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This podcast is all about self defense with a rifle.  Which rifle to use, what to have on the rifle and what’s your plan for using that rifle.

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Announcements

• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • July 13 San Antonio, Handgun Skill Builder
  • August 3 Albuquerque, New Mexico Beyond Concealed Carry
  • August 10 Handgun Skill Builder
  • October Brownsville, TX for Beyond Concealed Carry
  • Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
  • ShootersClubMembers.com
    • Upcoming giveaway to thank the members
      • 250 rounds of 9mm ammo!
      • 1 free ticket to any BCC course Bob and Ben teach through 2014!
      • 1 free ticket to any BCC course Bob and Ben teach through 2014!
  • Drawing on July 14

Equipment

• What rifle are you going to use?
• What should you have on the rifle
  • Sling, Light and needed equipment
  • Extra Ammo, I like butt-stock magazine pouches
  • Body Armor, If you have some consider putting it on, having extra magazines, extra light, and cell phone on it
  • Consider slipping on electric hearing protection too

Planning

• At what point to use a rifle
• How to get it
• What are you going to do with it

My Plans

• At home
• On the road

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

If you carry a gun daily or even just from time to time, you know that your belt loops always seem to get in the way.  What to do with the belt loops?  You should use that loop to help you.  It takes more time to thread the belt through the loops, but it helps out in the end.

You can see how the gun sags

A lot of people I know just skip the belt loop that is around their holster.  That doesn’t help except for when you put the holster on.  As you go through the day, you’ll find that the weight of the holstered gun pulls down the belt at that point more than anywhere else and your pants don’t match.  I find this feels like my underwear is bunched up and I can’t fix it.  It’s really uncomfortable.

You can use that belt loop to your advantage that you think is getting in the way by threading the belt and holster through it.

The gun stays when the belt loops are used

It’s kind of pain in the butt at first, but you can always put the holster on without the gun before you put your pants on.  I find this keeps me from getting frustrated trying to weave the belt and holster together.  I feel like a dog chasing my tail when I’m trying to put the belt through the holster, through my belt loop and then through the other side of my holster while I’m wearing my pants.

Laced in Correctly

I know that we can’t always wear a gun, but a holster is not illegal anywhere I’m aware of.  You can simply put the gun in a range bag when you have to go someplace without a gun and leave the holster on.  It’s much easier than trying to thread your holster on and off in the parking lot or bathroom.  This way, you can put the holster on at home before you put on your pants.

Holster Pushed against a Belt loop

Once you have the pants and gun on, use your belt loop as an anchor point.  Push the holster all the way forward or back until the holster stops against the belt loop.  It will keep the gun from moving around as much when you get up or sit down, and will allow you to put it back to the same point every time it moves.

Experiment which belt loops you will use and then go from there.  I find it easiest to use the outside seam on pants as a reference on where I want the gun to be.  My gun normally sits just behind the outside seam on my jeans.  Unfortunately, everything isn’t made the same, so you’ll just have to play with it a little.

Getting the gun on right can be a pain at first, but once you get the holster threaded through, you’ll be more comfortable throughout your day.  Try it next to you are going to wear a gun.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Got Cash?

Believe it or not having some money saved is part of your self defense.  You need to have some cash to get you through some ruff times.  If you need someone to help you wouldn’t it be nice to just have the money and buy it! You should keep some of that money on you.  It’s amazing what $100 in cash will still get you these days.  Most places it will still you get you a room for the night, a change of clothes, a cheap jacket if it’s cold, or a can full of gas if you run out.  I know this sounds mundane, but it really keeps you safe.  Simple problems become great tragedies when we are not prepared.

Last week when going to a picnic for my kids school (I was the only one in the truck) I saw a car blocking a lane on the on-ramp with 2 women in it.  I pulled past them to check out what was going on and then got out next to my truck about 30 yards up the road.  I waited for one of the ladies to get out and then we yelled back and forth over the highway noise.  Turns out they where out of gas (a gas station was less then a mile down the road) and they need someone to come get them because they didn’t have any money.  I only carry diesel fuel in my truck and was considering running up the road to get a gallon of gas for them when they said they got in touch with one of their boyfriends and he was coming out.

Of course the ladies didn’t want to get in my truck and head to the gas station with me, but if they had cash they could have handed someone the money and asked them to get the gas and paid them for their troubles.  Offering money for help goes a long way in getting it.  Expecting someone to help you just because you are breathing isn’t a good plan.  Some will help, some will not.  It’s nice to have options and money will do that for you.

I carry a “Red Neck Emergency Fund” in my wallet.  It’s just a hundred dollars normally in 20s that I can use to get help or anything else if I need it.  Remember cash always works.  When the power is out at the 7-11 they will still take cash for food, but the credit card machines aren’t going to work.

Here are some other boring reasons to have cash saved; buy something big, take advantage of a sale, things always break, cover a crappy month at work or forced time off because the company isn’t doing so well, or full blown emergencies.

Yesterday I had the opportunity to hang out with someone really cool and his wife.  We had lunch and just talked about life, because I have a little money saved I was able to pay for all or our lunches.  It’s nice to have some money to give to really cool people or people in need when you have the want.

Bottom line is having cash on hand will make your life better and easier anytime something happens out of the norm.

Stay Safe,

Ben

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• WhiteDogHolsters.com Check out their website or Learn about the Holsters here.

Announcements

• Rifle Course Thanks to Mark, Adolph, and Alex for taking the course
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • Handgun Skill Builder July 13
  • August Albuquerque, New Mexico and Another Handgun Skill Builder
  • October Brownsville, TX for BCC
  • Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
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Topic Covered

• Self Defense Fitness
• Finding a Local Shop gun shop
• Test gear yourself, don’t just read about it!
• Carry Gear appropriate for your travels

Stay Safe,

Ben

To all you Moms out there, happy Mother’s Day.

And just a reminder to everyone, you should probably call your mother today.  I’m going to right now.

Stay Safe,

Ben

I’ve been shooting for a long time now and still have my hearing.  Not everyone can say that.  As time marches on, hearing protection keeps getting better and better.  Hearing loss is a product of loud noises over an extended period of time.  It doesn’t just happen one day.  It happens over years and years of exposure.  The more exposure, the more hearing loss you will have.  A really easy way to know that you are having hearing loss is when it hurts.  Pretty simple.  Gunshots are extremely damaging to your hearing.  If loud noises come on slowly your ears can adjust some and protect you, but things that happen fast, like gunshots, there is no time for adjustment so hearing loss is happening.

If you want to be able to hear people talk and the just the sounds of the world years from now, you need to be wearing hearing protection every time you shoot.  I try to always wear hearing protection and even wore it in combat, despite being laughed at and even told they where going to get me killed by one soldier.  I even wear hearing protection when I go hunting.  I get made fun of a little because I’m the only one, but I know I’ll have my hearing while some of my friends are already losing theirs.

