Crime Guns

If you read that article, yesterday, to the bottom, you see a familiar fact.

Someone that works with disadvantaged youth in the city have only to ask one of their young charges to get them a gun and they will provide on in an hour.

Black market guns are easy to get if you or someone you know has connections with that market.

Something I hadn't thought of before. 

Clean guns are more expensive than dirty guns.  Guns are clean when they haven't been used in a crime or have not been stolen.  Ballistic or a serial number cannot be connected with any crime, so the price goes up.

A crime gun, a dirty gun, those can be cheap. 

Now, what if us gunnies had our own "gun buyback program."  If we bought a cheap crime gun, yes we might be receiving stolen goods, and we might not own an actual murder weapon, but...  that gun isn't going to murder anyone else once we have it.  Win win.  We get a cheap firearm and Black Market prices rise, and guns are removed from crime circulation making the streets safer.  Better than a cop sponsored buyback.  And we have cash, not gift cards. 

Gunnies from Seattle would have to buy guns in Baltimore, and Baltimore peeps should probably go to Seattle. 

I wouldn't mind if it was a murder weapon.  Not like the police are going to solve any murders from it if I turned it into them, unless I snitched out the person that sold it to me and cops shook that guy down working their way up the ladder to the actual killer.  Unlikely to be successful, even if I WAS a snitch.

But stolen property, that would bug me.  What if I got a really NICE black market gun, cheap.  The guy that originally owned it probably wants his really nice gun back.  I know I would.  So, a flaw, there.

Must be 30 or 40 kings down there...

This article has been making the rounds of gun advocacy websites.  The Right and Duty to Be At All Times Armed.

And this graph is the one that gets quoted

During the Viking Age, there was a man called Þorgnýr the Lawspeaker. The Lawspeaker’s office made him spokesmen for Swedes who owned their own farms—while not ‘citizens’ in our sense, they were a class of ordinary free people whose interests sometimes differed from those of their kings and lords. One such king, for reasons of pride, tried to draw Þorgnýr’s people into an unwanted war. This resulted in an outcry, and the king held a public meeting to persuade the people to go along. Þorgnýr spoke at this meeting, and reminded the King that seven previous kings had been drowned in a nearby well when they proved resistant to the advice of the people, and should reconsider his war.

Sheesh, I hope they pull up the drowned man quick like.  Folks can't get a bucket of water to wash the well is so choked with dead bodies.  And it's starting to smell foul.  That can't be good.   That Lawspeaker don't fool around.  But wouldn't it be better to hang the errant king from a handy tree limb?

MD CCW

Back in the old days, like before I was born, before the term CCW was a thing, people did buy gun and people did carry them on their person.  Back then, in Maryland, if there was going to be any background checks done on you, it was done with the local police forces.  The state or feds weren't set up to do stuff like this, and the locals knew the local people.

With a high sign from the local police station, you could carry concealed.  You had to ask face to face and have a good reason.  Or be buddies with the cops.  So, that is an abuse.

If you voted against the sheriff in the last election and supported his opponent, or you grew your hair a bit long, or your skin was the wrong color or the cops were just asshole, you might not get a 'permit' either.  More abuse.

Especially because of this racial angle, and with advances in database retrievals at the state level, the state of Maryland eventually gave the authority to say yay or nay to the Maryland State Police.  Easier to control from Annapolis, and hopefully would take perceived race prejudice out of the equation.  If you wanted to keep CCW permits out of black hands you just had to deny permits to most everybody.  And here is where we are.

Except people are trying to get the information from the Maryland State Police records on how they make their determinations to grant or deny a CCW.  Maybe find out if the state actually IS disproportionately denying certain racial groups.  And also find the plethora of other excuses used. 

Are the state police denying people because they take cholesterol medication or viagra?  That'd be interesting to know.  Is that a HIPAA violation?

So there is potential for legal trouble two ways, there, for the State. 

Plus just get the permit process to BUY a handgun these days hurt minorities.  Where does a person in Baltimore that relies on public transportation go for the required training?  What if they have no credit card, you need a credit card to get the permit from the state, online.  And you want to use a library computer to do all this?  Baltimore crime is increasing rapidly, and people that want to defend themselves have a harder time securing the means to do so than some middle class suburban resident in much-safer Crofton Maryland.

There are good holsters

And then there are bad holsters...

Ezekiel 25:17

The Crocodile is Never Sated

Compromise is not the way forward. They can't be bargained with. They can't be reasoned with. They don't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop... ever, until you are dead.

