Mississippi Democrat Pushes RKBA for DC: To the dismay of the
Washington, D.C., police chief and others who are trying to limit gun
ownership in the nation's capital, Rep. Travis Childers is pressing
legislation that would rollback restrictions. Childers, a Democrat from
Prentiss County, won a special election in May to represent the 1st
District. He hopes to offer his bill this week as an amendment to a much
narrower bill sponsored by Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-D.C. Childers
says his legislation is needed to comply with the Supreme Court's ruling
in June that the city's wide-ranging gun ban violates the Second
Amendment's right to bear arms...
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008809140368
---
Rule Two, Rule Three Reminder: Monday night at approximately 10:45 p.m.,
Martin County Deputy Daniel Foote was responding to a call for service
at 1225 NW Federal Highway. During the course of the investigation,
Deputy Foote was retrieving a Smith & Wesson .38 caliber revolver from
the trunk of a vehicle present at the scene. The weapon discharged
striking Deputy Foote in the left leg. Martin County Fire Rescue
responded to the scene and D/S Foote was transported to Martin Memorial
North for treatment. The injury is not life-threatening. (Rule Two:
Don't let the muzzle cross anything you're not prepared to shoot. Rule
Three: Keep your finger out of the trigger guard, up on the frame, until
your sights are on the target and you're prepared to shoot.)
http://www.wptv.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=9c16cf19-e46b-4e5f-a276-df7f3ba853c4
---
Japan Fails to Provide Adequate Sickle Control: A Japanese man killed
one person and injured six with a sickle at the grounds of a Shinto
shrine where an autumn festival was winding down, the police said
Sunday...Kyodo said the man told the police that he had become angry
after being teased by a customer, and that he went home and returned to
the grounds of the shrine, where around 20 or 30 people remained after
the festival, and began slashing at people with the sickle. Japan, where
crime rates are relatively low, was shocked last June when a man who
said he was tired of life went on a stabbing rampage in the crowded
Tokyo shopping district of Akihabara, killing seven people and wounding
a dozen others. (If Japanese crime rates are relatively low it's because
organized Yakuza crime is ignored in the statistics.)
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/14/world/asia/14japan.html?ref=world
---
From John Farnam:
8 Sept 08
Relative preparedness, from and colleague in the Midwest:
"This is a 'first' for me:
As is my habit, and yours, I started last week's Intermediate Defensive
Pistol Class with a dry-fire drill. I commanded students to report to
the line, face downrange, and unload.
One student interrupted me and said his pistol was loaded. I replied
that I expected all pistols to be loaded, and that we would thus all
unload at once. He emphatically responded with, 'You don't
understand! There's a round in the chamber.' 'Yes, that is perfectly
normal,' said I. 'We'll now unload them all before we run this exercise.'
By now, he was panicked, as we obviously were not communicating. He
nervously swept his cover-garment back, only to expose an empty
holster! He, and I, were baffled, as was the rest of the Class.
Suddenly changing subjects, he asked he if he could borrow a gun! I
asked if his pistol was in his range bag, or in his car. He then
started to tell a convoluted story about earlier in the day when he went
to the... , and his voice trailed off.
I asked the rest of the Class to take a break, as I took this student
off to the side. I indicated to him that, although he had passed our
Basic Program some weeks earlier, today was not a good day for him to
have any kind of gun and that he needed to go home and get his wits
together.
He departed, and we haven't seen him since!
It's a free Country, and no one is required to demonstrate that he is a
non-idiot before buying a car, a gun, or becoming a parent! We all have
bad days, but there are some people who need to either (1) get serious
about life and personal goals or (2) voluntarily pass on at least the
last two!"
Comment: "Somewhere, a True Believer is preparing to murder you. He is
making do with minimal food, water, supplies, facilities, and
sympathy. He has learned to depend upon nothing and no one, except
himself. To his superiors, he is expendable. He trains day and night.
He lives in filth and has lost count of his scars and brushes with
death. The only clean things on him are his weapons, and he
manufactured his own web gear. He doesn't obsess over cardiovascular
health, body fat, blood-pressure, carbohydrates, nor what workout is
best. He is thankful to have anything to eat! His gear weighs what it
weighs, and his runs "end" only when his enemies stop chasing him. This
True Believer has scant concern with pain and discomfort, neither his
nor anyone else's. Brutalized from infancy, he has become brutal
himself, and he knows with each encounter, he either wins, or dies, and,
either way, nobody cares, nor ever will. He expects no mercy, nor will
he have any. He doesn't plan on living to old age, and he doesn't go
home at 1700. He is home!"
He lives his "...ism." Do you?
