August 21st, 2009
Dear Friend,
If you have ever read an issue of our Concealed Carry Magazine, you’ll recognize the name Dr. Bruce Eimer from his extremely popular column: The Armed Senior Citizen.
Well, if you want access to Dr. Eimer, I’ve got great news for you. He has started an online forum all about the defensive use of handguns.
Be sure to check it out: http://www.defensivehandguns.com
A big thank-you to Dr. Eimer for being such an important part of the USCCA team.
|
== Survival Update == |
|
>>Click Here To Learn More<< |
Another Gun On Lay-Away
“…current administration is in power and/or the chance of a more brutal Assault Weapons Ban is strongly in play….”
by CR Williams
I put another another pistol on lay-away a couple of days ago.
I have a couple of reasons, main reasons, that I did this. The primary reason is to have a copy of my primary carry weapon available. If I’m ever involved in a defensive shooting, it is likely that my pistol will be taken up as evidence and not released to me until a final ruling is made on my case. Without a spare weapon, I would have a problem if friends or relatives of my attacker were to take his case up with me outside of public opinion and the courts. So I like to have a spare, same model, same type, set up the same way, fitting the same holster, just in case I fall on the wrong side of the bell curve some day.
That’s the practical main reason. The other main reason is more interesting to me. There is a nagging thought, a back-of-the-mind idea that, as long as it’s not stressing me financially, I should be keeping a firearm “in the pipeline” in one way or another at least as long as the current administration is in power and/or the chance of a more brutal Assault Weapons Ban is strongly in play.
It’s an interesting thought, that one. It’s not driven by fear that I can tell, because the political climate is currently running more in our favor than against it from a Second Amendment enhancement standpoint. Most states now allow some degree of ownership and concealed carry, and the latest NRA-ILA newsletter has an encouraging number of state laws going through that strengthen citizen rights to own, carry, and use firearms in self-defense. At least two amendments to legislation and one outright bill passing through Congress now are aimed at blanket recognition of concealed-carry permits across every state that allows it. (While you may not agree with this legislative idea, acknowledge that it is more for us than against us and part of the continuing trend.) And there have been legal victories across the US based on the Heller decision.
Shortages of weapons and ammunition have also begun to ease up. I am seeing both increased availability and decreasing price in both areas. I don’t believe it will be like the ‘good old days’ before the election for a long time if at all, but I am encouraged by the easing I do see.
Still, the back-of-the-mind idea persists. And so, as long as it doesn’t put me on a diet of Ramen Noodles, and as long as it’s something I like and/or it fits some place in my scheme of what I might use, or if there is a particular reason I want this particular gun, and as long as it’s a reasonable price, I will, for a while longer, put something on lay-away every so often. I will also continue to send a few dollars per paycheck into a ‘gun fund’ that might eventually get something that I can’t find to put on lay-away. And I’ll do that for at least a few months longer or until the list in my mind is filled, whichever comes first.
I will also continue to monitor the legislation that comes through my state and federal government as best I can, and I will continue to communicate with my state and federal representatives whether I think it will influence them or not, and I will continue to support at least two gun rights organizations if not more as I am able to. Because as quiet as it seems to be right now and as distracted as our opponents seem to be right now, there is still a threat. They have not forgotten what they want to do, and their patience has been rewarded in the past. They will wait as they need to until the time is right and the circumstances are more in their favor, and they will try again.
So now, while they are weaker and distracted and we are stronger and focused, now is the time to make our move. Support legislation, communicate with legislators whether you think it does any good or not, and facilitate those who speak for us and work for us in the hallways, the offices, the hearing rooms, and the courts.
“To crush your enemies and see them driven before you…” Ghenghis Khan said that was the greatest pleasure. It doesn’t have to be yours, but wouldn’t you take delight in seeing the anti-gunners disrupted and driven and shattered legally and politically and in public opinion? We have the strength—do we have the focus? The will? The patience? Can we turn the momentum we have now into unstoppable force, the isolated rocks on the hill into an avalanche that buries the antis for years to come?
YES. WE. CAN.
If we do not stop with what we’ve got. If we don’t lose focus like we have in the past. If we don’t turn away from the real enemies and fight among ourselves. If we learn and use the tactics and strategies that work. If we are patient like they are.
To crush our enemies and see them driven before us…
But we have to work for it. I’ll do that. Will you join me?
While you decide, I’ll be working on this lay-away…
USCCA Laugh of the Week
Coming Up On Armed American Radio
The Official Voice of the USCCA
by Mark Walters
What a show last week with the Mad Ogre, George Hill and Mike Barham from Galco. We packed as much as we could into the hour, in fact more than we normally do. At one point we had four people on at the same time when Ms. Nikki Goeser joined us live during a call. After the program, George and I were talking and he, like everyone else noted that the program needs to be longer. He is right. The biggest, in fact the ONLY complaint we get is from listeners who need more than one hour…well…we heard you!
