On the range this past weekend, the Significant Other spotted some mistletoe in the treetops. Having been through this last year, I knew where this was going.

She set forth to stalk the elusive mistletoe.

Being somewhat athletic (the Tae-Kwon-Do background, and all of that), there was a time when she would have scampered up the tree and harvested the pretty parasitic plant.  Today as a grandmother (yes, I’m at an age when the younger women are grandmothers), she feels there is a standard of dignity to maintain. So, she brought a harvesting tool.

To wit, her pet Remington 1100 Special Field LT-20 shotgun, stocked and otherwise customized to her specifications.  A few blasts of Winchester 20 gauge AA Sporting Clays loads of #8 birdshot later, she returned carrying her prey in her free hand.

“Peace on Earth, good will toward men,” I sighed quietly.

It is Christmas tradition to place mistletoe atop a doorway during Christmas season.

It is customary for guys and gals who meet at that spot to kiss under the mistletoe.

Am I going to kiss this pretty girl when we encounter each other beneath that shotgun-harvested greenery?

That is entirely up to her.

After all… she’s the one with the shotgun…

But, it shouldn’t have been. As we all know, “the past is prologue.”

This time, it was Sergeants Mark Todd and Kimberly Munley who “rode to the sound of the guns.” Fifteen years ago at the air base, it was USAF Security Police Officer Andy Brown.  Both times, the Good faced the Evil in horrific situations. Both times, it was the Good people – armed with simple Beretta 9mm pistols – who faced direct gunfire, outshot the Evil people, and put them on the ground…and decisively stopped the carnage.

Andy Brown is a helluva man. I had known his story since shortly after it happened, and got to meet him earlier this year when he attended one of my classes. He was kind enough to share his experience with the class, which unanimously found it both moving and inspirational. He allowed us to record his account of the incident at Fairchild AFB for the Pro-Arms Podcast. You can download it and listen to it at no charge through iTunes or Zune, or at http://proarms.podbean.com.  You’ll be looking for podcast number 033. Or, you can read it in the current issue of American Handgunner magazine, in the continuing feature Ayoob Files, available now on the newsstands or readable at no cost at www.americanhandgunner.com.

There is much to learn from it. Just today, we authorized a trainer in South Africa, where the ordinary citizens are presently embattled in a level of violent crime and terrorism alike that goes far beyond anything seen in this country, to use Andy’s podcast in training there.  Yes, it’s that important.

Sergeants Munley and Todd have already spoken to the press about their experiences. I hope that they can both do what Andy did, and share the specifics of what they went through with their peers, some of whom will inevitably have to do in the future what they did a week ago. And I salute Andy Brown for having had the courage to do that already.  The knowledge born in their hard-won experience will certainly save lives in the future.

For Andy, the most painful part of the experience was arriving too late to save those who had already been shot. The military fifteen years ago did not handle that sort of thing well, and Brown suffered in the aftermath. I sincerely hope THAT past does not become prologue for our two current heroes.

When it came out that he had used a 5.7X28mm pistol, to wit the FN Five-SeveN, some in the media and among the brie-and-chablis crowd seemed almost to wet themselves. This gun had already become a focus of the anti-gunners, who call it a “cop-killer.”
Now, I’m a little more on top of murders of police, and officer survival issues, than the average bear, and I’ve not yet found a case of a police officer being murdered with this particular handgun. But, I’m an old guy and probably getting forgetful. Can anyone ELSE document such a case? If so, post it here, please. Forgive me if I don’t hold my breath too hard…

The mainstream media is, in large part, overlooking the fact that the accused mass-murderer had studied under a radical Islamist who had also taught some of the 9/11 terrorists (LINK HERE). And that the accused killer had allegedly posted on the Internet, comparing suicide bombers with soldiers who throw themselves on grenades to save their comrades in battle (LINK HERE).  AND that he was a totally hypocritical FALSE Muslim. Out of one side of his mouth, he sought a traditional Muslim bride who would wear the hajib and pray five times a day. Out of the other side of his, uh, mouth, he apparently sipped light beer and bought lap dances for $50 a time from American blondes at strip joints. (LINK HERE)

My heart goes out to the victims and their families. I have family at Fort Hood myself. And I feel for the estimated 3500 followers of the Islamic faith who honorably serve at this writing in our nation’s armed services. I hope these loyalists won’t be tarred by the same brush as Hassan.

