The indefatigable Tyler Durden relays a must-watch presentation by Grant Williams, best known for his Things That Make You Go Hmmm newsletter. Some of the highlights?

Williams' Problem 1: If the global economy is stalling, Europe is in recession, China is slowing and growth is seemingly impossible to generate, what are equity markets doing at all-time highs?


Williams' Problem 2: If Chinese manufacturing has stalled, demand for raw materials is slumping, imports and exports are declining, and Chinese power consumption is falling, how is China's GDP growing at 7.7%


Williams Problem 3: France!?


Williams' Problem 4: If honesty is the best policy, then is dishonest the second best policy?

Williams' Problem 5: If there were no sponges living in the oceans, would the oceans be deeper?

Williams' Problem 6: Paul Krugman? Really?

Williams' Problem 7: The Gold Price and The Price of Gold are mutually exclusive

As Alan Roth observes regarding the equity markets, "investors rediscovering borrowing on margin and hitting an all-time high is clearly a red flag warning that there may be a rip-tide".

After a gun battle that changed his life, Sergeant Timothy Gramins dramatically upped the amount of ammunition he carries with him each and every day on the job. And no one tell the aspiring dictators Governor Cuomo and Mayor Bloomberg of New York: but Gramin also carries multiple high-capacity magazines.

An expert marksman, Gramins expended 43 rounds (of 47 he routinely carried), before taking down a single assailant. The murderous perp simply would not stop attacking, despite being shot 14 times with .45-cal ammo -- including six hits in supposedly fatal locations.

The most threatening encounter in Gramins’ nearly two-decade career with the Skokie (Ill.) PD north of Chicago came on a lazy August afternoon prior to his promotion to sergeant, on his first day back from a family vacation. [He heard an alert] that a male black driving a two-door white car had robbed a bank at gunpoint in another suburb 11 miles north and had fled... Unknown at the time, the suspect, a 37-year-old alleged Gangster Disciple, had vowed that he would kill a police officer if he got stopped.

...He was scarcely up to highway speed when he spotted a lone male black driver in a white Pontiac Bonneville and pulled alongside him. “He gave me ‘the Look,’ that oh-crap-there’s-the-police look, and I knew he was the guy,” Gramins said... The next thing he knew, bullets were flying. “That was four years ago,” Gramins said. “Yet it could be ten seconds ago.”

With Gramins following close behind, siren blaring and lights flashing, the Bonneville zigzagged through traffic and around corners into a quite pocket of single-family homes a few blocks from the exit. Then a few yards from where a 10-year-old boy was skateboarding on a driveway, the suspect abruptly squealed to a stop.

“He bailed out and ran headlong at me with a 9 mm Smith in his hand while I was still in my car,” Gramins said.

The gunman sank four rounds into the Crown Vic’s hood while Gramins was drawing his .45-cal. Glock 21.

“I didn’t have time to think of backing up or even ramming him,” Gramins said. “I see the gun and I engage.”

Gramins fired back through his windshield, sending a total of 13 rounds tearing through just three holes.

A master firearms instructor and a sniper on his department’s Tactical Intervention Unit, “I was confident at least some of them were hitting him, but he wasn’t even close to slowing down,” Gramins said.

The gunman shot his pistol dry trying to hit Gramins with rounds through his driver-side window, but except for spraying the officer’s face with glass, he narrowly missed and headed back to his car.

Gramins, also empty, escaped his squad — “a coffin,” he calls it — and reloaded on his run to cover behind the passenger-side rear of the Bonneville.

Now the robber, a lanky six-footer, was back in the fight with a .380 Bersa pistol he’d grabbed off his front seat. Rounds flew between the two as the gunman dashed toward the squad car.

Again, Gamins shot dry and reloaded.

“I thought I was hitting him, but with shots going through his clothing it was hard to tell for sure. This much was certain: he kept moving and kept shooting, trying his damnedest to kill me.”