There are two types of hearing protection, plugs and muffs.  The plugs go inside the ear canal and the muffs go over the top of the entire ear.  Doctors that I’ve talked to and read suggest you use muffs all the time because it keeps any noise from being transmitted to the ear bone and ensures that there is no damage.  Some experts I know say that you should double up and wear both.  The only time I’ve wanted to double up was when I was throwing grenades or flash bangs in the military.  In the civilian world I just don’t play with things that are that loud.

I have been using two different types for years now and probably won’t be changing anytime soon.  For muffs I used Peltor’s excellent SWAT Tac’s for over a decade now.  I’ve bought my own since 2002 and am only on my second pair.  They aren’t cheap but work really well.  They are electronic muffs, so the muffs muffle the sound down to a safe level and then there are microphones and little speaks built into the muff.  It picks up sounds and then cuts out once the sound is at an unsafe level.  It really makes hearing things a lot easier.  A couple things that make these stand out form others; one they use standard AA batteries that last forever (I don’t know how long but replace the batteries every year just to be safe).  Second is these are stereo.  Each side of the muffs have their own set of electronics in them.  This allows you to determine where a noise is coming from just like normal.  The Peltor’s are really good at picking up sounds, especially metallic ones.  They have a volume control that can be turned up way beyond what the normal ear can hear.  They where great to wear when I was on foot patrols in Iraq, and I wore them all the time.

The only problem with the electronic ears is that they amplify background noise.  When I’m just on the range or in a loud environment they can drive me crazy, so I like to wear ear buds from Surefire.

They are called Sonic Defenders.  I find they give a good balance between being able to hear and protecting my hearing, but most importantly they are comfortable and I don’t mind wearing them all day.  They are cheap compared to most everything else (especially the SWAT Tacs above) but they do wear out.  I buy a couple sets a year, but wear them at least all day a couple times a month.  When they start to wear out they don’t work as well and become uncomfortable for me.  I buy them two at a time, so when one wears out, I just switch.  I can normally find them for less then $15.  I also like the one’s that have the cord on them because it keeps me from losing one of them.  I replaced a couple sets over the years because I lost one side.  Surefire makes a lot of different numbers in the serious and that has to do with how much sound they block.  I’ve found that the Sonic Defender 4 works the best.  They also make a 3 serious and 6 serious.  The 3’s don’t block as much sound and when I’m shooting a match my ears would ring a little when shooting a rifle with a compensator on it near a barricade.  The 6 serious are too quite and I have a hard time hearing range commands and other people.  For $15 they are worth a try, buy them here at Amazon.  I’ve found they have the cheapest price and best shipping (at least at the time I write this).  I’ve also bought them from LAPoliceGear.com and the PX on base.

Whatever you buy, make sure you get something that is comfortable so you will actually wear it and that it is small enough to have with you so you can actually wear your hearing protection.

Stay Safe,

Ben

I’ve been teaching people how to gun fight for many years now and learned over a decade ago that you need to check yourself after a fight.  During the fight, you will get so pumped on adrenaline and other drugs that your mind dumps into your body, you may not even know what just happened.  That is why you may see police officers high five and hug each other after a gun battle.  Those drugs your mind dumps into your body make you feel like you just won the super bowl, hit the grand slam at the end of the world series to win it, and just had the best day of your life.  The police officers are just sharing that feeling with the others around them.  After a fight, you need to make sure you aren’t hurt.

One of the things I taught my Marines and teach in my advance courses is that you need to check yourself for injuries, and it’s not a bad idea to have someone else check you for injuries, also.  I had my Marines run their own hands over their body, feeling for tender spots, and would also have another Marine look them over and feel for tender spots.  It sounds kind of funny until you find something wrong.

I learned this from a police instructor.  He had a story of how someone on his shift survived a gun battle.  After they took the bad guy to jail, everyone was standing around, cleaning up the scene and the survivor was there, talking to other officers.  This instructor went up and started looking over his fellow officer.  He noticed that the officer’s radio had taken a round.  The survivor said it was no big deal, the radio took the bullet.  But when he stuck his hand behind the radio and onto the guy’s body, the survivor yelled in pain.  When he pulled his hand out, he found a good amount of blood.  The survivor was transported to the hospital where they had to pull bits and pieces of the radio and bullet out of his side and do a bunch of stitching to patch him up.  Eventually, the officer would have found the injury, but how much worse might it have been?

This can backfire on you, too, and this is why you need a second person to verify the injury.  In 2003, I was in Iraq and we had a small gun battle just outside Tikrit.  Two bad guys dead, one captured, no big deal.  These three “geniuses” thought they would attack 200 plus Marines and survive.  During the fight, a sandbag in front of me took something, shrapnel from the explosion or a round, I don’t know.  I was asleep when the fight started and had my feet up on the sand bags.  I started checking myself when it was over and found a tender spot between my legs.  I felt a little more and it was wet.  I couldn’t tell what the liquid was because it was the middle of the night and pitch black out.  It was so dark, our NVG’s (Night Vision Goggles) were having a hard time seeing.  Even if they were working, you can’t see color in NVG’s, so it wasn’t helping me.  I had to go to our doctor and ask him to use a white light and look at my crotch to make sure I wasn’t hit.  I think it was the most embarrassing and scary thing I’ve ever done.  To my relief, it was water, my CamelBak had leaked during the fight, and I was just sore from the month of fighting we had been through.  I think my Corpsman was a little embarrassed to be looking for blood there, too.

So, if you are ever involved in a self defense incident, check yourself after everything is safe and ask for medical attention.  You don’t know if you are hurt or not.  It would be better to have a medic discover that you are bleeding than for you to discover it later, when there is no one else around.

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Announcements

• Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
• Handgun Skill Builder July 13
• Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
• ShootersClubMembers.com

Great Announcement!!

• White Dog Holsters is back in business.  If you need a kydex holster, go check them out.  They are awesome!

After thinking about it

• Hollow core door
• AC that might have been in a fire
• Duct tape holding tile together
• Towel as a curten for half of the window looked like new glass
• Bed against wall no defendable part of room

Road rage

When you should leave

1. Gut tells you to

2. Things start getting out of normal

3. Violence starts to happen

4. Police show up in mass all of a sudden (Mexico and Federales)

5. Everyone is gone from the area (Los Angeles St in LA)

Stay Safe,

Ben

Winston Churchill

As I talked about in my podcast, 5 Skills to Win a Gunfight, mind set is the most important thing there is in any fight.  You have to continue to fight, you can never give up, and you have to continue the fight.

