TAS: "Ambush In Samarra"

The Longest Morning


From The American Spectator (h/t Donovan at Castle of Arghhh!)

Yes. This is what Combat is like. No "End Plan", no politics. Just hours and hours of boredom punctuated by minutes of terror and Doing The Jobs Only Americans Will Do.

This is "The Elephant" in its most terrifying aspect. If your admiration for America's warriors has grown tepid ... prepare yourself to be convinced all over again.

National Ammo Day

Kim du Tuit has just declared that the 2007 National Ammo Day will be November 19; National Ammo Week will be November 17 - 25.

The goal:

At least 100 rounds of centerfire ammo, or at least 500 rounds of rimfire.

Let me see ....
According to the calendar, the 17th is the 3rd Saturday of November. That means the 19th falls on Monday. Nope, no matches that day, so I won't be likely to shoot 100 rounds. Well, I get off work at 6pm and Sunset is calculated to be at 5:05pm.

Okay, this is too analytical. The point is, I work all day and can't get to the range in time to shoot 100 rounds before it's too dark to shoot.

But the day before National Ammo Day is Sunday, and that's the Tri-County Gun Club IPSC match (third Sunday of the month.) Yeah, I think I'll be shooting 100 rounds on THAT day. Probably more like 150 - 200 rounds, depending on the stages.

The day before? I'll be loading ammunition. And I'll cleave to the spirit of National Ammo Day by loading 500 rounds on Monday the 19th. After all, I'll need it for SWMBO and I to compete at the Dundee match the next Saturday ... the last day of National Ammo Week.



x

Geek Length!

Texas has too many reports

State agencies issue too many reports, a new 668-page report says.

Well, I thought it was funny.

Gun Free Zone

As much as I hate to steal from the blogger who originally did the research, for the sake of brevity I'll embed this Gun Free Zone parody here.



H/T Xavier

So .... in the interest of including 'value added' content (also from the Fox 1/2 hour News Hour), here's another skit on Gun Control:

Empty Holster Week - Part 4 and 5

Okay, I give up.

In the past week, I haven't seen a single person ... student, staff or faculty ... wearing an empty holster on my local campus in protest of the "no concealed carry" laws endemic to colleges in this country.

It may be due to the Oregon law (166.291, 166.360, 166.370) which permits concealed carry in this state. Or it may be due to student (and staff and faculty) ennui.

Fox News has an article, and there was a letter to the editor of the local student newspaper in favor of concealed carry on campus. It referred to an article titled "Guns On Campus", which is a likely original source but I can't find it on the school website.

At this point, I must concede that the "Concealed Carry on Campus" question is not a big issue here. I had hoped to present some evidence that it was, but I can only conclude that the fact that it is not news ... is news.

Band of Brothers

Yesterday was United Nations Day. It was, I think, an unhappy day, bringing to mind as it did the degeneration of a once honorable and hopeful force for civilization into the effete yet feral disappointment which now occupies Turtle Bay.

But today --- today is Saint Crispin's Day.

This is the day to celebrate the brotherhood of men who would lay down their lives for their family, their country and their honor.

Although our fighting men and women, our warriors, are daily denigrated by the rabid monsters of politics, we can take this day for our own to honor them for their devotion, their determination, and their sacrifice.

.... he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse;
We would not die in that man's company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call'd the feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispian.'
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say 'These wounds I had on Crispian's day.'
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words-
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester-
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb'red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.

Empty Holster Week - Part 3

Another day, another "sorry, no empty-holster sightings here" report.

Sure, I don't spend all day standing on "The Quad" watching students march through the rain. I walk to the office from the parking log, take a break outside, look through the windows from time to time, trudge back to the car ... I don't see empty holsters.

Deciding that a little research is in order, I look through the student newspaper. Nope, no articles about Empty Holster Week, let alone Islamic Fascist Awareness Week. Could it be that I reside in a Politically Unaware Student Environment (PUSE!)

In Other News ...

I voted today in the November 6, 2007 Oregon State Elections. Easy ballot (they're mailed to us here in Oregon, you know) with only three issues:

State: Ballot item rejecting Measure 37, which originally refused The State to impose zoning restrictions on property owners which were not in effect when the property was originally bought. VOTE: No (Sorry, Fish, don't mean to make your life harder).

Too many stories about property owners (farmers, mostly) wanting to build a second house for The Next Generation, and being forbidden; or trying to dry up a quarter-acre marsh because the mosquitoes were eating up the grandchildren, but forbidden because it was a 'protected Wetland.

