Be very careful how you unload your firearm . . .

. . . because this can happen.

The shooter covered the ejection port with his hand and attempted to capture the live round rather than letting it eject freely from the ejection port. The round was trapped, under pressure of the recoil spring, in-between the edge of the ejection port along the edge of the breach face and the front of the ejection port on the right side of the slide.

There is a noticeable linear denting on the nose of the projectile and an obvious strike point on the rear of the case and the primer. The projectile could not escape and the resulting effect was for the case to burst. The pressure from the burning propellent was absorbed by the shooter’s hand. He will not be able to make this mistake again.

It is a sobering lesson for many shooters. No one ever really believes that this could happen to them.

There's more at the link, including more pictures.

This is something most of us do instinctively, wanting to avoid having to bend down and pick up a round off the ground (which may be muddy, wet, or otherwise an undesirable destination for a live round).  Trouble is, trying to save ourselves trouble can get us into even bigger trouble, as the shooter above found out. Not a good idea.

Peter

Doofus Of The Day #955

Today's award goes to three special snowflakes - if, that is, it's politically correct to refer to a black person as a 'snowflake' - at Pomona College in California.  According to The College Fix:

If you want a window into how progressive students are being taught to think at privileged, sheltered campuses, look no further than an open letter to the outgoing president of Pomona College from three self-identified black students.

. . .

Dray Denson, Avery Jonas and Shanaya Stephenson were responding to an April 7 email to the campus community by Oxtoby that criticized the mob tactics that shut down a “Blue Lives Matter” speech.

Oxtoby had written that the administration opposes “the acting of preventing others from engaging with an invited speaker,” in this case the Manhattan Institute’s Heather Mac Donald:

Our mission is founded upon the discovery of truth, the collaborative development of knowledge and the betterment of society.

. . .

Denson, Jonas and Stephenson mocked Oxtoby for his “unnuanced views” that there is such a thing as truth, which is simply a tool of “white supremacy” and is aimed at “silencing oppressed peoples”:

This construction is a myth and white supremacy, imperialism, colonization, capitalism, and the United States of America are all of its progeny. The idea that the truth is an entity for which we must search, in matters that endanger our abilities to exist in open spaces, is an attempt to silence oppressed peoples. … The idea that we must subject ourselves routinely to the hate speech of fascists who want for us not to exist plays on the same Eurocentric constructs that believed Black people to be impervious to pain and apathetic to the brutal and violent conditions of white supremacy.

There's more at the link.  The full text of the snowflakes' letter may be read here (where it was archived, since the original was - unsurprisingly - taken down after the news broke of its existence.  Moonbat snowflakes really don't like to be exposed for what they are.)

So truth is a "myth"?  The USA itself is the "progeny" of that "myth"?  In that case, why are these three doofi bothering to get an education in the USA at all?  Surely they want to learn outside our borders, where that myth won't impede their progress?  I nominate Cuba, or Venezuela, or North Korea, or Iran.  In any of those countries, they can learn the hard way what they've got here - but don't acknowledge or understand.  Who knows?  They might even come to appreciate the "Land of the Free" for what it really is!




Peter

Selective denial or 'rationing' of health care?

According to Karl Denninger, it's likely in due course, thanks to budget pressures.

I claim no special power here, nor any inside information.  This is simply arithmetic coupled with logic.

. . .

... on the math, we have roughly 5 years before the US Federal Government will attempt to spend $2 trillion a year between Medicare and Medicaid annually, $600 billion more on a yearly basis than it spends now.  It may try to forcibly shift some of the Medicaid spending to the States (as the AHCA did) but the bottom line will continue to expand at its ~9% annualized rate.

That cannot be financed.

It is mathematically impossible to do so, and thus it will not happen.

If the government tries to "print" it (via Fed machinations) doing so will further depress productivity which will go negative from its already-suppressed levels (as a result of the last ten years of deficit spending) and at that point GDP collapses and so do asset prices and tax revenue.

So they won't do that either because unlike in 2007 when the total between those two programs was $830 billion they can't get away with it at nearly three times the price.

What they'll probably do instead, therefore, is unilaterally and sadistically cut people off.

If you're one of them you will either suffer, die or (probably) both and they'll target those who are both fat and sick figuring, quite properly, that you'll be physically unable to do anything about it.

The low-hanging fruit, where a full 25% of the spending happens today, is on Type II diabetes.

If you're Type II diabetic you're ****ed, in short.  You better fix that if you can, right now.

If you're overweight and especially if you're obese you had better fix that too, right now, because that has a very high probability of leading to Type II diabetes.

It is my prediction that this is where they'll target first.

There's more at the link.  Scary, but recommended reading.

I think Mr. Denninger is probably both right and wrong.

• He's probably right, in the sense that such 'rationing' of health care is already taking place, discriminating against smokers.  There have been many reports that smokers are being denied surgery and other health care options because their habit makes it more difficult to produce a satisfactory outcome.  That's the cause of much debate at present, in the health care community and in the wider civil rights arena.  It's not much of a jump from there, to rationing health care to obese people or those suffering from diabetes.
• He's probably wrong, in that overweight and obese people (which includes many diabetics) make up a very large proportion of the US electorate.  Any attempt by any administration, Republican or Democrat, to cut health care to these people would result in a ****storm that would make present political tensions seem like a minor disagreement at a Sunday School kids' party.  I suspect neither political party will risk that - at least, not overtly.

What I suspect is more likely to happen is that rationing will occur 'administratively'.  Bureaucrats will craft rules and regulations that will never be referred to Congress (which will tacitly condone them by not taking action to stop them).  Those rules and regulations will predicate that health care expenditure will be incentivized by the government on the basis of the success achieved by local hospitals and other facilities.  The definition of 'success' may also be modified.  This will allow bureaucrats to control access to health care in terms of cold, hard cash.

