Back From Blackbeard's

Just back from an excellent week on a Bahamas dive live aboard again with Blackbeard's and on the mighty Morningstar.

Even while a couple of the dive sites were the same, it was a different trip from December.  The Morningstar had a completely different crew on this trip, and they were fantastic.  I also got to meet and be friends with a great new fun bunch of divers.

Weather was actually cooler and wavier than in December, with chilly winds and chillier evening dives. As a result, I got to dive the Eleuthras as well as the Exumas this time.

Saw lots of cool things and cool fish including the friendliest parrotfish ever:

 

I also had multiple neat shark encounters - and not just during the shark feeding dive.  I'm talking closer than during the shark dive.

More blogging on the trip to follow.

Sure China, We'll Discuss Doing That Right After Recognition Of An Independent Taiwan, Ok?

Reuters:  China's foreign minister says admitting Palestinian state to UN is move to rectify injustice

China's foreign minister Wang Yi on Saturday said efforts to admit a Palestinian state into the United Nations were a move to rectify a prolonged injustice, state media Xinhua reported.

. . .

"A prompt admission of Palestine into the United Nations is a move to rectify a prolonged historical injustice," Xinhua quoted Wang as saying.

 At least the Biden Administration did cave to the Islamist Democrat vote and actually did the right thing and vetoed this latest bit of rewarding ongoing acts of Hamas terrorism.

But sure thing Wang, right after recognition of Taiwan's independence is made by China and Taiwan gets a seat in the United Nations, I'm sure we can discuss rectifying "injustice", as counterfactual as that is,  in the Middle East.

 I'll note Taiwan that Taiwan has a far better claim to independent statehood and hasn't been firing rockets at, committing acts of terrorism, mass murder, or rape of its neighbors while China backed Hamas sure hasn't been holding back in those areas.

That's Quite The Rationalization There

Remember folks there's a socialist in National Socialist. And just as in the opast the Progressives are again finding common ground with national socialist ideas, acts, and symbols.

Frontpage: Swastikas Are Progressive Now: Vandalizing synagogues with swastikas is good, leftists argue.

Malcolm Harris, a former Occupy Wall Street activist and author of ‘Palo Alto’ and other books published through Hachette, explained that swastikas were progressive now.

Harris claims that he viewed vandalizing a synagogue with a swastika as “an anti-zionist condemnation of Israeli genocide.” And if vandalizing synagogues with swastikas, the ultimate symbol of Nazi behavior is only “anti-Zionist”, not antisemitic, then there really is no difference between anti-Zionism and antisemitism, and between leftist anti-Zionists and Nazi antisemites.

 Verily, the article shows many of the ideas of the progressive left and the Nazis aren't all that distinguishable, especially when it comes to Jews:

The Democratic Socialists of America, which has led the campaign for Hamas, had invited a representative of Melenchon’s Communist allied party from France, who claimed that when a “man of the left” is “called an anti-Semite, it means he’s not far from power.” That same party became the only one to refuse  to condemn Oct 7 and political figures from the party accused Israel of killing its own children.

 It past time Harris and the other "progressive" pro-Hamasniks looked in the mirror and asked themselves :"Are we the baddies?"

The Liberty Aviation Museum - Part 2

There's lots to see at the museum:

If you have interest in the naval side of World War 2, they have not one, but two PT boats undergoing restoration.  Once restored, they plan to give tours on Lake Erie in them.

 

To defend the airfield and the PT Boats they have multiple German small arms:

And if that's not enough they have some German Flak guns:

That's a 20mm to the left and a 37mm to the right of it.

 

If you get hungry, they have a German field Kitchen, complete with a mounted machine gun, though the Tin Goose diner next door has far better food.

They also have multiple World War 2 Vehicles on display:

 

 

 

It's a very impressive collection, and that's not all of it.

Well worth a visit to see these amazing historical artifacts in person.

The Liberty Aviation Museum

At Port Clinton airport, while waiting for the eclipse we toured the Liberty Aviation Museum.

The Museum has been growing steadily since it was opened at the airport in 2011. It has a very friendly staff and enthusiastic docents wandering around sharing their love of hisotry and knowledge of the artifacts on display.

It has a rather eclectic range of exhibits and restoration activities, and it is not all aviation related.

This range includes informs and costumes. 

Early airline uniforms:

The original uniforms worn int he series Hogan's Heroes:

The uniform Charlie Sheen worn as the Wild Thing, Ricky Vaughn in Major League:

The bathrobe worn by Alan Alda in MASH:

Pretty cool stuff.