State: Ballot measure to change the state constitution to impose an even more exorbitant tax on tobacco. Vote: NO! This state has been receiving millions of dollars from The Tobacco Industry, presumably to use in treating citizens who have health-problems due to tobacco-product usage. But this is the same argument used to justify this measure. The Tobacco Industry funds received have NOT been used for this purpose, yet this is the same argument used to justify this measure. This is the first time a Constitutional Amendment has been proposed to impose a tax on a product. With any luck, it will be the last time. This is Oregon, the state which has infamously rejected Petition signatures and then unilaterally redefined procedural objections to review the objections of the petition signers who can prove that their signatures were in fact legitimate. (Complex subject, see here for a more understandable explanation.)

The bottom line is that this Red State is ruled by a liberal Democrat Governor, who historically as ALWAYS used the Bureaucracy to undermine the expressed will of the people. He's turning this green haven into Kalifornia North. I won't vote for anything that appears on his ballot.

Local: County measure to add 5% to the property tax to pay for improvements in police and 'other' county Support Services. Vote: NO! It breaks my heart to vote against anything that might help SWMBO (a county employee) earn a decent living, but the County is as Red as the State.

"This is just another Peyton Place and we're all Harper Valley hypocrites!"

Other:
The Wonders of Amazon.com -- good deal on Miami Vice Seasons 1 & 2
Good deal on the Jack Reacher (author Lee Child) book that I've read but don't actually own -- Running Blind. (The link is for the audiobook - no current amazon listings for the hardcover, which I just bought and AM reading as soon as I sign off here!)

Got 'em both, I'm spending more time blogging than I am reading or Pastell-a-visioning.

Must -- Resist -- The -- Fisk -- of -- Death!~

United Nations Day

Today is United Nations Day.

I remember the United Nations when I was a kid. Dag Hammarskjold was UN Secretary-General , Jonas Salk was giving the world a vaccine to immunize children against Poliovirus, and we went Trick-or-Treating for UNICEF.

I remember making the rounds in the neighborhood with my UNICEF collection cannister, before I went home and got my candy bag to revisit the same doorways.

Today ....

I can't say it any better than Sondra K.

Perfidious Albion!

A few months ago I held a sort of quasi-discussion with a Brit who called himself the ASBO-Monger. The subject was essentially whether gun control really works in Britain.

This video demonstrates the Buyer's Remorse of a people who have been convinced to give up their personal firearms ... with little or no compensation .. due to a governmental program which is wholly arbitrary.


I've said it so many times, so many ways, and yet I don't think I would ever be able to say it so well as these British Citizens Subjects serfs have expressed themselves in an NRA video on YouTube. (Courtesy of Ninth Stage)

I started out keeping track of the sound-bite / Bumper Sticker quotes, and soon lost track of them. The message from a people who have been forced to give up their guns for a pernicious Governmental program is this:

We will never give in. Never ... never ... never give in.

Churchillian, perhaps. More appropriately, reminiscent of "Rule Britania":

"Britains, never will be slaves!"

But today they are, and their message is clear.

When we accede willingly to governmental bans on firearms, we lose more than our right to own firearms. We lose our freedom to decide for ourself what is right, and what is not right. Only when we experience the consequences of our decision do we understand how wrong it may be.

Gun Control!

It's not about controlling guns.
It's about controlling the people.

It's not about who wins; it's about who loses.

Either we do, or they do; and we always, always lose when we allow them to convince us that we are being 'selfish' because we are not willing to 'compromise'.

For them, the word compromise means that we lose, and they win.

It's not about safety. It's not about crime.

It's about who makes decisions in the way we live our lives.
Either we do, or they do.

Our choice?

Liberal Talk Radio

Air America gone from Austin airwaves | Postcards from the Trail

Liberal talk radio will likely never be successful because liberals think for themselves.

Yeah, right.

Read the whole thing.

H/T: The Armorer

Empty Holster Week - Part 2

Breaking News - I Go To Work!

I'm still feeling puny, but my voice has changed from a croak to a growl to a really sexy basso profundo.

Maybe I'm being overly generous to myself here, but after a week of being unable to speak at all (Laryngitis caused by, according to my physician, "a combination of two or more flu bugs" which I prefer to call a "Flu Cocktail") it's really nice to be able to speak intelligibly ... if softly, very softly. Talking too much or being too active still causes coughing jags as it breaks up the bronchial congestion.

