Military is being run by hacks

A man is being tried for murder, and one of the key prosecution witnesses testifies that HE in fact was the one who committed the murder, not the accused. The witness can't be prosecuted because the prosecution screwed up and granted him total immunity in exchange for his testimony. The defense immediately moves to have the charges dismissed but the judge refuses the request, saying that it is up to the jury.

Cases like this one and the one of Major Matt Golsteyn are the reason why I told the recruiters to stay away from my kids, back when they were in high school. Our military is being run by political hacks who will destroy a man for doing his job, while they themselves are chasing prostitutes and guzzling taxpayer funded liquor.

I love this country and the ideals upon which it was founded, but I no longer feel that our military or our government are safeguarding those ideals. The men that serve have my respect, but the men that command them do not.

This is the reason why I think that the military would not be used to go door to door against the American people. Those above the rank of 0-5 might follow such an order, but many below that rank would not.

Short for a stormtrooper

Police encounter short stormtrooper.

AOC making foreign friends

AOC's remarks about ICE detention centers being like Nazi concentration camps has caused international outrage among the Polish Jewish community. As a result, a member of the Polish government has invited her to come and tour an actual concentration camp, so that she can see for herself.
From his invitation:

scoring political points with enflamed rhetoric is unacceptable in our contemporary Western societies

Here is the letter she was sent.

until you run out of other people's money

I was recently in Puerto Rico. Let's be honest here, the place is a shit hole. The problems that this island has were around LONG before Donald Trump and Hurricane Maria. Puerto Rico has elected nothing but liberals for decades, and as a result the debt of the place is outrageous at over $123 billion. With a population of only 3 million, this means that each person on the island's share is about $41,000.

So how do the residents of Puerto Rico want to solve the issue? How do socialists ALWAYS solve their fiscal issues? They get the money from someone else. That brings us to the main point of today's post. I took this picture in San Juan. 

The EPA is run by crooks and morons

The EPA’s highest-paid employee and a leading expert on climate change was caught bilking the government out of nearly $1 million in salary and other benefits over a decade.

He told his bosses that he REALLY worked for the CIA, and frequently took months long sabbaticals, claiming he was on missions and task forces in the war on terror. He then used his EPA accounts to pay for the first class air tickets and stays in luxury hotels. The EPA paid all of the expenses without question.

He even got a handicapped parking spot by claiming he had complications from malaria that he caught while serving in Vietnam. He never had malaria and never served in Vietnam.

He was only caught when he told his boss and coworkers that he was retiring, and stopped coming to work. They even threw him a retirement party. Six months later, his boss noticed he was still on the payroll and inquired. Had that not happened, one wonders if he would have EVER been caught.

You have to read the whole thing in order to believe the incompetence of the supervisors. Good to know our taxes are being so well spent. 

Workers' comp claim waiting to happen

So Pilot came to get the damaged safe from yesterday's post. Let me start by letting all of you know just how large of a safe we are talking about. It is 60 inches tall, 42 wide, and 25 deep. It weighs 860 pounds while mounted on the transport skids. With the size of this safe in mind, I was quite surprised when Pilot freight showed up with a trailer that was 4 feet tall and 6 feet long and looked a lot like this one:

It was being towed by an F150. The pickup crew was a pair of men in their 30's and a teenage boy. They originally delivered this thing in a truck with a hydraulic liftgate and used a pallet jack. 

The only equipment they had for moving it was an appliance dolly like this one. Note that the safe weights 100 pounds more than the dolly is rated to carry. Not only that, but the nose plate of the dolly wasn't long enough to lift the safe, so two of this team of rocket surgeons tips the safe over while the third member of the team stood under the tipping safe holding the dolly, so he could catch the safe with it as it tipped over. It made me nervous just watching them. 

So then they wheel this thing down my driveway, with all three of them on the downhill side of the load. I could just picture this thing getting away from them and running one of them over. Once they arrived at the back end of the trailer, they tipped the safe over until the dolly was lying on the floor, and then lifted the bottom of the safe and slid it in. 

I can only imagine how many on the job injuries these guys have, and they probably have no idea why. The good news is that the safe is out of here, I didn't have to call 911 for the paramedics to come rescue a Pilot employee trapped under a safe like Wyle E. Coyote, and Amazon already processed the refund to my credit card. 

Amazon service problem

My gun safe was full, so I decided to order another. The one that I selected was a Winchester Big Daddy. I looked around, and my LGS had them for $2000, plus delivery and taxes. I found one on Amazon for $1735 with free delivery, plus sales tax. I ordered it on May 6.

At the time of ordering, I had to select the delivery date. Of the available times and dates, the one that worked best with my schedule was May 17 from 3-6 pm. The shipping company was listed as Pilot freight. They got it as far as Tampa, and turned it over to a subcontractor for final delivery. That was where things went sideways.

I got a call on May 15, telling me that they would not have a delivery crew available on the 17th, and offered to deliver it at noon on the 16th. I explained that I had a job, had scheduled this delivery 2 weeks in advance, and couldn't do it on the 16th. We finally wound up rescheduling the delivery for the 20th, between 3-6. They showed up at 12:30. My wife hurried home and things got worse.

As they were delivering the safe, you can see on my security video where the dial for the lock came off. The delivery guy picked up the dial and stuck it back on. My wife, not realizing that the safe was broken, signed for the delivery. The safe is useless and will not lock. It is still on the skids.

I wound up buying the one from the LGS and paying $250 for the delivery. I called Amazon (they have a 30 day guarantee) on May 21 and arranged to have the broken safe picked up. We made an appointment for May 27th from 12-6. You guessed it- they didn't show and stated that when they made the reservation, they didn't realize it was a holiday. Now we have another reservation for June 1 (today) from 12-2.

If this one is a no-show, I am going to dispute the charge on my credit card. This wreck of an experience has been a month in the making.