And I am saddened to see clueless journalists instead blame and demonize the gun, which has roughly the on-paper ballistics of a .22 Magnum rifle that you or I might use to shoot woodchucks on the farm to keep them out of the lettuce patch.

The 5.7 in its original SS190 military load was indeed designed to pierce armor, and still tumble through flesh, creating substantial wound potential. From its inception a score of years ago to now, there has been much controversy over whether it’s a magic man-stopper or an impotent mouse-gun. Morbid as it sounds to say it, a LONG time from now, once the medical reports and autopsy results have been tallied and declassified, this terrible incident will give researchers information that may answer that question.

For now, it suffices for logical people to recognize that the pistol was not the demon.

In this terrible incident, the demon was the one holding the pistol.

The FN Five-SeveN with its 5.7X28mm cartridge.

Note that at the moment of discharge, mild recoil of the 5.7mm leaves muzzle on target, ready for next shot.

Fred Zera sends along THIS LINK to remind us that the Fort Hood massacre is not the first time GI blood has been fatally shed stateside by a cowardly assassin acting in the name of radical Islamic beliefs. Major Hassan apparently showed his hostility and even his murderous inclination well in advance. Someone should have reported it, and someone it was reported to should have acted upon it. I don’t intend for this blog space to become a host for anti-religion sentiments of any kind, but the fact is, our nation is in global conflict with people who commit mass murder for the sake of their belief system, and it cannot be ignored in the interest of either religious freedom or political correctness.

I’m still wondering why, for all those hours, the authorities told us the killer was dead, and only later revealed that he was alive and on a ventilator? Was someone perhaps pumping the SOB with sodium pentathol “truth serum” to find out whether his actions constituted a conspiracy or not? If so, the ACLU will have a problem with it, but the pragmatists among us will not.

When someone asked a Fort Hood spokesman why there was no soldier with a gun among the crowd to stop the religious fanatic, the spokesman almost indignantly replied that they didn’t need to be armed, because at the base they were “at home.” Someone might have told him that so many of us “backwoods home” folks DO keep guns at home for protection, because self-protection is already there and “official protection” takes time to arrive. At Ft. Hood it took some three minutes. A long-declared jihad has made American soldiers stalking victims. They have a right to be able to protect themselves any time, anywhere, just like the unarmed citizens they serve to protect.

Finally, kudos to Sgt Mark Todd and the wounded Sgt. Kimberly Munley, who courageously “rode to the sound of the guns,” shot down the mass-murderer, and ended the carnage.

Throughout the massive, beautiful campus of FPSI, you can hear the screech of tires and the crash of gunfire. It sounds as if an action movie is being filmed.  And, truth to tell, some of this is fun.  Chasing “bad guys” and ramming them off the training track with a PIT maneuver in a patrol car especially reinforced to take the repeated impacts, or going through a curve in the Skid Car – a vehicle fitted with a $45,000 apparatus that allows the instructor to cause it to lose traction and skid, and see if the driver can bring it back under control – is fun.  Disney World could sell this experience for a hundred times the price of an E-ticket ride. But these instructors are here on business, all 265 or so of them, and the Institute is charging them only a hundred bucks apiece for 40 hours. But the knowledge they’ll bring back to their emergency service agencies is priceless. It will save untold lives in the future.

We are surrounded by reminders of the danger these people and their in-service students face every day at work. The wreath solemnly laid in the opening ceremony, to commemorate those who died in the line of duty. The Troopers’ Memorial which we pass each day on the way to classes.