• Your surgeons have a 60% success rate?  That's terrible!  We're denying you incentive payments until you improve.
• Your surgeons have an 80% success rate?  That's pretty good.  Here, have some more subsidy money.
• Your surgeons have a 95% success rate?  Outstanding!  Here's more subsidy money and bonuses for your heads of department, to distribute among their medical staff at their discretion.

Money talks.  Once that sort of politically-correct bribery becomes common, you can expect hospital admissions staff to be very cautious about approving surgery for those less likely to recover quickly and/or fully from it.  That will, of course, include smokers, the obese, and diabetics.  Their reduced chances of health care success will impact the 'success' of the facility as a whole - and, therefore, the financial incentives it receives.  Such patients will therefore run into delays, and paperwork issues, and demands for more tests (at their expense, of course) to 'ensure that they can safely undergo surgery', and every other administrative roadblock that can be imagined.

I hit those problems last year, when I needed gall bladder surgery.  The fact that I'm a heart attack and bypass surgery survivor, and have a fused spine and other complicating factors, meant that the hospital demanded 'cardiac clearance' before it would proceed with the operation.  I'd had two kidney stone procedures just the year before, under general anesthetic, with no problems whatsoever, but they refused to take that into account.  I had to jump through all the hoops, all over again.  I was infuriated, but what could I do?  They weren't refusing surgery to me - just demanding extra steps, and extra costs, before proceeding.  If I couldn't or wouldn't have complied, there would have been no surgery for me;  but that would have been regarded as my fault, not theirs, because I'd 'failed to comply' with their 'reasonable requests' and procedures.

I suspect more and more of us will encounter such demands in future.  It's a form of health care rationing, whether we recognize it as such or not.  It also allows health care providers to take care of each other, by ensuring that they 'spread the wealth around', making patients spend money unnecessarily on procedures and tests they don't really need.

Thus, health care rationing will probably be applied, but I suspect it'll be administratively and financially, rather than by overt denial of care to specific classes of people.  That doesn't make it any easier or more bearable if, as I am, you're in one of the high-risk population groups for denial, of course.  Sucks to be older or less healthy, I guess . . .

Peter

Ashbutt, "helping" . . .

. . . to write the next book.

Ashbutt's been particularly playful and kitten-"needy" today, demanding to be picked up and cuddled after a huge thunderstorm scared him early this morning.  Oh, well . . . he's still very much a child, despite his impressive size - coming up ten months old.

Peter

Of storms, drains and steps

We've just contracted to have our property's drainage improved, because too much water was getting off our house's roof in an uncontrolled way, and eroding the ground near our home's foundations.  The contractor dug a ditch in which to lay pipe and drainage . . . only to have a real gully-washer of a thunderstorm hit us at about 3.30 this morning, filling it with mud and dirt, and threatening to submerge a ladder he'd left in the newly-excavated space.  It was a mess, to put it mildly.

He and his workers have been cleaning up the diggings and preparing to lay pipe.  They also took the opportunity to carry around a semicircular step, to put it in front of our back door and make it easier to step down into the garden.  That was a lot of work . . . the supplier delivered it to the front of the house by forklift truck some months ago, and told us we'd have to get it from there to where we wanted it.  Miss D. and I waited until we had the contractor on board for other things, then offered him extra money to take care of that little problem for us.  It took four strong men, plywood walkways laid over the (still sodden) ground, and a furniture dolly to get it done.

The workers have gone off to get some food and recover their breath before continuing with the drainage system.  The gutters around the front of the house will be extended down both sides to the back garden, and connected to the new drainage pipe.  When it's all done, we should be able to withstand even storms like this morning's without difficulty.

Ah, the joys of home ownership . . .

Peter

Ammo testing update

To add to my articles last week about caliber, cartridge and firearm selection, Lucky Gunner has just added .38 Special and .357 Magnum to the list of cartridges it's tested in ballistic gelatin.  They've taken samples of most available loads, run them through everyday firearms, and posted the results.  It's a very useful tool to find out how your chosen round performs in that test medium, or to help you select one if necessary.

I hasten to add that ballistic gelatin isn't a perfect simulacrum of human flesh, which contains tissues of varying density (bone, muscle, fat, etc.), and varies in thickness, and is protected by more or less clothing depending on location, season, weather conditions, etc.  Nevertheless, it's adequate for apples-to-apples comparisons of bullet performance, and gives us useful insights into how they're likely to perform when the chips are down.  I prefer bullets that are heavy for caliber, and penetrate deeper than normal, because I've had to shoot through an arm to reach the torso on more than one occasion, so limited-penetration bullets just don't do it for me.  However, if you're likely to use them inside your home, with loved ones on the far side of partition walls to think about, limited penetration is a lot more valuable to you!  Consider your own circumstances when making your selection.

I still won't buy ammunition from Lucky Gunner, in the light of my ethical concerns about their business practices.  Nevertheless, this is useful research, for which they deserve credit.

Peter

A second, or even a third, life for the Avenger?

Late last year I speculated about the present status and future potential of the General Atomics Predator C, also known as the Avenger (the prototype of which is shown below), and, in maritime form, as the proposed Sea Avenger.

Now the company has confirmed that it'll offer the Sea Avenger as a base platform for the US Navy's MQ-25 Stingray project.

The MQ-25 Stingray evolved from the ashes of the U.S. Navy's Unmanned Carrier Launched Surveillance and Strike (UCLASS) program. The program was introduced publicly in the Navy's fiscal year 2017 budget submission.  The aircrafted was redesignated the MQ-25 (M for multipurpose) from the RAQ-25 – the Carrier Based Aerial Refueling System (CBARS).

Stingray's primary mission will be airborne tanking, but the aircraft's pylons will also be engineered to fire missiles and drop bombs.  The tanking mission is necessary to relieve the carriers' F/A-18s that currently perform that role.  Additionally, the requirements necessary to make UCLASS a low signature (stealthy) penetrating air frame have been removed for Stingray.

