My wife loves competition TV shows.

People baking cakes, people making art, people blowing glass, etc.

The ones that really get to me are the ones that touch on “hard skills.”

My wife will come to me, as a metallurgist with a background in welding and manufacturing, and say “I found a show about metal workers, we should watch it.”

Then it’s full of fucking artists.

I’m tired of all the fucking artists.

Especially because half of them now are just a physical manifestation of an amalgamation of every (to conservatives) negative stereotype of artists.

Here is some ugly, pink hair, tattooed and pierced freak, explains how she’s competing on behalf of every transgender, non-binary, lesbian who likes to make sculptures out of scrap metal and junk.

Sure, she’s got a MIG welder in her hand but she’s not a welder.  Not in the way I think of a welder as a person who makes structural welds for a living.

I want a competition show for useful people who make shit for a living.

Day 1:

“Here’s a blueprint, there are some 2×4’s, you have a framing hammer, nail gun, tape measure, plumb line, square, and miter saw.  You have 6 hours to frame these walls.  Then we’re going to have three building inspectors evaluate your work for code compliance, stud spacing consistency, etc.”

Day 2:

“Here a blueprint, you have a MIG welder and a chop saw.  You have 6 hours to make this.  Then were going to have some CWI inspect it.”

Day 3:

Same thing, brick a wall.

Day 4:

Shingle a roof

Etc.

I want to watch skilled men build useful things with skill and precision.

Show me a guy who can frame a house perfectly or do a perfect TIG weld on a stainless steel manifold.

To me thats far more interesting than some pink hair enby making some piece of garbage.

And these would be working class guys, competing for money, and perhaps a bunch of new of tools, to start their own contractor company, weld shop, etc.

If I could, I’d get Mike Rowe to host it.

I’d watch the fuck out of that.

I suck.

I’m actually a very accurate shot.

I take pride in that.

I grew up in urban Miami.  The in the 80s and 90s most of the indoor ranges in Miami were homes to urban commandos of dicey character.

The public outdoor ranges were busy.

My dad was a lawyer so we had access to the local PBA range through the Florida Bar Association.

That range was set up for Police Pistol Combat (PPC).  I learned to shoot bullseye and PPC.  Slow and accurate from a fixed position.

When I switched to IDPA and USPSA years ago I never got over the precision aspect.

I want my two A zone hits touching.

So I move slowly.

I rarely drop points but I’m not fast and I don’t really push myself.

I see guys shoot stages in a third the time I do but shoot all B’c and C’s.

I stopped worrying about my ranking.

I did it once a month, maybe, and didn’t practice at home because I didn’t have a back yard I could shoot at or could afford the ammo with two kids.

I focus on the fundamentals.

Get the gun out of the holster, on target, for a first round A zone hit.

I’m there to have fun and to practice the skills that will give me a fighting chance in a gun fight.

If I come in, in the top 50% of shooters and did a little better than last time I’m happy.

I see guys show up with high speed gear, get smoked by some old fart who has been shooting for decades, and never return.

It’s fine to go to a match and not have a “competitors” attitude and ego.

Go as a way to practice the fundamentals and have a good time.

The moment you do that you’re miles ahead of the mall ninja (or cop or service member) who refuses to go to the range because he might get his ego bruised.

I found this article online.  It’s from 2018 but it’s still relevant.

New study on shooting accuracy. How does your agency stack up?

Researchers analyzed 149 real-life OISs recorded over a 15-year period by Dallas (TX) PD. In nearly half of these encounters, officers firing at a single suspect delivered “complete inaccuracy.” That is, they missed the target entirely.

In 15 incidents, the total number of rounds fired could not be determined. But in the 134 cases where researchers could establish that figure, they calculated the hit rate, “incredibly,” at merely 35%. In other words, more than six out of 10 rounds fired were misses.

“Unfortunately,” the study says, “the data do not provide a clear picture of what happened with these [errant] rounds, but, at worst, they struck other officers or innocent bystanders.”

Once again, “Hollywood entertainment [that] routinely depicts the police as sharp shooters” falls far short of combat reality.

From the earliest measurements in the 1970s, a wide range of researchers have documented that “police departments rarely ever achieve a 50% hit rate,” the authors report. Annual hit-rate averages in large departments such as New York City, Chicago, Philadelphia, and Las Vegas, for example, have typically ranged from 22% to 52% over the decades.