We’re getting state of the art material from top instructors from around the country. But it’s also a recharging of the batteries, a renewed commitment to the jobs we all do. And it’s always a joy to be surrounded by people who accept high risk and high liability alike, in return for the high satisfaction of saving human lives and providing a sense of safety and peace of mind to others.

Florida Highway Patrol cars set up for the repeated collisions of PIT Maneuver training.

The Troopers’ Memorial reflects the many generations and both genders of FHP who have sacrificed their lives in the name of public safety. Note the older style uniform on right, with service revolver in crossdraw holster.

The helicopter on the tower, located on a live-fire range, allows rappelling and assorted other SWAT rescue maneuvers.

My own favorites in the series include “Dirty White Boys,” “Hot Springs,” and “Pale Horse Coming.” The latter uses the device of real characters with slightly altered names when mid-20^th Century lawman Earl Swagger assembles the great gun experts of the period as a posse seeking justice in the Deep South.

Hunter does something similar in his latest in the series as Swagger’s son, retired Vietnam era super-sniper Bob Lee Swagger, decides that it’s once again “time to hunt.”

Suppose that someone murdered lefty icons such as Jane Fonda, Bernardine Dohrn, and Bill Ayers with a high-powered rifle from long distance. Suppose the quintessential Marine Sniper, Carlos Hathcock, was still alive and framed for the murders, then murdered himself?
And suppose Bob Lee Swagger joined up with real-life Marine sniper Chuck Mawhinney to right the wrong?
And suppose it all wrapped up to the tune of Marty Robbins’ classic cowboy ballad, “Big Iron”?

That’s what you’re looking at in the latest novel in Hunter’s series, “I, Sniper.”

And, best of all, Stephen Hunter’s masterful writing and plotting craftsmanship allows it to happen within that rarely achieved “willing suspension of disbelief,” which is exponentially harder to achieve when technical devices and protocols are involved, and when the audience knows those devices and protocols.

The novel’s title is a play on words that derives from a piece of gear that is a key to the plot: “iSniper.” Though there’s a computer game of that name, in the book it’s a sophisticated, computerized telescopic sight that’s only a few years out from actually existing at the level it does in the novel.Clearly, Brother Hunter has done his homework.

Hie yourself hence to the bookstore and reserve yourself a copy of “I, Sniper” by Stephen Hunter via Simon & Schuster. I’ve just finished reading an advance proof copy, and I have to say it’s the best fiction I’ve read this year.

If Dan’s action scenes sound realistic, well…it’s because they’re real. He hit upon the ingenious strategy of taking real-life gunfights and simply transposing them shot-for-shot to his fictional characters. In this case, cop’s cop “Dave Compton,” a beloved street-wise patrol sergeant, relives the shooting of a real-life beloved, street-wise patrol sergeant, Dan’s and my mutual friend Marcus Young. In both cases, the good guy survives multiple gunshot wounds and goes on to inspire others, and in both the real case and the fictional version, the classically evil bad guy ends up in the ground. Marcus is of course one of those mentioned in the acknowledgements.

Brother Dan also has a way with words. When officer asks a more experienced one why he calls even the worst bad guys “Sir,” the latter replies that it’s an acronym for “Sincerity Isn’t Required.” That’s a better definition than the one I learned many years ago. At one point, the serial murderer is described as “nervous as a feral cat at an NRA picnic.” Dan’s stuff is just fun to read.

You can order an autographed copy of “Nobody’s Heroes” from Dan Marcou, PO Box 195, Holmen, WI 54636 for $20 including postage. In a time when certain politicians try to spin fiction into reality, it’s good to see a veteran street cop turn reality into entertaining fiction.

I know Barrett, and I didn’t take it that way. In fact, he’s one of the few mainstream media people I know who seems to take a totally neutral approach to this highly polarized debate. In reading his article and the related sidebars carefully, I can find no hint of editorial prejudice against gun owners. The online version opens with a video of me explaining why both police and “civilian” markets took to the Glock pistol like ducks to water. Both Barrett and his editors had the opportunity to edit out the comments in which I treated the private citizen sector with the same respect as the law enforcement sector. They did not.