/John
9 Sept 08
Seattle cops indicted in SD biker-bar shooting incident:
Friends in Sturgis, SD tell me that their grand jury last week indicted,
for aggravated assault, a City of Seattle, WA police officer in the wake
of a shooting incident in a local biker-bar during Sturgis' annual Bike
Week last month. Several other SPD officers in the same group have also
been indicted on lesser charges, mostly for carrying concealed guns
while drinking in a drinking establishment. Members of the Hell's
Angels contingent who were involved in the same incident have also been
indicted, also for aggravated assault, and at least one for illegally
carrying a concealed gun.
The grand jury has obviously said: "Enough is enough! When you come to
our town (1) carrying guns and (2) obviously looking for trouble, don't
be astonished when you find it, more than you ever wanted, and we don't
care whom you are nor where you're from!"
The fight in question erupted in a notorious biker-bar in Sturgis during
the equally-notorious "Bike-Week." Members of various biker groups, all
displaying "colors," descend in droves upon Sturgis once a year for the
one-week event. Local biker-bars, all but deserted the rest of the
year, have standing-room-only during bike-week!
Wounds received by the Hell's Angel member who was shot were serious,
but not fatal. Gun involved was a G22. Two shots were fired. Both
hit. Brand of ammunition was not reported. No one else was hurt by
gunfire.
It is unclear who "started it," but the SPD officer who shot the Hell's
Angels member, at the moment of the shooting, was getting the worst of a
physical fight. In fact, many consider the shooting to be legitimate
self-defense, and, had it taken place anywhere but a rowdy bar, late at
night, and among a bunch of people who had been drinking, the grand jury
likely would have seen it that way.
There will be criminal trials, and, of course, and the outcomes are
anyone's guess, but this grand jury has apparently decided to put its
foot down, hard! I'm not sure these indictments represent a "trend,"
those of us who carry concealed, and regularly travel out-of-state, need
to take note!
Most otherwise perfectly-respectable franchises, like Outback, Red
Lobster, Olive Garden, Ruth Chris, Texas Road House, et al have bars and
serve liquor, and, when traveling around the Country, I patronize all of
them on a regular basis for the purpose of partaking of a nice dinner.
I don't sit at the bar, and I don't drink, but I often find myself in a
place that serves liquor, while I'm carrying a concealed pistol (usually
several), an act which may or may not technically violate some local
ordinance or state law, all of which may or may not be locally
enforced. I usually don't know, nor is there any real way of knowing.
Sometimes, I'll elect to eat in a restaurant without a bar, like Cracker
Barrel or Bob Evans, when convenient, and that, of course, solves the
problem. But, while both serve wonderful breakfasts, you won't find a
good steak at either, and sometimes, after a long day of flying or
driving, I'm in the mood for a good steak!
Laws, and local police agendas, with regard to concealed carry vary
widely from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, sometimes from season to
season, particularly on the subject of carrying in bars and restaurants
that serve alcoholic beverages. In addition, many such laws and
ordinances are so confusingly written as to be indecipherable!
Enforcement is sporadic and arbitrary. Look at all the "charts" you
want. They're mostly irrelevant, and all out of date!
My advice:
(1) Don't go to bars, particularly raucous ones that don't serve food,
and most particularly when patrons are displaying "colors!" When in
otherwise-respectable restaurants that serve liquor, don't sit at the bar.
(2) Stay out of the 'bad-part-of-town." Stay out of the entire town
during events like Bike-Week! There is little to be gained from
attending inherently seedy, frowzy, dangerous events and gatherings.
Unless you really fit in with that crowd, it's a pretty stupid place to go!
(3) When carrying, you can't drink, not anywhere, not any amount, not
even "a little!" An otherwise clear case of self-defense will rapidly
dissolve into a muddled can of worms when it is subsequently revealed
that you had been drinking prior to the incident. When you've been
drinking, don't expect "understanding" from any jury!
(4) When traveling out of town, be always polite and congenial, but
maintain a low profile and keep to yourself. Don't engage in animated
conversations with people you don't know. Even an offhand and harmless
remark about something as unimportant as a sports team can precipitate
violent reactions on the part of otherwise "normal" people!
(5) Don't stay out late! Eat dinner early and get to bed early. Most
violent events take place at night. Few happen during daylight hours.
(6) Dress so as to be "invisible." Avoid bright colors, stark
contrasts, glittering jewelry, expensive watches, and particularly
logo-patches and T-shirts with a "message." Dress conservatively. Be grey!
(7) Assure that your gun(s) stay discretely concealed. Don't talk about
guns, yours or anyone else's.
(8) Stay alert! When you see "trouble-in-the-making," get up and leave
without delay, no matter where you are, whom you're with, and even when
it seems you're the only one who noticed. Get out of there before it
gets any worse!