Um... okay, that's what they call a 'digression'.

Empty Holster Week
I did get to walk around on campus for a while today. I saw not one single student prominently displaying an 'empty holster'.

I'm disappointed. I thought this was going to be A Big Thing, and I was beginning to consider my home university campus to be more 'socially conservative' than most. Perhaps I was wrong. Perhaps it's a matter of the local university student body being more caught up in 'practical' matters, which might be expected in an institution which was originally named an 'Agricultural College'.

Or it may be a matter of ennui.

To summarize, here's the plan:

This week, you might see students around campus wearing empty holsters on their belts. Don’t be alarmed – it’s part of a harmless Rights Awareness protest. You'll probably see Ladies and Gentlemen both.

The point of any empty holster presence is to call attention to the gun owners whom you may not know. This is important for those who believe they are ‘uncomfortable’ with another adult student carrying their personal weapon on campus anywhere near them.

But one’s fellow student is the same person now they were before one found out they are a gun owner.

The thing non-gun owners can do is to inquire. The gun owner is usually well informed on U.S History, sovereign rights, personal authority, personal liberty, and tactics - and is a superb source of information on how it relates to heads of household who would like to learn more about household safety planning and considerations.

IFAW
I'm still hoping that the local University Students will jump on the bandwagon, so I'm thinking ... maybe they've been distracted by the (inconveniently timed) "Islamic Fascism Awareness Week".

During the week of October 22-26, 2007, the nation will be rocked by the biggest conservative campus protest ever – Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week, a wake-up call for Americans on 200 university and college campuses.

The purpose of this protest is as simple as it is crucial: to confront the two Big Lies of the political left: that George Bush created the war on terror and that Global Warming is a greater danger to Americans than the terrorist threat. Nothing could be more politically incorrect than to point this out. But nothing could be more important for American students to hear. In the face of the greatest danger Americans have ever confronted, the academic left has mobilized to create sympathy for the enemy and to fight anyone who rallies Americans to defend themselves. According to the academic left, anyone who links Islamic radicalism to the war on terror is an "Islamophobe." According to the academic left, the Islamo-fascists hate us not because we are tolerant and free, but because we are "oppressors."

Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week is a national effort to oppose these lies and to rally American students to defend their country.

So I'm wandering around the campus looking for flyers, demonstrations, protests and counter-protests.

Hmmm ... nope. Nothing to see here folks. Move along.

Campus Activism: Not Entirely Absent
I'm disappointed. Last year I was walking to lunch and ran into a battallion of Lyndon LaRouche supporters. As I passed by, they shouted "Hey, are you ready to impeach Bush and Cheney! Let's put them in prison. Better yet, they should be executed for treason!"

I admit, I was fascinated by their fascist fanaticism and spent a few minutes talking to one of the rabble-rousers. I asked him "Hey, is he out of jail yet?" The guy was a case-study in campus activism. As we talked, his eyes began to gleam and he started panting. Finally he shouted "It's you and your generation who are responsible for all that's wrong with the world today!" Too much for me, I went on to lunch and was happy to escape without punching the young gentleman in the nose. Or being punched in the nose myself, as in "Operation Mop-Up". Funny, I thought LaRouche was dead. No such luck, I guess.

Where are campus activists when we need them? They're never around, and I still haven't figured why Lyndon LaRouche campaigns were being conducted in a non-election year. Well, that's Campus Life for you --- fickle, peripatetic, and either spontaneous or a non-event.

DAY-BY-DAY:
Moving on, looking for a reason for living, I discovered that early editions of Day-By-Day cartoons are available as FREE downloads by Wowio.com, which you can find by going to the DBD website. I downloaded the first three 'books' (4th quarter of 2002, 1st & 2nd quarter of 2003) after establishing a Wowio subscription. It's a lot faster than going through Muir's website and accessing each individual day's entries. Wowio.com only allows 3 downloads at a time, and six 'books' are currently available.

UPDATE on "Empty Holster":
The Real Gun Guys has (have?) a bit more information.

Reid reviving 'amnesty' for illegals

WorldNetDaily: Reid reviving 'amnesty' for illegals

In a departure from our usual firearms-related ranting, I note today that the Liberal U.S. Senate is pushing a new immigration bill, which may be voted on as soon as tomorrow (Wednesday, October 24, 2007).

WRITE YOUR SENATOR

The Senate's Contact website has a quick, easy form by which you can email your senator.

Go there, then select your state. The websites for both of your senators will be linked.