There is nothing they don't want to ban.  They will cancel YOU if given any chance at all.

Did you see this gun control drama?

Did you see this gun control advertisement drama?

Summed up

A Virginia State Senator runs airs an ad and the ad says she is gonne "shoot down attacks from any anti-gun groups."

Gabby Giffords happened to be doing a spin through Virginia.  All the gun banners and her upcoming opponent pounced on Senator Chase

Oh Noes!  How could you?!  That's threatening violence!  She wants to shoot at anti-gun groups!

Senator goes "I never approved that wording!"

Ad company, "Oh yes you did you blood thirsty maniac!"

Senator, "I recorded the meeting with the ad company and let me play that for you."  She wanted: 'shoot down attacks on your gun rights' in the ad. 

Ad company: "How DARE you record us to prove we are now lying about you, Senator."

Senator Chase will probably lose re-election.  She is very pro-gun and that is a scalp the anti-gunners want in a state they can flip. So full court press against her. 

Range 23 Sep

Took the 1911.  All them good target with a striker trigger, let's see if there is change with that sweet 1911 Single Action!

Nope.

I mean not bad, but my flaws are the same.

36 rounds at the shorter range, one magazine at long range.

A good session with lots of good surprise breaks.  One day, every round in session with be a good trigger pull.  Not this time.  Still some big and little flinches.

Ooo, yes I did notice a perceived recoil increase going from 9 to .45. 

---

ooo, forgot.  50 more AE, no malfs, lubed ahead of time, 1117 since I made the gun. 

Way ahead of you.

You know what to do when the census comes. 

The social contract is dead.

Impeachment over a non-impeachable offense would have sealed that deal. But even worse a fake "inquiry" in name only that skirts the law. This isn't two-tiers. This is making it up as you go.

You have no obligation to this system. None at all.

— Jared A. Chambers 🇺🇸 (@C4CEO) September 24, 2019

So a buddy..

So a buddy, out of the blue, wants to get his Maryland HQL and buy a pistol.

The HQL is our 'permission to purchase' and it takes a while to get it all set up.  You need to pay some fees, get some training, some fingerprints, some checks...

Anyway, he'd caught the bug getting into prepper stuff.  He is HUGE into B-movies and Zombie movies, so easy match.  And dangit, why not?

So he asked me some stuff, but already had his eye on a Canik, a Taurus, or a Smith & Wesson M&P.  I told him some pluses and minuses for all of them.  So he is thinking S&W now.

But no matter, he asked what to get before he gets the pistol, since he has some time.

I always say a good gunsafe of some sort to lock it in.  First.  He has a kid, so especially so.  I also told him that children and surprisingly good locksmiths so train them up too.

But then the list of thing to get got longer.  And my list is much more compact now that I've been around the block.  I don't recommend elaborate cleaning kits, for example.  But the list is still long.

• gun safe
• Hoppes #9
• Shooter's Choice, oil
• Q-tips
• brass brush
• old tooth brush
• cleaning rags
• Bore Snake
• pistol case
• electronic ear muffs
• ear plugs
• Lula magazine loader
• A holster is on the list but not needed day one, here, in Maryland
• ...
• and ammo (paper targets you can get for a buck at the range)

I forgot eye pro because I wear glasses nowadays and didn't think of that.  

84th Division Documentary

Watching this old documentary.  84th Division holding the Marche - Hotton road in the Battle of the Bulge, and other actions.


I wonder why this guy's ammo has the rounds sticking our like that?  At first I thought it was stripper clips for an '03, but now thinks it's an M1.

But it's nice to see closeup of a soldier kit in these.

Everyone has one of these.  Guessing gas mask?  I could be wrong and they are extra rounds for the mortar tube spread out over a squad. But other than that they seem to be packing surprisingly light.  These days I expect bigger rucksacks getting humped all over for our soldiers.  When they're not fighting.  Maybe these aren't expecting imminent action, but action soon. Nice having lots of trucks hauling your groceries.

Even with a bigger pack it's still not that big.

But there is the entrenching tools.

It just struck me.

Lots of this is stock footage or footage re-used from other parts of the same documentary.  Such is the way of 1940s film.  You got more movie than you got footage.  I recognized someone hitting the deck from a different training film.  But the vast majority seems to be stuff from November and December 1944.  They aren't putting too much stuff from 1942, say, to pad it out.

