A Dixie Carpetbagger

It is unquestionably awesome that these two television shows exist [...] but of the gunblogs I keep track of, I seem to be the first mentioning this show… which means some PR weenie seriously screwed up.  — Linoge

It’s embarrassing because I had a draft post done about this and put it to the side.  I suck at that whole “fastest with the mostest” bit…  (cough)

So… erm… there are actually four shows– but it’s treated as one block– and if you watch the intro and exit bumpers for the segments, there are actually six different programs, but two are just short segments.  The four major shows are Practical Tactical, Because Lives Depend On It, What If, and Conceal & Carry School.  Each focuses on a different aspect of self-defense, with a bit of overlap.  For an example, Because Lives Depend On It covers tactics and skills, while What If covers a historical situation and walks the viewer through it, pointing out possible actions an armed citizen could take.

Conceal & Carry School is the interesting one, though.  Take a group of people with wildly varying skill levels, toss them in a classroom and training setting, and then watch them go through the course while covering their background.  It’s interesting watching the different personalities and skill levels mesh– one of the most brash individuals (a tattooed radio DJ) is also one of the slowest to catch up with a drill… which makes for interesting footage.  What’s great is that they have a decent variety of backgrounds, though– everything from the DJ to the Hispanic salon owner who’s been the victim of a hate crime.

But Linoge is right– these shows are promoted so poorly that it’s not funny.  Heck, I wouldn’t even know about The Don’t Be A Victim block if it wasn’t for the fact that I ran across it one Saturday morning.  The same goes for Outdoor Channel’s Wednesday Night At the Range or Sportsman’s Channel’s Lock and Load Thursdays.  Even worse is the fact that the listing for Lock And Load Thursdays no longer contains Modern Rifle Adventures… which was broken out from Guns & Ammo TV to give it more space.  Seriously, Dick Metcalf and J. Guthrie crossing the continent hunting with ARs… and it gets bumped?  Maybe if you had advertised the Allie Brock* episode, guys, this wouldn’t have to be so…

Which brings up the question of what makes a good show?  Most shooting shows have one or two of the things that bring in guys– guns and humor– but they need the third– women.   Some of the shows in these three blocks have great content, but they fall flat on the other two.  Some aren’t so great with regards to content, but they’ve learned that you have to lure the buck closer before you bag him.  Now, I’m not saying that a show would go so far as to have a smart, good looking young woman literally ride in on a horse to replace a co-host mid-season***, but you have to balance education with entertainment– think Bill Nye and Alton Brown.

Hey, better late than never, eh?

*Allie Brock was a guest on one of the episodes.  Elk hunting with ARs, teaching a young shooter… and did I mention she’s a 6′ tall blond?

** Yes, she literally rode in on a horse in her first episode.  In shorts.  Airgun sales probably went up 5% after that episode aired…  Heck, I haven’t fired an airgun in years and I still watch the show…

So, lets talk 380 ammo. [...] What do you carry? –Uncle

The words “what ammo for my Back-Up Gun (BUG)” usually start a flurry of comments, the volume of which is only surpassed by a good “Glock sucks/Glock rocks” or “AR-15 vs. AK vs. M-1″ discussion.  (By the way, Glock sucks and you can pry my AR from my cold, dead hands… but can you pass me an en bloc clip?)

With a .380, you’re going to have to make a choice: utter reliability or a chance at expansion.  In the far distant past (say, the late 1980s), the wisdom was that no .380 ammo would go fast enough to expand… so just use FMJ, it’ll feed better anyway.  In the modern era, there’s a bit of choice in .380 ammo… and the hollowpoints expand now!

The problem is that all guns vary.  Just because your buddy uses Magtech 180 grain .40 S&W in his XD, it doesn’t mean you can, too– you must check for compatibility.  Also, that brand new Lightning-bolt Super-Penetration Hyper-velocity  ammo that just came out might not work for you– check it out first.

Case in point, in the comments from above linked post.  Here’s my contribution:

90 grain Speer Gold Dots.

I love ‘em.  I have a supplier who keeps some in stock always (he’s the Speer distributor in my area), they are pretty zippy, and my LCP loves them.  But just a few comments later, Diomed comments:

Since my LCP chokes on Gold Dots, I stick with ball.

