I went for my second shooting lesson today, which I think you could call my second Second Amendment lesson. The teacher this time was Joe, a friend of my last teacher’s, who also happens to be an ex-police officer. Joe brought the guns, and I discovered that I’d better start doing this on a more regular basis. It took a while to get back into the swing of loading and unloading a weapon. But I got the hang of putting ammunition in the clip fairly quickly. The two guns were a .38 Smith and Wesson revolver and a .22 pistol (whose origin, I’m sure, Joe will alert me in the comments or email). I can shoot the .22 all day long. (The target pictured below is one of my best groupings with it.) It’s fun and easy.

The Smith & Wesson made my hand tired after a few uses. It also rather surprised me the first time I fired it. Oops. Bit more of a kick than the .22. I need to build up my hand and arm muscles. I should go back to to the rock climbing gym. You use many of the same muscles to climb as you do to hold a gun and fire it.

There were an awful lot of young men at the range today, and one of them rented what looked like a military semi-automatic rifle. I have absolutely no desire to try a weapon like that, but I was curious enough to stay until I saw him fire it. I think I may head back on my own and rent one of the rifles. Now that I no longer teach on Sundays, I finally have the time to hit the ranges and see what I like. Although it’s a rather expensive habit, but I was warned about that.

My new teacher declared himself very satisfied with my shooting skills today. I was thinking I really need to renew my prescription. It was getting tough to sight the target clearly. But overall, I did well enough to stop an attacker. Most of my shots were within a five-inch range, Joe said.

I think two or three more trips to the range will be enough for me to make up my mind about which guns to buy. The crime rate in my neighborhood is sure convincing me I need one. The range holds classes every other weekend. I’m busy this weekend, but two weeks after the Fourth, I think I’ll take that all-day class and learn about the gun laws in Virginia, shooting and cleaning a weapon, and protecting yourself with your Second Amendment right.

Overall, I think my second Second Amendment lesson went really well.

Add the Guardian to the list of Sunday papers that are featuring heavily the Israel/Iran issue. It apparently took four authors to slam Israel with the typical canards.

And while some of the messages amount to signalling, to warn Iran as well as the EU and the US that Israel does not intend its nuclear monopoly in the Middle East to be challenged, it is clear that Israel has launched an aggressive information campaign apparently designed to soften up public opinion for the case for war, reminiscent of the run-up to the war against Iraq. Indeed, some of the same cast are back on stage, not least the former US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, who has loudly been making the case for an Israeli strike.

Interesting how they put the cause for war. Israel doesn’t want it’s “nuclear monopoly” to be challenged. It doesn’t happen to be that Israel is at risk of being destroyed by Iran, no. The article discounts utterly the proxy war that Iran has been waging for years via Hamas, PIJ and other terrorist groups, and Hezbullah.

Academics and journalists who have recently visited Israel have come back from meetings convinced the country is getting ready for war. The campaign has been assisted by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) in the US and the Britain-Israel Communications and Research Centre in the UK, two influential Jewish lobby groups who have brought over experts to brief the media.

And thus we see the true subtext of this story. Those crafty Jews are at it again: Doing what they have done for millennia, tricked the world into going to war. You think I’m reading into things? Read on.

Last week, Bicom invited journalists to meet Shmuel Bar, a former military intelligence officer and civil servant in the Prime Minister’s Office. Now an academic, Bar writes on Iranian defence doctrine. On Monday the same organisation will be hosting a member of Israel’s security cabinet, Isaac ‘Bouji’ Herzog, who once again will answer questions, among other issues, on the threat posed by Iran.

The Israel lobby is trying to convince the media that the war is right. But there’s even more blame for AIPAC to go around, and of course, the article is filled with references to “neocons.”

Bush, vice-president Dick Cheney and the remnants of the neoconservative lobby in Washington are believed to be sympathetic to the idea. However, there are also those in strong positions, such as Defence Secretary Robert Gates and some senior military chiefs, who are thought to be privately opposed to such a move. ‘If it were up to Bush and Cheney they would want to see this thing done,’ said Larry Johnson, a former top CIA analyst. ‘But they are now up against a lot of fundamental military realities that make it hard. The military has been pushing back against this.’

Larry Johnson is now a Democrat (he once even gave the Democratic response to Bush’s radio address) with, shall we say, an agenda. You may remember that the Air Force is currently restructuring its top brass due to some really awful mistakes made with the transportation of nuclear-armed missiles (among other things).

The Air Force continued handing out disciplinary actions in response to the six nuclear warheads mistakenly flown on a B-52 bomber from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., on Aug. 30. The squadron commander in charge of Minot’s munitions crews was relieved of all duties pending the investigation.

[...] The original plan was to transport non-nuclear Advanced Cruise Missiles, mounted on the wings of a B-52, to Barksdale as part of a Defense Department effort to decommission 400 of the ACMs. It was not discovered that the six missiles had nuclear warheads until the plane landed at Barksdale, leaving the warheads unaccounted for during the approximately 3 and one-half hour flight between the two bases, the officers said.

Here’s Johnson’s analysis of what happened—before the Air Force investigation came out.

So I called a old friend and retired B-52 pilot and asked him. What he told me offers one compelling case of circumstantial evidence. My buddy, let’s call him Jack D. Ripper, reminded me that the only times you put weapons on a plane is when they are on alert or if you are tasked to move the weapons to a specific site.

Then he told me something I had not heard before.

Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can’t imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?

That’s some awesome analysis, Johnson. Why, it’s only 100% wrong regarding the nukes. No wonder the Guardian is quoting him. He says all the things they want to have “confirmed” by “experts” for their “readers.” (Sorry, got carried away with the scare quotes there.)

