Random News and Notes 10 October

On this date:

• 732 – At Tours, France, Charles Martel kills Abd el-Rahman and halts the Muslim invasion of Europe.
• 1733 – France declares war on Austria over the question of Polish succession.
• 1767 – Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon complete their survey of the boundary between the colonies of Pennsylvania and Maryland as well as areas that would eventually become the states of Delaware and West Virginia.
• 1798 – In Versailles France, Joseph Guillotin says the most humane way of carrying out a death sentence is decapitation by a single blow of a blade. The device that now bears his name was designed by French surgeon Antoine Louis and built by German harpsichord maker Tobias Schmidt. It was first employed on on April 25, 1792, against highwayman Nicolas-Jacques Pelletier, and later became the defining symbol of the Reign of Terror, executing thousands including King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette.
• 1794 – Russian General Alexander Vasilyevich Suvorov crushes the rebel Polish army at Maciejowice, Poland.
• 1845 – The U.S. Naval Academy is founded at Annapolis, Md.
• 1863 – The first telegraph line to Denver is completed.
• 1877 – Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer is buried at West Point in New York.
• 1911 – Revolution in China begins with a bomb explosion and the discovery of revolutionary headquarters in Hankow. The revolutionary movement spread rapidly through west and southern China, forcing the abdication of the last Ch’ing emperor, six-year-old Henry Pu-Yi. By October 26, the Chinese Republic will be proclaimed, and on December 4, Premier Yuan Shih-K’ai will sign a truce with rebel general Li Yuan-hung.
• 1933 – At Rio de Janeiro, nations of the Western Hemisphere sign a non-aggression and conciliation treaty. President Roosevelt adopts a “good neighbor” policy toward Latin America and announces a policy of nonintervention in Latin American affairs at the December 7th International American Conference at Montevideo, Uruguay.
• 1940 – During the Battle of Britain, the German Luftwaffe launches a heavy nighttime air raid on London. The dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral is pierced by a Nazi bomb, leaving the high altar in ruin.
• 1941 – Soviet troops halt the German advance on Moscow.
• 1953 – The Mutual Defense Treaty between the US and South Korea signed.
• 1954 -The Viet Minh formally take over Hanoi and control of North Vietnam.
• 1957 – President Dwight D. Eisenhower offers his apologies to Ghanian Finance Minister, Komla Agbeli Gbedemah, who had been refused service at a restaurant in Dover, Delaware. It was one of the first of many such incidents in which African diplomats were confronted with racial segregation in the United States.
• 1966 – U.S. Forces launch Operation Robin, in Hoa Province south of Saigon in South Vietnam, to provide road security between villages.
• 1970 – The Quebec Provincial Minister of Labour, Pierre Laporte, is kidnapped by terrorists.
• 1971 – The London Bridge, built in 1831 and dismantled in 1967, reopens in Lake Havusu City, Arizona, after being sold to Robert P. McCulloch and moved to the United States.
• 1973 – Vice President, Spiro Agnew, resigns after he pleaded no contest to a charge of federal income tax evasion in exchange for the dropping of charges of political corruption.
• 1985 – An Egyptian plane carrying hijackers of the Achille Lauro cruise ship is intercepted by US Navy F-14s and forced to land at a NATO base in Sicily.
• 1991 – Former U.S. postal worker Joseph Harris shoots two former co-workers to death at the post office in Ridgewood, New Jersey. The night before, Harris had killed his former supervisor, Carol Ott, with a three-foot samurai sword, and shot her fiance, Cornelius Kasten, in their home.

We start the news at the MVAP weather desk. Hurricane Isaias made landfall near Destin with 105 mph winds. It was the first hurricane since 2024 to make landfall in the continental US. The storm has left over 800,000 without power across Florida, Alabama, and Georgia. It quickly weakened to a post-tropical cyclone, but remnants pose risks of flash flooding, gusty winds, and tornadoes in the Southeast.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis declared emergencies in 25 counties, with crews clearing roads like Interstate 10 and 16,000 utility linemen restoring power amid reports of downed trees and flooded streets.

Meanwhile there is a tropical storm lashing southern California. The storm surge from Tropical Storm Rachel flooded low lying coastal areas across the region.

The remnants of this storm, expected to be over Las Vegas by mid-day Sunday, is forecast to drop 3-4 inches of rain across the southwest.

There is big 2A news to report. The ATF just released new guidance about short barrelled rifles, short barrelled shotguns, suppressors and “any other weapons” (a class of firearm that doesn’t fit neatly into any typical category). Under this new guidance, buyers are no longer required to fill out an ATF form 4 for the transfer/purchase of those items. The transfer can now be made on a 4473.

The changes come in the wake of the Big Beautiful Bill setting the tax on these items to zero and a court ruling striking down several provisions of the National Firearms Act of 1934 and the Gun Control Act of 1968 as unconstitutional.

This is a big deal if you live in a free state that does not restrict the purchase of these items. You can now go to your local and buy a suppressor over the counter with no more paperwork than a 4473 like you were buying any firearm. You can also make a sawed off at home with no paperwork at all. Your editor is unfortunately stuck behind enemy lines, else he’d have snapped up a couple.

President Trump made a stop in this editor’s AO last night. He spoke to a crowd of a couple of thousand at the OnCenter in Syracuse. During his remarks, he endorsed Bruce Blakeman, the current Nassau county exec in the race for governor. Among the speakers were Reps Claudia Tenney, Nick Langworthy, and Nick LaLota alongside Border Czar Tom Holman, Energy secretary Chris Wright, EPA administrator Lee Zeldin, Mike Tyson and Yankees President Randy Levine.

The rally also featured candidates Anthony Constantino, who is the Republican candidate for New York’s 21st Congressional District, hoping to succeed Elise Stefanik, and Kailee Buller, who is running for New York’s 22nd Congressional District against Democrat Rep. John Mannion.