For decades, the left has been winning in judicial appointments and, from that, in the courts.

Our republic was set up to encourage political experiments within each state. Each state could pass laws as their citizens wished, if those laws were bad, people would vote them down or leave.

Roe v. Wade was the Supreme Court cutting that experiment off. The states were passing laws as their citizens deemed best for them regarding abortion.

With Roe all that stopped. Instead, we moved into a period of lawfare. In the end, the Supreme Court corrected itself, returning the debate on abortion to the states, where it has always belonged.

When the people of California, a leftist utopia, were asked if they wanted “gay marriage”, they voted “no.” They enshrined that decision in the California constitution.

The losers whined and then went to court. In the end, the California supreme court issued an opinion that the state’s constitutional amendment was unconstitutional.

The people of California literally changed their constitution to refute gay marriage, and the courts said that the amendment wasn’t constitutional.

While we, The People, have been fighting for our Second Amendment protected rights, there has been a quiet fight going on in the background.

The Federalist Society has been making recommendations on judicial nominations for years. You can tell they are doing a good job by the amount of hate they have generated from the left.

Which takes us to today’s topic, false flags.

There is the term “borked”. This comes from the Democrat lead attack on Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork. The attack in the Senate was so horrible. The Senate rejected his nomination 42-58.

This was a win for the left and damaged the Supreme Court.

Since that time, every Supreme Court nominee presented to the Senate by a Republican president has been met with the same vulgar, nasty, attacks. The attacks on Judge Thomas were so bad that he described them as a “modern-day lynching”.

President Trump managed to get three originalists onto the court. The Federalist Society recommended all three.

This has resulted in the left losing its mind, again, what little it had to begin with.

They went after the Supreme Court as being “illegitimate”. The (pseudo)rational is that the republicans stole a nomination from Obama (Garland) and then didn’t let the democrats have the last nomination of Trumps first term.

When they were unable to sink the nominations of those three, they went to the media and started the drumbeat of “Thomas is corrupt!”

Justice Thomas has a wealthy friend. When he visits that friend, he stays at the friend’s house. They go out boating. They enjoy their time together. And it is likely they get to talk, like friends.

I assume most of us have done things like stay at a friend’s house. If you have, I am sure you don’t report that as a financial donation. Nor if you go out on their bass boat, do you report that as a “gift”?

What Thomas was accused of doing was not reporting those visits and those stays. When the rules changed and those types of things needed to be reported, he did report them.

Thomas was also attacked because his wife has a mind of her own and acts on her own. For some reason, when the wife of a Republican acts like a conservative and doesn’t kowtow to the liberal hive mind, that is actually her acting as her husband’s sock puppet.

It didn’t work. Thomas has stood strong. Roberts stood weak kneed, but he didn’t fall.

Since that didn’t work, they are now attacking Justice Alito. The great crime is that his wife was so upset at a TDS suffering neighbor, who was harassing her, that she flew the American flag upside down, as an indication of duress.

Not only that, but at their vacation home, she flew a revolutionary war flag, commissioned by George Washington.

All of this is supposed to force Alito and Thomas to the sidelines, and maybe Kavanaugh or Barrett as well, when Trump’s case reaches the Supreme Court.

The left are children. When they do not get their way, they throw tantrums. They throw things, they break things, they change the rules.

As soon as they are out of power, they want the rules changed back.

It doesn’t work that way.

What the left has done to my country sickens me. I pray that my grand-children have a country in 30 years.

It is that time of year, it is time to beg for your support.  Visit the store, there are a couple of support options there

There are many cases that seem to be in limbo, waiting for something to come out of the Supreme Court.

I expect something in Rahimi soon. I’m hoping Thomas writes the opinion.

Welcome to the new readers and commenters.  It is nice to see you here.

What is it that you look for from GFZ?

The comments are open, have at it.

Today, the Supreme Court issued their opinion regarding New York’s lawfare attack on the NRA.

This is a 9-0 opinion. Justice Jackson wrote a concurrence, as did Justice Gorsuch.

Unfortunately, and expected, Justice Jackson tries to lessen the power of this opinion.

This is likely the entire reason for her writing a separate concurrence. Having quoted the majority opinion, [the state] cannot do indirectly what [it] is barred from doing directly., she goes on to say how critical it is that the government has the power and authority to do what it wants.

Indeed, she again forgets that we are a republic, not a democracy.

This is a good opinion.

Of course, it was the Second Circuit court that found that the NRA was wrong. They seem to have made that decision when they read the parties names.

At this point, I have more tools than I have toolholders. This can be frustrating as I like to have “standard” tools ready to go.

Just as an example:

• Four different shapes of right hand turning tools
• Chamfering tool
• Parting tool
• Shearing tool
• Facing tool (left hand)
• Grooving tool
• Right hand threading tool
• 3/8″ Boring bar
• 1/2″ Boring Bar
• 3/4″ Boring Bar
• 5/8″ Grooving bar
• Right Hand threading bar
• Left Hand threading bar

These are tools that live in toolholders ready to be used.  I would have more in toolholders if I had more toolholders.