The Navy is expected to award an air vehicle contract to one prime contractor in the second quarter of 2018 with the initial delivery scheduled by 2021.

There's more at the link.

What interests me most is that, according to Wikipedia, the MQ-25 Stingray program is expected to "produce a Super Hornet-sized carrier-based aerial tanker as the Carrier-Based Aerial-Refueling System (CBARS), with 'a little ISR' and some capabilities to relay communications, and strike capabilities put off to a future version of the aircraft".  In its present incarnation, the Avenger is far smaller than that.  The Super Hornet is 60 feet long, has a wingspan of almost 45 feet, and weighs up to 66,000 pounds fully loaded for takeoff.  The original, land-based Avenger is 44 feet long, has a wingspan of 66 feet, and its maximum takeoff weight is only 18,200 pounds.  If the Avenger is to be "up-sized" to be a "Super Hornet-sized... aerial tanker", it's got a long way to go!

Nevertheless, this effort by General Atomics is intriguing.  As I speculated last year:

There have been few announcements about the Avenger since [2009].  It's been offered to the US Navy as a carrier-borne drone, the so-called 'Sea Avenger'.  One example was bought by the US Air Force for trials, and it's been suggested (but never proved) that several were bought by a three-letter-acronym agency of the US government for unspecified duties.  Your guess about that is as good as mine.

The very lack of information about Avenger is intriguing.  If the program were still being funded only out of corporate resources, it would surely have been dropped a long time ago, because such aircraft are very expensive to develop.  Therefore, the ongoing activity about it suggests that external funding is available;  and that, in turn, suggests some very high-powered interest in it.

Again, more at the link.

For a program of this technological sophistication and expense to have persisted for over a decade since design and construction began, without any (announced) major orders or government investment, defies belief.  General Atomics is too small a company to fund those sort of costs out of its own budget.  This program must have attracted some very high-level attention, and a lot of 'black project' funding, to have been around for so long.  One wonders how many Avengers are already flying, carrying out missions that no-one will discuss over nations that no-one will identify?  It was designed with 'stealthy' characteristics, so it could probably operate undetected over a pretty large proportion of the planet's surface.  Pakistan?  Iran?  North Korea?  Nobody's saying - yet . . .

I look forward to learning how General Atomics plans to 'scale up' a stealthy aircraft less than a third as heavy as a Super Hornet, into something less- or even non-stealthy, able to carry enough fuel aloft, and keep it there for long enough, to refuel a carrier strike force on its way to or from a target.  I frankly can't see how the base Avenger design can cope with such growth.  Will we see the Avenger program used to 'cloak' the development of something newer and much larger?  With all the 'black' defense department money that's still floating around, stranger things have happened.  Alternatively, the Avenger could serve as the springboard for a totally new design, perhaps in collaboration with another aerospace company.

Things are getting interesting in US Navy air operations.  The sudden surge of interest in new orders for a more advanced version of the Super Hornet, the ongoing difficulties in getting the maritime version of the F-35 Lightning II operational, and now the renewed emphasis on pilotless refueling and ISR operations, point to all sorts of interesting possibilities over the next few years.  It'll be worth watching.

Peter

Sunday morning music for Easter

From Handel's "Messiah", and from my favorite recording of it, here's the final two choruses:  "Worthy is the Lamb" and "Amen".

A happy, holy and blessed Easter to you all!

Peter

That's telling her!

How to put an irritating, whiny, poseur politician in her place.  From Senator Fauxcahontas Warren:

And the reply, from a retired US Marine Corps Gunnery Sergeant who's now a Senior Fellow at the London Center for Policy Research:

Question answered, I'd say!




Peter

There's a way around almost anything, if you try hard enough . . .

I was amused at the lengths (literally) to which some people will go to get - or sell - a drink.

On April 1st, India’s Supreme Court issued an order that bars, pubs and liquor shops across the country should be at least 500m away from state and national highways. The new rule hit business owners hard, and many of them have had to shut down their operations in the last two weeks. But one resourceful bar owner in Kerala appears to have come up with an effective, albeit unconventional, way of bypassing the requirement – by turning the entrance to his venue into a long, winding maze.

The Aishwarya Bar in North Paravoor, a suburb of Kochi, was forced to close down temporarily when the court ruling came into effect, but instead of complaining about it, the owner came up with an idea that would allow him to reopen the bar and operate legally. He hired some workers and spent three days putting up a series of concrete blocks that essentially turned the previously straight walkway leading up to the entrance into a maze. Now, the walking distance from the highway to his bar is 520 meters, so he is technically allowed to sell alcohol.

. . .

Excise officials have already admitted that the solution is acceptable, since commissioners measure walking distance, not aerial distance, so the bar is now in the clear.

“We do not measure the aerial distance but only the walking distance. However, they will be fined for altering the entrance,” a Vijayan IPS additional excise commissioner said.

There's more at the link, including photographs.

(And no, despite the date of the court ruling, this isn't an April Fool story!)

Peter

A sad farewell to John Clarke

Regular readers will recall that on occasion, I've put up a comic interview from Australian comedians John Clarke and Bryan Dawe.  Dawe always played a TV interviewer, while the person being interviewed was played (masterfully) by John Clarke.

Sadly, Mr. Clarke died of a heart attack last weekend, while climbing Mount Abrupt in the Grampians in Australia.  He'd been in apparently good health up until then, so his death was a huge shock to many of his fans - even more so to Mr. Dawe, his partner in entertainment for decades.  He's given an extended interview, telling of his reaction to Mr. Clarke's death.  It's sad, but compelling reading.

In memory of Mr. Clarke, here are three of his comedy sketches with Mr. Dawe.

Rest in peace, Mr. Clarke.  You'll be missed by tens of thousands of grieving fans.

Peter

Bollywood again

Another epic (?) fight scene, this one from the 2008 movie Ghajini.

Certainly acrobatic, isn't it?

Peter

More bullets are valuable, but not necessarily the answer

Continuing the series of posts I've been putting up about firearms issues in response to reader comments and questions, I'd like to go a little further into the capacity-versus-capability question.

I said on Wednesday:

... my preferred concealed carry pistol is chambered in either .45 ACP or 9mm. Parabellum, with the .45 my cartridge of choice.  I know that modern 9mm. ammunition is almost as capable as .45, but the latter still makes a bigger hole and delivers more felt impact on the receiving end.  The old Taylor Knockout Formula is derided these days as unscientific, but I'm an old African hand.  In Africa, we know the Taylor formula works, because we've seen it at first hand, against both animal and human targets.  I have no problem adding it to modern, more scientific test results, and letting it condition my cartridge selection based on that experience.

A couple of readers pointed out, in e-mails, that this appeared to conflict with my advice a few years ago, in which I said:

The odds of having to deal with multiple assailants are now much higher than in the past; therefore, it pays to select a handgun with a large magazine capacity. This, in turn, implies selecting a caliber that permits such a capacity. A bigger cartridge such as the .45 ACP may be very effective, but it's too large to permit the same handgun magazine capacity as a smaller cartridge such as the 9mm. Parabellum. With modern high-performance ammunition ... the smaller round now develops 80%-90% of the energy of the larger round, and has proven almost as effective in actual shooting incidents. I submit that for the average shooter (not necessarily for highly-trained experts), giving up 10%-20% of bullet energy in exchange for greatly increasing a handgun's magazine capacity may be a worthwhile trade-off.

Well, the two viewpoints don't conflict with each other - rather, they address different issues.  In terms of dealing with multiple assailants (or one assailant who just won't quit no matter how many times he's been shot), then obviously, the more rounds in the gun, the better.  However, all too often, shooters (including trained police officers who should know better - see, for example, here) spray their larger quantity of ammunition all over the surrounding landscape without hitting anything!  To illustrate the reflex action of pulling the trigger and keeping on pulling it, even after the attacker/evader is down, watch the brief video excerpt below.  GRAPHIC VIOLENCE ALERT:  You're about to see a man shot to death.

Would fewer shots have done the job?  Almost certainly.  I'd guesstimate, based on what the bodycam video showed, that 2-3 well-placed shots would have been sufficient.  However, the officer didn't stop at that point, but kept on shooting.  (I'd like to know how many of his rounds actually hit the suspect, particularly in vital areas.)

In the "old days" (the 1970's and 1980's), when I learned to shoot, hollowpoint ammunition was still relatively unreliable - it often failed to expand, and didn't deliver the performance that modern, more technologically advanced bullets do.  Therefore, larger, heavier rounds were favored, as they tended to work reasonably well whether or not the bullet expanded.  Smaller bullets might work if they expanded, but also might not, even if they performed as intended.  I described one such incident here.

An acquaintance was attacked by a machete-wielding man who was hopped-up on marijuana and alcohol. The defender drew his 9mm. Browning Hi-Power pistol and put no less than six Federal 9BP hollow point bullets into a five-inch circle in the chest of the attacker. The bullets performed as intended, mushrooming impressively and penetrating adequately. They shredded the attacker's heart - this was proven at autopsy - but they didn't stop him immediately. He had enough oxygen in his brain to close the (short) distance to my acquaintance and swing a wild blow with his machete, which chopped open his victim's head, slicing deep into his brain. Both the attacker and the defender died at the scene while waiting for medical attention.

If my acquaintance had only shifted his point of aim after two or three shots (by which time it should have been clear to him that they weren't producing the desired result - stopping the attack), and put the remaining three rounds into the "target triangle" in the attacker's head (see the first image above), things might have been very different. After all, the attacker was getting closer all the time, making that small target a practical proposition for a skilled shooter (as my acquaintance was). The three people with him (including myself) were all busy dealing with other problems at the time; so we weren't able to add our fire to his, which might also have made a difference.

I had the dreadful task of informing his wife, later that night, that her husband was dead.

During those years of violence and unrest, I had all too many opportunities to witness that a few larger, heavier bullets tended to get the job done, most of the time.  I saw this with rounds such as .44 Special, .44 Magnum, .45 ACP, .45 Colt, .455 Webley and others.  I also observed good to very good performance from smaller-caliber rounds that were shaped to deliver a full-diameter blow, such as a wadcutter bullet in .38 Special, rather than a pointed or round bullet that slipped more easily through flesh.  This observed reality has naturally biased my approach to the selection of a self-defense round.  I fully accept that modern hollowpoint ammunition is far better than it was three or four decades ago;  but the fact remains that if, for some reason, the bullet does not expand (for example, if its cavity is clogged by clothing material), then a larger, heavier round will usually do more damage and get better results than a smaller, lighter one, all other things being equal.  (They seldom are, of course.)

I do believe that in contemporary urban environments, carrying more ammunition in the gun and on one's person are worthwhile.  However, the corollary to that is that one mustn't "spray-and-pray", but use that ammunition accurately, conserving it to deal with multiple threats if necessary.  The wild burst of fire shown in the video clip above - go count the number of rounds for yourself - didn't conserve much, and was probably unnecessary if the first two or three bullets had done the job.  If they didn't, it was probably more a problem of marksmanship than a failure of the ammunition.  If you shoot me ten times in the foot, I'm not going to be walking anywhere, but you can bet I'm going to be extremely peeved at you - and returning fire!

The late Louis Awerbuck described armed encounters in very succinct terms (and he knew whereof he spoke - he came from South Africa, as I did).  This excerpt is taken from a SWAT Magazine article he wrote titled 'How many rounds?'  It was republished in his book 'Plowshares Into Swords: Musings of a Different Drummer', which I highly recommend.

It is ugly, it is brutal, it’s at halitosis distance, and all your neato audio-instigated range commanded dog-and-pony-show Mister Cool orchestration goes out the window. At seven or eight feet in a gunfight you will have about six degrees of peripheral vision, your auditory system will be distorted and your biochemicals will pump enough juice into your system to keep a crack addict wired for a week.

You will lose mathematical track of rounds fired, distances, and passage of time. And if it’s that close and violent – and you live through it – you will swear blind that your buddies dubbed and photo-shopped the video of the fight, because you know damn well that you didn’t actually do what’s portrayed on the video screen during later viewing. Except that you did. Even down to the ongoing foul language during the encounter when you never do that, you fine upstanding church-going gentleman, you. Nothing like a close-up gunfight to bring out your evil, abrasive, foul-mouthed clown twin....

So what can you derive from the post-analysis?

All the “hold the trigger to the rear and then ease it forward after firing to feel the sear reset” trigger manipulation goes out the window. You still need trigger control, but it will be quick shooting – so you may as well practice the same trigger operation during close-quarters range training that you will employ in the street.

You probably won’t be shooting “two body, one head shot” drills, unless you’re very, very lucky and it’s offered to you on a rare occasion. Not in a violent six-to-ten-foot confrontation you won’t. You’ll be moving, the shootee will be moving, and you’ll be delivering multiple rounds to the biggest piece of meat and bone you can acquire until the threat stops.

Why so many rounds? Because (a) you don’t have the time to shoot a couple of rounds and then take the time to assess the results at this distance. If the initial BBs didn’t work, it’s too late. And (b) What Doctor Lewinski terms “stop reaction time” is the same as your personal reaction time. In essence, even if your cognitive processes have realized your enemy is dropping, another three or four rounds will be fired before your finger detaches itself from the gas pedal – which is why you lose track of the rounds-fired count.

So the gist is do you – or can you – carry a large format large caliber high capacity pistol, do you carry a smaller-calibered high capacity pistol, or do you pack a low round-count handgun and forsake multiplicity availability of ammunition IN THE GUN? Because even though this is a rhetorical question for the reader to decide, nobody is getting a reload executed under the above-mentioned circumstances. If you need a dozen quick sequential rounds and your pistol contains only six, you need either at least two guns or it’s all over unless you’re Rambo, Bruce Lee, and Miyamoto Musashi combined.

What’s the ideal answer? There isn’t one, because of the legal and societal restrictions and ramifications mentioned above. But forewarned is forearmed (no pun intended), and you can at least apply some rational thought to the problem before it occurs.

No, it’s not a perfect world, but a battle without a prior battle plan is a battle lost before it’s started. And it’s unlikely that Hell is about to undergo an Ice Age in the foreseeable future...

I'm afraid I can't wave a magic wand and give you a short, concise, always-and-everywhere accurate answer.  Your salvation is in your own hands in a defensive situation, and you have to equip and train yourself to deal with the circumstances of your own life.  For myself, in a high-density urban setting, I'll carry a high-capacity 9mm. pistol, stuffed full of the best ammunition on the market today, and be confident in my ability to defend myself with it . . . but I'd still prefer it to be a .45!  I've also trained myself not to fire large quantities of rounds downrange in the hope that some may connect.  If at all possible, I'll slow down and try for accuracy over speed (although having both would be better!).  However, as Louis Awerbuck points out, in the heat of the moment, that may or may not happen . . .

Your mileage may vary, of course.

Peter

A sea change for independent author-publishers

My latest article for Mad Genius Club has just gone live over there.

In it, I discuss the impact of streaming audio and video on consumers, and how this is affecting and will affect independent authors such as myself.  It looks to me like a big wave building, that's going to roll over the industry over the next year or two, posing big challenges for us.

If writing and books interest you, click over there to read it, and contribute to the discussion in Comments.

Peter

The slaughter goes on, all over the world

Syria and North Korea are in the news at the moment, but killings and terrorism are rampant in many other countries - we just don't hear about them, because they're less newsworthy.

The latest to come to light is South Sudan.

On April 4, government militias loyal to the president, Salva Kiir Mayardit, entered the town of Pajok and began killing and raping men, women and children, one observer said.

Opposition forces led by the former first vice president, Dr. Riek Machar Teny-Dhurgon, estimate that more than 200 innocent civilians were killed in Pajok.

“At the onset of the massacre, the tribal army burned down several buildings in the town and indiscriminately shot at the innocent civilians including kids and women who were trying to run for their lives,” a security officer in South Sudan told Fox News.

“Primary school pupils were forced to lay on the ground in a straight line and were run over by tanks, and crushing them flat. Some of the primary school girls aged between 11 to 13 years were raped in front of their teacher and the teacher was later murdered by the government soldiers, possibly to conceal evidence of their heinous crimes,” an independent observer said.

When a grandmother in her late 70s said she could not tolerate the pain of losing her children and grandchildren, who had been slain in front of her, she begged the soldiers to take her life, too.

“Without remorse, the primitive government soldiers decided to cut her limbs, and she was left to die a painful death,” the observer said.

No one was spared from the soldiers’ wrath, he said, even the tiniest of children.

“Toddlers were thrown into the river live,” he said. “The lucky ones had their heads swung against poles and walls before being thrown into the river, at least leaving them dead by the time they have been thrown into the river.”

Though largely unknown to most of the world, these atrocities are happening with the full knowledge of international bodies, including the United Nations, the African Union and the Troika, which includes United States, the United Kingdom and Norway, meaning the non-Dinkas are left with no help and no options, the independent observer said.

There's more at the link.

However, because there are no major geopolitical factors in play in South Sudan, the international community will continue to ignore such atrocities.  They're doing the same in the Congo, in Yemen, in the Philippines, in Thailand, in Burma . . . in dozens of different nations.