(9) When people you don't know approach and attempt to engage you in a
conversation, politely dismiss them! When communicating with restaurant
hostesses and servers, one to three-syllable commands and responses are
all that are usually necessary. All others should hear something like,
"I'm sorry sir. I can't help you," or words to that effect.
/John
(If you care to ignore legal prohibitions on carrying where alcohol is
served, that is your own choice but there are websites
[
http://www.handgunlaw.us/,
http://www.usacarry.com/] that will at least
refer you to state laws on the matter - don't carry where it is illegal
simply because you did not check the rules for the road you will be
traveling. I heartily endorse most of John's advice but have never found
it necessary to be as "standoffish" with strangers as John advises. In
my experience, carefully selected words and body language will let
people know that you're not their pigeon for the night. I usually say,
"No, thanks," when people ask me for money; it tends to put them off
balance but shows them a measure of respect, lessening the likelihood of
an aggressive response.)
10 Sept 08
Self-esteem?
"When you walk, just walk. When you sit, just sit. But, whatever you
do, don't wobble!"
Ummon
All so-called "self-concepts" are illusions. They don't really exist.
They are just contrived limits you put on yourself. To add insult to
injury, you then endow them with license to influence your life. You
may expand and improve self-concepts, but a superior solution is to
simply revoke their license, watch them subsequently evaporate into
space, and then operate without them! "Safety" provided by this or
that self-concept is delusory. In fact, "security" itself is merely a
term we've manufactured for the purpose of describing a non-existent
phenomenon!
Our spiritual antecedents called it "mushin," or "no-mindedness." It
simply means operating without self-imposed limits and self-manufactured
speed-bumps. It means dismissing "I am," "I am not, "I don't,
couldn't, wouldn't, shouldn't, mustn't, could never, etc." The mushin
mind unfearingly confronts the challenge at hand, not worrying about the
horizon. When in mushin-mode, the mind flows, always forward, never
hesitating nor stumbling, audaciously observing no limits nor barriers.
The opposite is "ushin," or self-consciousness. The ushin mind spends
its time saying, "What wonderful thing will happen when I win?" or,
"What terrible thing will happen when I lose?" The ushin person worries
about results and forgets about confronting the challenge before it.
When in ushin-mode, the mind is apprehensive, timid, fearful. It
constantly missteps, pauses, and over-corrects, converting each trivial
speed-bump into Mt Everest! The ushin person is thus ever-bewildered,
unfocused, afraid, confined. He flounders forward, charging first this
windmill, then that. He goes down to defeat with monotonous regularity!
I have noticed some aspiring Operators, whom I know to be competent, who
shoot like blundering amateurs as soon as a prize is involved. They are
beguiled into thinking about the prize, to the exclusion of the path
before them. The prize imposes a rigid matrix into which they believe
they must fit themselves. They thus become progressively unfocused,
confused, befuddled. Their mind is disarticulated, spread out over too
many irrelevant places. Victory is out of the question!
Conversely, mature Operators think about neither winning nor losing.
They don't think about anything! With icy determination, they dash
forward joyfully, firm in the knowledge that the Almighty must have
great confidence in them to present them with such a magnificent
challenge. They become a seamless, flawless, unconfined whirlwind of
motion, effortlessly flowing from one subroutine to another,
unstoppable, unbeatable. They seldom miss!
"The mind of a perfect man is like a mirror. It grasps nothing. It
expects nothing. It reflects, but does not hold. Thus, the perfect man
can act without effort."
Chuang Tzu
/John
(Yes, John has lapsed into "warrior talk" again but there is some merit
in it. My former teaching partner used to speak of being goal-oriented
in general but having to become task-oriented for the split-second or so
that you have to take a shot. In my book, I refer to going into what
Carlos Hathcock called "the bubble" for those instants. I recently
experienced a spinout on a wet road. I noticed that my concentration was
entirely on the process of trying to correct the skids and counter-skids
until the vehicle came to a stop on the shoulder. When I described the
incident to someone the next day he remarked, "After your knees stopped
shaking..." I then realized that when I got out of the vehicle to check
for damage, there was no shaking of knees, no dry mouth, etc. Decades
ago, when the Army stationed me in snow country, on a nearly abandoned
base, I took advantage of every opportunity to learn the limits of the
vehicles I drove and how to handle them when I exceeded their limits. It
was the same for me, nearly a decade ago, when I was caught in the
robbery of a business I was patronizing - it felt as though I had a
calculating machine in my head that continually recalculated the
shifting equation, with absolute confidence that I would be able to
draw, fire and hit, with either hand, if it became necessary. This is
the purpose of training - to make life-saving responses reflexive.)
--
Stephen P. Wenger, KE7QBY
Firearm safety - It's a matter
for education, not legislation.
http://www.spw-duf.info