In this free-for-all, the assailant had, in fact, been struck 14 times. Any one of six of these wounds — in the heart, right lung, left lung, liver, diaphragm, and right kidney — could have produced fatal consequences…“in time,” Gramins emphasizes.

...reaching either [of his long guns in the trunk] was impractical. Gramins did manage to get himself to a grassy spot near a tree on the curb side of his vehicle where he could prone out for a solid shooting platform.

The suspect was in the street on the other side of the car. “I could see him by looking under the chassis,” Gramins recalls. “I tried a couple of ricochet rounds that didn’t connect. Then I told myself, ‘Hey, I need to slow down and aim better.’ ”

When the suspect bent down to peer under the car, Gramins carefully established a sight picture, and squeezed off three controlled bursts in rapid succession.

Each round slammed into the suspect’s head — one through each side of his mouth and one through the top of his skull into his brain. At long last the would-be cop killer crumpled to the pavement.

The whole shootout had lasted 56 seconds, Gramins said. The assailant had fired 21 rounds from his two handguns. Inexplicably — but fortunately — he had not attempted to employ an SKS semi-automatic rifle that was lying on his front seat ready to go.

Gramins had discharged 33 rounds. Four remained in his magazine... Two houses and a parked Mercedes in the vicinity had been struck by bullets, but with no casualties...

Before the shooting, Gramins routinely carried 47 rounds of handgun ammo on his person, including two extra magazines for his Glock 21 and 10 rounds loaded in a backup gun attached to his vest, a 9 mm Glock 26.

Now unfailingly he goes to work carrying 145 handgun rounds, all 9 mm. These include three extra 17-round magazines for his primary sidearm (currently a Glock 17), plus two 33-round mags tucked in his vest, as well as the backup gun. Besides all that, he’s got 90 rounds for the AR-15 that now rides in a rack up front.

What the Statist fails to under is that the law-abiding citizen deserves every bit of protection that a police officer does. Because if the citizen can't be trusted with firearms, why should the government?


Hat tip: BadBlue Guns.

Don't know about you, but whenever I need advice I always turn to a woman responsible for not one -- but two -- separate trillion-dollar calamities for the United States of America. I refer, of course, to the Democrat hack Jamie "The Mistress of Disaster" Gorelick who helped blind the intelligence and law enforcement communities prior to the 9/11 attacks and then, despite no background in finance, got a cushy position with Fannie Mae where she helped trigger the subprime mortgage meltdown.

Yes, Gorelick's just the one I'd turn to for counsel. Certainly the unhinged editors at The New York Times believe she's credible, which is why she appeared in print there defending the lawless behavior of Eric Holder's DOJ in the matter of its shotgun attack on the Associated Press.

Following the disclosure that the Justice Department obtained telephone records of Associated Press journalists, the AP and other news organizations have criticized the action as unwarranted interference with the ability of journalists to report on government operations.

As former Justice Department officials, we are worried that the criticism of the decision to subpoena telephone toll records of AP journalists in an important leak investigation sends the wrong message to officials who are responsible for our national security.

...the prosecutors were right to investigate this leak vigorously... But after eight months of intensive effort, it appears that they still could not identify the leaker.

It was only then — after pursuing “all reasonable alternative investigative steps,” as required by the department’s regulations — that investigators proposed obtaining logs of calls made and received for about 20 phone lines that the leaker might have used in conversations with AP journalists. They limited the request to the two months when the leak most likely occurred, and did not propose more intrusive steps.

...They were right to pursue the investigation with “alternative investigative steps” for eight months first. Ultimately, they were right to take it to the next stage when they still needed more to make a case against the leaker. If the Justice Department had not done so, it would have defaulted on its obligation to protect the American people.

