Well, not quite – but an equally iconic service weapon of the former glorious British Empire.
On a side note, despite their troubles on the island itself, Her Majesty’s troops seem to still be capable of imparting civilization to fuzzy-wuzzies in certain parts of the world.
Say for the moment that you’re looking for a snub-nosed, compact revolver, and for some reason you’ve taken leave of your senses and have decided to not get a Smith & Wesson J-frame, a Ruger SP101, or a Ruger LCR. Say that you’ve descended even further into madness and narrowed your choices down to a Taurus revolver, or a Charter Arms revolver. Which one would you pick? Taurus, made in Brazil; or Charter, made in the USA?
For me, I’d pick the Charter Arms gun. Not because I think it’s a better or worse gun, although the one Taurus snubbie I owned had the very worst trigger of any gun I’ve ever shot ever on it, which turned me off to Taurus guns. Plus, I figure that both the Taurus and the Charter have a high probability of throwing a part, so when they break I’d rather deal with Charter’s lifetime warranty than haranguing Taurus for 6-9 months to fix my $300 gun.
Tomorrow night at 9pm Eastern time, we’re proud to be hosting Representative Mike Murphy on Gun Nuts Radio. Rep Murphy is the author/sponsor of a couple of pro-gun bills in the Indiana Assembly right now, and it’s our pleasure to have him join tomorrow night’s show.
For show information, we air on the Blog Talk Radio network, the first all online streaming radio network in the nation. The show can be heard live by going to Gun Nuts Radio The Next Generation of Shooting on Blog Talk Radio at 9pm Eastern on Tuesdays, and the archives can be downloaded by visiting that link at any time.
Don’t forget, that’s live tonight at 9pm at www.blogtalkradio.com/gunnuts!
EXETER, NH (January 2010) – SIG SAUER, Inc., the leading manufacturer of commercial, law enforcement, and military firearms, has introduced the E² Enhanced Ergonomics versions of the benchmark P226 & P229 series of pistols. The SIG SAUER E² models provide improved handling for a wider range of shooters than ever before in two of the most popular SIG handgun platforms.
These should be on display at the 2010 SHOT SHOW. More from Sig’s press release:
The E² Enhanced Ergonomics P226 & P229 are currently available in 9mm with Nitron finish and SIGLITE Night Sights. Both models ship in a hard carry case with three 15-round magazines and have an MSRP of $1,149.00. For more information, log on to http://sigsauer.com.
Three 15-round magazines? Sign me up! It’s too bad that the price is almost $1200, as that puts these out of the range of a lot of people looking for an affordable defensive handgun. Still, the new gun is pretty cool looking.
At least, that’s how this story should read. There are multiple valuable lessons in this article for the armed citizen, and for anyone mindful of their own right to self defense. Let’s begin at the beginning, though.
Daniel Hauff, 33, said he tried to quell a dispute between two men on the train when one of them, joined by two other riders, began yelling gay slurs and other taunts at him.
Tip number 1: Don’t be a hero. If two dudes are about to start throwing hands, or shoving, or shouting, or anything like that, remember these words: “It’s not my fight”. If you’re an armed citizen, or just someone riding the train, let those two jerks settle it themselves. Only intervene if your safety is at jeopardy.
Hauff said he pressed the emergency intercom, and the conductor came. But the conductor soon left, Hauff said, and the train started moving again.
Tip number 2: Don’t count on other people to be there to defend you. I think we can all agree on this one, that when seconds count, the police, the authorities, or the people with badges are minutes away. Ultimately you and you alone are responsible for your own safety. Don’t count on the law to be there when you need them…which is why you shouldn’t go looking for trouble (see tip number 1).
Hauff said the men beat him while the train was between the Wilson and Argyle stops. “And I never once threw a punch,” Hauff said. “It’s just not in my nature.” Hauff said he got away by wiping some of his blood on the attackers and telling them he was HIV-positive, which was not true.
Tip number 3: Don’t just stand there and get your ass kicked. Seriously, if you are even attacked, fight back. Once violence has started, the time for being passive is over. Mr. Hauff sort of got that by employing an unorthodox weapon, but this was a fight that never should have happened to begin with.
If there is one thing I would take away from this, it’s my personal self defense mantra: you always win the fight that never happens. Or more poetically: he who flees and runs away can run away another day. Until someone hands me a badge again, it’s not my job, it’s not your job, nor is it your responsibility to break up fights. You don’t have to play peacemaker or anything like that – you defend yourself, and if you feel so obligated, defend innocent bystanders; but if two jerks on the train want to punch each other’s lights out, I say grab some popcorn and enjoy the show.
Received via long form text from a friend:
My name is Jorge Su?rez, from Venezuela , and I?m IDPA Safety Officer Instructor. If you have attended any National Championship last years, surely you saw me helping in a stage. Else, nice to meet you.