I do a mindset lesson during every class I teach.  It’s not the most fun thing I do, but is necessary.  One of the main points is “Never give up, never give up, never give up.” – Winston Churchill during World War II.

This should be your thought when you have to defend yourself.  The only way you lose is when you give up or when you are dead.  You have to put the simple fact in your mind that you will never give up.  Once you start fighting, if you give up, the other person will press their advantage and hurt you even more.

I learned this lesson when I was a teenager.  I volunteered as a Police Explorer in southern California and went to the crime scene of a fallen police officer.  It happened in the middle of the day, in a crowded area, where some of my friends actually witnessed it.

The officer pulled someone over for speeding on the highway.  The speeder got off the highway and stopped at a busy gas station surrounded by a strip mall and several places to eat.  When the police officer stepped out his vehicle, the speeder stepped out, also.  The speeder raised a gun as he exited and fired at the police officer.  The officer was struck multiple times, most in the vest.

The officer fell as the speeder, turned cop killer, continued to fire.  When the killer ran out of ammo, he calmly walked up to the officer, stood over him, reloaded, and emptied the new magazine into the officer striking the officer in the head multiple times, killing him.

If you give up, this is what could happen to you, is all I could think of from then on.  Now I know that I will never give up because that is what will happen to me if I do.  Now that I have a family, I know the same thing will happen to them if I give up.  So I will never give up! Never!

You have to get that deep down in your soul and being.  If you can feel anything, if you know anything, you are still in the fight. Don’t give up!

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Announcements

• Defensive AR May 11 in San Antonio
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • July and August 4 hour Training Course
  • Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
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Boston bombing has got me thinking

Most important

• Stop major bleeding
• Airway
• Circulation
• Cover the wound
• Treat for shock

Chest and Gut injuries

• Heart
• Lung Sucking Chest wound
• Gut

Medical Triage 

What I carry in my everyday

• Tourniquet
• Israeli Bandage
• Military Bandage
• Gloves
• De-Compression Needle
• Nasal Angioplasty
• Triangle Bandage
• Quick Clot Sponge
• Medical Shears

My Blowout Kit

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

Mass Casualty Incidents suck really bad and we can never be truly prepared for them.  Even the pros find themselves wanting when something truly goes wrong.  Recently, the marathon bombing in Boston has reminded us that we are on our own to help our fellow citizens in the immediate aftermath of an incident.  It’s not law enforcement’s or emergency personnel’s fault.  They want to help, but need to ensure that more people aren’t going to be hurt and that they are not going to become part of the problem by getting hurt themselves.  That just leaves us on our own for a little while.  Emergency personnel will regroup, clear areas, and help people.  It is just going to take time.

What do we do in the mean time? “Help as many people in as little time as possible,” straight from Community Emergency Response Team’s (CERT) handbook.  First of all, you have to get some medical training.  Get yourself a book, any book is better then nothing.  This book is on my to-read list, Beating the Reaper, and may be a good place to start.  Once you are okay, then you can start helping others.

We help others best by creating a triage.  If you are the only one there, you are in charge.  Create three triage locations and levels.  The first one is the easiest.  People that aren’t going to die right away without help, the ones that will survive for the next hour or two without anyone doing anything.  Think of these as the walking wounded.  Simply stand up and start telling people what to do.  Go to the area you want them to be.  Someplace out of the way of responding emergency people and someplace they won’t get hurt.  Simply call out, “if you are hurt and can walk, come towards the sound of my voice.”  Be careful to get out of the way if someone panics.

The next two groups are much harder.  You need to do the most good for the most people that you can, and that means there could be people that you simply can’t help.  They need to go in one location or area.  When a formal incident command is set up and EMTs arrive, they will start tagging people.  These will most likely be black tagged.  While they have more equipment and knowledge than you do, they are looking at pure numbers.  What are the chances of saving this person?  If the chances are slim, then they can best use their resources for others they are sure they can save with help. The ones that need some help to survive will normally be given a red tag.

For you, this is going to be difficult, at best, and next to impossible in reality.  You have to look at your supplies and knowledge and do the best you can.  Save the people that you know how to save.  At a mass incident, those are the people that are generally bleeding heavily.  Use pressure and makeshift tourniquets to stop the bleeding.  Get others to help you.  There will be a lot of people standing around that just don’t know what to do.  With a little coaching (“Hold pressure here”), they can help you save others.

We have to deal with the world as it is during an emergency.  In a mass casualty incident, I would want to save everyone, but the reality of the situation is that you may not be able to.  Four people died in Boston and there were a lot of professionals on the location with a bunch of resources for the race.  If you are ever caught in a mass casualty incident, you may not have that many resources and those resources may need your help.

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Announcements

• Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • July and August 4 hour Training Course
  • Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
  • ShootersClubMembers.com

10 Things you may not know about your AR

1. Most malfunctions caused by shooter, major malfunctions made worst by shooter
2. Sling Shot
3. How and where to oil/lub
4. Weight
5. Extra crap
6. Rear sights for military and civilians 8/3 8/3-2
7. Springs everywhere pistol grip stock
8. Parts kit get one
9. Punched parts of the gun staked parts carrier key, Rear stock
10. Wear in

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

Yesterday I talked about the bad things that could happen to you if you use excessive force.  Today, let’s talk about the application of force (disclaimer; in the police academy this is about 40 hours worth of material, this is only an overview and I’m not a lawyer and don’t pretend to be one).

“That force which is reasonable and necessary” is in the law in most states when it comes to using force to protect yourself.  What is reasonable? It’s what a prudent and reasonable person, under the same conditions, with the same amount of information, would do. What kind of person is that? It’s the person that will sit on your jury when the prosecutor decides to prosecute you for whatever crime he/she thinks they can get a conviction on.  Prosecutors are always looking for convictions.  If they don’t think they can get a conviction, they simply won’t try the person, unless there is public outcry for it (like in the case of George Zimmerman).  They are all afraid of what happened in LA and a lot of them are political animals that want to get elected to better offices in the future.

What is necessary? Again that is what a reasonable and prudent person would believe.  What that comes down to is what the jury says.  So we need to be careful about the amount of force we use on someone else during a self defense situation.

First, force will never be considered self defense if the case is found to be “mutual combat.”  Mutual combat boils down to a fight.  If you get into a mutual confrontation, then self defense is out the window.  Mutual is when you create aggression or show aggression towards someone else before the actual force is used.  You have to be the victim beyond a shadow of a doubt.  So there is no name calling, stepping outside, or posturing aloud.

