NY attorney says battle over traffic-ticket strip searches not over yet

Daily Caller Article
By Jen Veldhuyzen
@petrepan

The Supreme Court struck down a complaint April 2 from a man subjected to invasive strip searches for an unpaid traffic fine.

But despite the setback from America’s highest judicial authority, his attorney said Wednesday that she may file a petition for a re-hearing. The battle, attorney Susan C. Lask told The Daily Caller, is not over yet.

“This is about non-criminal offenders, and protecting their rights. It’s about the grandmother with the broken tail-light not getting pulled in and searched,” she said. “Even if it’s 10 percent, or just a thousand people a year, or 200 people — these people should not be treated inhumanely like that.”

“After this ruling, get ready to strip even if you have an unpaid traffic ticket,” Libertarian Party chairman Mark Hinkle said in a statement. “We are dismayed. This ruling sanctions new and unprecedented levels of invasion of privacy.”

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/05/ny-attorney-says-battle-over-traffic-ticket-strip-searches-not-over-yet/#ixzz1rYL04xQb

How Not to Stay on Topic: Fiction, News, and Feelings

Another blog post for another day! I realized today, what with my writing fiction so much and all, that I really ought to have a blog for writing fiction. Or writing about fiction. But I think it's so pretentious to pretend (wow) that I have wonderful great advice for people on that--while I do know a little more about the publishing process than the average grunt, I'm still...well, the average grunt. So I guess that's why I don't have THAT going on. Although, I suppose, pretending to know everything about writing fiction might be a great HOW NOT TO exercise. BUT I am considering doing little flash fiction bits every now and again if you like. Just for you, you know. Only considering.

I know, all of you who visit this blog visit for the news and the facts. Because yes, news and facts are pretty dang awesome. And I know it's been a while. Don't worry! You've got some African History coming your way shortly, and I may do a quick little "this week in Paraguay" for you as well. Because, yannow, news. Know your audience, and all that. But this is the how NOT to blog. I am allowed to NOT know my audience. To pretend that you're all thirteen-year-old girls who like to listen to me ramble.

In other things, there's a ring with a diamond on it--and it's on my finger. I always thought I wasn't the type. I guess I'm still not, considering that one of my first thoughts that I remember afterwards was, "dude, this is diamond. Hardest material on earth. I could like, go smash in windows and stuff!"

Speaking of how not to (I wasn't)--I know I've gotten like 8000 views over the past few months. Do any of you 500 viewers from last month have any...comments on layout improvement? I was planning on keeping the sucky layout, because, yannow, HOW NOT TO. But it's kinda hurting my eyes. Should I? Should I not?

Random Kind Comments on Youtube--You have the power (of Greyskull)

If, instead of posting critical things, all several thousand of you posted three kind comments on three youtube videos every day, we could brighten several thousand days for several thousand people.

That's pretty sweet.

Tips for Home Care Providers on Working with a Child with Autism

NOTE BEFORE YOU READ

I sold a much shorter, clearer, and more blog-like blog on this topic to Tender Tree Home Care a little while back. Check http://www.tendertree.com/ to learn more about home care of all kinds. The "blog" you'll see below is completely different, much longer post, so it's probably worth it to check out Tender Tree's blog post first. Without further ado--here are a few tips for working with a child with autism derived from a combination of ABA training, Sunrise training, and experience living with an autistic child for 11 years.

Every child with an ASD (Autistic Spectrum Disorder) is a little bit different, so many kids operate well in the normal world, and others have much more violent behavioral problems. Ability problem areas range from simply avoiding eye contact to never speaking; not every child will smear feces on the walls, and not every child will flap his hands like he's trying to fly. Here are a few tips for home care providers new for helping out in a family with an autistic or ASD spectrum child.

1. Understand where your tolerance and the child's needs should meet

Many children with autism have behavioral quirks that may not be actually dangerous to the child's health or to your ability to do your job as a home care provider. Caretakers often make the mistake of assuming that because a behavior is abnormal for them, it results from autism, and the child should change it. For example, a little boy once enjoyed playing with a pink fairy wand. A caretaker insisted that he could not have this wand and actually developed a behavioral plan to remove it from him. The boy's interest in the wand was neither obsessive nor obstructing his normal therapy or schedule, or even affecting his interaction with other children; she simply did not find a pink wand gender-appropriate. You should think carefully about prioritizing behavior-modification: which is a bigger problem, an autistic boy's habit of screaming when asked to perform any tasks, or his odd interest in picking fluff off blankets? Because many behavior changes become battles for children with ASD, you should pick your fights carefully. A child will often respond better to you as a caretaker if he feels safe and realizes that you aren't out to take away every little comfort from his life.