Colt 2

You know what would be a brilliant move by Colt, to make another announcement:

We at Colt made a business decision to concentrate our efforts on some major customer production contracts, and to temporarily withdraw from the civilian market.  These larger orders are where our profit center lies.  

However, anti-gun forces are pretending like we at Colt acquiesced to their demands and somehow the company does not support the right of all Americans to keep and bear arms.  Nothing can be further from the truth.  The groups that wants to ban civilian firearm ownership have taken advantage of our announcement to try to score propaganda points.  And we don't like that.  

We really do have to have to focus on our bigger contracts, but, that doesn't mean we can't produce a token 300 Colt AR15s every year until it makes business sense to produce more than 300, however long that takes.  Just to show we haven't fully abandoned the civilian AR15 niche.  You can recognize these 300 rifles in the market because it will have the year and "Molon Labe" stamped on the receiver.  We don't want Gun Confiscators to mistake our position on the matter, and we think this move draws a line in the sand on where exactly Colt Manufacturing's position remains.   Thank you.

A better PR guy than me can spiff up the press release.   The Colt 300 will sell out at the price point they want because the supply will be restricted, the company looks better to us, the announcement is a thumb in the eye of the bad guys, and 300 hardly interferes with the other work they are doing.  Win all around.

Colt

Maybe Colt managers are chickshite sellouts folding to George Soros' minions and betraying lovers of freedom and liberty that don't currently wear a uniform.

Maybe Colt has a crapton of orders to fill equipping some allies with M16s, and sales of over-priced but high cache ARs are flat.

I dunno.

The timing was odd for getting out of the civilian market for a time, either way, but maybe that might not have been helped.

And maybe option #3.  Colt is making bad management decision.  I mean when HASN'T Colt been making bad management decisions?  In my lifetime, sure.

Option D:  All of the above.

Goin with D?  Goin with D.   What I don't know is the weight of the A, B, C.

21 SEP

No Springs

It's hard to make your own brass cases at home.  Primers too.  Good bottlenecks for a tyrant to disarm a populace is to go after these.

Another hard thing to make at home is spring.  Well, GOOD springs.  You can make springs pretty easy.



A spring will make or break magazine functionality. 

If you are making a Home Depot Plumbing Department Sten gun at home, you need that one critical big spring.  Looks like an AR buffer spring a little.  Lots of those around.  I wonder if it would work for that application... Might not be stout enough.

Anyway, I need more spare springs.   I'm thinking for 1911s more than anything.  

And never wish for a disappearance of all springs.



Coily

If you could live in a past era...

What era would you choose?

Me?  I wouldn't want to go too far back.  No Rome or Colonial New England.  Certainly not 30 Years War era.  I'd want Air Conditioning and Anti-Biotics, and Modern Dentistry.  Yes, I capitalized them, as they are Important.

So, Post WWII.

Hey, Ima like the look of cars for a bit until the mid 70s!

But what would I drink?

Post prohibition beer isn't that great, and only get's worse over time until the microbrew revolution 60 years later.  Soda of the 40s-70s, for me, is too sweet.  I have to wait for the mid-80s to get a decent sugar substitute.  You remember how bad cyclamates and saccharin was!  So, decent beer is unavailable in the US for a couple decades, then when aspartame is available you still have to wait another decade for truly good micros to roll into the market.

Pah!

There is no such thing as the good old days.

Maybe I can live off of Ballantine from 1940-1970.


---

Guns?  Please.  Plenty of well made all-metal revolvers and automatics, the height of the war surplus days, and look for me to pickup some fun sub guns when inflations makes $200 seem less a bite.  Pre 1964 Winchesters.  The problem is what to restrict myself to.

Trial Balloon

The Whitehouse has released a trial balloon on a possible gun control scheme to placate the gun banners which will totally make them vote for Trump next November.

It's a gimped Universal Background check bill.

And folks don't like it.  I am one of those folks.  Unless hidden in it is some provision that removes all references to serial numbers in the background check.  It might also be a good way to expand the number of quasi FFLs as an unintended consequence.

The President didn't send it out and quickly announced through surrogate that he himself might not be on board with it.  So even he doesn't like it.  And at least needs cover from it. 

Ted Cruz notes it does nothing to go after bad guys and instead only goes after good guys. 

The only good thing I can say about it is this bill now might be better than a worse bill later and fend off that worse bill further into the future. 

But it still feel like I am losing another slice of the compromise cake. 

This bill PLUS nationwide CCW.   That'd be better.  Not best.  Best is just nationwide CCW and loosen suppressor regs.  

