Day: June 7, 2014💾

Group proposes new southern Adirondack wilderness

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Great. Exactly what we need, more wilderness.

NY already has way too many wilderness areas, and what's not wilderness is forest preserve, which is essentially locked up as wilderness, as the state constitution prohibits cutting any material amount of trees over 3" for any purpose.

It's hard to imagine they could build any new roads or snowmobile trails within existing forest preserve, except where relatively recent old woods road exists. Otherwise the tree cutting provision applies.

So I’m Out Fishing Today …

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So I’m out fishing today, on an old railroad bridge that crosses this creek. Most of the time today, I could barely get the darn worm into the water before fish were latching on to the hook. It was pretty crazy. I started out with a little trout hook, and ended up switching to a big bass hook, because they were biting at that on first.

Every time I dropped it in under this bridge, something got hooked quickly. Got a bunch of little brookies, several large-mouth bass, and bullfish. Ended up tossing most of it back in, because a lot of it was small, and even if it was legal to keep, it would be hardly worthwhile to take home and cook.

I ended up leaving after a few hours of fishing as I was getting sunburnt and tired of the hot sun, on the bridge. I left with 3 brookies, a 17 inch large mouth bass, and a bullfish. I probably could have taken more home, if I didn’t throw back the smaller bullfish and some smaller brookies.

So I go and tell folks, guess what, after dinner I’m going to finish off my trout limit or maybe catch another large mouth or bull fish or perch or something. If it was so easy earlier, I’m sure the fish still will be biting when I come back from dinner.

Granted, I didn’t catch much of anything after dinner, although I did get some bites. I did get a too-small to keep large mouth and a brookie, but neither was exactly what I wanted. Oh, well, that’s what you get when you get cockie.

Ken Ballew Raid – June 7, 1971

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The Ken Ballew Raid occurred on this day in 1971.

On June 7, 1971, acting on a tip from a teenage burglary suspect that there were “guns and grenades” at an apartment in Silver Spring, MD, ATF Special Agent Marcus J. Davis requested a search warrant for the apartment. Assistant US Attorney Charles Bernstein rejected Davis’ request, citing insufficient evidence for a search warrant. Davis rewrote the request giving Bernstein the suspect’s name and told him that there had been allegations of violent threats in the vicinity of Kenyon Ballew’s address. Bernstein then issued a knock-service daytime search warrant.

The raid was carried out by a task force of ATF and Montgomery County police. All the task force members were dressed in scruffy clothes to “blend in” with the neighborhood. They knocked on the back door and allegedly shouted “Federal officers with a warrant, open up.” Hearing some movement within the apartment, they took a battering ram to the door. It took them six attempts to break down the door. The two residents within, Ballew and his girlfriend, Saraluise McNeil, had both been in the shower when the attack began. He was naked and she was clad only in her underwear. Not having heard anything but the battering of his rear door, Ballew grabbed an 1847 blackpowder percussion Colt revolver while McNeil grabbed her own revolver.

The ATF agent, William H. Seals, seeing the naked man with the gun, yelled, “He’s got a gun” and fired a shot. The next officer behind Seals was County Police Officer Royce R. Hibbs who came through the door firing several shots. At that time Ballew had not fired a shot and none of the first two officers’ shots hit him.

It was only when Police Officer Louis Camillo came into the room and fired a shot at Ballew’s head that Ballew was hit. As Ballew fell, he dropped the Colt that discharged sending one bullet into the floor at an angle. Upon seeing Ballew bleeding on the floor, Saraluise McNeil became hysterical and surrendered to the police officers. This case, which was followed closely by the Washington Post, became a gunowner rallying point against the ATF during the 1970s. It was also one of the cases that Congressman John Dingell (D-MI) referred to when he called the ATF “jack-booted thugs.” This was the same Dingell who, as a member of the NRA board of directors, was later instrumental in the creation of the NRA’s lobbying arm, the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA).

Today marks 43 years since the raid of Ken Ballew's house that went badly wrong, and lead in many ways to the modern gun-rights movement.

It's also where the term "jack-booted thugs" comes from after Congressman John Dingell (D-MI) used it to describe the ATF's actions during the raid.
Map: Sliding Rock Falls at Hannacroix Ravine Preserve on Cass Hill Road

Local Governments Rebuff Efforts to Turn Off Red Light Cameras

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Probably the biggest and most alarming threat to our country is the addiction to government spending. Nobody -- not even conservative republicans -- ever want to cut government due to their fear of cutting popular programs.

But the reality is, we as a country must come to a reckoning -- if we are going to create new programs and laws to deal with "new problems" -- we must cut old programs to pay for them.

We can't just keep on raising taxes, especially not on working folk. There is only so much money to go around in the economy