OT: After 56 years, it all comes back as easy as bicycle riding...

That's what my son was using in the AR15. He also had a version with a longer casing, that he had to changes "bolts" to accommodate.

What? You don't believe Nanny Gloomberg will take care of you? ...Jim Thompson

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| James E.Thompson, CTO                            |    mens     |
| Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
| Phoenix, Arizona  85048    Skype: Contacts Only  |             |
| Voice:(480)460-2350  Fax: Available upon request |  Brass Rat  |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.     Sometimes I even put it in the food.

That's why I was proud... surprised the hell out me that I could just stand up and do that after all those intervening years.

It was interesting watching the "dust pops" 300 yards out :-)

I really liked that AR-15, really easy to shoot... no pull or buck except for that extra-charge type of round. ...Jim Thompson

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| James E.Thompson, CTO                            |    mens     |
| Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
| Phoenix, Arizona  85048    Skype: Contacts Only  |             |
| Voice:(480)460-2350  Fax: Available upon request |  Brass Rat  |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.     Sometimes I even put it in the food.

=A0 =A0 ...Jim Thompson

=A0 =A0| =A0 =A0mens =A0 =A0 |

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Why were you shooting one-handed?

I got my Russian-made (1938) Mosin-Nagant back in November of 2011, and I thought I was a pretty bad shot, actually. My worst shot was about 1 1/2 inches from the center, at 25 yards.

I took the boyfriend of my wife's high-school classmate to the range in May, and he shot out the center white circle of his target. I was very impressed. Then again he's from Tennessee, and has been shooting for years, if not decades.

7.62x54R bullet travelling at Mach 2.5. Now *that* is stopping power. =3D) I love the recoil too. Feels just right. The AR-15 doesn't have any recoil at all; not as much fun.

Michael

He was shooting handguns. Some people shoot better one handed.

The Mosin-Nagant is a fairly accurate rifle and you were shooting a 100 yard target at 25 yards.

Not to disparage your shooting but it looked as though you were comparing your shots with a rifle to Jim's handgun shots.

news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

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=A0 =A0 ...Jim Thompson

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Ah, the AK-74... 5.45x39mm... I almost bought one. Still looking, passively.

Thanks for the history lesson re: the LA Riots. I did not know that. Good thing the Korean shopkeepers were armed!

Michael

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=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0...Jim Thompson

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=A0 =A0 ...Jim Thompson

Exactly.

Same co-worker who introduced me to firearms explained it to me this way: we Americans don't trust our government as much as folks in Europe trust theirs.

Oh, and for Bill, a local price list for the range not too far from me (I'm in California, unfortunately):

Their rifle prices are way expensive, but I've got that Smith and Wesson 9mm on my mind.

Michael

My first time at the red line. Later my son showed me how to simply use my left hand "cup under", but that target was Swiss-cheese... my "virgin" target was very meaningful to me :-)

ALL of my AR15 shots were bulls-eye... how can you not... fabulous scope, swing down tripod, on a bench.

I could feel those 223 "heavy-loads", but otherwise you hardly knew you were firing. ...Jim Thompson

--
| James E.Thompson, CTO                            |    mens     |
| Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
| Phoenix, Arizona  85048    Skype: Contacts Only  |             |
| Voice:(480)460-2350  Fax: Available upon request |  Brass Rat  |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.     Sometimes I even put it in the food.

...

Oh! That was your first target, then?

Oh. I prefer iron sights. If they're good enough for Simo, they're good enough for me. =3D)

Yeah...

=A0 =A0 ...Jim Thompson

Have a good one!

Michael

Yep, first time a pistol in my hand in 56 years!

You too! ...Jim Thompson

--
| James E.Thompson, CTO                            |    mens     |
| Analog Innovations, Inc.                         |     et      |
| Analog/Mixed-Signal ASIC's and Discrete Systems  |    manus    |
| Phoenix, Arizona  85048    Skype: Contacts Only  |             |
| Voice:(480)460-2350  Fax: Available upon request |  Brass Rat  |
| E-mail Icon at http://www.analog-innovations.com |    1962     |
             
I love to cook with wine.     Sometimes I even put it in the food.

g

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0...Jim Thompson

s .

They are cheaper than they used to be, in terms of the proportion of disposable income they represent.

More likely because they fear their heavily armed neighbours. Guns aren't a particularly effective ways of changing a government you don't like. Political activism makes a lot more sense - democracy exists because elections are a much less disruptive way of organising a regime change than civil war.

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

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=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0...Jim Thompson

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=A0 =A0 ...Jim Thompson

That's supposed to be expensive? I've paid more for a meal in a restaurant (admittedly for four people in a three star restaurant).