As long as it’s not mutual combat, now we can claim self defense rightfully so.  Morally you can’t claim self defense when you start a fight with someone in a bar and then that person punches you.  I’ve known bouncers that will do things like goading people into self defense.  The bouncer would say loudly “Sir, calm down, lets talk about this,” then quietly, so only the person he is talking to can hear, would start calling that person names and making them want to fight.  In reality, this is unlawful and immoral, but what the witnesses see is that the bouncer was asking him to calm down and the guy just attacked the bouncer.  You may be able to get away with this legally, but we are the good people and don’t use crap like this.

We need to use just enough force to overcome the force someone is using against us so we don’t get hurt.  You can think of force at a couple of levels; verbal, holding, pushing, striking, and deadly.  You have to stay inside the level the other person creates for you.

The biggest problem is these lines are really blurry sometimes.  If there are 4 people striking you with their fists, I would argue that this is deadly force, others may not see it the same way (legally this is called disparity of force).

Simply put, if someone is yelling at you, you can’t hit them.  If someone is shoving you, you can’t shoot or stab them.  Most people understand this very well and it’s easy to see.  What we lose is the end.  Once the other person gives up, we need to stop being aggressive.  This is exceptionally hard when someone has just attacked and maybe tried to kill you.  Once they give up, you need to stop.

Unfortunately, I don’t have an easy way to help you with this.  We just need to know and think about this; once the attack is over, we are done.  We don’t need to chase the bad guy, we don’t need to catch the bad guy, and we don’t need to punish the bad guy. We need to keep our minds right.  We are simply trying to survive the confrontation and get away.  If you keep your mindset looking at those two things, we can stay out of the other.  This is exceptionally hard in today’s culture.  Movies, games, and people we hang out with teach us differently.  We really need to watch our thinking when something isn’t going wrong to keep our minds’ right when something bad does happen.  Those things we think to our selves everyday is what we will do once our survival instincts kick in.

Make sure you are always thinking survive and get away.  Don’t let yourself cheer on people on the news or movies that punish or give the bad guy what they deserve, and most importantly don’t let people hangout with you that will influence that bad behavior.  If we talk about self defense and have the people around us say that they will kill anyone that comes into their house or anyone that comes after them, we become those people we hang out with the most.  Make sure you recognize when someone is taking you down a path of thinking that you shouldn’t.

Stay Safe,

Ben

As someone who teaches self defense, intends to defend myself if need be, and a good person, I need to use force responsibly, reasonably (i.e. legally), and ethically.  There are many cases that show how the use of excessive force was used and people are going to jail.  We, as responsible good people, need to be able to escalate and de-escalate force very quickly.  We can’t give someone an extra punch, kick, shot, or whack in the head just because he deserves it.  No doubt that if someone attacks you, they deserve it, but we are good people and hold ourselves to a higher standard than those who would attack us.

There are two famous cases that show escalation and de-escalation of force is necessary for our survival.  The latest one was in Oklahoma.  A pharmacist was robbed by 2 men that appear to shoot at him during the robbery attempt (video here).  The pharmacist shoots one robber to the ground and then chases the other robber out the door.  The jury said everything was good until this point.  The pharmacist then went back and got another gun and then shot the robber that was on the ground 5 more times.  The prosecutor said it was murder because the medical examiner said the first shot knocked the robber out and then the 5 shots from the other gun are what killed him.  The pharmacist said it looked like he was still moving and a threat so he fired at him.  Unfortunately the robber is off the video when the final shooting took place.

The end of the story was that the pharmacist went to prison for 1^st degree murder.  He’ll be eligible for parole in 38 years.  Not the way we want to have our self defense situation play out.

The other famous case was the Rodney King incident that sparked the LA riots.  In 1991, King drove a car that fled from police.  After a high-speed chase, he stopped the car.  Two others got out of the vehicle without a problem.  King was the driver and refused officers commands.  A fight broke out (King was on parole at the time for a robbery conviction and didn’t want to go back to jail for a DUI) and the officers had to beat King into submission.  The courts first ruled that what happen was not excessive force except for a misdemeanor on one officer.  Then, the riots broke out, after which, the Feds came in and prosecuted the officers on the same offense (double jeopardy doesn’t always apply I guess), and the officers were found guilty.  Insiders I know from the case say a lot of information was blocked from the second trial to ensure a conviction.  The judge would simply not allow evidence in favor of the officers to be showed to the jury.  Either way, the verdict came down the same way as the Oklahoma pharmacist, everything was okay until this one point.  Once that happened, everything else was against the law. A couple of officers got a vacation at Club Fed for those hits afterward.  All 5 officers lost their jobs.

I’m not debating the Rodney King incident, just pointing out that these things could happen to you.  Make sure that you study excessive force and escalation/de-escalation of force so these things don’t happen to you.

We are the good guys, when the bad guys give up, we need to stop and let them.  Tomorrow we’ll look more at the force continuum.

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Announcements

• Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • July and August 4 hour Training Course
  • Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
  • ShootersClubMembers.com

Boston Marathon Bombing

How explosives work

• Pressure and Explosions
• Pressure and Heat
• Mixed with something to get better affects
• Needs Detonator
  • Electric
    •  Battery/something to create a charge
    • capacitor to increase the charge 
  • Fuses 
  • Complex 

What to look for

• People
  • Nervous 
  • Overprotective of something
  • Why are they there?
  •  No Back story 
• Items
  • Wrong weight for that size
  • Multiple bags
  • Big bags w/ heavy things 
  • Careful with it
  • Some kind of fuse or detonator 
  • Signs of hidden stuff 
• Other Signs
  • Entire Bags going into trash cans 
  • Bags left by someone that is trying to make it look like he isn’t leaving it
  • People Evacuating an area 
  •  More then one of the same bag left in the open
  •  Bags left in weird places 

What to Do

• Evacuate the area quietly
• Call police when safe (phone could set off)
• Give them any and all info you can
• Safe Distance
  • There isn’t one just keep going

Bomber Tactics

• Kill lots of people
• Multiple Bombs
• Suicide bombers
• Rarely Act alone
• big Statement for their “cause”

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Last week I went to a late movie with a couple of friends. I don’t mind the late show and it’s the only way we can get together because everyone is always busy. We saw the new GI Joe and it was just fun to watch. Coming out, the place was a ghost town. Everything was off except half the lights and I didn’t see any employees, only a couple of other people leaving. Walking out to our cars, there was a group of people standing next to their cars that were parked right next to ours. I couldn’t figure out why they were there or what they were doing, so it put me on alert.  I pulled my flashlight out of my pocket and had it in my hand.  The parking lot is dark and almost deserted.  I think there were about 10 cars scattered around the parking lot.

