Not just the guns, but all the stuff that goes with them
Oh lookee here, at Gun Pusher Supreme Steve Barnett’s website: a delectable shotgun.
And yes, it fills all Kim’s checkboxes: side-by-side, double triggers, splinter forearm, straight stock, 20 gauge, 29-inch barrels.
Workmanlike-yet-classy gun case:
Decent-but not-showy engraving, plus a little case-coloring for a bonus:
And amazingly (for Barnett), a price that does not cause a nasal haemorrhage. (And for those who enjoy shoulder pain, they also have a 12ga version of the above.)
Have mercy.
Here’s the latest good news for our side, and bad news for them:
Numbers released Monday show that the FBI ran 192,749 National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) background checks on Black Friday 2022. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) noted that the 192,749 NICS checks on Black Friday 2022 “[rank] it third in the Top 10 Highest Days for NICS checks and…[represent] a 2.8 percent increase from Black Friday 2021.”
The FBI conducted 187,585 NICS checks on Black Friday 2021 and 186,645 checks on Black Friday 2020, Breitbart News reported.
The NSSF observed that there were 711,372 NICS checks “during the week leading up to and including Black Friday.”
The strong Black Friday NICS check numbers come after surges in gun sales during recent years.
For example, on October 6, 2022, Breitbart News reported retailers had sold over one million guns a month for 38 consecutive months.
You have to ask yourself about the Gun Control Set: “Why do they even bother, anymore?”
I mean, if you look at the thing clinically, the whole concept starts with that innate human characteristic, that instinct of self-preservation that has been baked onto your genetic structure, perhaps only alleviated a little by the “fight or flight” reaction to danger. So there has to be an enormous amount of cognitive dissonance to resist that impulse, and I can only think that it’s assisted by constant propaganda of the “guns are evil” mantra of the media and politicians. On the one hand, you have people who are genuinely upset by violence (and there’s nothing wrong with that) but think (mistakenly) that removing weapons from individuals will end violence; and on the other hand, you have the malignant power-seekers for whom an unarmed populace is the sine qua non for societal control. (There is an overlap between the two groups, and I’ll address that later on when it becomes more relevant to the discussion.)
Then, of course, came a group of wise men in 1779 who, when starting up a new country pretty much from scratch looked at the situation and said, “The natural instinct for self-preservation is so obvious, only a fool would attempt to gainsay it.” (Okay, they called it a God-given right, but it’s the same thing, really.) And having just escaped the clutches of a tyrannical* government a couple of years earlier, they were even more mindful of the fact that men needed tools to resist those bastards who would want to control whole populations. But then came an even wiser man who realized that one day there would be fools who would want to take away that God-given right, and governments who would work really hard to do so, and so he said, “Right. We’re actually going to codify this thing so that even a moron can understand that the right of people to self-defense (both personal and societal) cannot simply be legislated away by some asshole that may look like John Kerry, Chuck Schumer or Joe Biden,” and thus, the Second Amendment to the Constitution.
And yes, over the years that followed the anti-weapon hoplophobes were able to chip away at that natural and legal right, as the government had been reasonably successful at preventing bad people from inflicting violence on innocent people and society at large. So people were duped into thinking that just because some mope shot at a President with a mail-order Italian WWII military-surplus rifle, therefore nobody else should ever be able to order a rifle from Amazon; or that when the Constitution was written the authors thereof didn’t know about AK-47s — an efficient semi-automatic rifle being way more dangerous than a muzzle-loading musket and therefore should of course be banned — without realizing that muskets are all very well, until the government brings AK-47s (or their Mattel equivalent) to a little oppression party.
All this was fine and dandy until the Third American Revolution began in, of all places, Ferguson, Missouri and people suddenly realized that the government, largely composed of knaves, cowards and Socialists (some overlap), was no longer going to guarantee the safety of innocent people against mobs of murderous thugs and vandals.
Which is why, as the above article points out, ordinary people have gone out and bought over 38 million guns since Ferguson — to the surprise of absolutely nobody except the hoplophobes and government stooges.