Aloris BXA#1 can be had for the low, low price of $83.  The #2, which has a grove for boring bars, is only $82+shipping.

Then there is the shop made version:

I have two more that are ready to finish to this stage.  Once those two are completed, all three are going into the mill for some aggressive chamfering.

When that is completed, they three of them will be hot blued, oiled, hardware installed, and then they will be ready to go into production.

I have the raw materials for another 6 toolholders.  I have some smaller tools, 1/4″ I think.  I plan to make a couple of 1/4″ toolholders.  Three more will be 5/8 and one will be 3/4.

The nice thing, is that having done this once, the next time becomes much easier.

This consolidated case is still live before the Supreme Court.

It was heard on the May 16th conference. It was put on the agenda for May 23rd. Yesterday, we learned that it is on the Agenda for the 30th of May.

It takes 4 Justices to agree to grant certiorari. It takes 5 to deny. This means that there are currently Justices that are still undecided and who are doing research.

For comparison, Duncan was distributed for conference one before Bruen and then again after Bruen where it was GVR.

Bruen was distributed for Conference (put on the agenda) On 2021-4-1, 2021-4-16, and then again on 2021-4-23.

Three days later, certiorari was granted.

Monday will be interesting.

A small boy and his friend run through the yards, they are 5 or 6 years old. They slide partially down a hillside and slowly peek over the top, looking for “Charlie”.

The one boy turns to the other and asks, “What are you going to do when you are drafted?”

War comes to them on the TV every night. They know about those that ran to Canada. They know those that stayed. They know of the bodies of what were once vibrant young men arrive day after day from that horrible place, Vietnam.

They talk of their grandfathers. Of those that served in WWII. They speak of the silence of those veterans who returned.

Today, I remember my Great Uncle Joe talking about all the heroes he knew. Some of whom died in the skies over Germany. He was never a hero. He flew in the same plane, he put his pants on the same, he ate with those heroes. According to him, every man aboard his plane was a hero, except him.

He was a hero. He was a bombardier of a B17 Flying Fortress.

Today, Vietnam is ancient history. Desert Storm, V1 in 1991 is ancient history. The war on terror is what is remembered by men older than their years.

“All gave some, some gave all.”

Thank you, I remember you. We remember you.

After more than a week, success was had.

The number of subprojects that went into this one simple little gear boggles my mind.

• Locate a reasonable rotary table
• Document what was needed for it
• Clean and restore 8″ Cushman Chuck
• Make chuck key
• Locate dividing plates for the rotary table
• Make T-Nuts for rotary table
• Make socket-head replacement screws for chuck
• Make socket-head attachment screws for chuck/backplate interface
• Make backplate
• Make retaining collar
• Make MT3 alignment plug
• Modify eccentric to have a retaining grove for U-Spring
• Make grooving tool
• Make nose cap for spindle
• Thread eccentric for tensioning ring
• Make a mandrel for holding gear blanks
• Make gear blanks
• Read the section in the 1914 Machinery’s Handbook about gears
• Create Emacs spreadsheet to calculate gear cutting parameters
• Create a Python program to create a dividing plate table
• Incorporate dividing plate information into Org-mode spreadsheet for single point of information (Enter DP and Number of teeth, get out cutting parameters and which dividing plate to use along with dividing plate setup)

In addition to that, I have 3 toolholders almost finished, I’m still waiting for the dovetail cutter to arrive and then to drill and tap the adjustment screw plus the retaining screws.

For those that might wonder why 14.5° PA, 16 DP instead of a more modern 20° PA, it is because this is what my lathe uses.  With a single purchase of the 8 involute cutters, I can make any gear my lathe might need.

Some compelling prose from Judge McGlynn, District Court Judge, S.D. Ill. He gets it.

He does the right thing and grants the preliminary injunction. The state runs to mommy, the Seventh Circuit court.

There, Woods and Easterbrook make a mockery of judicial decorum, judicial precedents, and show their utter disrespect for the Supreme Court. They decided that icky guns aren’t arms under the Second Amendment, so there was no infringement.

As the Amici said in United States v. Kittson

I’ve decided I really don’t like FedEx delivery. The last two times they have delivered, they have delivered late. For the company that made a name for itself by being on time with the best tracking is now performing worse than the USPS.

When last we left you, we were doing something in the shop. Progress has been made.

This shows a different view of the shop. On the right, the Bridgeport is cutting a slot in the homemade toolholders.

These 3 are BXA sized, but the front slot is for 1/2″ tools. The key is that the top of the tool is at nearly the same height as if you had a 5/8″ tool in a regular BXA holder. It will be using 1/4-20 set screws for clamping and 3/8-16 for the height adjust.