-- Bill Sloman, Nijmegen

First of all, age has little to do with it, except, perhaps, to make a person more aware of being unable to fight using plain physical force.

Second, there are legitimate reasons to be concerned about our government beginning to attack its own citizens. We're about a step or two away from a fascist regime. Some would argue we already have one. While I admit this concern may be incorrect, I still say that it is a reasonable one.

The fact that a person chooses to arm himself is not evidence of mental deficiency or illness. In any event, you are not qualified to make such a diagnosis.

You "practice" in order to ensure that your efforts to defend yourself are effective. A weapon is of little use, if you don't know how to use it, or can't hit what you're aiming for.

Preparing for an eventuality does not mean a person is stupid, crazy, or evil. You may scoff at the notion of the US government becoming a threat, but history is replete with examples of governments turning on their own citizens and murdering them or herding them off into camps or enslaving them. What, exactly, prevents this from happening with the US government?

One might well argue that it's the fact that so many of its citizens are armed.

--
An honest tale speeds best being plainly told.
		-- William Shakespeare, "Henry VI"

Never point a firearm at _anything_ you don't intend to shoot.

Of course there is a risk. Anything you do carries some sort of risk, including choosing to do nothing. The question is not whether there are risks, but which risks are more palatable.

No doubt about that. The statistics bear you out. A person is much more likely to die by his own hand, than to be killed during a home invasion. If I remember correctly, about half the firearm deaths each year are suicides.

However, I wasn't thinking of defending against home invasions. I was thinking more along the lines of defending against a government gone bad, something that is not as inconceivable as you might think. As you may recall from history, such things have happened within living memory.

I doubt whether this will happen during my lifetime, but I can understand that people might be concerned about it. As I said elsewhere, it may well be that this hasn't happened simply because so many citizens are well-armed.

However, they are wholly ineffective against an attack by anyone with a firearm. A person with a gun or rifle can kill you from a distance. You need to be within a few yards to use pepper spray or a taser.

If you're defending against a home invasion, the burglar is likely to be unarmed, so taser or pepper spray is effective. However, as I said, the danger many people fear is their government.

Hardly. I know what you know. I just give different weight to the information, and thus arrive at different conclusions.=20

Not everyone who disagrees with your conclusions is necessarily ignorant, or even wrong.

--=20 I'm having a RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE ... and I don't take any DRUGS

Dan, I don't think Bill was trying to claim that having a gun leads to suicide. I think he was saying that a person is much more likely to kill himself with his own gun, than to be killed in a home invasion if he didn't happen to have a gun. Far more people die by shooting themselves, than are killed by burglars or other home invaders.

The risk with firearms is that *IF* you get suicidal, you can quickly act on it if you have a gun - and the effort will very likely be fatal. Without a gun, you have to figure out some other way, it takes more time, and you might reconsider. And usually other means are less certain - you might make it even if you carry it out.

So what Bill said is true - if you keep a gun, you are at increased risk of committing suicide with it. There is little debate about that. The question is whether that increased risk is worth it.

--=20 genealogy, n.: An account of one's descent from an ancestor who did not particularly care to trace his own. -- Ambrose Bierce

Nothing. It has happened in this country before.

=C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2=A0 =C2= =A0 =C2=A0...Jim Thompson

OT

Bill, most of these people are not gearing up to start a civil war or revolution. Most of them are law-abiding citizens who want to just live in peace, but who see their government becoming increasingly dictatorial, trampling on citizens' rights in the name of "safety" or "security," or some other buzz word. They are buying weapons to defend themselves against a government gone mad.

I understand that for many people it is almost inconceivable that the government of a civilized country would ever turn against its own citizens. Unfortunately, this has happened within living memory. Not even 100 years ago, the government of one of the most technologically advanced, civilized countries in the world enslaved and murdered millions of its citizens. The Soviet Union (which I don't claim was a civilized country) murdered more millions of its own citizens.

What makes it impossible for other countries to do the same thing?

I believe that these people are incorrect - that the government probably won't go berserk during our lifetimes. However, I don't

*know* this to be a fact, and I can understand that many people believe that it could happen relatively soon.

--=20 Oh, by the way, which one's Pink? -- Pink Floyd

OK, I'll bite. When did that happen?

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Content:  80% POLYESTER, 20% DACRONi ... The waitress's UNIFORM sheds
TARTAR SAUCE like an 8" by 10" GLOSSY ...

I didn't think much of the S&W autos. I have a couple of revolvers (6" .357

686 and it's identical twin .22 617). For an automatic, I really like my Beretta 92FS Inox. Your gun store doesn't have a bad price for it at all. I think I paid $625 four years ago (pre-Obama).