Okay, two guys with Ruger LCPs… one LCP works perfectly with a certain round, the other chokes on it.  Now imagine that Diomed was a buddy of mine who didn’t check his gun/ammo pairing, and found out that the two didn’t play nice with each other at a bad time… like in the middle of a self defense situation.  Is ammo expensive now?  Yep.  Is .380 had to find?  Oh yeah.  Was it worth it to put a box of Gold Dots through my LCP to make sure it liked them?  Oh, yes.  (My LCP will feed Gold Dots reliably, but you cannot use the slide lock to put the first round in– you have to slingshot it.  But since I load the same way every time…)

As to why one guns likes X and the other doesn’t… (shrug)  I have no idea.  Maybe Diomed’s LCP has microscopic burrs on the feed ramp.  Maybe the guy who worked on the feed ramp on my LCP made of more pass and polished it a bit.  Maybe the person who took the barrel out of the machine was the first son of the first son of a first son who was born during a solar eclipse.

Oh, and that Magtech ammo I used as an example?  My XD loves to eat it.  So much that the slide unlocks a split second before the pressure fully drops, which causes some wonderful flashes in low light…

Via The Firearms Blog, Lucky Gunner is running a contest for bloggers– to win 1,000 rounds of .380 ACP.

No, that’s not an error– one thousand rounds.  To put this in perspective, I currently have 595 rounds of .380 ACP in my ammo bunker.  (And it’s a mix– Sellier & Bellot, Winchester, Aguila, Speer, RWS, Fiocchi and even some of the old Santa Barbara Toledo Spanish mil-surp stuff.)  1,000 rounds means I could stop hunting ammo… I’ll never go boom-less again…

Newbius finds an odd exhibit in a museum.  No, that’s not an M-4 with a shotgun’s sight rib– take a look at the muzzle.  It’s Colt’s prototype Advanced Combat Rifle.  What’s so special about it?  It fires two rounds at a time… kinda.

So, instead of modifying the fire control to fire a two-round burst, (wait a second… the M-16A2 had a three-round burst setting) Colt made a rifle that fired two projectiles (of different weights) with reduced accuracy (two weights, two points of impact) from a specialized cartridge (reduced powder charge, logistics nightmares, non-standard).  Anybody care to guess why the ACR contest went nowhere?

I need some advice.  I, err… (shifts uncomfortably in chair) I’m getting back into dating after taking a break for a few *mumbles*.  I need advice as to when the young lady gets inducted into the family– you know, the people who know I carry.  On the one hand, I’d rather not leave a string of angry females who know I pack in my wake, but I’d also like to be able to relax and not do the “packing heat hug” all the time.  Just sayin’.  I also intend to avoid this situation at all costs.  (I think it’d be hard for me to conceal I’m a hunter and gun owner, what with the antlers on the wall and the AR on the rack directly above the bed…)

So… thoughts?

Robb has a post pointing to a song called “Don’t try to take my gun” by Joe Bear.  (Good country song, great message.)

Via a comment on another website, I found Lance Truscott Morrison– a Deputy Sheriff who does music.  Pretty good stuff.

The decision may have come down by now.  I can only hope– and pray– that it’ll be favorable.

Massad Ayoob has links to a group of podcasts and interviews (including John Stossel’s show from this week) concerning the case.

Joe Huffman quotes justice Scalia from the Heller decision.  To paraphrase:

We are aware of the problem of handgun violence in this country, and we take seriously the concerns raised by the many amici who believe that prohibition of handgun ownership is a solution. The Constitution leaves [them] a variety of tools for combating that problem, including some measures regulating handguns… [...] But the enshrinement of constitutional rights necessarily takes certain policy choices off the table. These include the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home. [...] it is not the role of this Court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct.

Maybe we can take one more step towards true freedom today.

The following is a timeline of the controversy over the nomination of Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ban Anything That’s Fun or Exciting

“Peasant, we’s heard you’s liked playing airsoft, so we’s gonna ban the crap outta that so’s ya’s can’t plays it no mo’.  Jus’ ‘member, we’s from the gub-mint, and we’s here to help ya’s.”

Just to re-cap, from the post where I first heard about this:

Basically, if the ATF claims these airsoft guns can be easily converted into real guns, they should just demonstrate the conversion, and put a couple of magazines through it.

So, did the ATF test the gun like this?  From the third page of the ATF’s letter:

To determine if the submitted sample (as modified) is capable of expelling a projectile … [t]he test fire was conducted a total of three times…

Wait, wait, wait… how was the gun modified?  Well, the lower was Dremeled into shape, an M16 hammer, hammer pin, hammer spring, buffer and buffer spring were put in, and then an AR-15 upper was put on and held in place with a drift punch in place of the front retention pin.  In other words, As long as you have access to a whole bunch of parts off M-16s, you can assemble an Ar-15.  With a crappy airsoft lower.  Or, to quote a commenter over at Uncle’s:

My water glass can be converted into a machine gun.