As is always the case with the ludicrous Gorelick, she gets her analysis completely backwards. Both Democrats and Republicans have slammed Holder for his "unconstitutional" behavior:

...the DOJ failed to notify the AP of the subpoena issued for phone records before obtaining those documents... “The Code of Federal Regulations states that a news media organization [is] supposed to be notified of the subpoena, and they apparently were not notified of the subpoena. Therefore, that’s a big question that needs to be resolved because it looks like an effort by the government to sidestep a requirement,” [House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob] Goodlatte said.

He pointed out that former Attorney General Michael Mukasey believes the subpoena of “20 reporters over a two-month period of time … was too broad.”

“There is no judge — it’s a subpoena, not a warrant — that’s why it’s a big deal,” Goodlatte said before promising that his committee is “going to pursue this for sure.” ... In an interesting twist, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has ripped the Obama administration for the DOJ probe... “I have trouble defending what the Justice Department did. I don’t know who did it or why it was done, but it’s inexcusable. It’s an issue I feel very strongly about.”

And notice that Dame Disaster carefully ignored the other ongoing DOJ scandals that have made a mockery of the department under Perjurer General Eric Holder: the James Rosen wiretap debacle, Fast and Furious, the New Black Panther insanity, and many more. And, worse still, the very notion that Holder is investigating himself for some of these crimes.

That Gorelick would defend the indefensible is utterly bizarre, but not unexpected coming from the Countess of Catastrophe.

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Nation

Holder Perjury: Two Judges Refused Before Holder Got Fox Warrant: Lid
Lerner Signed IRS Demands Months After She Said Practice Stopped: Nice Deb
DOJ Begged Judge to Keep Fox Reporter in Dark About Monitoring: NewsMax

Justice Department Investigated a New York Times Reporter, Too.: Instapundit
GOP widening Sebelius shakedown probe: Hot Air
Rubio has long history of blocking immigration enforcement: DC

House GOP leadership is botching the Benghazi investigation: DC
The Warrior's Tale: Sultan Knish
Chris Christie snubs Snooki, but rolls out the red carpet for Dear Leader: WyBlog

Economy

Will Congress Get Around to Scrapping Duplicative Programs?: PJM
My Cincinnati IRS Audit Experience: Ushanka
NLRB acting illegally: Will

The Dollar -- and the USA -- is Toast: Monckton
La Raza (The Race) Partners with Feds to Hire Government Employees: Adams
Don't do business in New Jersey. Ever.: AmmoLand

Scandal Central

Obama Donor/IRS Director Monitored IG Interviews Of Employees: WZ
Moseley: The Obama Administration lied about Benghazi: CIF could have been on the ground in 3.5 hours: Owens
How much of Bloomberg’s fortune was gotten from monitoring his customers?: MoneyRunner

Climate & Energy

Oh, good: Iranian hackers trying to break into the American energy grid: Hot Air
Now That CO2 Has Passed 400ppm, We Should All Stockpile Cyanide Or Something: Cove
W.Va. joins fight to EPA greenhouse gas rules: BizWk

Media

CBS Reporter Sharyl Attkisson Reports She’s Been Shut Out By White House: Publius
Fired Over IRS Facebook Post: Larry Conners Speaks Out: Dana Loesch
The Danger in D.C. is Bipartisanship: RWN

See You in the Funny Papers: A tribute to an anti-mentor.: Taranto
Atlantic Magazine's Bogus, Pernicious Meme: Homosexual 'Marriages'...'Happier Than' Traditional Ones: AmPower
The #FreeKate Narrative Melts Down: Lies Exposed in Florida Teen Sex Case: AmSpec

The Words Most Abused by the Left: RWN
Just Plain Mean: RWN
Paul Krugman: Even Dumber Than We'd Thought: NB

World

Obama’s Cynical War Speech: McCarthy
The Stabbing Attack You Haven’t Heard About: WZ
Saudi Arabia Warns Against Iran Nuclear Program: AP

Infiltration? The Alarming Details Surrounding Alleged Hezbollah Member’s Arrest in Texas: Blaze
Netanyahu: Israel is the most threatened state in the world: JPost
Islamists attack kissing couples in Turkey: The Commentator