I'm not saying the USA needs to intervene in all those places.  We can't.  We can't afford it economically, and our military (particularly after having been deliberately run down under the Obama administration for the past eight years) is already spread too thin.  Nor can NATO or other international organizations do so - they're also overstretched, under-budgeted, understaffed and under-equipped.  I'm merely saying that violent death and terrorism are rampant, all around the globe. They've been that way since shortly after the end of the Second World War, largely as a result of the global geopolitical destabilization brought on by that conflict and its aftermath.  They aren't going to go away anytime soon.

Anytime someone says to you, "But we must do something!" about those evils, ask them what we can do that will eliminate the problem.  They won't be able to answer you, because there isn't anything that will do that.  All we can do is temporarily halt the problem in one place, or a few places.  As soon as we've gone, it'll come back - and meanwhile, it'll continue in all the places where we can't intervene.

Evil is always with us.  We can do our best as individuals to combat it, first in our own lives and families, then in our own communities, then by sharing our resources (personal and national, as far as is feasible without beggaring ourselves) with organizations that can and do make a difference (e.g. Doctors Without Borders, the Salvation Army, etc.).  We can also do our best to stop the proliferation of weapons to such areas, although that's very difficult to accomplish.  Apart from those things, we have to accept that we can't solve all the problems of the world.

Trouble is, too many people won't accept that.  They're blind to reality.  They demand utopia . . . forgetting that it was a fictional place to begin with.  It still is to this day.


*Sigh*


Peter

A great collection of aviation April Fools stunts

On April 1st this year, I mentioned the April Fool spoof of Vintage Wings of Canada.

Vintage Wings has had an ongoing April Fool project every year since 2008.  They've just published a retrospective article, listing all of them.  It's great fun.  For example, here's their 2011 spoof, where Canada was alleged to have bought MiG-21's from the Soviet Union.

There are many more funny spoofs at the link.  Recommended reading for aviation buffs.

Peter

Another look at healthcare costs

Last month I noted that the real issue in healthcare reform was neither Obamacare nor Trumpcare - it was the incessantly increasing costs of healthcare to the US economy and taxpayer.  I've since come across an essay by Charles Hugh Smith that provides very informative comparisons.

In 1952, it cost $30 to have a baby in an excellent hospital. If we adjust that by official inflation as measured by the Bureau of Labor Statistic's inflation calculator to 2017, the cost would be $275. ($1 in 1952 = $9.16 in 2017).

What does it cost to have a baby delivered in a hospital today? $5,000? $10,000? Who even knows, given the convoluted billing process in today's sickcare system?

The pharmaceutical cartel jacks up medication costs per dose from $3 to $600, even when the medication has been around for decades: the Pinworm prescription jumps from $3 to up to $600 a pill Parents, doctors angry over drug price gouging (via John F.)

My father paid 1.8% of his wages for "hospital group insurance" in the early 1950s (for a household of four kids and two adults.) For someone earning $1,000 a week, the equivalent today would be $72 a month out of a monthly gross income of $4,000.

My spouse and I pay $1330 a month for barebones healthcare insurance in today's sickcare system. Factor out subsidies paid by the employer or state, and minimal healthcare insurance costs tens of thousands of dollars per household annually.

Here's a chart that illustrates the breathtaking rise in healthcare costs. Wages are the nearly flat line:

There's more at the link, and in Mr. Smith's regular articles at his blog.  I highly recommend you drop in there from time to time, and read what he has to say.  It's always interesting.

I think Mr. Smith's article reinforces what I said last month.  Unless and until we get healthcare costs under control, it doesn't matter what system of healthcare our politicians inflict on us - it still won't work in the long run.  We'll end up bankrupt, as individuals and as a nation.

Peter

Why do your shoelaces come untied? Science to the rescue!

Doing some useful research for once, instead of following the latest moonbat craziness down its joint and several rabbit-holes, the University of California at Berkeley has discovered how and why your shoelaces come untied by themselves.

The answer, the study suggests, is that a double whammy of stomping and whipping forces acts like an invisible hand, loosening the knot and then tugging on the free ends of your laces until the whole thing unravels.

The study is more than an example of science answering a seemingly obvious question. A better understanding of knot mechanics is needed for sharper insight into how knotted structures fail under a variety of forces. Using a slow-motion camera and a series of experiments, the study shows that shoelace knot failure happens in a matter of seconds, triggered by a complex interaction of forces.

"When you talk about knotted structures, if you can start to understand the shoelace, then you can apply it to other things, like DNA or microstructures, that fail under dynamic forces," said Christopher Daily-Diamond, study co-author and a graduate student at Berkeley. "This is the first step toward understanding why certain knots are better than others, which no one has really done."

. . .

The researchers found that a shoelace knot unties like this: When running, your foot strikes the ground at seven times the force of gravity. The knot stretches and then relaxes in response to that force. As the knot loosens, the swinging leg applies an inertial force on the free ends of the laces, which rapidly leads to a failure of the knot in as few as two strides after inertia acts on the laces.

. . .

"The interesting thing about this mechanism is that your laces can be fine for a really long time, and it's not until you get one little bit of motion to cause loosening that starts this avalanche effect leading to knot failure," Gregg said.

There's more at the link, including lots of explanatory diagrams.  Here's a video clip from UC Berkeley illustrating the process.

Well, at least we now know why it happens . . . but I still want to know how to stop it happening!

Peter

A small .380 ACP pistol may not be a good primary choice for self-defense

I'm getting very worried by the current crop of tiny semi-auto pistols, mostly chambered in .380 ACP (some in even smaller rounds).  I know a lot of people who rely on them as their primary means of self-defense - in other words, they don't carry any other gun or weapon.  With the greatest respect to them, I fear they haven't understood the problem.

If the object is to simply get rounds into an attacker, without worrying about their effectiveness, then I submit even the lowly .22LR is going to work.  (I wrote an article about the .22's utility for self-defense;  it's not a bad choice, if you're willing to put in the work necessary to use it effectively.)  However, with any smaller round, you have to understand that you're giving up a lot of energy and terminal effectiveness, compared to a larger round.  Yes, I know all about bullet placement being critical (it is);  but if your aim isn't precise (and, under typical conditions of a crime, your heart's going to be hammering away nineteen to the dozen, your adrenaline rush is going to be at an all-time high, and you're unlikely to be steady as a rock in your aim), you need to deliver enough 'punch' to get the job done.