“Given the amount of firearms training the police receive, it would be assumed that they hit their target more often than not,” the researchers state. But the truth is that “officers are routinely inaccurate in their use of deadly force.”

Among all 149 shootings studied, officers struck the suspect “with at least one round 54% of the time.” There was some fluctuation from year to year, but the overall prevailing trend was about a 50/50 split between hits and misses—“not very accurate,” the researchers note.

Here, officers fired 354 rounds at suspects. Half the officers “were entirely inaccurate,” including one who fired 23 misses! Overall, about one-third (35%) of all officers’ rounds hit the targeted suspect. Most of those who had “perfect marksmanship” fired only one round.

The distances at which these shootings occurred was not provided but we know that 61% of police shootings happen within 20 feed and 50% within 15 feet, so we can assume at least half the shootings from the article were within 5 yards.

So three things to note.

Cops suck at accuracy.  I understand that police shootings are stressful and I don’t want to to come across as a Monday morning armchair quarterback, but in a career where we pay people to carry guns and know how to use them in stressful and violent situations, we are not getting quality results.

This really demonstrates how impressive an 80% hit rate at 40 yards for self defense shooter is.

Since we do not have qualified immunity as civilians, we are responsible for every round we send down range.  It is incumbent on ourselves to strive for perfect accuracy.

We need to train and train under stressful conditions.

Nothing matches the stress of a gunfight, but every stressed in practice helps.

Find an IDPA or USPSA match and sign up.

If you’ve never done it before, you will suck.

That’s fine.  You will practice drawing, sighting, and shooting under the stress of a shot timer.  That is good practice (and fun as hell).

You will get better and you will be better than someone who has never done it before.

Get out there and practice so you will be ready if the shit hits the fan.

"Climate activist" attached themselves to the road in Berlin.

George Soros is proud 🤣🤣🤣💀😵‍💫 pic.twitter.com/n3cE64Z01y

— 🔥🇺🇸 KC 🇺🇸🔥 (@KCPayTreeIt) July 20, 2022

The news says that she glued herself to the street with cement.

Cement has very alkaline and is known to cause severe chemical burns.

It is also exothermic as it cures.

She has the potential to really damage her hand with this dumb stunt.

Anyone stupid and ill informed enough to do this isn’t worth listening to.

The heroics go beyond Eli Dicken, apparently his girlfriend contributed too.

‘Good Samaritan’ identified in Greenwood Park Mall shooting; called ‘hero’ by his girlfriend’s family

As police rushed shoppers at Greenwood Park Mall to safety Sunday evening after a mass shooting, 19-year-old Shay Golden’s grandmother was getting frightening calls and texts on her phone.

She didn’t want to share her name publicly, but she did want to share with 13News what she calls heroic actions by her granddaughter and especially her granddaughter’s boyfriend, 22-year-old Elisjsha Dicken, of Seymour.

Shay took action too, her grandmother says, despite her terror.

She helped a woman she saw laying on the ground, who’d been shot in the leg.

“She’s been in nursing school for two years. She said she took her coat off and put a tourniquet around it and waited,” her grandmother explained. “She jumped in and went into action, yeah, and it’s just her adrenaline mode to just do that.”

Of course the focus has been on Dicken’s quick action and incredible shooting but tending to the wounded and doing bleeding control is critical to keep the body count low.

Both of them saved lives that day.

Experts impressed by armed bystander’s response at Greenwood mall shooting

A new timeline from Greenwood Police show it only took 15 seconds for the Greenwood mall shooting to come to an end.

Police reviewed surveillance video that showed the moments the suspect left the food court bathroom to the time Eli Dicken pulled out his gun, aimed and took out the threat.

Autopsy results also revealed the suspect was hit eight times from about 40 yards away. Police say Dicken fired 10 rounds.

Those numbers are impressing many gun experts and owners.

“What impressed me the most, compared to your average civilian shooter, was not the number of rounds fired, not the hit rate, not the time, but the distance,” said Mark Welter, retail manager for Indy Arms Company.

Welter and another instructor tested it out to see if they could do it. They put a target 25 yard out, which was the farthest it could go.