One would think, returning to the original question posed at the top of this post, that supposedly intelligent and rational people would see the absolute common sense of all this, and say, “Screw it. There’s no point in trying to overcome this gun ownership thing, because doing so is just a stupid and futile gesture and so we’re not going to bother with it anymore.” And indeed some have:
Gun control advocate Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said Sunday that Democrats in the Senate “probably” do not have the votes to pass a ban on “assault weapons.”
But these hoplophobes are people who have attempted to deny basic human nature, and their government allies have attempted to suppress it; so I suppose it’s just a battle which we’re going to have to fight over and over again, ad infinitum et nauseam. And speaking of idiots, there’s this statement from President Braindead:
“The idea we still allow semi-automatic weapons to be purchased is sick,” said Biden. “It has no socially redeeming value… Not a single solitary rationale for it except profit for the gun manufacturers.”
My only regrets are that a) we didn’t get to 200,000 NICS** checks last Friday, and b) the purchases weren’t all semi-sutomatic rifles.
*the concept of “tyranny” is very much a relative one; the Founding Fathers may have thought that a 3% consumption tax on tea was iniquitous and therefore justified rebelling against the greatest world power since the Romans, so we can only guess what their reaction would be to a government which takes away over a third of a person’s wages at gunpoint, and The People just shrug and say, “Okay.”
**yet another little institution which would cause the Founding Fathers, were they alive today, to reach for their AK-47s.
Some of you may have read the above article and gone “Huh?” at my choice of chambering (9.3x62mm) for the Mauser. A brief explanation follows.
As I’ve grown older, the thought of owning a whole bunch of different rifles (modern, not oldies) has palled somewhat, to the extent where I think I would prefer one astoundingly-good rifle in a do-it-all chambering. So why choose the 9.3mm Mauser?
It’s more powerful than the .30-06 Springfield and has less recoil than the .375H&H Magnum. Also, it’s old, having been developed back in 1905. So it could take pretty much anything I’d need to kill, certainly in the U.S., and just about anything I cared to shoot in Africa, were I ever to find myself back there. The premium hunting ammo (Federal Woodleigh 286gr) is horrendously expensive (over $4 per pull); but of course Prvi Partizan, bless their little Balkan socks, make it for about $1.25 each so practice is not as expensive as one might think.
Here’s a quick comparison:
…and then with the mighty .375 H&H:
Here’s the thing: the 9.3mm Mauser isn’t as powerful as the H&H. But that reduction in power comes with about 25% less owie to the shoulder — and lest we forget, the 9.3 was used to hunt all sorts of African game (including elephant) in the decade or so before the H&H came to the party.
I like the idea of it.
…as in, blowing smoke up our ass. Here’s a breathless little piece which, after careful reading, sounds like the kind of scam you would expect from a Nigerian con man:
My immediate take is: no. Not even close. Not when you see puffery like this:
The Army’s Next Generation Squad Weapon (NGSW) efforts have resulted in multiple, unique 6.8 mm cartridge designs. Each of the companies involved has tried to develop a solution to the Army’s reported desire to penetrate modern, peer-level body armor far beyond close-combat ranges. The selections of SIG Sauer’s 6.8×51 mm hybrid-case ammunition, XM5 carbine and XM250 light machine gun as solutions have been met with both fanfare and skepticism. While the velocities that are reported for the 6.8×51 mm, and its .277 SIG Fury commercial counterpart, seem to generate the most excitement, this cartridge’s projectile energy is likely to be the main driver of the DOD’s interest.
According to SIG’s published numbers, its hybrid steel-and-brass cartridge case allows chamber pressures to reach a whopping 80,000 psi. Subsequently, its 150-grain projectile is reported to leave a 16-inch barrel at 2,830 fps with 2,667 ft.-lbs. of muzzle energy. Running those numbers through a ballistic program shows that SIG’s loads should fly flatter and hit much harder than anything used in current battle rifle and light machine gun designs, including 7.62 NATO/.308 Win. loads, out past 1,000 meters.
Long experience in examining the .dotmil’s record in tinkering around with this issue makes me think they’re still in the “oh what if” and “wouldn’t it be nice if” stages — wishful thinking, in other words — and even so there’s this little warning sign:
Pushing a bullet faster so that it will fly flatter and hit harder is one thing. Doing it without rapidly burning out barrels or prematurely wearing out other parts has proven difficult with several past attempts to achieve game-changing muzzle velocities.