A lot of smaller rounds can do that under perfect conditions, but again, you've got to be able to control them well enough to put them where they'll do the most good (from your point of view) or harm (from your assailant's).  A small .380 auto pistol such as the Kel-tec P-3AT, Ruger LCP, or similar, is hard to control.  It's so small that you can only get a couple of fingers on the grip;  its sights are minuscule;  and it's so light that even a small cartridge like the .380 generates significant recoil.  I'm not denying it can work, but it'll take a lot of practice to be good with it - and, in the end, you're still dealing with an inadequate round.  The good people at Buffalo Bore have this to say about the .380 ACP:

The 380 auto inhabits a valuable and useful place in our society, mostly because of the easily concealable, tiny pistols chambered for it. HOWEVER, because of the very limited size of the cartridge, it is plagued with limited power and therefore most of the existing ammo in 380 auto suffers from not being reliable as a man-stopper. We've studied and played with nearly all of the existing available 380 ammo and find it wanting as a reliable means of self defense, especially against a large, insane, drugged up/pain free, determined attacker.

Here's the problem:

The current 380 auto frangible ammo delivers a large amount of surface trauma, but lacks serious penetration. For example, if you shot me or another sane man in the face with modern frangible 380 ammo, it would blow off a big portion of my cheek and send a few teeth down my throat, I would undoubtedly fall to the ground in shock and pain, but I would be very much alive and functional if I could get past the shock and pain as that frangible bullet would have stopped some where inside my face, never making it to my brain. However, if you shot a drugged up maniac in the face with that same frangible 380 ammo and blew half his cheek off, he would keep right on coming because he is insane and is not thinking like you or I. Plus, he is likely pain free and fear free and wont know that half his cheek is missing and if he did know, he would not care. So whatever 380 ammo you shoot him in the face with, had better go through his face and blow his brain stem out the back of his head, because only a CNS (central nervous system) hit with a 380 is going to stop him. Likewise, a torso hit to the sternum needs to penetrate deep enough to blow all the way through his spine in order to shut him down spontaneously. If you fail to shut him down instantly, you and your loved ones are going to have to find a way to survive while you wait for him to bleed out and pass out.

I share and endorse Buffalo Bore's opinion of the round.  (I carry a small .380 pistol myself, but only as a backup gun;  and when I do, I stuff it full of Buffalo Bore's 100gr. hardcast lead flat nose ammunition, which to my mind offers the best penetration in that cartridge.)

The FBI has studied gunfights in the real world for many years.  A few years ago, it refocused the firearms training it provides to its own agents, in response to those studies.

The FBI has quietly broken with its long-standing firearms training regimen, putting a new emphasis on close-quarters combat to reflect the overwhelming number of incidents in which suspects are confronting their targets at point-blank range.

The new training protocols were formally implemented last January after a review of nearly 200 shootings involving FBI agents during a 17-year period. The analysis found that 75% of the incidents involved suspects who were within 3 yards of agents when shots were exchanged.

The move represents a dramatic shift for the agency, which for more than three decades has relied on long-range marksmanship training. Apart from the new shooting regimen, agents also are being exposed to technology borrowed from Hollywood in which they can apply skills acquired on the shooting range to virtual scenarios involving the pursuit of armed suspects in schools, office buildings, apartment complexes and other potential targets.

. . .

"The thing that jumps out at you from the (shooting incident) research is that if we're not preparing agents to get off three to four rounds at a target between 0 and 3 yards, then we're not preparing them for what is likely to happen in the real world," says FBI training instructor Larry "Pogo" Akin, who helps supervise trainees on the live shooting range.

. . .

Until last January, the pistol-qualification course required agents to participate in quarterly exercises in which they fired 50 rounds, more than half of them from between 15 and 25 yards. The new course involves 60 rounds, with 40 of those fired from between 3 and 7 yards.

The new exercise also requires that agents draw their weapons from concealed positions, usually from holsters shielded by jackets or blazers, to mimic their traditional plainclothes dress in the field.

There's more at the link.  Bold, underlined text is my emphasis.  Highly recommended reading.

I submit that a light-caliber round, at such close range, is unlikely to achieve instant results unless it impacts the attacker's central nervous system.  That being the case, I suggest that it behooves us to carry the most powerful handgun and cartridge we can control in rapid, aimed fire, in order to deliver the greatest possible impact shock, rather than a round we know to be of inadequate power.

That's why my preferred concealed carry pistol is chambered in either .45 ACP or 9mm. Parabellum, with the .45 my cartridge of choice.  I know that modern 9mm. ammunition is almost as capable as .45, but the latter still makes a bigger hole and delivers more felt impact on the receiving end.  The old Taylor Knockout Formula is derided these days as unscientific, but I'm an old African hand.  In Africa, we know the Taylor formula works, because we've seen it at first hand, against both animal and human targets.  I have no problem adding it to modern, more scientific test results, and letting it condition my cartridge selection based on that experience.  (Yes, I know that in theory, applying the Taylor calculation proves that a sledgehammer is more effective against an elephant than a .470 Nitro Express round.  That's using the formula inappropriately, and I won't waste my time defending it against such nonsensical comparisons.)

When I can't carry a full-power handgun in an accessible position (for example, in winter, when I'm wearing several layers that make getting at a hip holster rather difficult), I'll try to carry a suitable handgun in an overcoat pocket.  This will usually be a revolver, in case I have to fire it through the coat - a semi-auto pistol's slide will get tangled up in the pocket material.  The minimum I'll carry in my pocket is a .38 Special snubnose revolver, and if my pockets are big enough, I'll make that a .44 Special.  In either case, I'll use effective ammunition (probably the Buffalo Bore full-wadcutter offerings in .38 or .44, to give the best penetration, and avoid clogging hollow-point ammunition with clothing fibers).