Beginning on September 1st, AAR begins an aggressive expansion across America. We expect to be announcing new affiliate stations across the country at a pretty solid pace and as a result, starting on September, 13th 2009 ARMED AMERICAN RADIO WILL GO TO A TWO HOUR FORMAT! That’s right, we will now be feeding your head with TWO SOLID HOURS of the truth! YOU asked for it! YOU got it!
Joining me this week on AAR will be Mr. Erick Williams, noted firearm trainer from Jacksonville, Florida who will be discussing a wide range of training topics. We’ll also talk about what the heck is going on with the Florida permit situation as well as discussing the events of May, 6th 2006 when Erick heard that one of his students had used skills learned in his class to kill a man attacking his family one horrifying night. You read about it in my column if you are a member of USCCA, if not, YOU SHOULD BE!
Also joining me for one half hour will be former congressman and Libertarian candidate for president in 2008, Mr. Bob Barr. A friend of the second amendment, we will be getting inside the head of this former congressman to find out his thoughts on what the heck this current administration is up to and what it means for our rights as gun owners!
Join me LIVE this Sunday evening for Armed American Radio. To learn more or see where you can pick up the show around the country, please visit www.armedamericaradio.org
Review of Blackhawk’s Enhanced Pro Shooters Bag
USCCA Gear Review
A trip to the range requires lots of support gear to be able to shoot those practice rounds safely and effectively. Also, none of us want to be caught at the range without a simple part or tool to fix a minor problem that could ruin the whole session. Direct experiences, or forward thinking, causes us to go into Boy Scout mode and Be Prepared. But being prepared means we are bringing lots of stuff that can weigh us down. Even a couple of hundred rounds of ammo can be quite heavy.
A new shooter who has zero experience with range sessions soon realizes that a good container to tote the gear back and forth is more than an accessory, it is a necessity. So which container is best? A hard container or a range bag? Well, for this review, I’m discussing a range bag from Blackhawk. In particular, their Enhanced Pro Shooters Bag Model 80SB06BK.
This bag is big but not huge. It is by no means unmanageable. It has a removable pad on the shoulder strap that I really like. Just about every soft container that I have ever owned had the option of a shoulder strap, but most of the pads on the straps were lousy. They were either too tiny, or they were not made of a material that would grip the fabric of whatever I was wearing. The shoulder pad on this strap is made of a tacky feeling rubber-like material that has just the right amount of grip to keep the strap on the shoulder, and the pad is big too at 12 1/4 inches long. Blackhawk calls it their HawkTex Shoulder Pad.
The bag has two end pockets, one large center storage compartment, and another storage compartment on the front of the bag, with a mesh storage compartment on the back. All of the zippers are YKK type, they have silent zipper pulls, and there is a double carry handle with a hook & loop overwrap.
Access to the main storage compartment is gained by opening a dual zippered flap that has a hook & loop cover flap at one end. One can open just one zipper to gain access, or open both zippers and swing the cover flap out of the way for wide-open access to the main storage compartment. There are web loops on one side of the main storage compartment, and a full panel lined with loop material to attach any accessories with hook backing on them such as holsters for guns, and magazine carriers.
I can secure guns and just about any other accessory on the loop panel inside the main storage area with holsters and carriers that have hook backing on them. This makes it easy to customize this range bag to the shooter. It wouldn’t be hard to load this bag down with so much gear that the shooter might have trouble lifting it up! A couple of full-size autoloaders around two pounds each, a few hundred rounds of ammo weighing a few more pounds, spare magazines, hearing and eye protection, cleaning gear, takedown and repair tools, a spare spring, extractor, or other parts, targets, staple gun and spray glue for paper targets, gloves, a kitchen sink and this bag starts to weigh as much as a woman’s purse.
The bag is made of 1000 Denier Nylon. Tough stuff indeed. The dimensions are 7 inches by 17 inches by 12.5 inches. None of these types of bags from any reputable manufacturer are cheap nowadays. At $132.99, the Blackhawk Enhanced Pro Shooters Bag isn’t cheap either. But on the other hand, it isn’t made cheap.
I’ve been using an old plastic toolbox to tote my gear around. It’s kind of clumsy to haul around, and doesn’t offer any more protection to the contents than this sturdy, nicely padded range bag. This bag from Blackhawk is made to take the bumps and knocks typical of transporting expensive gear back and forth to the range. The main compartment is padded on all four sides and the bottom too, with .375 inch closed-cell foam. I wouldn’t be worried if I dropped the bag with my gear in it.