Grandpa

On this day in 1944. My grandpa was killed by Japanese forces.

For conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity. The Silver Star. Semper Fi.  I wonder what he really did to earn that?  The details of the citation are sparse.

Peleliu. HQ company for his battalion. 1/7. Hanneken commanding the regiment.

I get my height from him. No one else in my family is as tall as us.  My other grandpa came closest.

Enlisted 2 June 1942. Mom was born 30 May 1942.

I've been looking for contemporary accounts that might give me information about my grandpa who died 25 years before I existed.  Eugene Sledge.  Robert Leckie.  Wrote about it, and were there.  No mention of even my Grandpa's boss.  Leckie used nicknames for everyone.

Gotta try George Peto.

Also

Fixed this for ya, @willwilkinson! https://t.co/yMMbKtNnyo pic.twitter.com/rC4IN2vuwp

— Robby Soave (@robbysoave) September 18, 2019

It took a whole week

Before a Democrat said Beto was wrong. 

Dem Sen. @JoeManchinWV on Beto pledge to confiscate AR15s:

"Beto's one human being. He gave his own opinion, OK? I think it was very harmful to make it look like all the Democrats. I can tell you one thing: @BetoORourke's not taking my guns away from me. You tell Beto that OK?"

— Lindsay Wise (@lindsaywise) September 18, 2019

These gimmicks always intrigue me

See All Open Sights.


I'm a sucker for fancy new sighting systems and I have to resist buying all of them with every fiber of my being.  Sometimes I succeed in resisting the temptation.

This one, tho...  Maybe I can try it on a Ruger .22 pistol...  It's not that expensive.

If you are the type of person that will put a mini-red dot on your 9mm, why not this?  It's more compact.  Though you lose some view under the 'dot' that you already don't have with iron sights, but do with regular red dots.

"Why do you resist getting these new fangled sight things, or sights with wide notches and big dots or sights with little triangles or sights that are just troughs in the slide, T-Bolt?"

Well, they don't really gain you much, and sometimes take away.  New equipment combos don't make a better a shooter, the shooter makes a better shooter.  Plus the whole Keep It Simple Stupid.  Were there gains to be made in pistol sights?  Yes, and we already made them.  Compare the sights on a WWII vintage 1911.  Teeny and low vis.  Now look at what come universal on most 1911s that aren't trying to look GI.  Bigger, square, decent rear notch with 'room' for light on both side of the front sight.  I like a single dot, but three dot, or line and dot, or dot over dot, are all fine, too.  I used to have CHANGE IMMEDIATELY to my preferred config, now...  I just live and let live on the sight types.  That's from training with a variety of configurations

"You gonna get one to try, T-Bolt?"

Naw, not right yet.  Let's simmer on this a little while.

You know what this is about?

Zombies.

"Virus" Lab.  Mmm hmmm.

The fire hides evidence of shamblors and ensures any over looked zeds are accounted for.

Heavy Metal Poisoning

When Notre Dame burned a lotta lead spread through the air.

Meh.  It wasn't good.  But it also wasn't panic inducing bad the NYTimes make it out as.

Same exposure, how many weeks do you think you'd get the same levels breathing in air in a city in the 1930-1980 era, with all the leaded gas?  When a city was bombed and fires broke out in WWII, the paint and roofs and pipes then were as leaded as anything.

Lead is bad, yes, but humans are just awful at judging risk factors.  Don't get stampeded by the Leftists running the NYTimes.  I mean, they want you to believe Trump is more racist than George Wallace and Bull Connor and Woodrow Wilson put together.  But before 2014?  Not a hint.

No, not that George Wallace.  The other one. 

No, don't eat old paint chips, lick bullets, advocate for a return to leaded gasoline engines, or seek out lead vapor to inhale.  Switch the solder on your copper pipes to lead again.  But don't assume Paris is doomed because one big building had a fire either.  

Innsmouth Cast

In H P Lovecraft's story The Shadow Over Innsmouth the denizens of the named decrepit Massachusetts town are a bit teched.   This affliction comes from close intimate contact with an ancient race of people called Deep Ones.  Symptoms of someone that exhibits these traits are small ears, a narrowing head, and prodigious, unblinking eyes.  Hmmm....

If it's any consolation, Senator Spartacus, Deep Ones live an exceedingly long time, swim well, and are very very powerful beings.  But you probably don't want to be connected to anything Lovecraftian for a whole host of reasons.