Click on either of your senators (or both, one at a time) , fill in the simple identification information, find "Immigration" on the subject list, and type in your message.

I suggest you keep your message system, such as writing one of the following brief notes:

DREAM Act - NO

or

DREAM Act - YES

It appears that this is as close to a vote as we are likely to get on this issue.

Empty Holster Week - Day 1

You may have wondered if anyone on campus was spotted wearing a holster during "Empty Holster Week". (See Concealed Carry on Campus - SCCC) I know I'm curious, but I spent the day at home, still fighting the Three Week Flu -- and that's another story.

I did have a comment on that article, referring to a co-worker who "never saw any reason why anyone would want to have a gun." I started to reply in the comments section, but it started to get a little "Geek-Length" so I decided instead to reply here.

If you're reading this, you are probably a recreational shooter. Chances are, you shoot IPSC and are more or less competitive. Statistically, it's a toss-up whether you have a gun because you want to do a particular kind of shooting ("I need to hunt elk so my Elk rifle doesn't get rusty!"), or have a gun and just want some reason or excuse to go shoot it.

I actually shot my first IPSC match because at age 38 I had recently bought an army surplus 1911 from my father and was wondering what to do now that I had it. (I had never been a pistol shooter; some say I'm still not.) Someone at my office had posted a sign about "competitive pistol shooting" being available at a local range - Tri-County Gun Club - and I showed up the next weekend for training and certification.

Yesterday, home with the flu, was one of the few months times I missed a TCGC match. It takes a reason for me NOT to shoot.

You and I need no better reason than to shoot for sport -- an excuse to go to the range in nasty weather and embarrass ourselves in the company of good friends. We do have other reasons, including personal defense and hunting, but it's all of a package.

We just do not commonly associate with people who have NO personal firearms experience, who quite possibly have never handled a gun and aren't sure they remember if they've ever seen a "real live gun". The person of whom I wrote was one such individual, and was not only indifferent to an invitation to come out and try shooting one, but acted skittish about it.

It is a fact that there are people who are literally fearful of guns. The reasons for their fear are not easily understandable to me, I can never tell whether it's Nature or Nurture. That is, they're essentially timid or fearful people, or they have been taught to scorn and/or fear firearms. I suspect it's more often that their family was much different from mine, when they were children they were discouraged from a 'morbid interest' in guns.

I see this 'nurtured' abhorrence of firearms less often in my own generation than in the generation which was raised in accordance to the concepts advocated by Dr. Spock. Spock's best-selling book "Baby and Child Care" was first published in 1946, but his radical political ideals became more evident in the 1970's when my generation started families. Spock was a left-wing radical "political activist" and a Pediatrician. I have written here before, and recently, of the growing trend of Pediatricians to extend their influence on child-care beyond the scope of caring for the physical needs of children, and to treat firearms ownership as a 'safety issue' in child rearing.

Not to put the blame for timidity about guns, if blame there must be, on the shoulders of one man; many families consider firearms to be 'instruments of violence' and reject the ownership and/or usage of firearms as they reject violence. Some do this for religious reasons, some because it is a connection they have made independently.

I refer you to Kevin Baker's blog The Smallest Minority, and specifically to one article which in part discussed the two types of violence.

I refer to this as an inability to differentiate between the two "gun cultures" - the "violent and predatory" and the "violent, but protective." His type (exemplified by the British press, and it would seem, the majority of the British populace) sees only violent, and all violence is, by their definition, bad - unless that violence is carried out by an authorized member of the government, where it is instead referred to as force. And there is still some ambivalence even about those acts. I'm heartened to see what appears to be a growing public support for what they term "have-a-go heroes" - those who fight back against attackers - but they've got a long way to go after almost ninety years of a disarmament culture.

[Emphasis in the original]

I warn you, The Smallest Minority is (a) addictive and (b) almost invariably "Geek Length". The difference being, of course, that Kevin can put more concept and information into his writing than I do, he is a better writer, and a much better researcher.
___________________________________

I agree with Kevin's proposition, that people who object to guns on the basis of an abhorrence of violence do so indiscriminately. Literally, they don't see any difference, for example, between, a man who initiates a home-invasion burglary and the home-owner who defends his home and family by the use of violence. These are the people who say "only the police and the army should have guns."

And that is the fast-track to Gun Control, which is a growth industry which parallels the Information Age both in time-span and the increasing prevalence.