Nothing bad happened, except for my piss poor planning. Instead of voicing my concerns or thoughts to my friends, I made a sarcastic comment that it was just like the gym. The only two people here and they are right next to us. I was carrying my Glock and a back up. I was glad I put the Glock on at that moment because I was almost lazy and left it at home. As we continued to walk, I moved to the right side of our group of three to better see what was going on and be in a better position if things went south.

I was still trying to figure out what was going on when my friends turned around to shake hands and say good night. I let them take my attention and I shouldn’t have.  Now I felt committed to our vehicles because that’s where my friends were going and I wasn’t going to leave them.

We continued on and I was able to get to my vehicle and take a covered position until my friends where able to enter their car and leave.  I already had my car running and just jumped in and left.

This turned out really nice.  When nothing happens, anything you do works, but would it have worked if things had gone bad?  I had cover from my vehicle, but I wasn’t in a place to dominate the fight if one started.  I didn’t have a very good view of what was going on if my friends needed help and the people that may have been the threat had their vehicles as cover.  I could easily have been pinned down and had to drive away or wait.  Not a good place to be in.

When we first came out of the theater, I should have been talking to my friends when I saw the group of people standing near our car.  Neither of them is big on self defense but they could have easily seen something I didn’t.  Maybe these guys were all there working on a broken car and I just didn’t see the jumper cables.  Once we got closer and I couldn’t figure out what was going on, a smart remark is not the way to go.  Again, communication is key. If I was with others that are big into self defense, knowing that I mentioned a group is a way to know that I’m watching them.  It would have been enough with pros, but these are good guys that I hang out with and aren’t as keyed in as some of us.  So my communication just sucked.

After the communication, I should have gotten a count.  I just saw a group and then fell back on the military training.  It looked like a squad-sized element (or 13 guys).  The group was all guys and there were between 6 to 8, I guess.  I should have gotten a count.  It may or may not help if something really bad happens, but could be good info to have and is easily obtained.  If I had taken the second to count, it would have been easy to get.

My last major mistake was feeling committed to the vehicles.  I’ve made this mistake in my life in the past and it hasn’t cost me yet (thankfully).  But sooner or later it could get me into trouble.  Just because I’m headed that direction does not make me committed, it just makes me going that direction.  They say no plan survives first contact with the enemy, and it shouldn’t.  Your plan to survive should always be fluid along with the direction you are going.  Just because we were almost there didn’t make our vehicles the safest place to be.  It could have been safer to go past our vehicles and keep going, take a left and go across a row to another row of vehicles, or to turn around and go back to the theater.  My mistake was just closing those other options in my mind.

Three things I learned from my non-event; keep your options open, communicate clearly with those around you at their level, and get as much info about the situation as you can going in.

Stay Safe,

Ben

From Flickr and by papertygre

The biggest mistake people make about fighting is that we practice to stand and deliver everything.  With firearms, we stand there and practice drawing without moving our feet.  The people that do move their feet generally move to get to some kind of stance that they have practiced from a million times.  There isn’t much of a reason for it, they just have always practiced getting into that stance and then drawing.

I’ve seen the same thing with people that are training to fight in any fashion.  We start by learning the correct stance and then learn how to strike, block, and do whatever the art teaches.  With guns, we’ve done the same thing.  This is totally detrimental to your survival in self defense.

I’ve watched how much time it takes students to draw their weapon when they take a step to get into their perfect drawing position and then draw.  It takes them half a second or more to get into the stance and then draw.  In a real fight, will they ever be able to get into that perfect position? Have they ever tried drawing from another position? Could they?

I learned a little piece of truth while working for an armored car company; draw from where you are.  Chances were really good that, as a courier, I would be walking when I had to draw my gun, so I learned how to draw while moving.  As I learned more and more about civilian self defense, it occurred to me that most, if not all, fights will be started by someone else and they will choose when and where we are when they attack.

When they attack us, we will be behind the power curve desperately trying to catch up.  We need to be able to fight from whatever position we end up in!  That could be any position, anywhere.

Some attacks have started by the attacker knocking down the person he is attacking.  Can you draw your gun or knife from the ground? Can you fight from the ground?  What if the attacker pushes you against a wall and pins you there.  Can you draw your gun or knife?  Do you know how to use the wall as leverage to fight from? Can you escape a hold to get into the fight?

I teach people to start by moving and then drawing.  Lots of fights will start by an outside indicator like the other guy drawing a weapon on you.  Once that happens, you can’t stand and deliver.  You will get killed.  You need to do something else like move, draw, fire.  Being able to move is the most important skill you need to learn to keep from getting hit.

The Marine Corps MCMAP (Marine Corps Martial Arts Program) now teaches: move, block, strike for everything.  We need to be thinking about that when we practice our gun techniques.  Think about moving first and then drawing your weapon.

Start slow. Use an unloaded gun (check it 3 or 4 times before you start). Then walk and draw your weapon.  Start by taking a couple steps one way or another and then draw your gun.  Moving is more important at first than getting your gun out.  If you telegraph your draw, you’ll probably get shot before you can move.  If you move, the stats are in your favor and the probability of you winning goes way up.

I was working on this today and found that my CKRT M16 Knife doesn’t come open like I want it to when I pull it from my pocket while on the move.  I can rip the knife out of my pocket and have it open automatically every time while standing still (video).  Once I’m moving it becomes harder.  Now I know what to work on.

When is the last time you practiced something different than just standing there?

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

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Announcements

• Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • July and August 4 hour Training Course
  • Looking at Going on the road and need hosts! Email me
  • ShootersClubMembers.com

Left Front Pocket

• Wallet
• Lighter
• Flashlight

Right Front Pocket

• Keys
• Clip Knife
• Revolver Reload

Right Back

• Tactical Pen

Left Back

• Head Phones for my phone

Belt Carry

• Glock 19 Crossbreed Super Tuck
• Ruger LCR Sticky Holster Appendix
• Tactical Knife
• iPhone
• Glock magazine

Sunglasses on my head

What I’m thinking of changing

• Knife, back to Emerson
• LCR instead of appendix right, go to left side
• Tactical knife move from horizontal to vertical in front of magazines
• First aid Israeli bandage and Tourniquet or a little tactical kit from ITS Tactical

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

Fighting Just to Fight

This week Alan Gottlieb has been called a traitor and worst.  Alan Gottlieb is the guy that started the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF).  The SAF has been winning huge court cases for a while now.  They are putting up and winning the court cases that no other group wants to take because of the possibility for losing.  Working for the Second Amendment Foundation he has won more for gun rights in the last couple years then a lot of groups have done in the last couple decades.  Now he is switching tactics and working with lawmakers on a bill that will give more then it takes.  It’s a true compromise (unfortunately).