2. Identify real problem behaviors and their sources

Real problem behaviors have many different sources, and autistic children have very different behavioral responses to life in general than other children do. It's funny how even after Dr. Bernard Rimland disproved Freud's 'unloving mother' theory of autism we tend to look for normal reasons for abnormal behavior; even very well-meaning new caretakers will sometimes assume the child simply received too little discipline, or too much scolding, or some other issue resulted from the child's conniving heart or parental weakness.

Look for three major sources of a problem behavior: physiology, resistance, or social reward. Many autistic children have heightened senses and experience the world differently from you, so it's no use scolding an autistic child to wear his shirt when he won't because the fabric actually hurts him. On the other hand, coddling a child who resists the shirt because he wants to disobey and control you will only end up hurting the child's family life in the long run. The autistic child may be resisting the shirt because a response you give rewards him: you may put him on time-out, and that escape from unwanted interaction may be exactly what he wants.

How do you know what behavior has what cause? You have to chart triggers of the cause, and you have to see in what situations the behavior stops. This will take a long time of getting to know the child, and watching the problem situation over and over again, but part of the diagnosis lies in the solution.

3. Find replacement behaviors for physiological or other comfort behaviors; ignore resistance

To use our shirt example a little more, if you find the child responds better to a different material, the problem may have been physiological. You can ask a doctor as well to evaluate the child. Some autistic children with horrible allergies experience intense internal pain or even hallucinations; the child may bang his head on the wall, or shriek every few minutes, or even show fear of the floor, and the problem might actually come from something a doctor can help with. The child may smear feces on the wall because he's constipated, or because he's reaching an age where his diaper makes him uncomfortable. Try to look for every possible physiological trigger for the behavior, and if you find none, check to see if you're simply rewarding the negative behavior.

Replace desire-based problem behaviors with behaviors that fulfill the same needs. A child may smear feces just to feel the goop against the wall; replace that behavior with finger paints, and the child can experience the same sensation without the yuck. You can teach a child who likes to throw to participate in a game of catch with you. These kinds of solutions may sound silly, but finding ways to channel a child's problem behaviors will save you a lot of frustration.

For resistant behavior, negative reinforcement like taking away a favorite toy or other discipline--you need to talk to your family to understand how they feel about spanking and other controversials--may work. "Normal" kids often respond well to negative reinforcement, but you have to remember that ASD kids live in a completely different world, and negative reinforcement might actually hurt rather than help the situation. If you use negative reinforcement, you must apply it directly after the problem behavior occurs. Not ten minutes later, not before as you see it coming, but directly after. This is the best way to ensure that the child connects the negative reinforcement with the behavior. This may have to happen over and over tens or hundreds of times before the child makes the connection.

You almost have to think like an autistic child in order to make sure you aren't encouraging the problem behavior: the smallest things may become rewards. Some autistic children will actually throw or break things in order to see your anger response. This may sound ridiculous, but because most autistic children have trouble interpreting social patterns in the world around them, they cling to any pattern of normalcy or control. If you had no idea how to communicate with anyone, and everyone behaved completely unpredictably all the time, you might also take comfort in the one truth that throwing the plate makes Nana scream. Much of the time, an autistic child might actually completely tune out your yelling or frustration; at other times, the child may not understand that a particular negative reinforcer has anything to do with the problem behavior. She may just tremble under the loss with no idea as to why it's happening.

The hands-down most-ABA-recommended way to deal with a reaction-seeking problem behavior? Ignoring it. Because autistic kids can be more detail-observant than the rest of us, this means no eye contact, not a word, and if possible no change at all in your body language. Kids who are looking to make you angry will increase the intensity of the behavior for a while to see if they can finally get that response. Don't crack. If you ignore it to the end, the child will realize the response gets them nothing they want, and they will find something else.

I hope your first experience helping an ASD child is a positive one, and that the child feels loved and accepted as you embark on this new phase of your professional home care life!

Homecare for Family Members with Handicaps: What to Pay, and How to Find Help

When my cousin came over just before Christmas Eve, small talk brought up her new job working for a wealthy family member who became paralyzed in a diving accident. My cousin has to help him get dressed, eat, accompany him to the gym, and do everything else that you may have to do with your friend or family member with physical or neurological disabilities. We got around to talking about payment, and she explained she's taking a cut in pay because he's a relative.

It can be a hard question--what should you pay a caretaker who helps you with differently-abled family? How much more does it cost? Should it cost more? Many children with Down's syndrome have happier demeanors and easier "obedience ethic" than "normal" children do. On the other hand, spending a day with a stimming, high-energy autistic child has turned many a saintly caregiver into a rage-class sinner. Here are some considerations for paying a caregiver for a differently-abled family member.