You ask: "Geek, a few minutes ago you blamed Dr. Spock for teaching parents to be fearful of guns, now you're blaming computers for gun control?"

Good question, and I'm glad you asked that. The answer is no.

The only way computers lend to the gun control movement is in the same sense that computers have enhanced the information-sharing ability of us all. Again, this is indiscriminate and allows strong opinions to be shared with like-minded individuals. You can not name a Gun Control Organization that doesn't have an active website, and you can't find a Gun Rights Organization that doesn't have an active website. The breaking point is that there are a lot of private blogs (such as this one) which allows individual Gun Rights activists to spout their own personal opinions on the subject. There are fewer personal blogs specifically devoted to advocating Gun Control than there are devoted to Gun Rights, by a factor of 1000%. (Yes, I made that up. Gun Control advocates make up their own statistics, I guess I can too.)

That private, individual alternative is part of the reason why the Gun Control controversy is becoming more intense in recent years ... say, fifteen years. In the same way that blogs such as Little Green Footballs (LGF) have exposed Main Stream Media (MSM) inaccuracies and slanted reporting (LGF was instrumental in exposing both the Dan Rather "Bush Letter" and the photo-shopping of TWOT photos from Iraq and Afghanistan), other blogs help us to become aware of anti-gun legislation such as the recent Kalifornia Microstamping Technology. We, as private citizens concerned with our Second Amendment Rights, can't always stop the passage of such wrong-headed state and local laws, but we can help ensure that legislatures don't push these bills through without the scrutiny of an informed citizenry.

And in a way, as we talk about these issues between ourselves, we are encouraged to talk privately to people who "never saw any reason why anyone would want to have a gun." We can at least act as an example of a rational person who sees no reason why they should not be able to have a gun, in careful distinction to not want to have a gun.

To not want to have a gun is to exercise personal choice.
To not be able to have a gun is an exercise in tyranny.

It's not a matter of safety. It's not a matter of culture. It's not a matter of "if it only saves the life of a single child".

It's a matter of who makes our decisions.

Concealed Carry on Campus - SCCC

Students for Concealed Carry on Campus - ConcealedCampus.com




In my day, Student Activism consisted of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS, which actually still exists in a much watered down form), and The Weathermen.

Phooey! Those campus radicals were Idealists (read: Anarchists). Today there are new students with new ideals ... individual freedoms.

The Students for Concealed Carry on Campus (SCCC) has called for a week of passive demonstrations. During the week beginning October 22, 2007, SCCC has called for students to wear empty holsters on campus.

I'm tempted to join them. Maybe I will. I'm getting long in the tooth, and my priorities are doing my job and earning the generous salary I'm provided from the state University System.

But I would like to support this drive to convince College administrators that students really care about their right to defend themselves on campus.

After the massacre at Virginia Tech, it's clear to most clear-thinking Americans that "Gun-Free Zones" don't protect college students against predatory madmen. What some may consider a protective policy, predators consider a 'target-rich' environment. If students don't buy into either concept, who are we to deny them the right to self defense?

The public outcry against "School Shootings' probably started with The Stockton Massacre.
It was brought most emphatically to the forefront of our attention by the Columbine High School Massacre,
but none of us are likely to feel comfortable with supporting the arming of juveniles, although allowing faculty and staff to arm themselves may be a good second step.

The first step just may be to acknowledge the right of adults on college campuses to defend themselves.

SCCC's position is that adults (21+ years old) with a Concealed Carry license should be permitted to carry concealed firearms on campus, for their own protection and for the protection of their fellow students.

Yes, in this state there are no laws forbidding an adult carrying a concealed handgun on campus. But school policy ... is inconsistent state-wide. Well, perhaps not so inconsistent; where policy exists, it is decidedly anti-gun.

When I consider my own participation, I have to consider two issues:

1. This is a 'student-driven' movement. If the students don't care, is it my place to make their point for them?
2. And if they do care ... if some students DO show up on campus with empty holsters ... would I be undermining their self-determinism by participating in a student-organized event?

At this time, I'm not sure what is the best thing to do. I know I won't wear an empty holster on campus tomorrow, although I believe I'll bring a holster. What I do with it depends on what the students do.

Many of my co-workers, all of whom are aware that I shoot pistols in competition, are already vaguely uneasy with having a 'gun nut' in their office. In casual conversation, at least one co-worker has already stated that he 'never saw any reason why anyone would want to have a gun'.

On the other hand, I've already taken two co-workers to the range, and they seemed to enjoy themselves.

