H-K Woops?

About that squad automatic weapon contract for an H-K Christmas present? Maybe not. From Christian at DefenseTech:

So Syscom wrote me back a vaguely-​​worded email response to a query about all this, seemingly denying that the service had made a final decision on the IAR and stating only that the Corps had ordered “24 weapons” from an “existing contract” that was let back in December ’08. That would most likely be the original con tract to Colt, FN and HK for the IAR downselectees.

H-K has a history of ill-timed leeks...remember the big coverage on Fox about the "next generation U.S. infantry rifle," the late XM-8?

I'm waiting for my copy of my friend Dave Kopel's newest book, AIMING FOR LIBERTY: THE PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE OF FREEDOM AND SELF-DEFENSE. Here's the Amazon review:

David Kopel's book covers topics ranging from the origins of the Wascington, DC gun ban to the Heller decision. He discusses the genesis of modern American gun control, the KKK, the true anti-gun agenda and the deceptions and errors used to promote anti-gun laws. He covers the right to self defense from Judeo Christiran perspectives. Other chapters explore United Nations and International gun control attempts and failures, law enforcement abuses and solutions, the culture of the right to keep and bear arms and the gun control movement. He concludes his book with a chapter on several prominent American gunowners from Thomas Jefferson to Eleanor Roosevelt.

Dave is an important figure in RKBA circles, and I'm looking forward to the book.

There's a really brilliant piece of self-defense writing on master gunsmith Grant Cunningham's blog about shooting stances, and I would class it a "must-read:"

Since we're talking about self defense, let's start with the conclusion: as I study surveillance films of actual shootings, and as I play with the concepts of force-on-force training, I'm struck by the fact that violent encounters rarely involve an identifiable stance. The players, especially the defender, are shooting from whatever position in which they happen to find themselves.
[...]
Some may immediately think of the term 'training wheels', but I prefer to call the stance a 'scaffold': a temporary device that allows us to build something. In the case of a defensive shooter, we're building a skill set. Without the support of the scaffold - the solid, repeatable stance - it's difficult, if not impossible, to build those skills. With it, the student can focus on the truly important things, secure in the knowledge that they are operating from a stable base.

The problem comes when the instructor doesn't understand the true nature of the shooting stance. In those cases, the stance becomes an end unto itself: it drives the instruction, rather than serving as an instructional tool.

Back in the old days of IPSC shooting we used to design stages to force people out of their comfort zones. I may have mentioned one of my all-time favorite stages was the one I designed for a state championship...the Tom Sawyer Memorial Fence Assault. We got 20-some-odd feet of 6-foot high fence sections, anchored them on fenceposts, then had step ladders, platforms and obstacles along the length of the fence. Some of the shooting ports were cut with a Sawz-All; some created with just a sledge hammer, leaving a jagged, irregular-shaped hole; ports were anywhere from ground level to over the top of the fence. Targets on the other side of the fence were a contact distance out to 25 yards, with vision barriers to limit from which shooting port the targets were visible.

I was honored when one of the top shooters in the world said, "Congratulations, Michael...there is no good way to run this stage!"