Tuesday, May 27, 2014

Monday we had a really unproductive day fishing in the jacked up Gulf stream in 600 – 800 feet. Lots of birds, flying fish and scattered weeds, but no fish. We decided to pull back in shore, and worked our way back north. Once we got inside the humps and out if the Gulf Stream the seas calmed down considerably, but we still had the same scattered weeds, birds and bait. Just as we could start to see the 7 Mile Bridge our port long rigger popped off, and the line started pulling off. Finally, something that actually pulled drag! I grabbed the rod off the rocket launcher, and the fish accelerated, came out of the water and gray hounded toward the horizon. All I saw was a bill as long as my arm, it’s back, and whitewater everywhere.

It was just my wife and I on the boat, so I hollered for her to put on the belt, and handed her the rod while I cleared the rest of the lines. Of course the fish hit a TLD20 loaded with 20 pound mono, so we knew we had to be careful chasing this thing down. The fish just kept running and almost dumped the reel by the time I could get back in the pilot house and start backing down on it. My wife did really well, and other than cussing a few times at the fish and at me for putting her in this situation, she held up like a trooper. We played tug-o-war with the fish for an hour and a half and finally got it close to the boat. We began circling each other and had a couple of shots to try to get it up so I could get a leader on it. It must of been fun to watch, my wife reeling her heart out and me diving between the pilot house and the cockpit trying to leader the fish. Finally, after a good turn, we got the fish up and coming in. The leader came up and I grabbed it and pulled the fish alongside the boat for the official release. Right when I reached for the bill, pop a crimp failed on the leader, and marlin slowly swam away tired but healthy.

So no pictures, but memories for a lifetime. It was the first blue marlin that my wife has ever caught, and the first blue one on our boat the Woody Too. What an awesome way to start our fishing down here in the Keys.

For those that care, the reel was a Shimano TLD20, 600 yards 20 pound test, the bait was a dink ballyhoo rigged on a small pink squid skirt, 80 pound mono leader 6/0 j-hook.

“Happy Memorial Day.” How does the word “happy” fit with Memorial Day? It is an oxymoron. Are we happy so many have died so we get a weekend to party, fill our gullet, drink to excess, go to the beach? Some may say those that made the extreme sacrifice allow us to imbibe in our excess “celebration.” Every year during this “holiday” I regurgitate these same thoughts. I guess you need to spend time in the thick of war or be of age during the draft era to truly understand where I’m coming from.

I’ve noticed on my Facebook page those that post about Memorial Day. Most who were a soldier, of an age during the draft or know someone close to them who was killed or horribly wounded, honor our lost soldiers. The younger “friends,” but not all, post how they are partying hardy today. They don’t even comprehend or connect that the day is dedicated to preserve the memory of the fallen. I don’t blame them. They never received a notice from the draft board. They never sat waiting the day of the draft lottery to find out their number. Bring back the draft!

Fortuitously, I found this article shortly after writing this rant. Only 28% of our younger generation know the reason for this holiday. Link

Background checks are the first step along with controlling sales at gun shows to help protect us from them.

“War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.”

In May 1941, the order was given for the Bismarck to break out into the Atlantic. Once in the safety of the open ocean, the battleship would be almost impossible to track down, all the while wreaking havoc on Allied convoys to Britain. Learning of its movement, Britain sent almost the entire British Home Fleet in pursuit. On May 24, the British battle cruiser Hood and battleship Prince of Wales intercepted it near Iceland. In a ferocious battle, the Hood exploded and sank, and all but three of the 1,421 crewmen were killed. The Bismarck escaped, but because it was leaking fuel it fled for occupied France. On May 26, it was sighted and crippled by British aircraft, and on May 27 three British warships descended on the Bismarck and finished it off.

Sink The Bismarck–Johnny Horton

It is supremely ironic that the obsession of the left to shut down our Second Amendment rights has caused the biggest boost in gun sales, ever, and the biggest push for less strict gun laws in our history. It is also a crystal clear referendum on America’s thoughts and values.

Those who blame gun control laws for this most recent mass violence in  California must remember that California has some of the most draconian gun laws on the books. The three handguns apparently used by the shooter were all lawfully purchased by a young, patently mentally ill, white male who was consumed with self-pity, hate and rage.  The existing laws prevented the police from acting. You should also recall that the killer began his rampage by fatally stabbing three of his roommates. Yet there is no hue and cry to outlaw knives. In his rampage, the murderer used his car to attempt to kill two separate innocent bike riders. Yet there is no hue and cry to outlaw cars (well, maybe BMW’s should be banned).

The stone cold fact is that the murderer was hell bent to kill. He used three different tools in his spree, firearms, a car, and a knife.  Had he not had these tools, he might have used a screw driver, or a chain saw, or Molotov cocktails. The killer clearly telegraphed his intentions to kill. Just days before the carnage the police, at the family’s request, checked him out and could see no reason to detain him for evaluation.

Spree murders have been with throughout history. Some killers names come to mind, Caligula, Jack the Ripper, Gilles de Rais (the original “Bluebeard”) , Elizabeth Bathory (the “Blood Countess”), Gilles Ganier and Peter Stubbe who butchered their victims with such bestial ferocity that they were believed to be literal werewolves. Other homicidal monsters of the pre-modern era include the Scottish cannibal Sawney Beane and Vlad the Impaler.

Andrew Kehoe on May 18, 1927, in Bath Township, Michigan, killed 38 elementary school children and six adults in total, and injured at least 58 other people. Kehoe first killed his wife, fire-bombed his farm and set off a major explosion in the Bath Consolidated School, before committing suicide by detonating a final explosion in his truck. It is the deadliest mass murder in a school in United States history. Please note that Kehoe’s carnage was not done with a gun.

Spree killers are not a modern phenomenon, they are not the fault of our gun laws, the twisted murders have simply updated their tools.

The tools, the guns, the car, and the knife, were not responsible for the California killings. The cops were not responsible, the killers parents were not responsible. The gun laws were not responsible. American society is not responsible. The responsibility lies solely on the shoulders of the deranged and very dead killer who was so determined to kill and maim that he used every tool at his disposal.

MM is a truly heavyweight hypocrite. He tells us he hates guns. But MM has admitted that he owns handguns and that he retains armed security guards. All of which are young white males. I guess he likes that.

Part 2) Do you think that our economy is well on the way to recovery? That is what Team Obama and many in the left tilted media claim, they say all’s well. It isn’t.

In the first quarter of this year our GDP growth was barely discernable, it was only one tenth of one percent. The economy’s meager 0.1% GDP growth in January, February and March represented the slowest three-month growth in the economy since the end of 2012, and a sharp deceleration from growth in the second half of 2013, when the economy grew at a 3.4% rate. GDP should have been well over 4%.

We still have nearly 10 million Americans unemployed. Team Obama is pushing and pushing hard to force a $10 per hour minimum wage. Yet, the CBO, The Congressional Budget Office tells us that a $10 per hour minimum wage would cost us a half a million jobs. You have to ask yourself why Obama and the Democrats would make such a demand at this time given the harm to the job market and our economy that it will do. Is it strictly to get votes from base of the Democrat party, or is there another reason? Would you like to be one of the half million who lost their job?