“That was seven seconds to draw and get off 10 rounds in 25 yards and I’m low on a lot of them,” Welter said after he finished shooting.

Police said Dicken had no police training or military background. He told them he learned to shoot from his grandfather.

So WTHR Indianapolis found some shooting instructors who couldn’t reproduce what Dicken pulled off.

The lesson here, of course, is practice more.

And I’m absolutely certain his grandfather would be proud of him, using the skills he taught to save lives.

As everything seems to be falling apart, it’s getting diceyer out there.

It’s good to know that they’re are still good Samaritans with skills out there.

Strive to be one yourself.

Carry everywhere and make sure you have a tourniquet on you.

Wake up and smell the coffee! Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz slams woke leaders for ‘abdicating their responsibility’ to fight crime causing his chain to shutter 16 profitable stores because of assaults on staff – with MORE closures to come

The CEO of Starbucks is shuttering 16 profitable stores nationwide over disruptions that he’s blamed on the cities’ woke leaders for ‘abdicating their responsibility’ to fight crime.

Howard Schultz said ‘America has become unsafe’ after he announced that 16 stores will close in several left-leaning cities across the country because staff are being attacked and reports of drug use at the popular cafés.

Schultz warned that this is ‘just the beginning’ of store closures and said there ‘would be many more’ as staff fear for their own safety amid a rise in crime, homeless and people with mental health issues.

In two leaked video excerpts of Schultz speaking at an internal meeting, shared by Ari Hoffman of KVI-AM talk radio in Seattle, Schultz said he was shocked to hear that one of the primary concerns of their retail partners is their ‘own personal safety.’

The reported disruptions include drug use by paying customers and, more often than not, members of the public – who often take advantage of the company’s open bathroom policy, which allows nonpaying patrons to use their facilities.

As a result, the bathrooms have in large part devolved into dens of debauchery, regularly used by vagrants and homeless to do drugs and engage in other illicit behavior.

Well, well, well, isn’t it the consequences of Schuktz’s own actions.

He implemented the open bathroom policy after Starbucks was bullied by Wokies online.

He has openly supported all of these Woke politicians and Woke bail reform and drug decriminalization policies.

He supported and donated to the people he now blames for making these cities unsafe and causing him to close stores.

I honestly believe that Starbucks shareholders should demand Schultz be fired for helping cause this mess with his PAC.

Since the last few mass shootings, I’ve decided perhaps it’s time to up my usual carry game from either a 38 snubby or a sub compact 9mm.

Those are light and easy to carry, but if I’m going to a bigger place, perhaps a compact 9mm with a 15 round mag is a better option.

I ordered more JHP, which sent me down the path of big money gun bloggers (the kinds with millions of YouTube subscribers, ads, merch, and sponsored videos) doing ballistic gel testing.

Apparently I’m going to die because one of my guns is loaded with Federal 124 grain Hydra-Shock.  I also have a bunch of Winchester Ranger that I got as Law Enforcement surplus.

See, these are older styles of hollow point and when these guys did their tests every once in a while they didn’t mushroom perfectly and maybe only penetrated 11.5 inches instead of the minimum 12.

Then there was a test of one of my loads I have a bunch of, Buffalo Bore 124+P.  Sure, every bullet consistently hit 14 to 15 inches deep, and fully mushroomed, but the jackets shed some petals and there wasn’t 100% weight retention, so it was rated as “junk.”

I seem to remember an old saying “perfection is the enemy of good enough.”

I’m pretty sure that putting a 124 grain bullet into an asshole at 1200 fps and sending it 15 inches into him will do the trick whether or not it forms a perfectly symmetrical, 100% weight retained mushroom.

Not to mention that some of those older bullets, e.g., Winchester Ranger, Federal Hydra-Shock, Remington Golden Saber, etc., have decades of use as duty ammo yeeting assholes.

Let’s not discount that over one gel test.

And if your first shot doesn’t stop the bad guy, shoot the fucker again.

Maybe my pragmatic approach is why I don’t have a million subscribers and a sponsored YouTube channel.

Because “buy JHP you can afford and put the rest of your money into practicing good follow-up shot placement” doesn’t sell as much as “your beloved JHP is obsolete junk and will get you killed, buy my new favorite load instead.”