Yeah, that bastard Newton enters the fray again. But all is well:
One bit of reassurance on barrel wear concerns comes from a reliable source within SIG, who told me the special material technology used in their 6.8 barrels can hold up to this high pressure cartridge.
Oh, well then we don’t have anything to worry about, do we? Manufacturers never lie about this kind of thing, especially when there’s a multi-billion dollar military contract dangling in the wind.
No doubt, their “special material techology” will be super-inexpensive too, cheaper than the current steel even.
Just think: if the US Army had adopted the superb .280 British (actually 7.2x43mm, or .284 in Murkin) cartridge back in the late 1940s, we’d still be fielding it — but no, we had to go to the 7.62×51 which was oops too powerful and then over-correcting with the .223 which was oops too underpowered. Ever since then, the Army has been fucking around trying to find ammo’s Holy Grail — and I have to say that based on what I can see, the 6.8x51mm isn’t going to The One. (FFS: .277 SIG “Fury”? Better ammo through marketing?)
It’s like watching a kid with learning issues trying to fit the multi-shaped sticks into the proper slots:
So, to answer the headline’s question, the answer is…
Idiots.
So Oregon’s prospective gun owners are going to get it in the shorts:
Gun sales more than doubled in Oregon with Ballot Measure 114 (BM 114) pending, and Oregon State Police are struggling to keep up with the demand for background checks.
KDRV reports that BM 114 passed by a margin of 50.9 percent to 49.1 percent, and will take effect December 8, 2022. The measure requires a permit, which costs $65, to purchase a gun. It also bans “high capacity” magazines and requires law enforcement to maintain a database of gun permit applicants, among other things. The process for getting a gun permit under BM 114 includes submitting fingerprints and passing a gun safety course.
And for all those Oregon gun owners who couldn’t be bothered to go out and vote on Nov 8: you have only yourselves to blame.
Ahhh that democracy thing… although I bet that if this “initiative” ever makes it to the Supreme Court, it will get revoked. Keyword: “if”.
Time to play this game again, as many people have written to ask for it.
The Challenge: You have the opportunity to go back in time, arriving on the east coast of North America circa 1650 in the early spring, and your goal is to cross the North American continent, taking as much time as you need. When / if you reach the Pacific coastline, you’ll be transported back to the present day. Your equipment for this journey will be as follows (taken back in the time capsule with you):
— enough provisions for the first five days’ travel
— a backpack containing some clothing essentials
— a winter coat, raincoat and boots
— waterproof sleeping bag
— an axe
— a couple of knives, and a small sharpening stone
— a box of 1,000 “strike anywhere” waterproof matches
— a portable water filtration system
— a set of topographic maps of North America
— binoculars and a compass
— a current U.S. Army First Aid kit
— ONE long gun (shotgun or rifle) and 300 rounds of ammo (but no scope; and no interchangeable-barrel rifles like a Thompson Center Encore or Blaser; drillings are acceptable, but you still only get 300 rounds of ammo, total)
— ONE handgun (and 200 rounds)
— ONE rimfire gun (either a rifle or handgun, with 500 rounds).
Once there, you’ll be given a horse, a mule and a dog or two — but apart from that, you’re on your own. Remember you’ll be traveling through deep woods, open prairie, desert and mountains. You may encounter hostile Indian tribes and dangerous animals en route, which should be considered when you answer the following questions (and only these):
1. What long gun would you take back in time with you?
2. What handgun?
3. What rimfire gun?
Unlike previous surveys, I’m not going to tabulate the answers; just have at it in Comments. Reasons need not be given, as the choices will pretty much speak for themselves. If you must justify your choices, keep it short (as I have with mine).
Oh, and one last thing: you can’t keep your previous choices of firearm; you must find new ones. So in my case, for example, I can’t pick the 1896 Swedish Mauser / CZ Safari Magnum and Ruger Redhawk .357 revolver / Springfield 1911 from the last couple of times — so my own new choices for this year are below the fold. Read more