Right-wing think-tanks, however, such as the American Enterprise Institute and the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, have been vocal in their advocation of confronting Iran. Indeed, the institute recently produced a report on a theoretical military attack on Iran authored by Patrick Clawson and Michael Eisenstadt, entitled ‘The Last Resort: Consquences of Preventive Military Action Against Iran’.

The study fell short of recommending such an attack but it did provide an exhaustive argument on why and how such an attack would work. That led critics to dub it a blueprint for war with Iran. It suggested that the possible best line of attack would in fact not be against Tehran’s nuclear programme but against its oil industry, thus cutting off the source of Iran’s current wealth. ‘The political shock of losing the oil income would cause Iran to rethink its stance,’ the report suggested.

Shyeah, because that’s exactly how stupid they think we are: Performing actions guaranteed to double (yet again) the price of oil.

It comes at a time when a resolution has been put forward in Congress calling for a naval blockade of Iran led by US warships. The proposal calls for the United States to lead an international effort to cut off the country by sea, something that would almost certainly by seen as an act of war by Iran. The resolution has got huge support from Israeli politicians and the country’s highly effective lobbying industry in Washington, led perhaps inevitably by Aipac, which has made the issue its legislative priority. ‘The war drums are beating. There is no doubt about that,’ said Johnson.

A naval blockade? Oh, they must be referring to this:

(2) urges the President, in the strongest of terms, to immediately use his existing authority to impose sanctions on–

(A) the Central Bank of Iran and any other Iranian bank engaged in proliferation activities or the support of terrorist groups;

(B) international banks which continue to conduct financial transactions with proscribed Iranian banks;

(C) energy companies that have invested $20,000,000 or more in the Iranian petroleum or natural gas sector in any given year since the enactment of the Iran Sanctions Act of 1996; and

(D) all companies which continue to do business with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps;

(3) demands that the President initiate an international effort to immediately and dramatically increase the economic, political, and diplomatic pressure on Iran to verifiably suspend its nuclear enrichment activities by, inter alia, prohibiting the export to Iran of all refined petroleum products; imposing stringent inspection requirements on all persons, vehicles, ships, planes, trains, and cargo entering or departing Iran; and prohibiting the international movement of all Iranian officials not involved in negotiating the suspension of Iran’s nuclear program; and

That’s a bill in committee at the moment calling for tougher sanctions on Iran. So does this make the EU complicit in the war as well? They’re also calling for tougher sanctions on Iran.

Read the whole article. It’s Israel Wants A War Day in the British press. Know your enemy, as Frank J likes to say.

Looks like Israel is creating more reasons for Hezbullah, Hamas, and other terrorists to kidnap more Israelis. They’re freeing Samir Kuntar and other Lebanese prisoners for what is now declared the corposes of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser.

The cabinet approved Sunday the prisoner exchange deal with Hizbullah, which will facilitate the return of IDF captives Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser. The motion was carried with a majority of 22 ministers.

Earlier, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert urged his ministers to vote in favor of the deal. “At the end of a long process, I have reached the conclusion that as the Israeli prime minister I must recommend that you approve the proposal which will bring this painful affair to an end – even at the painful price it requires us to pay,” Olmert said during Sunday’s cabinet meeting.

I’m not an Israeli. I don’t understand why the nation will allow terrorists to hold it hostage this way. But I do understand cause and effect, and incentives. Israel has just guaranteed that Hezbullah will try to kidnap more soldiers. Next up: the Hamas swap for Gilad Shalit.

There’s one tiny point of light at the end of this dark tunnel. I think that Israel may be clearing up all the details of her prisoners and KIA hostages as a way to clear the decks for action in Gaza. In other words: If Israel has her captives back, whether they are alive or dead, she can then start clearing out the terrorist rat’s nests with a clear conscience, and without fear that it is causing their deaths.

Mind you, I have a tendency to see the glass half-full, so this may be entirely wishful thinking. But maybe it isn’t.

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. It’s yet another article from Uzi Mahnaimi, proven liar about all things Israel and Iran, with yet more unnamed sources (in this case, “defence sources”) claiming that the Israel-Iran war is imminent.

Iran has moved ballistic missiles into launch positions, with Israel’s Dimona nuclear plant among the possible targets, defence sources said last week.

The movement of Shahab-3B missiles, which have an estimated range of more than 1,250 miles, followed a large-scale exercise earlier this month in which the Israeli air force flew en masse over the Mediterranean in an apparent rehearsal for a threatened attack on Iran’s nuclear installations. Israel believes Iran’s nuclear programme is aimed at acquiring nuclear weapons.

The sources said Iran was preparing to retaliate for any onslaught by firing missiles at Dimona, where Israel’s own nuclear weapons are believed to be made.

The Times keeps publishing this liar, and every time they do, they lose yet more credibility. You’d think the editors would catch on by now. You’d think Israel would protest every time they publish this buffoon’s lies about Israel, especially with those liberal U.K. libel laws. Because I would think that the man who created the blood libel of the “genetic bomb” (that is now used on anti-Semitic conspiracy websites as truth, and by anti-Israel lefties the world over as “proof” that those Israelis are just plain EVIL) wouldn’t be able to keep being published by a paper that used to have a record of credibility and real reporting.

The fact that they keep publishing this man makes me disbelieve most of what I read in the Times. The fact that Ynet publishes this drek as if it’s real news surprises me even more.

Pass the word, please. Liar on Aisle 2.