Ruminations - 21jan2011

George Rebane

- New Muslim threat, offensive Jihad
- American GIs killed by their trainees and combat ‘comrades’
- Dog training
- Pelline on Rebane and KVMR
- Denial of pension problems
- New Mexico pulls out of capntax
- Prevalent illegal alien attitude?

Offensive Jihad.  The latest development on the terrorist front, unreported in the lamestream media, is a new fatwa that enlarges the scope of worldwide jihad from merely ‘defensive jihad’ to ‘offensive jihad’.  All the wanton killings of innocents to date by Muslims have been done under that rationale of retribution for the wrongs inflicted by the west against Islam.  Now the gloves come off – Muslims everywhere are encouraged to kill infidels (aka you and me) wherever they are found for no reason except to “extend God’s religion” until it is covers the Earth.  Lest you think this little exhortation came from some fevered mullah in a musty backwater mosque, think again.  It came from no less than Dr. Imad Mustafa, of Egypt’s al-Azhar University, the world's most important Islamic university.  (more here)

On the same theme, western coalition soldiers continue to be killed by their uniformed Arab allies in training situations during which they turn their weapons on their trainers.  It is almost weekly that we hear of another Iraqi or Afghan soldier/policeman doing this.  This is usually done be someone who over the weeks/months has gone out of his way to earn the trust and friendship of the western soldier.  Given the Koranic teachings – such perfidy against infidels is a duty – and given the new fatwa, our troops are in an unimaginably stressful environment where all known social norms are facades like buildings in a movie western.  Do they not know that without elemental trust of personal safety, they are making rapprochement impossible for the moderate Muslims among us?

The border collie (sometimes aka Australian sheepdog) is long considered to be the smartest of dogs.  A recent report (here) identifies one such puppy as having mastered over a thousand words or labels for things.  As a dog/animal trainer of some experience I am truly impressed by such performance.   Our current mutt is a red Dobie who, along with the Standard Poodle, are judged to come in second on the doggie IQ scale.  My method of ‘training’ dogs is a bit different from those you see on TV.  It involves teaching the animal passive language instead of distinct behaviors, and this includes abstract concepts like ‘more’, ‘other’, ‘again’, ‘around’, ‘back (to point of origin)’, etc.

The result is that the pup can then execute an uncountable number of behaviors in various environments.  These results have been confirmed by professional animal behaviorists and the AKC.  Back in 1971 and  subsequent to one of their directors seeing our then six-month old Great Dane perform like a Hollywood movie dog, the AKC put out the word that they changed their ‘start training age' from one year to six-months.  All Rebane dogs are started at six to eight weeks old.  For years I have been asked to write up my method, and perhaps soon will be the time.

Russ Steele of NCMW emailed me the latest from Pelline’s blog where he again takes a personal swipe at me.  In his diatribe he also demands that I “apologize” to KVMR listeners for my commentaries in general, or in support of the Tea Party Patriots (of which I am a member) – it is difficult to decipher.  The man lobs these unrequited dirt bags at Russ Steele and me at what appear to be regular intervals.  It may have something to do with boosting his traffic, I don’t know.  But what has become clear over the years is that Jeff Pelline is what Jeff Pelline does.

Are there any progressives left who still deny the overwhelming damage that public service employee unions and their outrageous pension plans have done to all western countries?  In the US, the states are $2.5T behind in funding their employee pension plans.  I find it hard to believe that their sudden silence on the matter really indicates a new understanding.  Perhaps one our local worthies can corroborate this assessment.  (more here)

It appears that New Mexico is the latest state to pull out of pursuing their own global warming cap n’ tax programs.  After seeing what CARB and its AB32 are doing to California, Governor Susana Martinez is taking her state in new directions from that which the Democrats rammed through before last November’s election.  The Alamogordo Daily News (here) pulled the article but left the comments.  The lamestream is having a hard time reporting this, but the blogs (here) don’t.  It’s a new world in getting the word out.  H/T to RR reader for the heads up.

Anybody know how prevalent is this attitude among illegal aliens?

 

Comments

[Dave C]

The smartest of dogs.

We're leaving January 29 for our annual trek to New Zealand. While most of our time will be spent on the south island we like to spend a couple of nights each trip at a B&B on a working sheep ranch near the smelly town of Rotorua on the north island.

The border collies on the ranch are absolutely amazing. No verbal commands, just series of short and long whistles at different tones. Watching them herd a couple of hundred sheep to a new grazing area, through a narrow gate is thrilling. Especially seeing them run on the backs of the tightly packed herd. Equally amazing were the dogs could unlatch the gate and close it after the last sheep went through.

I've also seen the rancher put two unshorn sheep in a herd of about 100. Through a whistle command, one dog will pair out the two unshorn sheep and escort them to the shearing shed.

These dogs love to work. But, they are by no means pets. They don't come in the house, not even the porch and they don't have names.

On one trip a person in our group asked what the dogs names were. The rancher replied he never named them but asked the person to pick out a name for one of the female dogs. She suggested Waltzing Matilda. With that the rancher just hollered "Waltzing Matilda" and one of the female dogs ran up to the rancher and sat down.

[George Rebane]

We had a similar experience in New Zealand, and as a result I bought two models of the whistle used to command those dogs. Thought I'd teach our puppy to also respond to some whistle commands. Turned out that I was too dumb to learn how to make any kind of civilized sound come out of those whistles.

At one milk ranch where we stayed, the dogs were kept in large diameter pipe kennels where they stayed until it was time for them to herd cows. They're definitely not treated as pets. But it's impressive to watch one of them cross a flock on the backs of the sheep to do a job on the other side.

[Dave C]

Actually, the rancher in New Zealand did not use a whistle device. He just pursed his lips and let out a loud whistle.