The Truth About Guns

News outlets have few details about a reported ‘active shooter’ situation developing at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colorado. Arapahoe HS is about five miles as the crow flies from Columbine High School, a detail which I’m sure will not be overlooked by some who will try to exploit this news for political gain. Two people are reported wounded at the 2,200-student high school, and no one was in custody as of 1:00 Mountain standard time. Check back for more details as they develop.

Tiger McKee [via tacticalwire.com] writes:

You would never leave home without your electronic “I-thing,” yet the majority of those who carry pistols never consider the need for a secondary or back-up pistol. Fights, especially defensive confrontations, never go as planned. You’re presented a unique problem. There’s a very short amount of time to come up with a solution and apply the skills necessary to solve the problem. Having a pistol is a good start. Having two pistols is even better . . .

A big reason for carrying a spare pistol -this applies to f

Grizzly Targets has encouraged me to be absolutely merciless to their line of laser-cut AR500 steel targets, and my secret inner vandal has been only too happy to oblige. Their newest product, the Trifecta triple gallery target, has proven to be just as indestructible as their other offerings. And much more challenging. Unless you’re shooting steel-core ammo or hypervelocity jacketed slugs, you’ll have an absolute blast connecting with not one but three reactive steel targets mounted to one easily-portable base.

Three Times The Target Plates!

The Trifecta uses three of the same 3/8″ AR500 hardened steel target plates that the AR-220 uses. The 14″ tall tar

“Some guys look at that and they start to get the heebie-jeebies,” Tom Gresham points out (1:49), pointing to his privates. Well, not really, but you get the point. So to speak. Personally, I have trouble with the idea of a gun aimed at the baby maker and family jewels. No matter how well covered the trigger. And while Rob assures us that the gun isn’t muzzling anything during presentation, I’m not sure that would be true at, say, a Victoria’s Secret after-party. Still I’ll give it a go (appendix carry) after your thoughts (about appendix carry)?

As the anniversary of the Newtown shooting approaches, the usual gun control advocacy organizations are gearing up their propaganda campaigns to try and convince us that guns make us less safe, and that the only “common sense” solution to the “gun violence epidemic” is gun control. But as we’ve proven time and again here on this website (and cataloged for you in our Gun Facts section), that’s just not the case. Every claim that gun control advocates make trying to link the existence of guns to violence falls flat on its face when you add a splash of context and some verified numbers. But in preparation for this weekend, I wanted to bring together some of those hard and fast facts, based on verified numbers from the U.S. government (rather than surveys or flawed studies), that illustrate the truth about guns and violence in the United States. This way you’ll have a single pos

The “background chatter” (as the NSA calls it) on gun control is ramping up ahead of the one-year anniversary of the Newtown massacre. Despite the inevitable bloody shirt waving, the antis’ exploitation of the tragedy isn’t moving the needle on the post-Newtown push for civilian disarmament. On Tuesday, Vice President Joe “Double Barrel” Biden met with families of Sandy Hook victims to announce that Uncle Sam will channel $100m into mental health services to commemorate the killing [paraphrasing]. While lamenting the lack of federal “gun reform,” the mainstream media is consoling itself with the reaction on the state level. Example gi

The headline above sits atop the dead tree version of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch profile of TTAG’s main man Dan Zimmerman. After a reader kvetched about the inherent anti-gun bias the Dispatch’s online editor dispatched it in favor of Olivette man the force behind TheTruthAboutGuns.com. I prefer the original. It’s more . . . Zimmermanesque. Either way, it’s clear that the Missouri newspaper—known for its anti-gun views

“It’s easier to get people to see that they don’t want something than that they don’t have a right to it. Focusing on the need rather than the right to own a gun, many may well conclude that for them a gun is more a danger than a protection. Those fewer guns will make for a safer country.” Gary Gutting, Who Needs a Gun? [at nytimes.com]

Received this recently from Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia: “Hi. I’m looking to buy knifes that would suit my Stoeger Shotgun please see attachments for details. Do you sell them and if so what price are they and do you ship to Newcastle area and I will pay all cost.” I (nicely) informed her we don’t sell knives, in fact don’t sell anything, and asked her permission to show you the photos, which she gave. Here ya go. Click for the full size glory, and make the jump for the other photo…

Gun buybacks are sad affairs for most people. They’re sad for the bored police officers who have to staff them, unless they get to cherry-pick the guns they want to keep for themselves, and they’re sad for deluded utopians who have convinced themselves that melting down replica 2-band muskets will prevent gang-bangers from killing each other on Oakland’s mean streets. Now a Bay Area anti-gun group is the latest to join the pity party, because their crowdfunding outreach hasn’t even raised half they money they need for a December 14th buyback in San Jose . . .