I still carry a .380 auto pistol . . . but only as a backup to a larger, more powerful handgun that's easier to control and likely to be more effective on target.  I simply don't regard it as powerful enough to be my primary means of defense.  Your mileage may vary;  but I strongly suggest you try training with your carry gun according to the FBI protocols described above, emphasizing speed, accuracy and effectiveness.  I suspect you'll find your little .380 to be a lot harder to use effectively, under those circumstances, than a larger, more hand-filling, more controllable weapon.

In particular, given that most small pistols of that sort are carried in pockets rather than in holsters, consider your speed of accessing the gun.  If an attacker jumps you from 2-3 yards away, you won't have much time to react and draw your gun, particularly while you're backpedaling, ducking and maneuvering to avoid his attack.  Something you can fire from inside your pocket, in a halitosis-range emergency, is likely to be more useful than something you have to take out first!

Unfortunately, it's difficult to train that way, given the expense of constantly having to buy new clothes.  Nevertheless, thrift stores such as Goodwill offer cheap, used trousers and jackets.  I suggest you buy a few of them, take them to the range, and expend them on pocket-shooting training with your chosen carry gun.  You might be surprised at the results - and you'll learn a lot, including why we shouldn't use high-flash, high-pressure ammunition in pockets.  The resulting fires - not to mention muzzle-blast and cylinder-gap burns - can be painful.  Also, note the effects of muzzle blast on fabrics that can melt, such as nylon.  When they do so on your skin, it's not funny!

Peter

Understanding the North Korean problem

StrategyPage has two very interesting articles outlining current problems and potential solutions to the North Korean issue.

The first article examines North Korea's internal problems.

In the north the government may be socialist in theory but in practice they follow the money. Thus a growing number of state run factories in North Korea have become market based enterprises. The police, and even the secret police, spend more time collecting taxes, fees and “contributions” from the growing number of donju (entrepreneurs).People are responding by devoting much imagination and energy to evading the demands (which keep growing) from a desperate government that is under increasing international economic pressure. The North Korean government is nothing if not adaptive, which is how it has survived for so long. So the secret police have now been ordered to not only collect more money but also to do it with minimal use of terror. Popular opinion and morale is important, even in a police state. It was never easy being in the secret police and with all the economic problems it just keeps getting worse. Yet compared to most other North Koreans, being in the secret police pays well and there is a degree of job security not found anywhere else in the north.

The tax collectors up north have a hard job. In the last year China has enforced the sanctions more than ever before. That suddenly put a lot more government enterprises out of business and forced over a million people to find a new source of income. State owned firms, particularly those producing military goods, were always seen as immune to nationwide economic problems. But China cutting off much of its trade hit the military factories hard and now there are desperate people seeking food and other necessities. Many of these newly unemployed did not expect it and there is an increase in suicides and petty crime in the areas where large state owned factories abruptly shut down in the last year. At the same time government officials are finding out that they no longer control the economy. That began during the 1990s when the government could no longer provide basic food and energy needs because decades of Russian economic subsidies were cut off. The growing power of the black market (and now legal free markets) means price controls no longer work either.

What it has come to is that the government will allow an illegal enterprise to operate as long as they pay the bribes and fees demanded by the government and do not engage in activities that threaten the Kim dynasty. While much of this additional income goes to the “special weapons “ (nukes and missiles) programs and gifts to keep the senior officials loyal a lot is spent on vanity projects that glorify the Kim dynasty. This is a problem when word gets around that work continues on these vanity projects (especially new, and very visible one, in the capital) while aid for reconstruction in northwestern areas hit by major floods is not arriving as promised. In the past the news of these shortages would not get around, but with the cell phones that is no longer possible.

There's more at the link.

The second article examines China's options with regard to its troublesome southern neighbor.  This is particularly important in the light of China's relationship with the USA.

China is increasingly angry at Koreans in general for not showing sufficient respect. The biggest (and growing) problem is North Korea. China wants a stable communist dictatorship in North Korea, not a failed government that would send several million starving refugees fleeing across the border. China also does not want North Korea to collapse and get absorbed by South Korea. That would put a democracy on China's border and give many Chinese a view of how things might be much better with a different political system in China. Koreans are seen as "younger brothers" to China, and it's embarrassing if the younger brother outdoes his older sibling. South Korean democracy is played down in China, but that would be difficult if a democratic, united, Korea were right on the border.

The Chinese have made it more obvious to the North Korean leadership that China will support pro-China elements in the North Korean government if the current North Korean leadership fails to turn things around. China has recently sent 150,000 additional troops to the North Korean border to emphasize Chinese concern. While many of these troops are there for training (which the Chinese Army is doing a lot more of), other are to reinforce border security and most of those additional troops are showing up at the border so North Koreans can see them and draw their own conclusions. The latest escalation is accompanied by blunt suggestions in Chinese state controlled media that perhaps some Chinese military action inside North Korea might be more persuasive.

. . .

For China the main threat from North Korea is also economic. China wants to avoid chaos in North Korea because that would be bad for the Chinese economy and increase the threat of conflict with even more dangerous opponents like Japan, South Korea and the United States. The most extreme (but acceptable) measures China could try include literally taking control of North Korea, something which China has done in the distant past. Staging a coup in North Korea has always been a possibility but the paranoid (for good reason in this case) North Korean leadership has made it difficult for China to recruit enough North Korean officials to make this feasible. That said, the potential is still there and China could still go this route. Many North Koreans believe that the Chinese will just move in and take over if it appears that the North Korean government is about to fall apart or otherwise becoming too dangerous to China.

Again, more at the link.

StrategyPage is a very interesting Web site.  If you're interested in geopolitical affairs and their military implications, and vice versa, and you're not already following it, I strongly recommend that you do.

Peter