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A few years back I bought a Carcano, the rifle used in the JFK assassination. I had always remembered every year some "firearms expert" being trotted out and c

by cgore 13y ago

A few years back I bought a Carcano, the rifle used in the JFK assassination. I had always remembered every year some "firearms expert" being trotted out and claiming that there was no way that shot could have been made. I don't think I could reliably make that shot, but a really good shooter could. It is actually a pretty accurate rifle. It is really unreliable though (although that might be just because it is from WW2). So whenever the TV tries to tell you something about firearms, just remember that most news reporters haven't been near anything more powerful than a NERF gun in their entire lives. An interesting little bit of trivia. Mussolini was a really hard-core atheist, to the point where he even tried to get rid of the Christian year system. And I don't mean just trying to replace BC/AD with BCE/CE, he restarted the calendar at the date in which he took power in Italy. Mine was stamped "1941 XIX", 19 years by Mussolini's count.

imrehg 13y ago
An interesting little bit of trivia: in Taiwan the years are still counted since the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) party took power in China in 1911, making this year year 102, for example. Oh, and of course they mix it with the "western" years too. So e.g. my birth year of 1980 is occasionally written on documents as 1980, as 80, as 69. Hilarity ensues. The parallel with Mussolini (ie. being far right as well) is not lost on me, though. Food for thought.
- cafard 13y ago
  As your Emacs will show you (Meta-x calendar, then p f), the French Republic used a calendar beginning with the revolution. It would be hard to describe the First Republic as "far right". And I noticed on co-worker's diploma that Syracuse University gives the year both AD and from the founding of the republic--but whether counting that from independence or from the constitution I don't remember.
curtis 13y ago
One of the facts that is not widely appreciated -- unless you have visited the site of the assassination -- is just how short a distance we're talking about. I remember thinking that it couldn't have been more than about a hundred yards. According to Wikipedia, the distance from the sixth story window to where Kennedy was when he was shot in the head is 265 feet. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_assassination_rifle#Ballistics_Research_Laboratory_tests http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_assassination_r...)

by cgore 13y ago

imrehg 13y ago

An interesting little bit of trivia: in Taiwan the years are still counted since the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) party took power in China in 1911, making this year year 102, for example. Oh, and of course they mix it with the "western" years too. So e.g. my birth year of 1980 is occasionally written on documents as 1980, as 80, as 69. Hilarity ensues. The parallel with Mussolini (ie. being far right as well) is not lost on me, though. Food for thought.

cafard 13y ago
As your Emacs will show you (Meta-x calendar, then p f), the French Republic used a calendar beginning with the revolution. It would be hard to describe the First Republic as "far right". And I noticed on co-worker's diploma that Syracuse University gives the year both AD and from the founding of the republic--but whether counting that from independence or from the constitution I don't remember.

curtis 13y ago

One of the facts that is not widely appreciated -- unless you have visited the site of the assassination -- is just how short a distance we're talking about. I remember thinking that it couldn't have been more than about a hundred yards. According to Wikipedia, the distance from the sixth story window to where Kennedy was when he was shot in the head is 265 feet. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_assassination_rifle#Ballistics_Research_Laboratory_tests http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_assassination_r...)