the point. Simply put, the Second Amendment wasn’t going to be revived because the courts wouldn’t feel like going there. [more . . .]

Reviewing the Amici

It’s impossible to summarize all the amicus briefs that have been filed in support of our position, but we wanted to point out at least a few that appear to be significantly helpful or illuminating. It’s not an exhaustive list, and we may revisit this topic in the future. [more . . .]

For all you South Park fans, here’s Mr. Hankey, your favorite Christmas Poo . . .

HOWDY HO, KIDS!

Well, sorta like a couch potato football weekend. Watched NFL on Thanksgiving Day, college rivalry days Friday and Saturday. Looking forward to NFL Sunday tomorrow.

We actually didn’t just vegetate. The Better Half and I put up our Christmas Lights yesterday; that’s a lot of trips up and down the extension ladder. That, plus religiously taking walks after big meals gets a few miles on the old bones, at least.

The setup in the clickable image is the big 42-inch HD on the left and the 19-inch digital on the right. Both are fed from DirecTV tuners. Try out the clickable image feature. I upgraded the site with a home-grown image viewer feature.

A couple of nights ago, the family dog came over to me and ‘asked’ to go out. Dutifully, I got my butt out of the chair and walked her out to the back yard so she could do her business.

I usually look up after dark to see the stars, what few of them we can see from this badly light-polluted location. To my surprise, a couple of the stars up there were moving southeastward. I immediately knew it had to be Space Shuttle Atlantis and the International Space Station.

The dog’s new name ought to be ‘Ephemeris.’

I called in the back door to the Better Half and when she came out we could see a slightly dimmer Atlantis leading the race across the sky. Both spacecraft were very bright, about magnitude -2.5 or so. Just before they got straight overhead, they passed behind Earth’s shadow and winked out.

Out of curiosity, I went to one of the favorite websites and looked at the page where you can type in your zip code to see the satellite pass predictions for your area; the pass I just witnessed was on the list, along with a prediction that there would be another pass which I witnessed tonight. I went to the back yard at the predicted time and, sure enough, there was the ISS (Atlantis landed in Florida this morning). I did not have the camera with me on Wednesday, but I brought it out tonight to see if I could image the little point of light sweeping across the sky.

The (clickable) image is the only one that came out. The arrow is pointing at the ISS pinpoint almost straight up as seen through my ham radio 6-meter Yagi antenna. The pass remained visible well beyond the zenith when it finally flickered out in the east. The magnitude was -4 or so. I could see it even when it was behind some thin cirriform clouds in the area.

The Better half and I took a ride down to Point Vicente today. It was a nice clear and warm Thanksgiving Day and a lot of other people had the same idea. The air was clear, the ocean was calm and you could easily see Catalina Island across the channel to the south. To the west south west, if you really tried, you could make out Santa Barbara Island, about 45 miles offshore.

It was also a nice day to jump in your Boeing Stearman open cockpit biplane and take a flight along the shoreline. I took this photo of the plane as it rounded the point near the Lighthouse. It’s painted in the original pre-WW2 Army Air Corps primary trainer color and markings.

This is Wikipedia’s summary of the Boeing Stearman Model 75:

The Stearman (Boeing) Model 75 is a biplane, of which at least 9,783 were built in the United States during the 1930s and 1940s as a military trainer aircraft. Stearman became a subsidiary of Boeing in 1934. Widely known as the Stearman, Boeing Stearman or Kaydet, it served as a Primary trainer for the USAAF, as a basic trainer for the USN (as the NS & N2S), and with the RCAF as the Kaydet throughout World War II. After the conflict was over, thousands of surplus aircraft were sold on the civil market. In the immediate post-war years they became popular as crop dusters and as sports planes.

If you have a pair of red-blue or red-cyan 3D glasses, you might be interested in a 3D picture of this very same airplane that I posted last month on the family blog. It’s a beauty. If you don’t have the glasses, the 2D version is here.

The Better Half pointed this picture out to me while she was reading the blogs last week. I don’t know about you, but I may never be able to look at pumpkin pie again, without having this image pop into my head.

All the silliness aside, we are planning to feast on turkey parts, stuffing, cranberry jelly, mashed ‘taters and pumpkin pie for dessert. Prior to the feast, we will be enjoying the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade and all-day NFL games, all on the HDTV. The morning game is the Packers at the Lions, the afternoon game is the Raiders at the Cowboys and - new this year - the evening game is the Giants at the Broncos.

I wonder if the new Thanksgiving Day game will be permanently played in Denver, as it is in the other two “D” cities, Detroit and Dallas? Does anyone know the answer to that?

We wish everyone a great Thanksgiving Holiday!

Over at the Second Amendment Foundation’s Chicago Gun Case website, there is a tab that takes you to a case filings page where you can view the amici briefs filed in the case. They have been organized by “Amici Curiae In Support of Petitioners” and “Amici Curiae in Support of Neither Party.” I read the latter as “Against,” but that’s neither here nor there.

The important thing is the count of briefs for the petitioners vs count of briefs for neither. I counted 30 briefs for the petitioners and only 2 briefs for neither. As usual, the “Against” briefs are from the Brady Center and the NAACP Legal Defense Foundation. I opened these briefs and they basically argue “if it’s not broken, then don’t fix it.”

I sincerely hope that SCOTUS carefully considers the weight of the arguments presented from the petitioner’s perspective; the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals presented the Supreme Court with something that really needs fixing. Restore the Second Amendment to those states and cities that oppress the civil rights of gun owners and prospective gun owners.