Here is the bill (as of today 4/16/13).  Read it before you pass judgment.  And read it with an open mind (legalize stinks to read).  Here is a link to Senator Minchin’s fact sheet about the bill.  The part that sucks the worst about this entire argument is that no side is doing any good reporting.  It’s all “he said, she said” crap!  I had to dig for the copy of the bill (hat tip to the Senator for actually publishing it on his site).  I read 20 or 30 stories this morning about the bill, some from the likes of MSBC and others from alternative media like GunNuts.net.  I could not find a copy of the bill in any of them.

Read the bill for yourself.  It’s 49 pages of stuff.  It forbids the federal government from having a national gun registry and expressly forbids the Attorney General from keeping one.  The fact sheet talks about being able to buy handguns in a state other then your residence, but I didn’t see that expressly written in the bill.  The bill did get rid of a bunch of text in other bills and it could be under one of those.

Alan Gottlieb and the two sponsoring Senators say it is in there and I think it is.  The bill does close the “gun show loophole” by making all sales at or around a gun show have a NICS check.  It doesn’t say all gun transfers and has a provision for family members to be exempt.  It also only expands the background checks to become necessity when a firearm is advertised.  It also gives a good definition of what a gun show or “event” is and what it is not.   So if you don’t advertise your gun or show it at an event, you don’t need to go through a background check.

This is really the middle ground.  It’s right on the edge and is almost repulsive and almost acceptable at the same time.  If I want to sell a gun to a friend and we just talk about it over lunch, I don’t need a background check. If I sell the gun at an “event” or advertise the gun someplace for sale (like the internet or local paper), then I need a check.  I think I would rather have it as allowing people to have access to the NICS system for sales.  When I sold a gun to my father I certainly didn’t need a NICS check on him to give him the gun.  When I wanted to get rid of 1911 I had to get a Glock (didn’t have the extra cash at the time), I sold it to a gun shop because I didn’t want to take the time to find a qualified buyer.  This is a law that will effect me very little, but will change how a lot of gun shows are done.

The bill offers a nice civil liabilities block if you sell a gun to someone and that person uses it in a crime.  That hasn’t been in the law for individuals before and was hard won by firearms manufacturers when the government tried to put them out of business when Clinton was President by suing them like the tobacco industry.

So the bill is right there on the line.  For all those people that say “we have to do something.”  This is doing something and further protecting us legal gun owners in the process.  I think a couple of the sections could have been worded better and stronger, but all in all it’s a bill I could live with…  And I almost thru-up a little when I said that to myself.  It hurts to give away any rights at all.  If something is going to pass (which it will), this is the least heinous of them all by far and actually has some protections for us law abiding gun owners in it (including better provisions for travelling with a gun).

Lets stop trying to fight everyone and everything on this and work with people that are trying to make it better.  I believe that Alan Gottlieb is one of those people, and maybe one of the few we can trust.  We have trusted him for the last 5 years and now as soon as he says something that sounds bad we attack him.  The fighting has to end somewhere and the work has to begin.  If Alan has found a way, we should support him.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

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Announcements

• Intro to Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • ShootersClubMembers.com

Who should know you carry or even have a gun?

Family

• Which ones, wife/husband
• Immediate family
• I try to hide it from my 3 year-old

Friends

• My closest friends know and people that are in the gun culture
• More open then I probably should be about it.  Hard to hide when I do this show
• Who should you tell… No one except those that absolutely need to know

Kids

• Age and maturity appropriate
• When they won’t be bragging to their friends about it
• They won’t spout it out someplace in public
• They won’t ask to see it someplace they shouldn’t
• Talk to them about it
  • Tell them not to tell people
  • Explain to them why they shouldn’t be telling others
  • If they make a stupid comment, correct them right there that you are not carrying a gun, tell them later why

Respect other’s views

• Their homes
• Their privacy
• Their wish to not be around guns (in their homes or businesses)

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

My Everyday Carry (EDC) gear is more stuff then I fit into my pockets. My wife makes fun of me all the time for the amount of stuff I carry. I carry most things in the hope of never using it. Here is a list of what I carry and where you can get it.

Glock 19 Gen 4	EFK Fire Dragon Recoil Spring	Speed Sights
Grip Force Adaptor	Federal 9mm Guard Dog Ammunition	Federal 9mm Hydra-Shok Ammunition
White Dog Holsters	On Your 6 Designs	Crossbreed SuperTuck Holster
CRKT M16 Knife Read the Review	Eric Fritz Custom Tactical Knife Read the Review	LED Lensor Flashlight
Blackhawk Magazine Pouch	On Your 6 Designs	White Dog Mag Pouch
Ruger LCR Gun Review Here	Sticky Holster	.38 Special +P Federal Hydra Shok
5 Star Speed Loader	Bianchi Belt	Tactical Pen
iPhone 5	Apple Ear Buds	Disposable Lighter
Cheap-Thin Wallet	$100 Emergency Cash	AAA Membership Card

What do you carry? Is there anything I’m missing that I should be carrying?

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Announcements

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
• ShootersClubMembers.com

3 Types

Internal; Time the trigger is pulled until the bullet exits the barrel

• Lock Time
• Dwell Time
• Barrel Harmonics
• Forcing Cone or Throat
• Bullet Jump
• Twist Rate
• Pressure Curves
• Powder Burn Rates
• Lock Time

**** I mentioned the chamber pressure for an M4 a couple times as 25,000 PSI and the SAAMI spec is actually 52,000 PSI.  Thanks to the listener  for pointing that out.  I should have looked it up instead of going off of my faulty memory. ****

External; The acre the bullet takes in flight

• Bullets Fall at 9.8m/s²
• Sights or Line of Sight is designed to intersect the bullets path
• Bullet appear to fall faster as it moves slower
• Ballistic Coefficient

Terminal; What the bullet does when it hits something

• Normally what people are concerned with
• FBI Test (see an outline here)
  • Penetrate 12-18 Inches
  • Ballistic Gel Blocks 6×16”
  • 6 Events 5 rounds each (total 40)
    • Bare
    • Heavy Clothing
    • Steel
    • Wallboard
    • Plywood
    • Auto Glass
    • Heavy Clothing at 20 Yards
    • Auto Glass at 20 yards
  • 2 Different guns, “1 service weapon and 1 test barrel”
  • 2 10-shot Groups fired from each for measurement
• Target Shooting Doesn’t matter much
• Self Defense Most trauma possible to create as fast a stop as possible
• Bullet weight retention is always mentioned
• Permanente Wound Channel
• Temporary Stretch Cavity
• The Strasbourg Tests
  • Conclusion “…Because of the high probability of rib impact, a single handgun bullet cannot be counted on to immediately incapacitate an individual.  Multiple rounds should be fired.”
• 3 Times is the magic number

Stay Safe,

Ben

Do you have any? Should you have some? If you are reading this blog, you are probably into your own self-preservation.  Money makes it a whole lot easier to survive.  Having a little as a safety net makes life easier.

