LonelyMachines

Ah, YouTube: a veritable cornucopia of questionable gun advice. Today's example is MrSurplusnut . See if you can make it all the way through without cringing. He likes the word "scenario," and he really likes his CCW badge. By the two-minute mark, I lost count of the number of times he swept the camera with his finger on the trigger of a loaded gun.

Arizona Senator Lori Klein justified pointing a loaded gun at a reporter by claiming, "I just didn't have my hand on the trigger."  I wasn't aware that made it acceptable.  I'll have to run it past the folks I shoot with and see how they react. Evidently, Ms. Klein bought the Ruger LCP to supplement her ".40 caliber revolver."  Though she mentions the usual politician backstory of childhood hunting trips with dad, she does not mention any contemporary training, nor does she seem to understand the gravity of carrying a pistol. She is fond of the Ruger because it's "so cute."  I'm sure cleaning up blood and settling lawsuits diminishes the "cute" factor by quite a bit.  She needs to leave her guns at home until such a time as she can get some sort of training.  Until then, she's a dangerous liability to everyone around her.

HB 1217 has passed in Virginia.  The bill allows local elementary schools to teach firearms safety to students, using the NRA's Eddie Eagle program as a template. Predictable but impotent resistance came from the Virginia Center for Public Safety, a Brady Campaign partner .  The VCPC is an affiliate of States United to Prevent Gun Violence , who recently merged with Joyce Foundation beneficiary Freedom States Alliance (*). A spokesperson for the VCPC lamented that firearms safety training did not belong in the schools, and that it is "up to the parents to teach that at home."  With the latter, I agree. The problem is, that's not happening.  If parents were doing their jobs, this wouldn't be an issue.

Gun show reloads strike again.  Fortunately, the gun was intact. This is a casing from a 9mm reload, fired from a Glock 19.  It's a standard-pressure, 115gr FMJ sold in bulk at local gun shows.  What you're looking at is a case-head failure.  This can break a gun really quick. It can also lead to severe injury.  Saving a few bucks isn't worth taking such risks.

Ever since Taurus started marketing this silly gun , I've been saying something like this would happen: The gun, a model known as "The Judge," was loaded with bird shot, and Davis took aim at her husband and emptied all five of the weapon's chambers as he fled through the yard, Bonnett said. He was hit in the upper and lower back by two blasts before escaping, Bonnett said. Connie Davis shot her husband after he admitted to a prior affair.  Full stop. It doesn't matter that the loads were likely insufficient for causing serious bodily harm.  Ms. Davis leveled a deadly weapon at another human being and pulled the trigger.  That's the salient fact, and it illustrates my problem with the Taurus Judge.

Below is a 95gr .380 FMJ. Due to a negligent discharge, it ended up plowing through two plastic rifle cases, a wooden 2x4 bench, two layers of drywall and a chunk of carpeting. Though it was robbed of most of its energy, it still bounced hard enough to cross ~35 feet of a retail sales floor and lightly impact a wall. Notice that it's still largely intact and quite capable of rending flesh and bone.

Want to know why there isn't an outdoor range anywhere convenient to a metropolitan area? Want to know why even the remote ones keep closing up? Want to know why existing ranges receive such harassment ? Here's your answer: [flv:http://lonelymachines.org/video/resaca.flv 480 368] This video, filmed at the John's Mountain WMA range in Resaca, was brought to my attention today.  I've witnessed some truly horrid behavior at outdoor ranges, but I assumed that John's Mountain was far enough from the suburbs that it hasn't been subjected to this sort of treatment. Apparently not.  Besides the shocking number of safety violations, you can see plain vandalism to the property.  This is why we have to drive farther by the year to find a 100-yard range.

Her name is Barbara, but her friends call her Barbie.  I am not kidding; she told me this herself.  She's in her mid-40's, fake blonde and not very bright.  At some point, someone did Barbie the disservice of telling her she could cruise through life on her looks alone. Under some circumstances, I could almost pity her. That is, unless she's waving a loaded .357 Magnum in my face.

A sixgun or automatic pistol is a tool, and a deadly one; handle them as such. From the start, consider all guns as being loaded whether you know them to be empty or not. Treat them as loaded guns and you will never have an accident. I am scared of empty guns and keep mine loaded at all times. The family knows the guns are loaded and treats them with respect. Loaded guns cause few accidents; "empty guns" kill people every year. --Elmer Keith, Sixguns , p. 87 Posted because I'm tired of telling grown adults nicely. Photo from Dean Spier's site .