Of course there are airplanes:

Georgie's Gal, a B-25 in flying condition.

A PBY Catalina undergoing restoration:

The PBY is a lot bigger in person than you would think from this picture. It's huge.

There's also a couple Ford Trimotors undergoing restoration to flying status.

A beautiful Stearman was on display:

A beautifully restored TBF Avenger, with its wings folded, was in the hangar:

Lots of things to see, with more pictures to follow.

Hamas Health Ministry Admits Their Casualty Numbers Are "Flawed"

The credulous and anti-Israel world takes Hamas Health Ministry causality reports as gospel.

Even though this is the same Hamas-run Health Ministry that outright lied about the casualty count when the Hamas rocket hit the Al Shifa Hospital parking lot (500 claimed when they tried to pin it on Israel when in reality it was less than 50).  The same Hamas-run Health Ministry whose casualty reporting is statistically rather suspect - with casualty numbers that increase perfectly linearly daily throughout the conflict.

Well, the Hamas Health Ministry just admitted they have some flaws.  As in a lot of flaws, as in massively overstating casualties sort of flaws.

FDD: Hamas-Run Gaza Health Ministry Admits to Flaws in Casualty Data

The Hamas-run Gaza Ministry of Health said on April 6 that it had “incomplete data” for 11,371 of the 33,091 Palestinian fatalities it claims to have documented. In a statistical report, the ministry notes that it considers an individual record to be incomplete if it is missing any of the following key data points: identity number, full name, date of birth, or date of death. The health ministry also released a report on April 3 that acknowledged the presence of incomplete data but did not define what it meant by “incomplete.” In that earlier report, the ministry acknowledged the incompleteness of 12,263 records. It is unclear why, after just three more days, the number fell to 11,371 — a decrease of more than 900 records.

Prior to its admissions of incomplete data, the health ministry asserted that the information in more than 15,000 fatality records had stemmed from “reliable media sources.” However, the ministry never identified the sources in question and Gaza has no independent media.

In other words, potentially half of the 33,000 Health Ministry reported casualties that the Arabs and the world uses to claim Israel is committing "genocide" may be entirely made up propaganda by the Health Ministry.

This would reduce Israel's terrorist to civilian death ration to below 1:0.5 from the current 1:1.8.

Global average ratio of terrorist to civilian death in urban combat is around 1:9, with the US military being  around 1:5 or 1:7 by comparison.

In short, Israel is likely now running the most civilian-safe intense urban combat campaign in recorded history - against an enemy using civilians as human shields, deliberately emplacing itself and fighting from civilian locations, and providing no shelters for the civilian population.  

The Islamists and their fellow travelers claims of genocide in this conflict are simply so much bushwah, and should be treated as such.  Those making such claims are either an outright pro-Hamas idiot or just a credulous idiot - pick one.

Anyone that claims there is a "Gazacaust" or "genocide" occurring in Gaza needs to go find the nearest tree and apologize for being a waste of oxygen.

I Believe That's What Is Called A Clue

Heading into court today and after passing through the metal detectors I got to watch the deputies stop a fellow after he had gone through to let him know he could not take the handcuff key on his key ring into the building.

They nicely agreed to hold onto it for him as it was raining out.  

They don't want just anyone wandering about the courthouse with a handcuff key, as there is often handcuffed prisoners around the facility and having people wandering around with they keys could get interesting. Good on them for paying attention and seeing it.

When asked where he was going, the fellow stated he had an appointment to see his probation officer.

Yet another good reason to relieve him of his handcuff key, that.

So, a good thing to keep in mind for law enforcement is felons they stop on the street may be carrying around handcuff keys to get out of handcuffs after they are arrested, so it pays to check for it.

Ah, Detroit Uglification Strikes Again

The nature of Detroit doesn't really change.

For $425,000.00, Detroit got the following sign and a couple others like it installed along Highway 94 in time for the NFL draft - note the difference between the original conception and execution:

A tad less grand than expected.  It's rather underwhelming, and with a coloration that blends into the grass and barely stands out from the background along the highway. In short, score another one for Detroit uglificaiton rather than beautification.

The Detroit News: Gmac Cash on Detroit's new 'Hollywood' sign: 'You can take it back'

One must wonder at the amount of grift and kickbacks that may have involved in the contracting for this sign for the city to spend so much to get so little, and for it to be so ugly as well. Expect any criticism to be that one doesn't understand art, or something similar.

As one anonymous wag on the Internet dryly noted:  "This is what happens when you order your Hollywood-style sign from Temu."