I took Barrett to a couple of pistol matches so he could see why ordinary folks liked these popular handguns. In an exercise in “participatory journalism,” he took some private lessons with us and competed in the second match, using a borrowed Glock 17. He proved safe and competent for a man who has never owned a firearm and had only fired them in the course of research related to his reportage on the weapons industry. New to the gun, he did not come in last in the match.

In talking with Barrett, I got a sense of an honest reporter trying to show every side of the story he had been assigned to write. Some former Glock execs, whom he plainly showed in his article to be  inimical toward the company, had to be quoted; when I talked with him, he was trying desperately to get counterpoint comments from current Glock spokespeople.

More than a month before the article came out, Paul Barrett was interviewed for the ProArms podcast by producer and editor (PrEditor?) Gail Pepin, with a view toward getting an outside analyst’s view of gun issues in general and the gun industry in particular. It can be downloaded from The ProArms Podcast site.  That, too, sounded pretty even-handed to me. The poet Robert Burns said, “Oh, what a gift the giftie gie us, to see oursel’s as others see us.” The ProArms interview of Barrett is a unique opportunity to see how we gun people are viewed by that rare creature, the unbiased and unprejudiced outside observer who has studied us.

I can understand how some reflexively call the reporter “anti-gun” when he quotes sources hostile to someone’s favorite gun manufacturer. Gun owners are a minority long persecuted by mainstream media, and we can be as prone to over-reactions as Harvard professors who focus on racial prejudice and suddenly have a cross-racial misunderstanding with law enforcement.

Read the Barrett article and sidebars in their entirety. If you believe a media source has been unfair to you, your beliefs, and the truth, by all means speak out and hold them accountable. But, if you see the uncommon case where a mainstream story touching on guns has been done without prejudice to the guns themselves and those who own them, it’s just as important to write a comment and let the magazine know you appreciate honest, impartial reportage.

“Reinforcing good behavior,” and all of that…

Mas, background, and Herman Gunter, foreground, coach Paul Barrett on how to shoot a Glock.

Participatory journalism: Paul Barrett shoots an IDPA match with a borrowed Glock 17 9mm.

On the rifle range, we were all impressed with the accuracy and smooth function of the Thompson/Center high powered, bolt action hunting rifles. T/C was famous for accurate, value-priced guns even before they became an S&W subsidiary. The distinctive Icon Precision Hunter, new this year, lived up to its name with groups well under an inch at a hundred yards. Even their low-priced ($500 manufacturer’s suggested retail price) Venture model was doing under an inch at that distance. We were shooting the Precision Hunter in .22-250, and the Venture in .30-06.

Those cute little .22s I mentioned in the last blog entry endeared themselves to all. Factory insiders told us to expect an inch and a half shot grouping for five rounds at fifty yards. We did that easily with CCI Mini-Mag ammo, which is a small game hunting and general purpose round. Chris Christian, who writes for Outdoor Life, got 1.1” in a strong crosswind. In the course of two days we put thousands of rounds through an assortment of these cute little AR15 clones, and I never saw one malfunction. It’s going to be interesting to see, down the road, what these rifles can do with standard velocity Match grade ammunition. I’m down for two of ‘em, one for me and one for the Significant Other and Adult Supervisor.

The comments on the previous entry on this topic showed the intensity with which firearms traditionalists dislike the integral lock system that S&W has been putting in its revolvers for the last several years. The keyway is an unsightly hole above the cylinder release latch, and the key that comes with the gun can be used to lock the action frozen, preventing firing if the gun gets into unauthorized hands. This produces a visceral negative response from gun folks on several levels.