Sci-Tech (courtesy BadBlue.com/Tech)

'Batwing' attachment adds new wrinkle to iRobot IED hunters: ArmyTimes
Google Considering 'Wireless Balloons' to Deliver Internet to Countries: PCMag
Google Glass Photographer Makes Picture-Taking Awkward: Mashable

Cornucopia

Voyage into Volvulus: Driscoll
Obama’s Naval Academy Commencement Address: “Sub-Optimal”: MOTUS
The Good Son: iOTW

Image: Voyage into Volvulus
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: Benghazi: Demand the Truth (Video)

QOTD: "[President Obama's] speech [at the National Defense University] was bizarre, to put it mildly. It was often incoherent, as when he gritted his teeth and actually admitted that there is an ideological conflict between us and the terrorists. “Most…of the terrorism we face,” he said, ”is fueled by a common ideology…that Islam is in conflict with the United States and the West.” Without taking a deep breath, he hastily added that the “common ideology” was “based on a lie.” Why? Because “the United States is not at war with Islam…”

It’s typical of the president’s world-view that he would assume any such war to be instigated by us, but in this case the jihadis have it right, and he’s got it backwards. There is indeed a war, it is theirs, the jihadis’ war, and they are waging it because they firmly believe they are commanded to do so by the Almighty. They aim to destroy or dominate Western infidels and apostates. Those commands are in the Koran, and are repeated by a great mass of imams, ayatollahs and mullahs. Those thousands of Iranians or Hezbollahis who chant “death to America” mean just that. It’s the reason for their jihad against us." --Michael Ledeen

In Sweden, the city of Stockholm has been torched every night for nearly a week. The authorities have responded not by cracking down on the Militant Quakers behind the riots, but by ticketing vehicles destroyed by the barbarians.

STOCKHOLM (FRIA TIDER). Owners of cars destroyed in the riots fined for parking illegally while police adopt non-intervention policy.

Since last Sunday, May 19, rioters have taken to the streets of Stockholm’s suburbs every night, torching cars, schools, stores, office buildings and residential complexes. Yesterday, a police station in Rågsved, a suburb four kilometers south of Stockholm, was attacked and set on fire...

But while the Stockholm riots keep spreading and intensifying, Swedish police have adopted a tactic of non-interference. ”Our ambition is really to do as little as possible,” Stockholm Chief of Police Mats Löfving explained to the Swedish newspaper Expressen on Tuesday.

In Merry Olde Englande, authorities have responded to this:


With the arrests of Twitter users for anti-Islamic tweets and proposed censorship like this:


Hey, geniuses: blocking the Internet, China-style, ain't gonna solve your radical cleric problem.

Exhibit A: Anjem Choudary, the infamous U.K. Islamofascist hate-cleric, opined on one of the Woolwich savages: "What he said, not many Muslims disagree with."

Best of all, the British citizenry is subsidizing kooks like Choudary. The "cleric" receives £25,000 a year in public assistance benefits — £8,000 more than the take-home pay of soldiers fighting in Afghanistan -- and lives in a £320,000 house in Leytonstone, East London.

Earlier today, a French soldier walking on the streets of Paris was stabbed in the neck by "bearded man of North-African origin."

Europe is doomed.


Hat tip: American Digest.

Holder lied, the free press died.

Feel free to copy, tweet, Facebook, post, and otherwise distribute this animated GIF (our current blogging platform doesn't appear to allow embedding animated GIFs, thus the link to an external site).

The following screen-caps represent the un-animated version.






This malevolent, lawless man makes John Mitchell (Nixon's A.G.) look like Lindsey Lohan by comparison.

Guest post by NRCC


If you think about it, Washington Democrats are a lot like the Bluth family. They’re a bunch of out-of-touch, elite big spenders ensnared in scandal who have no concept of fiscal responsibility. To illustrate that, we give you IRS’ted Development: a collection of 15 quotes from Arrested Development that could have come from Democrats: