InstaPundit Poll on Obama's Comments on Guns...

See the results here.

83% of the respondents answered, "Are you kidding? I'm burying AR15s in the back yard."

Prescription Pistols?

A very good thing!

From MSNBC:

FDA approves handgun for the handicapped
Single-shot gun designed for those crippled by arthritis, muscular dystrophy

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has accepted a conceptual, ergonomic 9mm handgun — designed for people crippled by arthritis, muscular dystrophy, or similar conditions that render them too weak to operate normal handguns — as a Class 1 Medical Device.

The single-shot gun, dubbed the Palm Pistol, is "an adaptive tool that allows someone otherwise incapable of handling a revolver or semiautomatic weapon to operate one," said Matthew Carmel of Constitution Arms, the New Jersey-based company developing the gun.

Thanks to the gun's designation as a medical device, doctors could eventually write prescriptions for it and then be reimbursed by Medicare.

Predictably, the moonbats are up in arms:

Gun control supporters are not happy about the FDA's decision. Ladd Everitt of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence was nearly speechless when asked about it.

"This seems like a catastrophically bad decision from the FDA," said Everitt. "A gun is not a medical gadget. It's a tool used to take human life."

God forbid people at the most risk should be able to protect themselves! Good on Constitution Arms!

Leaving Las Vegas

Well, I lost big. Of my designated $10 gambling fund, I lost $6, then gave the remaining chit to my Sweetie, who proceeded to lose the rest of it.

I was hoping to finance our dinner at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill (tuna, if you must know, and God's own chili relleno), but the penny slots refused to cooperate.

Gunwise, I note in the Chicago Sun Times this AM that President Elect Hussein Obama says we don't need to buy guns, since he believes in the Second Amendment:

"I believe in common-sense gun safety laws, and I believe in the second amendment," Obama said at a news conference. "Lawful gun owners have nothing to fear. I said that throughout the campaign. I haven't indicated anything different during the transition. I think people can take me at my word."

Obama also reportedly promised that he will respect us all in the morning and that, on his proverbial word, he will do nothing...untoward...in any of our orifices.

Here's a much better gunny article from Richard Munday in the Times of London...at least some Brits get it!

The guns used in last week’s Bombay massacre were all “prohibited weapons” under Indian law, just as they are in Britain. In this country we have seen the irrelevance of such bans (handgun crime, for instance, doubled here within five years of the prohibition of legal pistol ownership), but the largely drug-related nature of most extreme violence here has left most of us with a sheltered awareness of the threat. We have not yet faced a determined and broad-based attack.

The Mumbai massacre also exposed the myth that arming the police force guarantees security. Sebastian D’Souza, a picture editor on the Mumbai Mirror who took some of the dramatic pictures of the assault on the Chhatrapati Shivaji railway station, was angered to find India’s armed police taking cover and apparently failing to engage the gunmen.

In Britain we might recall the prolonged failure of armed police to contain the Hungerford killer, whose rampage lasted more than four hours, and who in the end shot himself. In Dunblane, too, it was the killer who ended his own life: even at best, police response is almost always belated when gunmen are on the loose. One might think, too, of the McDonald’s massacre in San Ysidro, California, in 1984, where the Swat team waited for their leader (who was held up in a traffic jam) while 21 unarmed diners were murdered.

Rhetoric about standing firm against terrorists aside, in Britain we have no more legal deterrent to prevent an armed assault than did the people of Mumbai, and individually we would be just as helpless as victims. The Mumbai massacre could happen in London tomorrow; but probably it could not have happened to Londoners 100 years ago.

In January 1909 two such anarchists, lately come from an attempt to blow up the president of France, tried to commit a robbery in north London, armed with automatic pistols. Edwardian Londoners, however, shot back – and the anarchists were pursued through the streets by a spontaneous hue-and-cry. The police, who could not find the key to their own gun cupboard, borrowed at least four pistols from passers-by, while other citizens armed with revolvers and shotguns preferred to use their weapons themselves to bring the assailants down.

Today we are probably more shocked at the idea of so many ordinary Londoners carrying guns in the street than we are at the idea of an armed robbery. But the world of Conan Doyle’s Dr Watson, pocketing his revolver before he walked the London streets, was real. The arming of the populace guaranteed rather than disturbed the peace.

