It made me a bit sad.

No explanation attached to the video. I am guessing ammo that was unsafe for whatever reason and by the looks of the cases already spent, it has to be some big caliber as in long gun or crew served weapon, very possibly Russian.

Somebody commented that it was the Devil’s Popcorn machine. Sounds about right.

Hat tip to Sal F.

Trevor Fair, a 33-year-old cameraman at WDBJ for six years, said that the words Parker used are commonplace but that they would routinely set off Flanagan.“We would say stuff like, ‘The reporter’s out in the field.’ And he would look at us and say, ‘What are you saying, cotton fields? That’s racist,’ ” Fair recounted.“We’d be like, ‘What?’ We all know what that means, but he took it as cotton fields, and therefore we’re all racists.”“This guy was a nightmare,” Fair said. “Management’s worst nightmare.”Flanagan assumed everything was a jab at his race, even when a manager brought in watermelon for all employees.“Of course, he thought that was racist. He was like, ‘You’re doing that because of me.’ No, the general manager brought in watermelon for the entire news team. He’s like, ‘Nope, this is out for me. You guys are calling me out because I’m black.’ ”Flanagan even declared that ­7-Eleven was racist because it sold watermelon-flavored Slurpees.“It’s not a coincidence, they’re racist,” he allegedly told Fair.

Source: The comments that became a reporter’s death sentence | New York Post

The more I read about Flanagan, the more I am convinced he was not somebody with a long story of mental issues but somebody that created his own little world and decided to seek his own brand of justice for perceived injuries. He was a willful self-created sociopath who disregarded what you and me consider the proper norms of civilized behavior because his own needs were not fulfilled. Narcissism is no longer an occasional behavior but the normal behavior for many.

The problem arrives when the expected compensation does not arrive in a prompt manner of it at all. They get frustrated and these were people raised without the important teachings that life is a long chain of frustrations, small and big, that are there for us to overcome. Without the coping mechanisms that regular, well raised people were taught and with the “moral” backing of a group  sharing the same principles, narcissists become destructive, sort of “If I Can’t Have It….” If we are lucky, they direct that anger to themselves via drugs, alcohol and posting crap in Twitter and Facebook. But I see Vester here as the next step of the Social Justice Warriors and assorted Whining Meemies: I  have to do something! I’ll Burn It All!

So I fear that we may have a mass casualty event from somebody in the Opposition. They have wished us dead over and over and to me it is a question of when it will happen. It may be an attack at a local gun range or at the NRA Annual Meeting or any other type of gathering related to guns and the Second Amendment. Somebody will suddenly have an urge to “teach us a lesson” because we do not acquiesce to their “needs.”

Anyway, that is what I think. The usual grain of salt is available for consumption. 🙂

You know you are a gun nut when you measure your weight loss increments in what you can comfortably carry IWB.

(Actual conversation with the wife)

Her: “How is the new gym membership going?”

Me: “Good, I’ve already lost some weight.”

Her: “How much?”

Me: “Enough to go from my P238 to my LCR.”

Her: “What!?”

I have been working on this post for a while now, I apologize if it seems to ramble a little.  I was motivated to revive it because of a news story about an attack on a CCW permit holder.  This is not the first story I have read about a CCW permit holder getting taken down and not firing a shot.  I first started this post as a response to a post by Miguel regarding a failed DGU that resulted in the death of the defending party.  And of course there is the oft repeated anti-CCW argument that women are too weak to have or carry guns.

In each one of these cases, and those like them that I didn’t link to, the scenario begs the question: why have a gun if you are not prepared to use it effectively?  This post is my attempt to answer that question.

Many years ago when I was In ROTC in college, I would read whatever I could get my hands on regarding military strategy, tactics, and doctrine.  I was going to be a general.  Rommel you magnificent bastard, I read your book.  Needless to say, those plans did not come to fruition.

One of the more interesting books I read was by Samuel Lyman Atwood Marshall, the Chief Military Historian of the US Army for WWII.  Marshall discovered that about 80% of soldiers would no fire at the enemy with the intent to kill them.  Many never fired their weapon at all.  Of those who did, many would “pray and spray” or provide covering fire.  That is not to say the remaining soldiers were cowards.  They carried ammo, water, wounded, etc,. and provided for the war effort.  But it was a small minority of soldiers that could line up their sights on an enemy and pull the trigger with the intent to kill them.

This information is reinforced by the whole history of technology in combat, which served to separate the soldier from the killing he was expected to do.  The greater the distance, the better the solider was as killing: clubs to swords to spears to arrows to the long bow to muskets to artillery to bomber aircraft to ICBMs.  The further a soldier was from the casualties he was producing the easier it was for him to kill.  Arial bombardment and artillery produced far more casualties in war than small arms fire.

There is a reason for this, of course.  Humans are social animals; we do better in groups than on our own.  Empathy is part of that.  Evolution or nature or god or whatever has programmed us to be empathetic to our fellow humans, so that we don’t kill each other and instead work together.  The stronger the bond – family, clan, tribe, nation – the more empathetic we are.  It is hard to look someone in the face and kill them.  It goes against our empathetic nature.

So to get back to the original point of this post.  Why do I believe that a woman, fearing for her life from an ex didn’t kill him?  Why did two CCW permit holders not use their permitted guns to defend themselves?  I believe that despite owning a gun, obtaining a permit, and perhaps years of target practice, they weren’t prepared to kill.  That is a major emotional hurtle for a person to climb.

The military developed an entirely new training regiment prior to Vietnam with the goal of making 80% of solders combat effective.  There has been a downside to this.  It is believed that one of the reasons that America soldiers have suffered so much more emotional trauma (PTSD) in Vietnam  and the Middle East, compared to WWII, is that these young men and women have been trained to kill in combat, but do not know how to cope with the emotional ramifications of that when they return home.

So where does that leave us?  It is possible for a person to overcome their good, empathetic nature and defend themselves with lethal force.  If you choose to own and/or carry a gun for self defense, you must be emotionally prepared to use it.    If not, you may get killed by the psychopath who has no empathetic qualms about ending you.

Re the murder of the two media folks in VA

Stop. Just fucking stop.

This is getting play for only two reasons.

Oshkosh Corp. on Tuesday won a $6.75 billion contract to build almost 17,000 new light trucks to replace aging Humvees for the U.S. Army and Marine Corps, cementing the future of its defense business.

Source: Oshkosh Wins $6.75 Billion Military Contract to Replace Humvee – WSJ

Good news indeed even though the Humvee was never intended to be a light armored vehicle but a substitute to the venerable Willis MB 1/4 ton truck.  The Humvee proved to be an amazing platform which went above and beyond its original design and was maligned for political purposes. It was akin to getting a Corolla as a substitute for the Pinto, suddenly demand it did the work of a Ford F-250 and then bitch because it was not doing it 110%.

What we need now is DOJ to make the retiring 120,000 Humvees available for the civilian market the same way they did with the Willis MB.

Hat tip to Justin P.