Stay tuned. I'll let you know what happens this week.

The rest of the story

The Story:
cbs11tv.com - Dallas Man Shoots, Kills Second Burglar In 1 Month

A 70 year old veteran and business owner shot and killed a man who was attempting to burgle his place of business. This is the second burglar he has killed in the past three weeks.

The businessman, James Walton, was not arrested after either shooting. However, his two shotguns were confiscated and a Grand Jury will hear the question about whether he should face any penalties.

The Back Story:
Rebecca Aquilar, a local Fox News television affiliate reporter, found Walton returning to his car in a shopping center parking lot after he bought a new shotgun. Positioning herself inside his open car door (so that he was unable to leave), she questioned him despite his repeated statements that he didn't want to talk to her or to have his face shown:

"Are you a trigger happy kind of person? Is that what you wanted to do, shoot to kill?"

The Rest Of The Story:
The video of the newscast was all over the Internet for three days, until the television station caused it to be removed because it was "proprietary material".

The station then suspended the reporter. Supposedly, for 'journalistic improprieties'. We call it "ambush journalism".

No doubt they were embarrassed by their own lack of journalistic ethics. Didn't they send her on the story? Don't they have an editorial board to review and approve features before are broadcast? That seems the be the question of the day.

Breitbart.TV News, however, created an 8-minute video which features 'selections' from that original video, which is a legitimate usage of proprietary material (as opposed to publishing the entire content) along with appropriate commentary. This makes the TV station actions the focus of the story.

Sondra K ("Knowledge Is Power") has the link to the Breitbart.TV News feature, as well as links to other explanatory text. Rather than put the same links here, I suggest you go to the Sondra K. feature. She did the legwork, she deserves the traffic. (Read the comments appended the the Breitbart video, to see the sense of outrage it generated.)

Besides, "Knowledge is Power" is a fascinating blog and one which I visit at least two or three times a week. I may be moving it to the 'Websites that I visit every day' section of my sidebar.

Home Back-Up Protection

The Back-Up

(H/T: Conservative Scalawag)
Very interesting, but it won't fit on my waterbed.

Guess I'll just have to stick with the mossberg 590 laying on the floor, the 1911 in the nightstand, the Blackhawk .41 magnum in the computer desk, the ... hey, none of your business!

Still, it's an interesting idea, although prone to staining the sheets with gun-oil and making your bedroom stink of Hoppe's. Hey, that's an aphrodisiac, right?

"Many customers are buying one for each side of the bed!"
Sounds like a really rocky relationship.

AK-47

Defense Tech: Josh Rushing on the AK-47

(H/T - Castle of Argghhh! - H&I Fires October 16, 2007)

Whether you think the AK47 is "The gun that changed the world", or a piece of junk, you can't deny that the availability of a relatively cheap, relatively reliable honest-to-gosh Assault Rifle has put a lot of firepower in the hands of a lot of people.

Often these are people whose concept of firearms maintenance is primitive at best. We're talking about the same folks who think shooting full-auto bursts into the air, with no concern about where the lands round, is 'kewl'.
*(embedded video is 27.l3mb from Yahoo, downloads as you play it.)*

Click on the Defense Tech link for the full information, which also includes links to accompanying text AND a plethora of personal comments. You'll find that as many people there mirror your own opinion ... almost regardless of what your opinion is.

I can't speak for the accuracy of Josh Rushing's commentary, but it's 11+ minutes of interest for this Vietnam Veteran.

One thing which should be mentioned:
When I was in Vietnam, I heard rumors that the U.S. forces (especially "Long Range Reconnaissance Patrols -- LRRPS or LURPS) had found it effective to leave captured AK-47's where wanna-be VC could find them.

The 'top' of the breach on the AK was latched by a spring-loaded latch at the rear. The LRRPs would weaken the spring-metal on the latch so that it would hold it down until the gun was fired. This was done by simply stressing the metal. When the AK was fired, the latch would soon give way so that the breach cover released. This exposed the bolt and mainspring, allowing the bolt mechanism to travel past its designed limits. The bolt would be ejected to the rear with great force, speed and momentum causing grevous injury to any body parts in its path.

So rumor went. If the rifle was fired from the shoulder, it would be expected to, minimally, crush a cheek-bone. In actual practice, it was probably fired from the hip and the injuries were not likely to be fatal or even debilitating ... unless it broke an arm or took off a chunk of the rib-meat.

I can't attest to the veracity of the story, but it was some small consolation to those of us in the boonies.