That armed England existed within living memory; but it is now so alien to our expectations that it has become a foreign country. Our image of an armed society is conditioned instead by America: or by what we imagine we know about America. It is a skewed image, because (despite the Second Amendment) until recently in much of the US it has been illegal to bear arms outside the home or workplace; and therefore only people willing to defy the law have carried weapons.

In the past two decades the enactment of “right to carry” legislation in the majority of states, and the issue of permits for the carrying of concealed firearms to citizens of good repute, has brought a radical change. Opponents of the right to bear arms predicted that right to carry would cause blood to flow in the streets, but the reverse has been true: violent crime in America has plummeted.

There are exceptions: Virginia Tech, the site of the 2007 massacre of 32 people, was one local “gun-free zone” that forbade the bearing of arms even to those with a licence to carry.

In Britain we are not yet ready to recall the final liberty of the subject listed by William Blackstone in his Commentaries on the Laws of England as underpinning all others: “The right of having and using arms for self-preservation and defence.” We would still not be ready to do so were the Mumbai massacre to happen in London tomorrow.

“Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India,” Mahatma Gandhi said, “history will look upon the act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.” The Mumbai massacre is a bitter postscript to Gandhi’s comment. D’Souza now laments his own helplessness in the face of the killers: “I only wish I had had a gun rather than a camera.”

Ho Ho Bang!!!

Marshal Halloway & I get Christmasy at the Bellagio...


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Another Day at the Office

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Old Vegas

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Another Misspent Evening in Sin City

We be in Vegas...

Producer Mike Long & PA Erin Ramsey in Tupelo Flash limo...



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Are All Sports Columnists Morons...

...or is John Feinstein at the Washington Post just a special case? In any case, logic isn't is strong point:

The owners and players should agree that players can't own handguns. That won't prevent players who like to hunt from hunting. If a player feels unsafe for any reason, he can ask his team to provide security -- all NFL teams have good-sized security forces, most of them retired law enforcement officials -- or they can hire their own security guards.

Now, let's not start screaming about the Second Amendment. To begin with, the amendment should be abolished -- a sensible interpretation of the amendment is that it was written to allow the people to raise a militia for protection and to hunt for food. Clearly no one needs to raise a militia these days, and those who hunt for a living can be licensed to do so.

It would be nice if President-elect Obama had the time to focus his energies on repeal of the Second Amendment, but he first has to deal with a broken economy and the incredibly wrong-headed war started by his predecessor. What's more, the issue of gun rights causes almost as much screaming from the right as abortion rights, the irony being that those yelling the loudest about the right to life are usually those yelling almost as loud about their right to carry weapons that kill.

The Second Amendment isn't going to be abolished any time soon. That should not prevent the NFL -- and all sports leagues -- from taking handguns away from their players. It is no more unconstitutional to say players can't own guns than it is to say they must be subjected to drug testing when there is no evidence they have used drugs, or saying they can be fined for speaking their mind about officiating.

Worth Remembering!

From GunPundit:

The high-cap magazine term is a place where the pro-gun side allowed the other side to frame the debate. 20 and 30-round magazines aren’t “high” capacity, they’re “standard” capacity. But no one, and I mean no one, sees it that way.

Magazines and ammo will be the next battleground.

What the Moonbats are Saying About US

From Alternet:

Although the gun group unleashed everything in its arsenal to defeat Barack Obama and dozens of down ticket gun-control candidates, it lost by a margin as historic as the war chest it opened in an attempt to convince voters that Democrats were mortal enemies of the Second Amendment. Despite expending nearly $7 million in a national fear campaign, NRA-endorsed candidates lost 80 percent of their races against gun-control candidates. More than 90 percent of candidates endorsed by the NRA's nemesis, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, won their races. If 2008 was, in the NRA's own words, "arguably the most important year in its history," then the election results suggest that the gun group is arguably the most overhyped and impotent special-interest lobby in the country. The NRA even got its chamber cleaned in its home state of Virginia.

The sweeping victory for gun control has been one of the most underreported stories of the election. This is largely because it was immediately overshadowed by the trendy postelection narrative of spiking gun sales and runs on assault weapons. In recent weeks, it seems as if every TV news program and newspaper in the country has featured some variation on the following story: Anxious Americans are cleaning out their local gun stores in anticipation of a.) Barack Obama's radical anti-gun agenda; b.) social chaos engendered by economic collapse; or c.) both.