1. Government aid

Families with mentally-affected family members sometimes receive government social security subsidies for care. Depending on your needs, the state you reside in, and other factors, once they've reached eighteen years of age the government may pay anywhere around $695 a month to supplement their care. This definitely factors in to any decisions the rest of us make about their care in the future. A caregiver in Hawaii can receive as much as $14.64 an hour from the government to help with home care for a young adult with cerebral palsy; you may want to pay a comparable or competitive rate even if you don't receive government money, just to attract good caregivers.

2. Volunteerism

Lower-income families not yet eligible for government aid and unable to pay government rates to their caregivers don't have to fear getting edged out of the home-care market by Uncle Sam; you can still attract good help for less. If you live near a college or university, you may take advantage of psychology or pre-med students looking for volunteer credit. "Miriam" posted an ad in the local student volunteer center asking for help with her child with autism. She trained volunteers to use the Sunshine program to play with and care for her son, held meetings every Sunday, and scheduled each volunteer for a few hours every week. The simple math reveals enough: twenty volunteers at two hours each every week equals forty hours of care, and even ten or fifteen volunteers can fill up a sizable chunk of your in-home needs.

If you don't live near a large student population, an e-mail out to your local church may even get you a long-term caregiver for ten or so hours each week who's just looking for room and board as payment. Don't feel overwhelmed, and don't give up your search--people can help you.

3. Training

This leads to the issue of expertise. It's often fairly easy to train caregivers for basic help, but if you want higher quality intensive therapy you will certainly have to pay more. An ABA therapist with a master's costs $100 an hour, but you can get good therapists working on their bachelor's for around $9.00. This is actually a criminally low rate--ABA therapists often receive much more training than non-therapeutic caregivers have, and non-therapeutic caregivers in Virginia can go for as much as $20 an hour. However, it can be tough to get even 30 hours a week of in-home therapy, and having therapists come in and out of your house may require more of your presence at home. You may need to mix and match in-home therapy and other in-home care. Many care.com special needs' experienced caregivers work for $10-$15 an hour.

Whatever your cost evaluations for in-home care, make sure you remain up-front with your caregiver about your health needs and pocketbook. When you post a special needs opening on care.com, make sure to list all the important needs and details so that you can get the right caregiver for your family. Don't be afraid to ask for free help from your church or community center, and remember that the rest of your family has needs also. Join a support group for families with differently-abled members for resources; many of us understand and sympathize with you. It's common for families with special needs to feel judged by their local community or co-workers, so finding a forum of similar families not only helps families share resources--it also allows you readier access to info about non-judgmental, experienced caregivers and friends. It's okay to ask for help if you have to stay home more while in-between caregivers or if you can't find a caregiver who meets your needs: that doesn't make you any less an educated or empowered person. Families with special needs face a lot of pressures from all different directions, and you have to feel comfortable with your own decisions to do the best for YOUR family, not some imagined ideal.

Blessings, and peace.

Book Review: M-1 Garand Assembly Guide (so where you can look to find out about modifying your M-1 Garand)

Some people learn by reading; others learn by doing.

For the gun owners who lie in the latter category, a historic firearm becomes more than a relic to hang above their fireplaces while they sit under it and read of its exploits.

For those hands-on learners, historic guns become bygone battlefields for minds and fingers to explore--a way for you to connect with whatever past soldier first field-stripped that gun years ago.

Geared towards that hands-on historic gun collector, "The M-1 Garand Complete Assembly Guide" by Walt Kuleck aims to present a simple guide for someone with no Garand modification experience, according to its introduction.

Does the book meet that goal? The specific, detailed subject may frighten brand-new general gun enthusiasts into believing they will not understand Kuleck's book: not so.

In fact, the book simplifies Garand assembly for the new owner almost to the point of the ludicrous. The author wasn't satisfied just to write the caption "note the receiver" above an image of a receiver, for example; he also wrote it again two inches away on the image with a big dark arrow pointing to the indicated part, in case the reader, a consummate idiot, still does not note the receiver.

The clear, step-by-step images take the reader through disassembly from trigger guard to buttplate, and then back through assembly. The images makes the book: I only wish I had seen these pictures before interviewing Mr. Kuleck on Garand accuracy--it would have made researching the gun much easier.

Each set of basic directions includes safety features throughout that should also provide a solid aid to new Garand owners. "Always wear your safety goggles" brings back memories of high school robotics for me, but Kuleck's story about a gun exploding on his hand reminds the young and reckless that this isn't the science fair anymore.

Also for safety, Kuleck's book recommends a full read-through before an owner makes any modifications, and a final check with a certified armorer before the owner fires the finished gun. He illustrates, with images, the unsafe way to remove a trigger assembly--with a cocked hammer--and what used or welded gun parts could prove disastrous additions to a rebuilt Garand.