You take the glass and replace it with a machine gun, take the water and replace it with ammo.

Voila, machine gun.

There’s “massaging the evidence,” and then there’s “we took it to the massage parlor down on Riverside and got it a happy ending.”  This is the latter.  To recap: if you have access to parts from an M-16,  an AR-15 upper, drift punches and a Dremel tool, you can create a machine gun.  Kinda.  Sorta.  Maybe.

Oh, and they have re-defined transfers, too.  Now, your favorite gun writer will have to fill out a 4473 to get an evaluation gun.  It’s almost like they’re trying to clamp down on us gun owners, isn’t it?

One of Weer’d's readers left him a comment on one of his DGU (defensive Gun Use) posts.

Funny story. I tell my GF I want a gun because I follow this blog, but she tells me she doesn’t want me carrying it around her. She argues that pepper spray or a taser would be equally effective. Thoughts?

Weer’d responds here with some videos and facts.  His points, in short: tasers and OC (Oleoresin Capsicum) spray are nice, but they only for cops.  As to why, I’ll quote Weer’d himself:

You see as a civilian I have one dichotomy when it comes to personal defense. Deadly force, and no Force.

Which ties in with something Bob S. wrote:

What level of violence is acceptable when fighting back against a criminal intent on harming me or mine?

I answered in the comments with something I’ll expand here, the “Axe Theory.”

The philosophy of the Soviet General Staff is no different from that of the horsemen (The Magnificent Seven –ed.) whom I had watched riding the desert. `If you want to stay alive, kill your enemy. The quicker you finish him off, the less chance he will have to use his own gun.’ In essence, this is the whole theoretical basis on which their plans for a third world war have been drawn up. The theory is known unofficially in the General Staff as the `axe theory’. It is stupid, say the Soviet generals, to start a fist-fight if your opponent may use a knife. It is just as stupid to attack him with a knife if he may use an axe. The more terrible the weapon which your opponent may use, the more decisively you must attack him, and the more quickly you must finish him off. Any delay or hesitation in doing this will just give him a fresh opportunity to use his axe on you. To put it briefly, you can only prevent your enemy from using his axe if you use your own first.

[...]

Many years passed and I became an officer serving with the General Staff. Suddenly, as I studied American theories of war, I came to an appalling realization. It became clear to me that a modern American cowboy who is working up to a decisive fight will always expect to begin by spitting at and insulting his opponent and to continue by throwing whisky in his face and chucking custard pies at him before resorting to more serious weapons. He expects to hurl chairs and bottles at his enemy and to try to stick a fork or a tableknife into his behind and then to fight with his fists and only after all this to fight it out with his gun.

This is a very dangerous philosophy. You are going to end up by using pistols. Why not start with them? Why should the bandit you are fighting wait for you to remember your gun? He may shoot you before you do, just as you are going to slap his face. By using his most deadly weapon at the beginning of the fight, your enemy saves his strength. Why should he waste it throwing chairs at you? Moreover, this will enable him to save his own despicable life. After all, he does not know, either, when you, the noble hero, will decide to use your gun. Why should he wait for this moment? You might make a sudden decision to shoot him immediately after throwing custard pies at him, without waiting for the exchange of chairs. Of course he won’t wait for you when it comes to staying alive. He will shoot first. At the very start of the fight.

This is why police officers draw their weapons.  This is also why so many people who try to use “less than lethal” force end up in hospitals… or the morgue.  If you have a good tool, use that good tool.  If a guy is attempting to beat down your door in the middle of the night, don’t try to build up to things… go for broke.  After all, he might get phased when you crack him over the head with a frying pan… or he might get pissed off and hurt you.

Remember, most DGUs result in no shooting.  Which of the following is the better scenario:

1. You are exiting a Quickie Mart one night when a rough-looking gentleman in a T-shirt and shorts accosts you for your wallet.  Observing that he is holding a knife, you pull your OC spray and dose him.  He begins to fail about, and then charges you and stabs you.  You end up in the ICU with multiple knife wounds.

2. You are exiting a Quickie Mart one night when a rough-looking gentleman in a T-shirt and shorts accosts you for your wallet.  Observing that he is holding a knife, you draw your sidearm and aim it at his center of mass.  He holds his hands up and surrenders, and you hold him until police arrive.

I know which one I’d rather participate in…

For humor: here’s how scenario one would play out, and how I feel about OC spray.