No doubt thousands of paranoid gun owners have purchased Glocks and AR-15 assault rifles out of such fears. And it is true that the economic crisis has fueled an interest in personal protection and even Northern Idaho-style survivalism. But sensational stories about booming holiday-season gun sales obscure a more profound phenomenon: the coalescence of a new consensus, joined by the majority of the nation's gun owners, in favor of what gun controllers call "commonsense reform." A subtext of this phenomenon is the evaporation, first witnessed in 2006 and reinforced last month, of the idea that guns are a sure thing conservative wedge issue.

Of course he's full of shit, but read the whole thing anyway! And GO BUY SOME AMMO!

Leaving MO in the Broad Daylight...

...and just ahead of the snow. I can't imagine why I once thought travel was romantic...

Been at Midway USA for a bunch of reasons...one was talking to the product manager for the full scoop on AR-Stoner magazines. Based on that talk and Midway's willingness to share ALL info with me, I can give an even more positive 2-Thumbs-Up on these private branded C-Products! 30 rounders due in on 12/07...be quick!

On truth, given the economic conditions, I'm more concerned about b-HO's impending spate of executive orders than a new AWB before the 2010 Midterms...I am stocking up on mags that come from overseas (can you spell "X-D?")...if you're down on your 7.62 X 39 or 5.45 X 39, now might be a prudent time to stock up as well...

Brady is listing their hoped for Number Uno Christmas present as "closing the gunshow loophole" big time, as in ending private sales period...might also be a good time to do your shopping at a gunshow (if you state still allows private gunshow sales, which CO doesn't) or from classifed ads or f-t-f locally.

I'm doing a "triage" of my guns,which I'll be talking about on next week's podcast. Be sure to listen to TODAY'S special podcast on THE BEST DEFENSE!!!!!

Time to fly...


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Post Turkey Day Enthusiasm

After four days of serious rest, I'm feeling decidedly human again! I slept late, read, didn't turn on the computer in my office — well, not very much — took daily long hikes with Alf the Wonder Beagle and my Sweetie and avoided anything that looked like stress. As a result, I'm now convinced I will actually survive December and SHOT Show January! I am always surprised at how much mental energy a day of filming takes, not to mention that you're usually on a dusty, windy location somewhere and you don't get to sit down much, if at all, for 12 hours. The frenetic pace since July ground me up pretty badly.

I'm excited because lots of super cool things are going on...obviously THE BEST DEFENSE is going to be a paradigm-breaker. I've also just gotten the approvals for that spectaular 10th season of SHOOTING GALLERY I mentioned a while back...we'll be going extra-spicy for this one! It'll be filmed in 2009, premiering Quarter 1 2010. Plus, there's a good chance that Series #4, which I can't tell you a THING about (except that yes, it will go bang), will be green-lighted before the end of the year. Series #5, a really exciting project with Rob Pincus (and that's ALL I can say right now!), looks good for 2010; Series #6 is waiting for just the right moment to be birthed.

Bookwise, I've approved the new cover for TRAIL SAFE and the set text should move to final proofing in the next two weeks. This is the original book with a bit of editing from me, including with a new forward I'm writing. It will be joined mid-year by a companion DVD that focuses on the survivial mindset and choosing appropriate hardware for the backcountry. 2009 will also have a new edition of OVER THE EDGE with a newly written forward that brings the book up to date. Finally, I sketched out the rough outlines of a new gun book and companion DVD that will be my 2009 writing project, along with finishing and publishing FIVE TO GO. I'll also be writing the forward for a new training book from Rob and Mike Janich, based on our work on TBD...it will definitely be a must-have for your training library!

There will be some significant changes in DOWN RANGE, too, but I don't want to get into those just yet. I believe Marshal Halloway and I will have some big announcements at SHOT.

So there!

Policemen Who Didn't Shoot

Interesting sidelight on the terrorists' attacks in India...the case of the policemen who didn't shoot back...this from Neoneocon:

Photographer Sebastian D’Souza, who was able to take a photo of one of the armed terrorists in the train station in Mumbai, also described the events he witnessed there. One puzzling—not to mention profoundly troubling—aspect of his report was the following [emphasis mine]:

But what angered Mr D’Souza almost as much [as the terrorists’ rampage] were the masses of armed police hiding in the area who simply refused to shoot back. “There were armed policemen hiding all around the station but none of them did anything,” he said. “At one point, I ran up to them and told them to use their weapons. I said, ‘Shoot them, they’re sitting ducks!’ but they just didn’t shoot back.”