Oh, and fish lips McBugeyes thinks you should be required to maintain a federal license to keep a firearm.

Metrocon

Was David Brooks, token 'conservative' columnist on the NYTimes, ever really a conservative?  Particularly on guns?

"Crack the wall of inaction" on gun control.  After that, the rest can pour through that crack.

Bernie? Bro?

Well, Bernie Sanders is promising free healthcare for illegal aliens, and a moratorium on deportations, when he is president.  So vote for him.

I guess he is counting on ineligible foreigners voting for him next November.

And why does everyone, including Trump, call them "Illegal Immigrants"?  The term must poll well with likely voters.  They are aliens.  Immigrants are moving here.  Aliens have to go back.  They ain't staying.  They broke the law in coming here.  If they don't have to obey the law, then why do I? 

Registration is Confiscation

True

To avoid this unconstitutional peril, a conscientious  legislature that insisted on background checks for firearm purchases would prohibit any connection of the check with a unique serial number.

NICS:  "Joe Schmore, desirous of purchasing a [handgun/rifle/shotgun/NFA item] is not prohibited."

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

OMG this is a straight lie!!

“With the passage of the ban, it became unlawful to "manufacture, transfer, or possess" most semi-automatic weapons.”https://t.co/OxxP8ShYj6

— Jon Stokes (@jonst0kes) September 14, 2019

Good Point, John Nolte

WHERE ARE THE DEMOCRATS TELLING BETO HE IS WRONG TO CONFISCATE GUNS?

WHERE IS JOE BIDEN TELLING BETO HE'S WRONG????

THIS SILENCE TELLS YOU EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW.

THE DEMOCRATS MEAN TO DISARM US WHILE THEY EMPTY PRISONS AND REPLACE US WITH ILLEGAL ALIENS. pic.twitter.com/yOWagBKAhH

— John Ocasio-Nolte (@NolteNC) September 14, 2019

The only Democrat person criticizing Beto his talk about gun confiscation is Senator Coons.  And not because Coons disagrees with Beto.  Coons is worried about political blowback now that the truth is out about what the Democrats want to do. 

That means all the Democrats agree with gun confiscation, in violation of the Constitution.

No Democrat of any note has yet to contradict Beto. 

Don't lose sight of that. And watch out for squishy GOP types that will go along, or maybe put a milquetoast fight like, "well, don't confiscate them NOW. Wait 5 years or so. That's a 'conservative' attitude."

Beto said it, admitting it on live, nation-wide TV what our side has always said they wanted (but were called crazy and over-reaching for pointing it out), the lefty crowd in the audien CHEERED him for it, and the party leadership never contradicted him, just lamented her made a gaff by admitting the truth. They will start a civil war because of rifles that kill maybe 300 Americans a year.

Beto is not an outlier. He is Democrat leadership mainstream.

Kid Myths

As a wee bairn, 6th grade, in the shadow of the Vietnam war, ca. 1981, we boy talked among ourselves about important subjects like army stuff and tanks and guns.  We knew that our side used M16s and the other side used AK47.

Other received wisdom that we were told was true back then?  That the two rifles used different sized bullets.  But them crafty Commies made it so their rifles could shoot from M16 magazine, but our side couldn't do it the other way around.  This was a good idea, by our kid logic, as the enemy could scrounge from our supplies, and it was short sighted of the Pentagon to not do the same.  Our confidence in our military gear back then was shaken a bit, and I am sure that pleased the Kremlin.  Negatively impact our morale early on, you see. 

Yes, we thought, told by our friend's older brothers, I am sure, or misheard from a buddy's father, that a Viet Cong AK could shoot what we now know (more precisely) as 7.39x39mm Combloc ammo as well as 5.56x45mm NATO.  It couldn't shoot the American stuff as well, but how accurately do you have to shoot a bullet hose? 

Like I said, this was received wisdom, and, to us, almost certainly true.  Elementary school libraries and our meager researching skills were no help sussing out the truth.  If we even considered it. 

We were obviously misinformed. 

Offer still good, G-Man

Regarding your buyback program.

I am more than happy to sell you 'back' one (1) so called (by you) 'assault weapon.'  It's even one of those evil AR15 style.  It will look a lot like this, for ease of shipping:

If you prefer, I can even render it inoperable before transfer 'back'.

I will need you to pass a background check, of course.  I dunno how you'll do that.  Just pick a federal bureaucrat at random, maybe?  Run Beto's?  That might not work tho.  Anyway.  You'll figure it out.