Dave Ramsey is the man when it comes to budgeting, saving, and investing.  He suggests starting with $1,000 emergency fund and then building it to 3 to 6 months worth of living expenses.  I can tell you from experience that having a large sum of money in the bank makes life less stressful.

But for everyday, just having money can get you out of a lot of problems.  I don’t carry a lot of cash, just $20 or so of mad money to spend.  I budget myself by only getting $30 a week to spend on crap.  But that isn’t emergency money.  I always have a card on me with at least that $1,000 I can spend if something really bad happens.  For life’s everyday little problem, I carry a “red neck” emergency fund.  I carry $100 bill behind my cards in my wallet.

If you are in trouble, $100 cash can get you a lot of things that a card can’t.  That’s enough to fill up my gas tank, get a room for a night, or enough money to get someone to help me if I need it.  Cash also works when your card gets cut off.  It’s happened to me when I was traveling across the country.  The bank thought someone had stolen my card and shut it off.  I was in the middle of nowhere USA and there was no cell service to call the bank.  That $100 easily filled my tank and bought my wife and me some snacks and drinks to be on our way.  We wouldn’t have died without it, but it would have made life interesting trying to make it to the next cell service or borrow a phone to call the bank so they would re-activate my card.

I also keep cash around the house.  It’s easy for me, just lock it in the gun safe.  Cash will get you a lot of things.  Years ago, I had about $1,500 in the safe and our refrigerator went out.  I just pulled out the stash and went to the store.  Kept us from spending an absurd amount (have you seen what they want for refrigerators these days!)

My suggestion is have enough cash on you to get home from where ever you are going and then have enough cash at home to spend for food and gas for a week or so.  That way you will never have a problem.  I’ve been lucky and never had to use my stash for more than the refrigerator, but when I traveled overseas, I always had enough cash to get out of the country and most of the way home.

The idea is to always have a way out if something goes wrong.  When you have cash at home you always have a way to get to your money.  If the banks close down for some reason, or the power goes out in your town, you will have cash to buy things.  Remember, if there is no power, there are no credit card machines to take your bankcard.

Stay Safe,

Ben

This weekend in San Antonio there are two handgun courses going on.

Saturday is Intro to Defensive Pistol.  This is a 4-hour course, only $75, is designed for someone that has just started to learn or has never fired a handgun before.  We will start with safety, function, and use.  Then quickly move onto shooting at different distances.  We shoot all steel targets and work in a small class to keep everything fun and safe. The entire point of this class is to learn safety and have fun.  By the time someone leaves this class they will easily be able to pass the Texas CHL qualification course and go to the range on their own to practice.  Everyone that has taken this course has had a blast!  If you know someone that hasn’t shot a handgun before or has done it hardly at all, this is the course for them.  They will have a great time and be ready to go to the range with you the next time you go out!  Sign up Here.

On Sunday is Beyond Concealed Carry.  We will be shooting all day for only $150!  This course is designed as an intermediate level course.  Even if you haven’t had a formal course before you will enjoy this course.  If you have already had a course you will love this extra training.  We will have a blast shooting on the move and shooting at steel targets.  Most classes are stationary and don’t allow multiple fast shots.  We will show you how to make hits faster then ever before and then show you how to shoot while you are moving and make hits.  Then you get to practice shooting while moving a lot.  This class will either be the class that teaches you how to fight or a great brush up on your skills.  Most students learn to fight and have a blast pushing their pistol skills further then they thought possible.  Sign up Here!

If you would like to take both we’ll give you a price break of down to only $199!  Sign Up Here!

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

Download Here

Announcements

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
• ShootersClubMembers.com

Prep:

• Do you know where you are going?
• Do you know the lay out of the area you are going to?
• Who knows where you are going and when you should be there?
• Will anyone come looking for you if you don’t show up?
• Do you know the airport you are going through?
• Ask Questions of Airport People
• If you look like a lost tourist you become targets for all sorts of stuff
• Tag your Bags so you can Identify them easily

To Bring:

• Flashlight
• Pen
• Cable Lock
• Carabiners
• Nalgene Water Bottles
• Cane
• TSA to let small knifes on again soon

Knives

• Hide knives in your bag, someplace hard to get to for someone else.
• As soon as you get there get the knife out

Firearms

• Declare an unloaded firearm
• “I need to declare an unloaded firearm”
• Disable your gun
• Austin Almost a problem
• No ammo in or around the gun
• Hard case, locked and only you can have the key or combo according to Federal Law
• Ammo in Manufacturer’s box is easiest

Getting in

• Don’t check in outside too many people
• Watch your stuff and don’t let people get too close to you especially outside security
• Don’t hang out with crowds if you don’t have to Travel when you can avoid crowds
• San Antonio Airport first flight

Inside Security

• Can relax a little
• Criminals are there, but to travel
• Watch out for the Opportunist

On the Plane

• Exits Know where they both are and how many seats are between you and them
• Don’t get trampled
• Isle Seat
• If something happens, calm and tactical patience
• Attack; Surprise, Fast, Deadly (see these posts Shock Force, Speed, Violence of Action)

Getting off

• Patience
• Trampled
• Security Pause
• Get to baggage first, don’t let you stuff go around more then once
• As you walk out, notice exits and where they are
• At the baggage claim know where the exits are

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

Today ammo is ammo.  Trying to get ammo is like pulling teeth.  I’ve never cared what other people said about whether ammo was good or bad. I only care that it works.  Working is a relative term.  I’ve seen a lot of classes, schools, and ranges that specify U.S. made, newly manufactured, brass cased ammo only.  Sometimes it’s appropriate because of the systems used at the range, and other times, it’s personal experience.

When I lived in California, I was part of an indoor range.  The range required that you buy their ammo when renting their guns.  The range employees always said it was because they wanted to make sure only “good” ammo went through their guns.  Sounded reasonable to me at the time.  The only problem was that they used a small local company that reloaded the ammo.  I don’t remember what the company name was or the name of the range, but they blew up more handguns than I’d ever heard of.  During the couple years I was a member there, I saw a Berretta M92SF, a Sig P226, an HK, a .357 revolver, and a couple others that I don’t remember.  They sold their reloads at a good price, but I never bought any (I was afraid my gun would be next).  Obviously, I would consider that bad ammo.

Anything beyond blowing up a gun, I would consider good ammo.  Lots of people will tell you this ammo or that ammo isn’t any good for x. But the truth is, as long as the ammo doesn’t blow up the gun, the ammo is good for something.  I use any ammo.  I started buying Wolf Ammo when it first came to America.  I bought a case of .223 for super cheap.  I couldn’t get it to run in my rifle after about 400 rounds.  I got lots of practice clearing malfunctions and got really good at it.  I sold it to someone with an AK in .223.  He couldn’t get it to run in his rifle either.  He ended up weighing each round and found that every fourth or fifth round only had about half a powder charge in it.