…The militants returned inside the station and headed towards a rear exit…Mr D’Souza added: “I told some policemen the gunmen had moved towards the rear of the station but they refused to follow them. What is the point if having policemen with guns if they refuse to use them? I only wish I had a gun rather than a camera.”

Neoneo does a nice job of analysis, but it's worth noting that this is consistent with David Grossman's theses from ON KILLING. Police...even paramilitary police special units...don't have or should have the same conditioning (for lack of a better word) as military troops. Police also have, quite correctly, a huge, huge aversion to civilian casualties. Still, as seen in Mumbai, it's a weakenss that terrorists didn't hesitate to exploit.

A Few Thoughts on Enemies Foreign and Domestic

Not the Matthew Bracken books, which I really liked, but on the terrorists attacks in India. Interesting paradigm, as described extremely lucidly by Mark Steyn on NRO:

They launched a multiple indiscriminate assault on soft targets, and then in the confusion began singling out A-list prey: Not just wealthy Western tourists, but local orthodox Jews, and municipal law enforcement. They drew prominent officials to selected sites, and then gunned down the head of the antiterrorism squad and two of his most senior lieutenants. They attacked a hospital, the place you’re supposed to take the victims to, thereby destabilizing the city’s emergency-response system.

And, aside from dozens of corpses, they were rewarded with instant, tangible, economic damage to India: the Bombay Stock Exchange was still closed on Friday, and the England cricket team canceled their tour (a shameful act).

What’s relevant about the Mumbai model is that it would work in just about any second-tier city in any democratic state: Seize multiple soft targets and overwhelm the municipal infrastructure to the point where any emergency plan will simply be swamped by the sheer scale of events. Try it in, say, Mayor Nagin’s New Orleans. All you need is the manpower. Given the numbers of gunmen, clearly there was a significant local component. On the other hand, whether or not Pakistan’s deeply sinister ISI had their fingerprints all over it, it would seem unlikely that there was no external involvement. After all, if you look at every jihad front from the London Tube bombings to the Iraqi insurgency, you’ll find local lads and wily outsiders: That’s pretty much a given.

There's some other good analysis on the Web (like this from the Canadian National Post), but the short form is that the India attacks are a new paradigm — low-cost, low-tech, high effectiveness.

I've been rereading The Prince, the compendium of Jerry Pournelle's Falkenberg Legion saga sliced, diced and repackaged by Pournelle and S. M. Stirling, maybe the best SF writer currently working. It is a wonderful lesson in Terrorism 101, how and why it works and how it might be fought. Obviously, the basic premise — the U.S. and Russia combine forces to rule the earth and colony star systems as the CoDominium — has been overcome by events, but much of the military writing, as updated in 2002 by Pournelle and Stirling, read like headlines. If times produce the man, these times call for John Christian Falkenberg!

Midway USA AR mags...

...on sale!

Midway's AR-Stoner mag are on sale for $9.99 a pop. They have 20 rounders in stock, with a shipment of 30 rounders due on 12/07.

Midway sent me 2 20 rounders for T&E last week. I just bought 10 more. Says it all...


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Another Reason to Ask Santa for an iPhone

A full-featured ballistics calculator, titled (appropriately) iSnipe!:

iSnipe is the first and only ballistics calculator for the iPhone and iPod touch. Based on the excellent GNU Exterior Ballistics Library, iSnipe generates accurate 3-DOF solutions for small arms trajectories, including corrections for pitch, yaw and wind conditions.

Simply put; a ballistics computer is a calculator used to predict any bullets path/energy/wind-drift/etc… For shooting enthusiasts, this means the ability to pre-determine how, where and at what speeds your bullets will fly, before you even load your gun.

Created with ease of use in mind, iSnipe is the perfect companion for any gun aficionado, competition shooter, or even law-enforcement officer... It's just that accurate. With all the ingredients you'd expect from a portable ballistics calculator, including the ability to save and load ballistic profiles, automatic save of form values and all the other features you'd expect from an integrated iPhone app, there is no better way to get on target every time. Finally there is a portable desktop quality application that we can all take along with us to the range.

Of course, you've already downloaded SureFire's free shot timer ap!

Amazing! You can calculate bullet drop while listening to Chinese Democracy!

Chicago & the Second Amendment

This from the Chicago Tribune:

When it comes to firearms, Mayor Richard Daley is no slave to rationality. "Does this lead to everyone having a gun in our society?" he asked after the ruling came down. "Then why don't we do away with the court system and go back to the Old West, where you have a gun and I have a gun and we'll settle it in the streets?"