‘Gunbygun’ launched a gun buyback crowdfunding campaign with the goal of raising $10,000 by December 10th. But according to the

Ever since I saw the movie Airplane, I have a hard time taking all that macho Gladiator stuff seriously. But I do pay close attention to products “built in the USA.” Maximus Arms‘ press release (after jump) doesn’t say anything about their new 1911′s origin, but the headline at ammoland.com and the website pic proclaim that the company’s take on John Moses Browning’s masterpiece is “100% American made.” I reckon that’s a good thing, not a

user3369 writes:

According to childstats.gov, there are approximately 48.6 million children under the age of 12 in the United States. msnbc.com and Mother Jones are jumping on a study on children were killed in gun homicides in 2012/2013 since Newtown. They’re “appalled” that roughly 200 (173 in MSNBC and 194 in Mother Jones) died this way.

Hero911 Network™ (iOS, Android Free) (www.hero911.org)

“This is a free app and is exclusively for active law enforcement officers from all jurisdictions and for retired officers who complete annual certification training to carry their weapon. The app requires applicants to submit their credentials and/or official government work email. Official police officers vet the activation requests and will approve or deny them within 24-48 hours. If the requests are approved, the Hero911 app will sit dormant on their phone and will only alert officers if they are in close proximity of a school shooting reported from the

There’s no doubt that Advanced Armament is the 800 pound gorilla of the silencer world, but Silencerco is one of the companies nipping at its heels. With the sales of their Saker silencer picking up and their Osprey handgun silencer gaining popularity, one would assume that the Vice President of Sales would be pretty happy with how things are going. However, news comes today that Gary Hughes has left Silencerco. According to the press release (written by the man himself) the reason was to take a different job at a non silencer related company, but given the recent firing of Mike Pappas (co-founder of Silencerco) it’s not hard to see a correlation.

By Tom in Oregon

Brit reader Adam Pugh read yesterday’s ‘Which Gun Would You Grab’ post and saw, well, a few problems with the way gun laws in the Land of Hope and Glory were portrayed. Being an aspiring gunsmith, he appears to have experience navigating Blighty’s ballistic barriers to bangstick ownership. Being from Cambridge, he eschews the Oxford comma and for that we salute him. Here are his corrections and amplifications . . .

1. Semi-automatic centrefire guns are not banned outright – only semi-automatic centrefire rifles and pistols. You can own semi-automatic shotguns in both Section 2 (shotgun certificate, limited to 2+1 capacity, 24+” barrel – 40+” OAL) or Section 1 (firearms certificate, unlimited capacity, if semi or pump then same dimension requirements as Section 2, if SxS, O/U,

Perry Danos sent me this song as a wv file. I asked him to upload it to YouTube for your dining and dancing pleasure. Also to make the point that new media has opened-up new avenues for the pro-2A crowd. Could you imagine Colion Noir’s rants on a “regular” TV channel or this website—which recently passed 100m page views—as a mainstream magazine? The question is, now that we have access to newbies is the pro-gun message getting through? Are we winning the info war?

CLP stands for Cleaner, Lubricant and Preservative. It refers to a liquid substance that’s designed to be the “one gun fluid to rule them all,” something you can use to clean the gun and then leave in place to keep it from rusting and make sure everything slides around properly. Most CLP formulas result in a watery and runny fluid that quickly evaporates or disappears after a few days in the gun safe. Rand CLP, on the other hand, is not “most formulas” . . .

The Rand CLP fluid is without a doubt the most viscous CLP I’ve ever tried, but despite looking for all the world like a glop of glue it is slippery as all heck. Squeeze a little out onto a cloth cleaning rag and it forms a bubble on the surface instead of soaking into the cloth, and then as you apply the fluid to the gun you can feel how slick it makes the surfaces.

That viscosity is a double edged sword, though.

In what might appear to be a counter-intuitive move, Wilson Arms plans to move its barrel production facility from Wisconsin to Connecticut. But the company already has operations in Connecticut and this move will be a consolidation of operations. The company owner, Hugo Vivero, purchased the company from the Wilson family six years ago. Wilson Arms was founded in New Haven, Connecticut back in 1954 when firearms regulation and legislation were more sane and reasonable . . .

Wilson’s acquisition of the former Ba