I like this bag, and would be more than happy to keep it for myself to use. I’d really like to replace the old tool box I use with this bag, but I’m going to give it to a man who deserves a gift or two. His name is Jimmy Shape, and he is the son-in-law of my friends Frank C. and Ruth Ann Menhart Jr. Jimmy married Frank’s eldest daughter Gretchen. Gretchen and Jimmy had baby Makenna on April 1, 2009. She was born at only 25 weeks, and only weighed 1.2 pounds!
This photo is of Makenna that was sent to my cell phone eight days after she was born:
Makenna is a true representation of God’s love and miracles and will be coming home soon even though one of her physicians said on more than one occasion that Gretchen and Jimmy should just take her off of all support, and just hold her until she dies. Yes, he really said that!
Jimmy is an avid fan of guns and shooting, so I’m going to give him this range bag and a set of Caldwell’s G3 Series Stereo Electronic Hearing Protectors. I don’t have any gifts for Gretchen or Baby Mac, as I refer to Makenna, but maybe my wife and I can come up with something. Way beyond the giving of hearing protectors and a range bag, we are all so very happy that Baby Mac will be coming home, though there were those who were convinced that she would never live long enough to even have any hope of that day coming.
I really think that Jimmy will enjoy this Enhanced Pro Shooters Bag from Blackhawk, and it is made well enough that it should last him for many years. If you want one for yourself, go to www.blackhawk.com.
A Must Read…
USCCA Exclusive
Dear Tim,
I am not writing to ask a question, I am writing to say thanks for the Beat the Ban. I thought I was ahead of the curve, but only realized I had been putting off buying what I may need and what I really wanted before the Obamanation takes place. I wanted to beat the ban.
I was going to joke and say your Beat the Ban cost more than 17.00 dollars, hell I bought a Saiga 12 Shotgun overpaid but got it anyway and to 2 RRA AR15s at retail cost due to having a gunsmith relationship. I also bought some fantastic 5.56 ammo and over 2k rounds of practice ammo.
My next purchase will probably be an SKS or AR47. I have read a great deal more about my rights to arm myself and to protect my country from a threat.
Thanks for placing me ahead of the curve and your book only cost me over 2800.00 dollars in guns and ammo. Well lets just say it was a good investment in my family’s future! Best to you and your family and may you continue with success and great health.
-Mike P.
Proud USCCA Member
Proud Member of the NRA
Proud American!
This is a DIGITAL PRODUCT on PDF and MP3, so you get this timely information instantly delivered to your inbox, so you can Beat the Ban ASAP!
Quote of the Week
“Certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms. This is not to say that firearms should not be very carefully used and that definite safety rules of precaution should not be taught and enforced. But the right of citizens to bear arms is just one more guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against a tyranny which now appears remote in America, but which historically has proved to be always possible.”
-Sen. Hubert Humphrey, Know Your Lawmakers, Guns, Feb. 1960, p. 4
USCCA Forum Highlights
Every paying website member has complete access to the USCCA forum, which is constantly being accessed by members sharing information, knowledge, insight, and fun. With well over sixty-thousand posts and growing by the hour, this is one heck of a valuable resource!
If you have never logged in but are a member, visit THIS location to watch help videos, including how to find out your username and/or password!
*******************
Saved By The Gun With No Shots Fired
I live in a city in NE Ohio that has been inundated by the gangs coming out of the Cleveland area. When I moved here about 13 years ago it was a nice quiet neighborhood with nice houses and good neighbors. In the last 5 years or so things have been deteriorating but I’m not ready to move right now so I have a choice. Hide in the house terrified like the rest of the neighbors and let these punks run the neighborhood or stand my ground and not put up with their crap. I choose the second option.
My wife and I both have our CCW and carry all the time. I usually carry my Glock 22 and my wife carries her Sig 232. An incident occurred here about 6 weeks ago where myself and several neighbors chased a group of these kids out of the area with the assistance of the local PD. The LEOs were 100% on our side in the matter and told us that they were getting 40+ calls a week on this street dealing with these kids and they really can’t do much to them because they know exactly how far they can push things without doing enough to get arrested.
Since this all took place in front of my house I thought that there would be some kind of retaliation from the gang so I figured it would be a good time to put up a good surveillance system. This was the second best decision I have made. First best was carrying a gun all the time.
One of the favorite things for these kids to do was to drop their trash in my front yard. Not much of a threat but with the cameras running 24/7, several kids are currently spending their free time doing community service and cleaning up some of the trash in the city. It had greatly reduced the problems in my area of the hood because most of these punks don’t like to be on camera so they avoid the area around my house.