The price, to you, for this buyback scheme, is still at a low low price... it's a steal, really... of only $3,000.000.00.

If you are interested in buying anymore at some later date, get back to me after you've gotten one from most erryone else.  We can do some more business, maybe.  Horse trading.  But let's not get ahead of ourselves.  Stick to this initial deal, at this time.   Mustn't count chickens before they hatch, eh? 

-----

"Hey T-Bolt, whatcha gonna buy with that $3M?"

Well, it's mostly going to go toward low load income funds, so I can live off the interest.  Prolly retire in a year or two.  In the meantime I might treat myself to equipping up a machine shop.  Old stuff, or course.  A nice milling machine and lathe, tooling.  But new stuff two.  CNC router and a decent 3D printer

"Whatcha wanna make in that shop?"

Oh, buyback money....  Gonna make lots of buyback money.   Simple stuff at first, then as I learn, more. 

Range 8 Sept.

I learned today there are really two types of flinches I can discern.  Major and minor.

75 more rounds through the rental Commodity Plastic Striker Fired Service Pistol.

Not bad.

Back to the flinch types. 

1. Good job!  Keep that up!  Doing great!
2. Minor flinch.  Sorta called it when they happened?
3. Major flinch.  Oh yeah, I knew those were flinches when it happened before looking for the holes. 

But the worst shots are still 3 inches from the best shots.  Only one off the target major flinch on target #4.  I consciously went faster on target #3. 

When I was doing good I was relaxed, focusing on the front sight and not thinking about prairie dogging my looking at the target, and the trigger pull was good.  But that's always the secret

This day

Muslim Jihadist hijacked four airplanes and crashed them into buildings killing thousands of innocent Americans.

Surviving Jihadists the world over are defiant to this day.

I bet...

I bet Wade Callender is loyal to Wayne.

I used to the do the 'round up' feature when making a purchase at MidwayUSA.  I'll prolly do that again when LaPierre's destructive rampage has stopped.

Sasquatch

So, Bigfoot has ads.  They sell a $75 belt that is reinforced.  I don't have to tell you that if you have a holster you want to hang it off a decent belt.  Bigfoot is trying to sell you a decent belt. 

Except here is the ad.

Well, yes a flimsy standard belt is no bueno.  Hey, wait a minute.  Is that a nickel Beretta in a $12 nylon holster? 

I guess he blew his upgrade money on the belt and will have to wait til his Milt Sparks VM2 gets made and shipped (and charged) to him.  Hope he got the shark trim.  I really like the shark trim.  But that should spread the payments out. 

But yeah, if you are going to advertise your high end product, maybe don't use low end accessories with it.  That's like getting an ugly misshapen creature like me to be your butt model.   Not good for bidness.

And Tanks

"You're welcome!"




So I went here.  Open house at the Tank Farm in Nokesville Virginia.  Virginia Museum of Military Vehicles.

It's spread out over a few acres.  See all them for a previous year?  Looked like that on Saturday.  Those tanks don't live in that field, they moved themselves to those spots

See?  They all run.  This tank moved to that spot.

That's an M1917, a French design we built under license.  100 years ago.  Those orange scribbles are where black tip .30-06 armor piecing hit it and didn't go through.  It was peppered with those test shots.

They had a couple T-34s, A Valentine, some sweet Universal Carriers.  And you know the 'armor' on them, and other armored trucks/half-tracks, is supposed to be rifle proof, but it's only a quarter inch thick.  And I've shot at steel gong targets with a rifle and rounds sailed right through the metal....  Then I thought "You know, T-Bolt, you are shooting at mild steel gongs, and the steel in these vehicle might be a different alloy."  Yeah.

There was a Hetzer.  Taller than I thought it would be.

They had 4 Shermans, but my favorite was this one, the 1942 cast version.  M4A1.

 
The other Shermans were all welded.  One was an Israeli Sherman.  That tank started out in our inventory, went to the French post war, then the Israelis.  Got a diesel somewhere along the line (and it was pretty quiet when running, I was surprised by this, too.) and a different, longer gun.

My favorite?  A Dodge staff car.  Pre Powerwagon Dodge.

I don't know why.  Seems like it'd be a nice daily driver.

Oh, the smell of the place.  Army canvas and oil and rubber and whatnot.  Vinyl?  Very distinctive.  Almost like the smell of a 1973 VW Beetle.  You know what I am talking about.

Here are some C-Rats for ya.