The red tray over the lathe is shop made. Originally, there would have been a plate to hold collets for the lathe. I did not have the collet chuck, the collet closer nor did I have the tray. I had the post and the ring to hold the draw bar.

A few years ago, I made up this thing. It has three separators to keep the toolholders from sliding down or off. The plate is steel, but the separators are aluminum angle. This was a great improvement and organization system.

The three rows are “right hand turning tools”, “left hand/facing tools”, and boring bars.

I actually have more tools than I have holders, thus the need to make the toolholders. I’m waiting for a dovetail cutter to arrive before I can complete the toolholders.

There is another 12 inches for 6 more toolholders. 4 will be 5/8 slots and 2 will be 3/4 slots.

You can see the rotary table on the mill. I used the rotary table to finish the alignment boss for the chuck. You can see the shiny backing plate attached to the second chuck. Once it was attached to the chuck, I moved both to the lathe to face and turn it to size.

The jaws have been removed from the second chuck to allow it to fit against the jaws.

Yesterday’s progress didn’t feel like that much. I finished the slots in the first three toolholders. I got this picture, so I can break down the chuck in chuck setup. I drilled and tapped the holes in the retaining plate for the rotary table., and I started cutting the groove for the spring washer.

On the rotary table, you can see a small lever pointing to the right. That is the lever to rotate the eccentric to engage or disengage the worm. That disk is a replacement for the original. That is now completed.

Once that was done, I removed the retaining collar, the worm backlash adjust, the eccentric retaining plate.

With that, the eccentric came out with no issues. The worm came out by unscrewing it.

It was here that I realized that I had to cut a groove in the eccentric, not the central. Bummer.

This required changing out the chuck for the four jaw.

Which meant I had to actually clean the four jaw chuck. That went well. It still has 3 tight jaws, but it is much, much better.

Once the four jaw was back together, I realized that the cradle for the 3 jaw doesn’t fit the four jaw. This meant it was a pain in the rump to get it on. It happened.

Then I had to dial in the eccentric so it ran true. What this means is that by moving to opposing jaws, you can move the workpiece. By putting a dial indicator on the boss, you can measure the difference between opposite sides. You then move things until the reading stays the same as you rotate it.

I dialed everything in to within 0.001. For a groove, this is more than good enough.

I then realized I didn’t have a grooving tool. So I ground one.

Just as I started to cut the groove, Something felt off. I think the workpiece slipped in the chuck. I’m not sure that I tightened all the jaws fully.

This means I have to dial it back in again. Not a bit deal, but that is a today job, not a yesterday job.

The only task, after completing the groove, is to cut flats on the worm. This is a slight issue as I do not have any metric 5C collets to hold it.

This means that I will need to get ER40 collet blocks to go with my 5C collet blocks. A cheap set of metric ER40 collets covers nearly the same range as 5C and is pretty cheap.

What I will likely do is to use a pair of matched V-Blocks to hold it and use a square to make both sides parallel.

Again, this is not critical. It just has to be good enough for the crank arm to fit over and to be locked in place by the screw.

As we have discussed, multiple times, the courts are only allowed to act when there is an active dispute. This is most often seen in “The Question” put to the court.

The formation of those questions can make or break a case.

As cases move through the appeals process, the parties will state the question in the most favorable light to that party.

The state might say: The question is whether the state has the authority to regulate the sale of dangerous implements?

The People might phrase it as: Does the Constitution protect The People’s right to acquire arms?

Part of the problem is that we all fall into the trap of using the enemy’s language. When we do, we have lost at least part of the battle, and maybe the war.

Judge VanDyke wrote a powerful dissent in Duncan. In that dissent, he wrote about how the courts should analyze Second Amendment cases. His answer, to the Ninth Circuit, was that they should use strict scrutiny.

We have learned that the correct answer is we use the text and this Nation’s historical tradition of firearms regulation.

When we use text and history, we win.

What this means, is that we should never be fighting for strict scrutiny. Any level of scrutiny is a request for the judiciary to balance away our rights.

The question(s) should not have are in common use for lawful purposes. The reason is simple, that is not what the plain text of the Second Amendment says. It says, “shall not be infringed.”

Remember, it is text first. Does the conduct of the individual, wishing to possess semiautomatic banned by Illinois, implicate the plain text of the Second Amendment and if so, has the state provided examples of firearms regulation in keeping with this Nation’s historical traditions?

Now, my phrasing isn’t the best. I hope you get the idea. When we simplify the question (K.I.S.S.) then it becomes clear that this isn’t about “lawful purposes”, nor is it about “law-abiding”, nor “responsible” citizens. It is text, and historical tradition of firearms regulations.

The state has not met their burden of proving that historical tradition.

For context, here is the state’s response:

Notice that the question presented by the state has nothing to do with the constitutionality of the law in question, it is about the interlocutory state of the case.