A more believable war-story (all these from the 1st Infantry Division in 1969-1970 in the Dian area) is that of a young 2nd lieutenant on the first night of his first 8-day patrol. He had a squad of his platoon spread out in-line in a night ambush covering a known VC path. In the middle of the night a VC discovered the ambush, found a place at the end of the line and hosed the entire squad with a banana-clip (30 rounds) from his AK. They young lieutenant was not the only U.S. soldier to lose his life that night.

You can say what you will about the AK-47, but I know that it worked often enough to be an effective weapon in Vietnam.

Speaking of which, if you watch the video you will see comments about the unreliability and tendency to jam of the M16.

The early M16 did not have the 'forward assist' feature. Most of the problems were caused by fouling of the bolt, which allowed it to move forward without actually going into battery. It was difficult to recognize this situation, and more difficult to correct it.

Later versions (in place when I went 'in-country' in September of 1969) featured the forward-assist, and we found this to be an entirely reliable way of insuring that the rifle was functional

Other improvements included:

• the introduction of LSA rifle lubrication
• an understanding that not only the rifle, but also the magazines and the ammunition needed to be cleaned regularly
• appreciation that magazines (both 20-round and 30-round) needed to be 'underloaded' by two rounds to insure reliable feeding
• the issue of plastic 'zip-top' baggies to keep loaded magazines clean and dry in magazine pouches
• a regimen of using up 'old ammunition' between missions on the practice range
• the practice of always cleaning your rifle (often including using barrels of gasoline as a solvent!) EVERY time you completed a mission, and quick-cleaning your rifle at least every other day whether you used it or not

During the 12 months I was in Vietnam, I never heard of a single major malfunction with an M-16 when these procedures were observed and ritually practiced.

The M-16 was still a mouse load, and those fast, light bullets still couldn't be relied upon to push through the jungle to their target. I carried an M79 grenade launcher (loaded with 'canister' rounds ... buckshot) and backed up with HE rounds and flare 'illumination' rounds, as well as a 1911 .45acp pistol.

Still, my platoon never got a kill that wasn't directly attributable to artillary, the claymore mine, "booby traps" or the M-14 carried by our point men.

YMMV.

Mark Steyn on Gun Control?

Mark Steyn on National Review Online

"... on CNN the other night Anderson Cooper was worrying about the homicide rate in Philadelphia.

The city of brotherly love is the murder capital of the nation, and CNN had dispatched a reporter to interview the grieving mother of a young black boy killed while riding his bicycle in the street. Apparently, a couple of cars had got backed up behind him, and an impatient passenger in one of them pulled out a gun and shot the kid.

Anderson Cooper then went to commercials and, when he returned, introduced a report on how easy it is to buy guns in Philadelphia and how local politicians are reluctant to do anything about it. This is, again, an argument only the expert class could make.

In the 1990s, the number of guns in America went up by 40 million but the murder rate fell dramatically. If firearms availability were the determining factor, Vermont and Switzerland would have high murder rates. Yet in Montpelier or Geneva the solution to a boy carelessly bicycling in front of you down a city street when you’re in a hurry is not to grab your gun and blow him away.

It’s the culture, not the technology."

I've been trying to make that point for years, but without notable success.

Who can compete with the genius of Mark Steyn?

(Go read the whole thing)

Schwarzenegger signs handgun microstamp bill

Schwarzenegger signs handgun microstamp bill

This would be AB1471, which was approved by the governor on October 13, 2007.

(Here is the full and complete text of the bill as it was approved; the last update of 9/17/2007.)


As we discussed in September, 2007, the Gun-Control activists in California have been pushing The Governator to enact draconian anti-gun bills during his reign term in office, and now they have succeeded in Act II. (Act I was the 2004 "Drop Testing" of handguns. It also included, in the same year, the ban on private ownership of .50 caliber rifles. See here and here.)

The Governator's justification was:

"While I appreciate and understand that this technology is not without limitations, I am signing this bill to provide law enforcement with an additional tool for solving crimes committed with semi-automatic handguns in California," Schwarzenegger said in a statement.

Translation: "I know the technology is unproven and dubious, but it makes me look good to actually sign a bill once in a while; with the other bill I signed last week, this puts both the Anti-gun lobby and the Gay Rights lobby right in my pocket. My message to Family Rights and Gun Rights people is: there aren't enough of you to affect my next election, so Hasta La Vista, Baby!"