Couple of newer things.  The tank the kids were allowed to crawl on was a T-72.

Typing Simulator

Don't hit more than one key at a time.   It has 'correction tape.'

Johnny Dollar's dollars

So, I was listening to the Todd Matter.



A $75,000 insurance case is being investigated.  But when?

Well a wealthy person has a 1955 Cadillac in this episode, assume it is relatively new.  Mid 50s.  That's the answer as to when this story took place. 

My house cost $11,000 in 1952, so $75k is five houses, in the mid 1950s?  Give or take.

A 1955 Eldorado cost, base price, $5,814.

Ok, so we got relative money values.

The story revolves around a stolen mink coat.  That cost $11,000.  Eleven G's.

The lady is wearing two Cadillacs!

 How were fur coat ever that expensive.  Well they can run as high as $150k these days, so I guess it is me.  I'm the one that is out of touch on luxury items. 

$11k just floored me when I heard it on the old time radio podcast.

---

Also, Johnny must have PTSD.  Most every week a person gets killed before his very eyes.  Or he watches them die in the hospital.  Often because of murder, and almost always violently.  He was in t
the Marines during the war, and a police Sergeant in New York before taking up the job as an insurance investigator.  Both those jobs see more than an average person's fair share of death.  There are morticians that have seen fewer corpses than Johnny Dollar.  That could probably weigh on a man.

Viper MkI

"A simplified Sten gun."

Wait, how do you make a Sten simpler?

Better watch.

Yup.  That is simple. Jeezum crow, making something Spork simple even simpler.  It's practically Foon simple.

So, you spec out the common parts and the hard machining part is a barrel and a bolt assembly... I am going through the fabrication order of operations in my head, see....

But yeah, one of the more complicated operations on that viper is all the woodworking required.  Easier now, these days, with CNC routers, tho.

Range 3 September

Ok, I rented the same Commodity Plastic Striker Fired Service Pistol again.

I shot it well last time, I am wonder if I got more and better surprise breaks because I was more relaxed last time, and, more importantly, I didn't know where the break was yet in that trigger.  A little trick that only works while you are unfamiliar with the gun.  Then you learn it and the break is less of a surprise and you can concentrate on introducing your flinches for improved disappointment.  If you are into that sort of masochism. 

Meh, I did OK.  Test inconclusive.  Three magazines of 15.  Chest and head at 25 feet, then chest at 75 feet.  I count 8 of that third magazine outside the central group from with the longer ranged string.  All but #1 up there are decent hits.  That isn't the order shot, tho.

My arms were muscle-tired by lifting chores I had done all weekend.  I labored on Labor Day.  And I pushed myself to a higher round count than usual to see where I was shooting when fatigue was more evident.

Also not so bad.  75 rounds total for the day.  Test inconclusive. All good hits.  Opening up the groups a little as I tire one the head maybe.  The holes in the white are from a hole punch or staple tears.

Plus, you know, Commodity Plastic Striker Fired Service 9mm Pistols are a good value and decent guns to start with.  Not easy to shoot, but nothing like hard.  Medium easy.  Oooo, if I was a biker that's be a great nickname.  Medium Easy.

The Wisdom of Chapelle

Now people that know noting about firearms are going to start loading their shotgun tubes so they fire birdshot buckshot birdshot buckshot buckshot buckshot.

If you haven't seen his latest Netflix comedy special, that is how he claims to load his pump action shottie.  (It's a good show, watch it, and don't believe what the whiner PC crowd say about it being bad and everything.)

Claims.  It was part of a comedy skit, he might have been doing all that for entertainment purposes.

In the skit, the birdshot is to pepper the opiod addict intruder stealing from his change bowl.  The buckshot is in case he turns toward Dave instead of running away.  Second birdshot is in case he has a friend, and buckshot if THAT guy doesn't get the hint, then buckshot all day.

You know, the ol' Dutch Load.  Candy cane.  Like dudes that go every other in their pistol, Holler Point to stop a bad guy, Full Metal Jacket to achieve penetration.

Not usually the recommended thing to do any more by serious firearms trainers, if it ever was. 

But now, MILLIONS of people have been explained it by Dave Chappelle, and they are going to remember it.  And when they get a shotgun to protect their houses...  a whole lotta folks are gonna go birdshot buckshot birdshot buckshot buckshot buckshot.  For no other reason except that a stand up comic made it sound reasonable. 