Despite the simple language and safety instructions geared towards beginners, long-time Garand owners may benefit even more than newbies as Kuleck, a Garand Collector's Associaton board member, builds on established knowledge with his experienced, trial-tested tips for the best techniques, the trickiest pitfalls big and small, and ideas for saving time.

Continue reading here: http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48066

How to make an old gun (M-1 Garand) shoot like new. Okay, not really. How to make your historic M-1 Garand more accurate

                                                                                                                                 Image courtesy of army.mil
Reserve color guard honors World War II veterans at a football game Nov. 8, 2010 in WWII uniform, with M-1 Garands

Guns & Patriots asked Garand expert Dr. Walter J. Kuleck, a board-member of the Garand Collector’s Association and author of several authoritative gun manuals, what tweaks can give your Garand its best competition accuracy.

“First off, you need to make sure that the rifle is kept clean and lubricated with a high quality grease. If you don’t have a basic platform to start with—a clean, solidly assembled rifle--it really doesn’t matter what you do to it from there on,” said Kuleck, a doctor of psychology who spent many years as a Boeing engineer.

The former engineer said improving the accuracy of any rifle requires three critical points: the barrel, the fit of the stock, and what happens at the front end of the gun.

“If the barrel is rusted or pitted or defective in some way, you’re not going to get anywhere in terms of improving the accuracy,” he said.
The second critical accuracy point, the stock, may need adjustments to tighten its grip around the receiver, said Kuleck.

“The stock is held between the receiver and the trigger group. That is to say, when you field-strip a Garand, you swing down the trigger guard and remove the trigger group—that’s got the hammer, the trigger, the safety—the stock then comes off and you have the barrel of action, in other words the receiver,” he said.
“If that fit isn’t tight—in other words, if the receiver’s allowed to move around in the stock just a little bit—the accuracy is going to be materially affected, negatively,” he said.

When the Garand was standard military issue, finding a perfect stock for a rifle was easy for armories because they had so many Garands available, said Kuleck.

Today, when stock-fit decays, Garand owners can use glass reinforced resin or fiberglass bedding to tighten their aim, he said. “That enables you to get a perfect, lasting fit between the stock and the barrel receiver.”

Kuleck said the final focus area of the gun for accuracy enhancement lies on the front end of the gun: a study by the Marines showed that even just placing a penny on the top of the front end of the barrel by the sight would dramatically alter rifle accuracy.

“You would shift the place the bullets were hitting by feet at 600 yards,” he said.

The front end must always return to the same place with respect to the rifle--this means making sure that the gas cylinder does not bind on the barrel, because if it does, when the barrel heats up the cooler cylinder ring will bend the barrel, he said.

“On a service rifle, you want the front hand guard to rattle a little bit back and forth because as a rifle heats up, if it’s all jammed in there, it’s gonna have a similar effect—it’s gonna begin to warp as it gets hot. So on a match rifle, what you do is you secure the rear of the handguard to the metal piece that surrounds the stock, called the front-end ferrell,” he said.

Typically a gun-owner could secure the ferrell with glue, or drive screws in through the back and then glue it into place—while ensuring that the handguard does not have the freedom to touch the back of the gas cylinder, he said.

Tweaking those three critical points will help hone the inherent accuracy of the rifle, but a shooter must also find ways to reduce user error, Kuleck said.

“You can’t stop there. The interface—I hate that word, but some places it just works--between the shooter and the rifle is extremely important, and the two important elements that I’m talking about are the sights and the trigger,” he said.

Sights should enable the user to adjust placement with respect to the bulls-eye, so size matters: choose a sight that’s too big, and the shooter can’t tell where it is under the bulls-eye, while too small means hard to see through, said Kuleck.

Standardized Garand national match sights end up somewhat smaller than normal service rifle sights, and have a bit of a taper from back to front to reflect any glare forward rather than back towards the shooter’s eye, he said.

A smaller back sight aperture creates a sharper image, and for accuracy the aperture is adjustable so each click in the horizontal direction is one half minute of angle—half the normal adjustment for a battle rifle, said Kuleck.

“One minute of angle translates to one inch at a hundred yards, two inches at two hundred yards, three inches at three hundred yards, and so on,” he said.

The trigger forms the final accuracy-enhancing aspect of the gun/user interface, said Kuleck.

“If the trigger has a lot of what we call creep—in other words, you have to really move it a long way before it goes ‘bang’—rifle shooters don’t like that very much because it allows—it keeps you from discharging your rifle when you want to,” he said.

The weight and delay of pulling a single-stage four-pound trigger, for example, might cause a shooter to lose aim while the gun fires, said Kuleck.

To make a trigger pull more smoothly, Kuleck said owners can...

Can what? How can you make a trigger pull more smoothly? How not to not end a sentence. = P Keep reading here: http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48058