The effect on gun owners is uncertain at this time. This is partly because news reports indicate that it only affects NEW guns:

Activists had called for the legislation, which requires new models of semiautomatic handguns sold in California to have internal parts that "microstamp" shell casings with codes that identify the guns when they are fired. Revolvers are exempt. [Ed. - emphasis added]

But the text of the bill which was made available in September suggests a much more draconian effect:

By expanding the definition of "unsafe handgun," the manufacture, sale, and other specified transfer of which is a crime, this bill would expand the scope of an existing crime, and thereby impose a state-mandated local program.

Note the added emphasis: "the manufacture, sale and other specified transfer of which is a crime."

This strongly suggests that not only is the designation of "unsafe handgun" not just applicable to new "gun models", or new guns ... it applies to any "semi-automatic pistol" which is transferred to another owner.

California owners cannot legally sell or trade or give away a firearm which is designated as an "unsafe handgun". If you're a California resident that means, for instance, that the 1911 which Grandpa brought home to commemorate the Battle of the Marne cannot legally be handed down to your children or grandchildren. It means that if you have a Glock 19 and your friend has a Kimber, you can't swap them whether or not there is an exchange of money involved.

It means that you can't take your Beretta down to the gun store and exchange it for a revolver. In fact, you can't even sell it to the gun store.

What happens when you die? That Colt Gold Cup can't be part of your estate unless it is retro-fitted with the "microstamping technology" --- which The Governator has coyly admitted is "not without limitations".

What happens if, by January 1, 2010, the "microstamping technology" has still not been proven? Oh, no problem: the bill is not enforceable until " ... the Department of Justice certifies that the technology used to create the imprint is available to more than one manufacturer unencumbered by any patent restrictions."

Another consideration is that, even though the assumption is that the microstamp will be either on the firing pin (imprints on the primer) or on the breechface (imprinting on the base of the case), the actual text of the bill requires that the firearm be "... designed and equipped with a microscopic array of characters that identify the make, model, and serial number of the pistol, etched or otherwise imprinted in two or more places on the interior surface or internal working parts of the pistol, and that are transferred by imprinting on each cartridge case when the firearm is fired ..."

Technically, this requires not ONE but TWO imprinting arrangements, which more than doubles the technological challenge. Nobody seems to have questioned whether the primer is considered part of the 'case', as the term is used (but not defined) in the law.

The effect on the manufacture and sale of new guns is also uncertain. We can only look back on the 2006 "Drop Safety Requirements" to discern the guidelines. You will recall that this law (section 12128 of the California Penal Code) required handgun manufacturers to submit THREE handguns of the specific make and model for testing ... which includes dropping all three handguns on a concrete surface from a height of about 40". If any handgun fails any of the six tests, the make and model will not be certified for sale (failure is if the cocked hammer falls.) This is obviously 'testing to destruction' as the handguns will not be suitable for resale -- being as they are likely to be all dinged up!

Some manufacturers (STI specifically, with 25 models of 'semi-automatic pistols' in their current line) refused to yield to this unreasonable obligation. Manufacturers who gave in to the last (Act I: 2004) round of excessive gun-control legislation are likely to take a second look at the profitability of selling to California buyers when Act II becomes effective.

One more time, just for the record: this is not a safety issue, this is not a 'crime stopping' issue, it's not even a 'crime solving' issue.


It's a back-door 'gun control' issue ... just one more way to keep firearms out of the hands of honest citizens. And that means that by signing the bill, Arnold the Barbarian has signed the bill for purely political reasons.

He wants to be re-elected.

What do you know about the AR15?

I got a letter today asking for information way beyond my experience. Maybe you can answer some of these questions:

I'm Lee ****** and I live in Spokane. I've been active in USPSA pistol shooting since March and am having great fun building guns, reloading ammo, and shooting a large quantity of rounds. We do a little 3 Gun activity at a couple of shooting clubs in the area and I am thinking of buying a used AR-15 (Rock River). I caught your blog in a Google search and thought I'd ask for some advice, if you have the time.

Do you reload for the AR? Is it any more difficult or hassling than standard pistol reloading? Is swaging of military primer pockets as easy as I have read it is? Finally, should I look for a .223 or 5.56 chamber?

I'm running a Dillon 650.

Thanks for the help.

If you can answer some of these questions, either post here or send me an email. I'll forward it to Lee and I'm sure he'll be grateful for your help.

Even if you do choose to contact Lee directly, the next reader who has these questions might appreciate the information here, so ... comments would be appreciated.