First, it changes both the appearance and (subtly) the frame shape of the gun. It’s an esthetics thing. Second, it’s like dumping mandatory helmet laws on motorcyclists: experienced practitioners believe they can handle their own safety needs, thank you very much, and don’t like someone else’s safety concepts being forced upon them. Third, it’s a constant reminder of the anti-gun Clinton Administration’s attempt to force unwanted things down the throats of free American gun owners, which is why so many disparagingly call that little keyway the “Hillary hole.” Finally, there have been a few – not an epidemic, but definitely, a few – cases where the damn thing has locked itself spontaneously during firing, and that just sends cold chills down the backs of those who rely on firearms for life-saving purposes. I’ve generally run across that happening only with the very powerful guns in very light formats, the Model 329 super-light .44 Magnum with hot loads for example.

I discussed this with the S&W folks at the seminar, and frankly, long before then. There is strong sentiment among some at S&W to get rid of the lock, just as there is among those consumers who prefer classic firearms. However, the company is going to stay with them for a while because of the liability climate, and the fact that integral locks are required to sell their products in jurisdictions such as California. The feedback S&W gets from firearms retailers and general consumers is that only a small, hard-core group of gun fanciers consider the lock a “deal-breaker.”

For those who don’t like that feature, S&W added this year another gun to their “lemon-squeezer” line, a retro re-introduction of the Model 42 revolver of 1952. “Hammerless” in external configuration, it has a grip safety that will only allow the trigger to be pulled when in something approximating an intentional firing hold. Action was sweet, workmanship was good, and the little Model 42 snub-nose (weighing under a pound thanks to its aluminum frame Airweight construction) shot where I put the sights. Buying one of this series, also available in all-steel from an earlier introduction, can help send S&W the message that you’ll spend your money for their guns if they DON’T have those internal locks you don’t like.

More later…

Here’s the new version of the classic-style K-22…

Chris Christian of Outdoor Life got this 1.1 group with the 15-22 in a crosswind at 50 yards with CCI Mini-Mag .22 LR ammo.

This is the reincarnated Model 57 in .41 Magnum.

Newly introduced .38 Special Airweight Bodyguard, the Model 438, is blackened stainless with aluminum frame. Red arrow points to the internal lock keyway…

…while the lock is notably absent from this Model 42-1 Airweight .38 Special “lemon squeezer.”

I’m presently at a gun writers’ seminar in Tulsa, on the splendid USSA (United States Shooting Academy) range. We’re getting to play with some of the cool new rifles and handguns from this maker that should have been available to the consumers by now…and would have been, if the post-election gun buying frenzy natinwide hadn’t thrown production schedules into a cocked hat.

As nature gave us a panoply of its broad range of Oklahoma weather through the day — by turns windy and still, pouring rain and unremitting sun — we got briefed by S&W executives and engineers, and got to put lots of rounds downrange.

Star of the show, I think, was the coolest little .22 rifle to come along in a while. It’s the .22 Long Rifle version of their M&P 15, which in turn is Smith & Wesson’s take on what has truly become “America’s Rifle,” the AR15. Rendered with lots of polymer, including even the accessory rail, it weighs only about five pounds or so. More than a dozen of us poured 25-round magazines of CCI ammo through it, and I didn’t see a single malfunction. Accuracy was good on the “practical range,” shooting all sorts of steel knockdowns and silhouettes. We will be taking it to the longer rifle ranges tomorrow and hope to be able to bench test it for accuracy. It will sell for $499.95 suggested retail, and I predict it will definitely be a hit.

We plan to work with a precision rifle from Thompson/Center, now of course a Smith & Wesson subsidiary, tomorrow.

On the handgun side, the adjustable sight version of the 1964 Model 57 in .41 Magnum proved eminently “shootable.” Something of a “niche cartridge” these days, the .41 Mag has always had a strong following among those who really knew their guns and appreciated a heavy-duty outdoorsman’s revolver. We also got to shoot the new iterations of the great old K-22, in both 6″ barrel Model 17 and 4″ barrel Model 18 configurations. These are recent additions to S&W’s successful “retro” line they call the Classic Series.

There are also new variations in their super-popular Military & Police semiautomatic service pistol line, and their 1911 series semiautomatic pistols, and more.

I’ll get back to you after tomorrow’s shooting session, with more info, and should have some pix for you by the end of this week.