The exception is one 5 foot tall 130 pound kid that is trying hard to be the crazy gang leader. One evening this week I notice a Cheetos bag laying in my front yard so I went in a ran the recording back to see where it came from. What the video showed was this punk kid finishing his snack and with a big smile throwing the empty bag in my front yard. This was great. I burned a copy the video from both front cameras and printed out a few still images for the police and in the morning called the police on this kid. The LEO said that this was cut and dry and the kid would get cited for littering… no problem.
When the kid found out that the police were looking for him because I turned him in he went crazy and decided to come get me. I was upstairs in my office talking to a customer on the phone when I started to hear someone yelling outside. It gradually grew louder and I finally recognized the voice. by the time I hung up the phone and went downstairs the kid was standing in my front yard calling me outside so he could kick my ass. I don’t ordinarily consider this kid a threat so I went out the front door while I was calling 911.
When I came out the kid came storming up my front yard and stopped about 20 feet from me while calling me every derogatory word in is small vocabulary and telling me how he was going to kick my ass while he was tearing off his shirt. Still not very impressed I figured that I would just wait for the police and let this kid hang himself because It was all being recorded.
This is when I noticed the baseball sized rock that he had in his right hand! OK, now I’m paying attention!
(Read the rest at the link above)
*******************
Does anyone have a company that they have bought cargos from that they really like? I’m looking for both durability and presentability. Thanks
*******************
Got a chance to buy a Rock River AR15 (.223) for a pretty good price. I don’t know that much about them except that I’ve wanted one for a long time and will buy one soon if I don’t get this one by the weekend. Is there anything in particular that I should be looking for that a AR15 novice like me would not think of? This one does have a chrome plated barrel, two stage trigger, folding rear sight, pistol grip, and 6 position buttstock.
Is there any reason why the Rock River would not be a wise choice? Any advice would appreciated!
Video of the Week
How Gun Free Zones Get People Killed
by Hermes Alvarez
This week, I want to feature a speech that a USCCA member gave to his college class. Doing this took some serious guts, and he hit a home-run.
Good going, Mr. Alvarez. This country needs more men like you!
Part 1:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bs8oXIP5VWU
Part 2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abRk8OvvdVw
USCCA Photo of the Week
All Photos of the Week are taken from Mr. Oleg Volk’s website:
http://www.a-human-right.com/.
It is a fantastic site. Please check it out!
USCCA Self Defense Story
Every day, thousands of Armed Americans use their firearms to preserve human life. Let this section of my newsletter serve as a record of this fact!
August 12, 2009 Jackson, Mississippi
From: The Boston Channel
Police had been watching Vincent Goff for years, convinced he was the masked man who sexually assaulted couples at gunpoint on the Mississippi coast. But before investigators closed in, they say Goff picked the wrong victim and was beaten nearly to death with his own rifle.
Goff, a 37-year-old unemployed Biloxi man with a wife and two stepsons, was being held Wednesday in the Harrison County Jail after spending five days in a hospital recovering from severe head wounds. Little is known about Goff’s background or the unidentified man who beat him so hard that the wood stock of the rifle broke. But authorities say Goff’s arrest caps a terrorizing series of attacks that began on the sandy banks of the Biloxi River in 2006.
Goff allegedly approached a man and woman last Thursday afternoon on an isolated logging road in Harrison County and forced them into the woods with a rifle, Sheriff’s Maj. Ron Pullen said Wednesday. They were forced to strip off their clothes and told to perform sexual acts when the male victim, described as a physically fit member of the military in his mid-30s, wrestled the gun away.
“He beat him until the stock broke over his head and then continued to beat him until he thought he had him incapacitated,” Pullen said.
Closing Thoughts
Dear Tim,
I find it funny the way people act when they ask or find out that I carry a concealed weapon. I have never done any thing against the law or anything else with a gun but they still act like I am a nut to even own a gun let a lone having a concealed gun. Some times my wife and I feel like outcast for the way we feel about our 2nd armed.
Thank you, -Hugh
Hugh, I feel your pain. That’s why we need to surround ourselves with people who think the same way we do. I’m not suggesting that we remove ourselves from society- no way!
But feeling alienated for doing something GOOD (like carrying concealed) is a bad thing- that is exactly why so many people have decided to become part of the USCCA.
Hugh, no matter how alone you feel sometimes, you are never alone. At the USCCA, there are over 30,000 armed citizens who understand your reasons for carrying a gun.
No related posts.
Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.
E-mail me at: cody@uscca.us
Follow Me on Twitter