From listening to him, you might assume that the only places in North America that don't have firefights on a daily basis are cities that outlaw handguns. You might also assume that Chicago is an oasis of concord, rather than the site of 443 homicides last year.

So it's no surprise that Daley refuses to make the slightest change to the handgun ordinance, preferring to fight the lawsuits filed by the National Rifle Association. He is not impressed that 1) the law almost certainly violates the Constitution, which elected officials are supposed to uphold, and 2) it would cost taxpayers a lot of money to fight lawsuits the city is bound to lose.

The Chicago ban dates back to 1983, when no one had to worry about the forgotten 2nd Amendment. The ordinance prohibited the possession of all handguns (except those acquired before the law took effect).

It had no obvious benefits: Homicides climbed in the ensuing years and by 1992 were 41 percent higher than before. But the policy rested undisturbed until last summer, when the Supreme Court ruled that Washington's ban on handguns violated the individual right to use arms for self-defense in the home.

Read the whole thing!

HAPPY T-DAY & Michael's Menu

Much to give thanks for today...for those men and women in uniform, whether in the deserts of Iraq, the mountains of Afghanistan or Places Elsewhere, a profound thank you for your service. We can never thank you enough, and be assured that you are never far from our thoughts and prayers. Stay safe out there!

Me, I'm just glad I've been able to keep my karmic surfboard off the rocks for another year...I gotta say, every year the waves get bigger and bigger, and every year I get older and older...thank god for guile, stealth and blind luck!

Small Thanksgiving dinner this year, and I sort of themed it around food that triggered a favorite memory, although I didn't tell my Sweetie since she thinks I'm crazy enough as it is. Here's the menu:

• Poached salmon with dill sauce, cooked in a clay pot.
• Two styles of dressing, including traditional Southern cornbread/biscuit sage dressing and a second that is more of a spicy homage to the oyster roasts I used ot like when I lived in New York City and traveled around New England. I used the stale, toasted cornbread and biscuit mix as the base for the oyster roast.
• Key West Apples, a dish I concocted to remind me about boat drinks down in the Keys...the tangy local apples are marinated, then cooked in a rum-Key West lime juice-melted butter liquid mix seasoned with cinnamon, ginger and a tiny bit of allspice. Take the liquid left over, add equal parts seltzer and that nasty dark rum from Barbados, toss in a little umbrellas and, viola!, wait for the sunset at Mallory Pier.
• Horseradish mashed potatoes.
• Fresh local asparagus
• Homemade rolls from my Sweetie.
• A fresh plum pie from my pal Tom Judd, who co-founded with me Rocky Mountain IDPA back when we were younger and dumber.

So, a turkeyless Thanksgiving, although I am assured by my fishmonger that the salmon was, indeed, free range!

BTW, beverages include Heller Estates Chenin Blanc, Benziger Family Winery Merlot (both are wineries we've visited, Heller in Monterey and Benziger in Sonoma...both are organic wines, since we live in Boulder County and risk execution if we drink Night Train Express) and/or Arrogant Bastard Oaked Ale from Stone Brewing Company in Escondido, CA.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING, Y'ALL!

HAPPY PRE-THANKSGIVING

Well, the newspaper this AM — remember newspapers? I do...I have parrots whose cages need lining — had a recipe for creamed Brussel sprouts and bacon. Yum! Reminds me of when my Mom, who was one of the 3 worst cooks on earth, sent a whole Thanksgiving party to the emergency room with a casserole of canned English peas, Velvetta and 2-day-old warm mayonaise. I, of course, fed my portion to the dog, who threw up.



Watched THE SHIELD series finale last night, and it was everything the SOPRANOS series finale wasn't. Michael Chiklis's brilliantly acted amoral antihero Vic Mackey did indeed get what he deserved — a Dilbert-sized cubicle for him to ponder the destruction of all he had hoped, the betrayal of friends, the loss of family, etc. Walton Goggins breathtaking high-wire act as the desinigrating Shane Vendrell, groping his way to the only kind of nightmarish redemption he could imagine, kept me on the edge of my seat...CCH Pounder closing out the role of a lifetime.

If you like great acting, download the episode when you can.

Delayed Podcast! SORRY!

All day filming Monday...tied up in meetings all day Tuesday...pocast delayed slightly until tomorrow AM...SORRY!!!

Also visit new TBD BLOG...From yesterday's shoot...





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