I'm Not Irish

I'm Scots...on the single malt, as opposed to the Irish whiskey, side of the family. I think we can all agree, however, that beer remains the ultimate huminod food. Here's a link to DRAFT magazine..don't just glance through it, study it!

Been in Indiana culling a big buffalo bull for COWBOYS. We were at Cook's Bison Ranch in Amish country...who'd'a thought? What great people! Wayne, Pete, Jason and all the guys really pulled out the stop for us, making it a totally fun weekend. Tequila used one of the supercool Mini-Sharps from Chiappa Firearms. Essentially, it's an 80%-sized 1874 Sharps rifle...downright petite!

Tequila's rifle was custom-made by Chiappa in .454 Casull. Normally, he and I would have worked up a heavy-bullet reload with Laser Cast bullets and Hogdon H110, but it took longer to get our handsw on the rifle than we'd expected. We opted for a Winchester 260-grain hunting load. It didnt matter to the 2200-pound bull, who went down quickly with a single lung shot. And yes, for all you pagans out there, I said the Words over the bull, sending him on his way to the Summerlands...hell, I hope somebody someday does the same for me!

I came away with a renewed respect for the .454 round...it is a hammer. The rifle has originally been sighted in with the hot 300-grain Cor-Bon .45 Colts...it sht more than four feet high with the Winchester .454s!! BTW, we had a Ruger Alaskan .454 revolver with us loaded with the same rounds with us as a back-up.


Also BTW, I'm working with Ron Norton at Chiappa on a gun near and dear to my heart — a lever action 16-inch M92 Trapper take-down in .44 Magnum! As most of you know by now, I'm a big fan of the lever gun as a self-defense, or if you will, tactical, weapon. One of my favorite "house guns" is a Winchester 94 Trapper with at 16 1/2 inch barrel in .44 Magnum, usually loaded with either Black Hills 240-grain JHPs or Winchester 250-grain hunting loads as the "just in case" gun in bear/lion season. I like this option so much we're going to be doing a "Tactical Lever Action" class later this summer, which we'll film for SHOOTING GALLERY in 2009.

I like my 94, and it's been a 100% gun with both the magnums and .44 Specials, but the M92 is a much more sevelte package, being as the action was designed around pistol-length cartridges. Ron loves the .45 Colt, especially the thumper Cor-Bons 300-grain +Ps.

Chiappa already catalogs a .45 Colt 16-inch M92...It's a beautiful little gun with a smooth-as-butter lever stroke. The shorter action and the half-inch off the barrel (down to the legal minimum) make this an extremely handy gun...as you may or may not know, most of the "Trapper" versions of lever guns...made, duh, as a handy alternative to a handgun for trappers or cowboys on horseback...had barrel lengths in the 14-15 inche range before the 1934 Firearms Act (or, as we generally refer to it, the Let's Give The Now Unemployed Revenue Agents Something To Do Act) made short-barreled rifles subect to federal control. You can see lots of examples of the shorter-barreled Trappers in the Marlin history book (P. 214) and the Winchester history (P.94). Winchester actually made a few of the M92 Trappers (325 made with less than 18-inch barrels).

Anyhow, I'm badgering Ron to build me a gun like he built himself...a composite-stocked, hard chromed take-down 16-inch M92...his is in .45 Colt; I want .44 Magnum because I believe it is a more veratile cartridge...in fact, I believe it is the most versatile cartridge in the world! Hopefully, we should have the guns by summer. This is the gun I want to use in our Tactical Lever Action class.


The reason I want it as a take-down gun is that it becomes the ultimate travel rifle...it breaks down into a very small package and once we find the right plastic case can be easily stashed in packed baggage (yeah, yeah...of course you have to declare it!). When packaged along with my overhauled S&W M329 revolver (which will be on the way home from Jim Stroh at Alpha Precision any day now), my Alpha Precision 629 .44 Magnum 3-inch (sort of like this one, but without the internal lock and with a world-class DA trigger), or one of the new shorter-barreled Night Guard version, here, , and a selection of .44 Magnum ammo, you have a nearly unbeatable travel package — a concealable big-bore revolver backed with a powerful, accurate rifle. Ideally, I'd want one of the XS scout scope mounts on the rifle, backed up with Ghost Ring sight, and I'd carry an Aimpoint T-1 Micro with a quick release mount for the scope rail.

Admit it...you want one of these Bad Boys, too!

Here's our daily dose on Heller from the WaPo...we're checking our feed systems for tomorrow, which is going to be a busy, busy, busy day!

"This may be one of the only cases in our lifetime when the Supreme Court is going to be interpreting the meaning of an important provision of the Constitution unencumbered by precedent," said Randy Barnett, a constitutional scholar at the Georgetown University Law Center. "And that's why there's so much discussion on the original meaning of the Second Amendment."

The outcome could roil the year's political campaigns, send a national message about what kinds of gun control are constitutional and finally settle the question of whether the 27-word amendment, with its odd structure and antiquated punctuation, provides an individual right to gun ownership or simply pertains to militia service.

"The case has been structured so that they have to confront the threshold question," said Robert Levy, the wealthy libertarian lawyer who has spent five years and his own money to bring District of Columbia vs. Heller to the Supreme Court. "I think they have to come to grips with that."

Stay tuned...