I?m working very hard to create IDPA in different countries around the world, specifically in Latin America , and running some matches there. Due this, I want invite you to attend our next matches:Brazilian Match: it will be held on Belo Horizonte , Brazil , and it?s coordinated by CBTD (Defensive Shooting Brazilian Confederation, in English). This 2-days match will be the first IDPA match in this country. Dates: March 13 & 14, 2010. This is not an IDPA sanctioned match. Information: www.cbtd.org.br (Mr. Sergio Bitencourt)
1st. Costa Rica International Match: a major and IDPA sanctioned match (see www.idpa.com) during 3 days: April 2, 3 & 4, 2010, in Costa Rica , a special country.. You can find a lot of information in English about this match. See www.acsicr.com (Mr. Alberto Soto)
I’m sending this information to you, as club contact, and I beg you that inform all your members and shooters who want to attend this exciting matches, and get the chance to visit this very beautiful countries. All coordinators in this countries have many information about tourism in this area, including beaches, volcanos, jungle, historic places, and many more.
Please, send this information to all IDPA shooter that you know. Any kind of information, just write me an email to: [email protected]
Take care.
Jorge Surez
www.ateca.com.ve
VENEZUELA
Shooting sports in Venezuela? Awesome.
In 2009, I set goals for myself for my shooting sports accomplishments. Some of those goals were realistic, and some of them quite aptly demonstrate how unfocused I was in my goals in the shooting sports. To put it mildly, very, very unfocused. With that painful lesson in mind about setting realistic goals, here are my goals for 2010 which hopefully are a bit more realistic and focused than I was in 2009.
Right now, I’m Expert Class. The last time I shot the qualifier, I missed Master by about 10 seconds, but there are places in that qualifier where I could easily shave that time in points or penalties.
Again, this is another goal that I’m right on the cusp of. With limited practice and training time, I shot a 1458 last year, and finished in the Top 20 at Bianchi Cup. I feel like focusing and practicing will allow me to improve on that finish if I actually dedicate some significant range time to preparing for The Cup.
That one pretty much explains itself.
Last year, I won my class/division, ESR Expert, but lost the overall division crown to a shooter that just plain outshot me. Not this year. My goal this year is to win the whole thing.
I was overly ambitious with my goals last year. Unfortunately, I let my eyes get bigger than my stomach in terms of the matches I wanted to shoot and things I wanted to do. This year, the focus is on being realistic. I want to set manageable goals, and I also don’t want to kill myself trying to make it to every major match in the country, all while trying to hold down a real job, a marriage, and some kind of life outside of the shooting sports.
Not just good advice for kids, but everyone.
Is that it really is forever. I have the same problem as Tam, inasmuch as I look back on some of the things I’ve said on gun forums (and even on previous iterations of this blog) and I just roll my eyes and cringe. Usually this is accompanied by me saying “what was I THINKING”, which is rhetorical because the answer is clearly “nothing”.
It can be painful having your learning process displayed out in the open for the whole world to see, but at the same I feel that it’s also good for me to do that, because it helps keep me honest. I can’t just bury the stupid things that I’ve said and pretend they never happened, if someone wants to dig up an old quote of mine and feed it back to me, they’re merely a few searches away from that.
On the flip side, it’s also kind of neat. It’s easy to look back at old posts, old match reports, old scores, and see how much things have improved. I can see scores improving, but more importantly I can see my understanding of the mechanics of shooting has improved. That’s in no small part to the friendships and relationships I’ve picked up from this blog – classes with Todd Jarrett go a long way towards improving one’s skill as a pistol shooter, for example.
The moral of the story of course is that the internet is forever, so think twice, post once. But if you do say something dumb, like “Hi Points don’t completely suck” (they do) then just eat your crow when the time comes and learn from it.
Brownells has made a practical rifle shooting DVD, featuring the one and only Jerry Miculek. A lot of people don’t know that in addition to being the Revolver God, Jerry is a multi-time 3-gun National Champion, and has won countless “Outlaw” 3-gun matches as well.
The DVD will be available at Brownell’s website, the stock number is going to be 100-004-974, as well as Jerry’s website which is at www.bang-inc.com. According to the Brownells press release, the DVD will cover everything from setting up your rifle to stance, grip, trigger control; and all the way up to advanced shooting techniques. If you are an AR15 shooter, trust me, there is something in this DVD for you. Regardless of whether you run that AR for competition, home defense, hunting, or just to upset Nancy Pelosi, Jerry Miculek is someone to learn from.
As an aside, I actually starting doing the hands-forward grip on my carbines after watching a Jerry Miculek rifle protip on ShootingUSA where he demonstrated the grip. Since then, I’ve been getting faster and faster, and I haven’t looked back to the “Modern Technique” grip.