---

The reason he bought a shotgun in the first place?  When he bought a house and land in the country near Dayton Ohio he noticed a guy walking on HIS land with a slung rifle.  I dunno what the hunting regs are in Ohio, but I am guessing this interloper was a hunter hunting or scouting for a hunt, and Dave's acreage wasn't yet posted to DNR specification that there was to be No Hunting on that land, so scouting it was perfectly legal.  Check your own areas laws, it may be legal where you live too.  But I am just guessing, like I said.

Starting Over Addendum

I am glad I hadn't gotten interested in acquiring firearms seriously 15 years sooner.  I totally would be the guy with a few 10mm handguns right now.

Yeah, my personality would definitely tripped me up and send me down that rabbit hole.

I'd have over paid for a Bren Ten and definitely overpaid for the magazines. 

Phew.

Ok, alternate universe....  Nothing but .45.  Two 1911s, two 625 revolvers, maybe cut down to 2 inch barrel to be an impossibly imporactical pocket carry monstrosity, and a DeLisle style .45 bolt action with a big can.

Ok, that is madness.  Forget it.

If I was starting over

Buying guns.

Current-ish gunblog meme.

Starting over, now, knowing what you know, what do you get?

I'd buy two duplicate Commodity Plastic Striker Fired Service Pistols. Used. While living in a state that allows you to do that.

 (This all presumes a volcano opens up under my neighborhood and takes my house and all my stuff and that is why I am starting over buying guns from scratch at my age).

I'd buy two duplicate pocket pistols.  Used.  Prolly some pre-lock J-Frames that time on all 5.

That's about it.  Maybe a double barrel shotfun.  In case hunting.  Prolly don't need a spare, so no duplicate necessary.

I'm too old to do much rifle work in the militia.  But if I ended up in rifle country?  Meh, a couple ARs would get built, mebbe.  Put a pin in the rifle category.  Say zero for now.

No 1911s, sadly.  It's a great gun, but starting from scratch to make one work right again is a long haul.

So four, maybe five.  Three really.  Two pistols and their spares, maybe a shotgun.

I wouldn't even mod them much.  No tritium sights, frex.

Spare parts that'd fit in a .30 cal ammo box.  Ammo for each type that would fit in a .50 cal ammo box.  Four spare mags for a total of eight for 9mm.  Level III retention holster for the big pistols.  Small safe to store them in.

"What about a .22, T-bolt?"

What about it?  Nah.

Hmmm

Some folks are training themselves to say, "I am in fear for my life!" when about to use lethal force.

Meh, I don't think that phrase is the magic talisman of legal protection you think it is, Scooter.  But read that link and let Greg Ellifritz explain it to you.

I mean you might as well go on about Ezekiel 25:17:  "The path of righteous man is beset on all sides the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men..."

If you are gonna bust a cap, might as well do it in style, am I right?  Prolly doesn't look good in front of a jury, but hey, you got Sprite out of it.  

2 SEP 1945

Yeah, that's pretty much where I am.

Policy might not matter to those who get paid well to rewrite the same outrage tripe ever week

But for normal families, proposals to double taxes, outlaw private insurance, take guns, stack courts, end electoral college *may* matter more than mean tweetshttps://t.co/bKmlV1GULV

— Retired Orrin G. Hatch (@RetiredOrrin) August 31, 2019

Calls himself "the chosen one" in a presser?  Heh.  Don't take that stuff too seriously, man, it'll drive you crazy.  He's messin wit chu, almost certainly. 

I do wish he was a little better on guns. Or that Paul Ryan wasn't such a simp from 2016 - 2018 and we'd have passed vital gun rights legislation back then.

BIDS

I've been calling for something like BIDS for years.  YEARS.  Glad others are of the same mind.  Maybe it'll spread even further.

You want universal background checks? Fine.  Just divorce the check from the serial number of the firearm.  Or if the sale happened at all. 

Joe Blow wants to sell a gun to John Schmoe this month?  John Schmoe got a valid background check this month, costing about $20?  Fine.

Why do it this way?  To protect innocent law abiding gun owners from gov't overreach.  What about the criminals?  What about them?  They were never doing ANY of this, at any rate. 

To continue the compromise, purge all previous background checks that are tied to serial numbers.  All good.  I was assure by both sides that it was never suppose to ever be a gun registry. 

Oh you didn't mean that?  Then forget it.  It's off.  You've always dealt with us American people in bad faith, then.  Repeal Brady AND the 1968 GCA.  Molon Labe, &c., &c.