Wolf got better at their quality control and I’ve shot thousands of rounds from them over the years.  I’ve also shot ammo from Korea and South Africa without any issues.  I used to know a local reloading company in California and bought thousands of rounds from them over the years and shot it all.  I miss those guys.  They did a great job and were really cheap.  They’d even give me a better deal because I’d bring them brass back after I shot the ammo.

Most people say steel cased ammo is bad, but I shoot lots of it in almost everything I have.  My Glock doesn’t care if the ammo is steel cased.  Some people tell me that the malfunction rate in Russian ammo is higher than others, but I don’t care.  I use the cheapest ammo I can find for practice and personally prefer Federal Ammunition for my self defense ammo.  I only use a large tested manufacturer for my self defense stuff.  I want my self defense ammo to fire every time but my practice I don’t care because if it fails to work I get malfunction practice.

Besides second-rate small-time reloads from someone I don’t know, the only other ammo I have any concerns with shooting is military surplus.  In the civilian world I have not seen an AR blown apart because of bad ammo, I have seen multiple rifles blown apart in the military by bad ammo.  Take care shooting that military surplus 5.56 you got for a good price.

Today, I buy whatever I can find.  The only exception to that rule is the ammo going into my precision .308.  That rifle I only feed match brass ammo because I don’t want any extra wear on the chamber or throat to keep up the accuracy.  With a precision rifle, brass vs. steel cased ammo may be a concern, but anything else, it doesn’t matter.

Unless you are trying to get sub MOA groups at 500 yards and beyond, don’t even worry about the ammo you are putting into your rifles and pistols for practice.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

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Announcements

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
• ShootersClubMembers.com

I like it

• Others have fear
• Use the advantages and disadvantages
• Everything that is a disadvantage turn into an advantage

Using light

• How your sight works at night
• Control your night vision Ruin the other person’s night vision
• Light and Move, Don’t trail yourself
• Don’t put light between yourself and what you want to see

Different Equipment

• Need a Flashlight
• Dark Clothes (not black)

Sound, light, and movement

• Light is first draw of attention
• Sound is second
• Movement
• Shadows to hide you and what you are doing
• Don’t let others use the shadows
• Movement should be slow and smooth
• Can’t eliminate noise all together but get rid of metallic and scraping sounds

Practice

• At night in your house lights off
• Just start moving around in the dark to get familiar
• Try walking through stuff and around things in your home
• Look for darker spots, that’s where things are
• Pick up you feet
• Don’t scrape against walls or hold your hands out trying to find something
• Walls are our reverence points during the day but different shades of dark and light need to be our reference points at night.  The door way will be either darker or lighter colored then the hallway
• Learn to walk straight helps to use square shoulders like episode 31
• Truly move silently:
  • Square up to the direction you want to go
  • Pick up one foot knee high
  • Go a quarter to half step forward with it
  • Use your toe to feel if there is anything there that would make noise
  • Don’t wear squeaky shoes or boots
• Security Pause often; no one can move or be truly silent

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

These days just about every car comes with some type of alarm.  I don’t think it really helps with car theft but we can use the built in alarm system to do more than just lock and unlock our doors.

First, you can keep your keys near you at night.  Find out where your key fob works and where it doesn’t in your house.  If someone is outside at night, or you think there might be someone, you can push the panic button on your car alarm.  Not the best system because most people ignore car alarms now, but most burglars and criminals don’t want attention.  If someone is trying to break in your house, they will probably go elsewhere.  It’s also a good way to see when it’s dark.  I’ve done this at hotels late at night.  I just wanted to make sure no one was around my truck so I just pushed the unlock button and all the lights come on in my truck.  Really easy to see if someone is there with all the lights on.  Just don’t abuse your alarm late at night, you might piss off you neighbors.

I actually use my key fob to lock my truck.  It’s a simple way to make sure you don’t lock your keys in the car.  If you always use the key fob, you always have your keys with you.  Not that big a deal until you lock your keys in your car late at night in a bad area.  I do it just because I hate waiting on AAA to unlock my vehicle.  Yes I have AAA and have for decades.  They do a good job for the $125 a year I pay.

The time I use my alarm on my truck the most is when I have stuff to load, especially when I have my kid.  My kid goes in his car seat in the back passenger side.  I will unlock the doors, open the door I need and then lock them all again.  This keeps anyone from slipping in the other side of your vehicle while you are loading.  It hasn’t been that popular around the country yet, but this tactic was used against mothers in California for a while and looked like it was going to spread.  So simple to unlock the doors, open the one you need and then lock the rest of them.  It avoids a lot of problems.  Criminals that are targeting you will be listening to the sounds of the doors locking and unlocking.

When I keep the keys with me and all the doors locked all the times, this gives me options.  For instance, I’m putting things in the car and someone walks up to me.  I can simply close the door and turn and face them.  This is especially if someone means harm and I have my kid half in the car.  If I have the doors locked and close the door, this limits access to my child.  Now I can deal with the problem.

One of my options at the point is to chuck my keys.  If someone wants my car really bad, but I really don’t want them to have it (because my kid is in there), I can throw my keys into the bushes or just as far as possible.  This buys me time.  I’m fully aware if I use this tactic that the person trying to car jack me or kidnap my kid is going to be extremely angry and probably take it out on me.  If it comes to fighting someone or losing my kid, the fight is on.

These are just a couple things that can be done.  Sit and think about it.  Learn how your car alarm and door locks work.  You will come up with lots of things to do that will keep you safer.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Two weeks ago, I got to spend some time at a nice sized gun show here in San Antonio.  Friday, I helped a friend at Sparks Firearms set up his booth and then got to walk around on Saturday.  I wasn’t looking for anything particular but am always looking around for something I can’t live without.

First, I bought a Ruger LCR from Sparks Firearms.  I’m loving this gun and carrying it everyday now (see the review here).   So, after buying the gun, I was looking around for holsters and anything else that would be fun to have or a deal I couldn’t pass up.

A couple things I noticed right away,  ARs are back in stock.  Everyone seemed to have one for sale again.  The prices where still pretty high, but you could get one if you had the money.  Ammo was in stock but at a huge premium.  Some of the prices hurt to even look at.  It seemed that the vendors were trying to out do each other with how much they could charge for the ammo.  It was like a bidding war in reverse.  Rumor had it (I never could find it) was that the highest priced ammo was a brick of .22 LR for $125! Maybe they sold out by the time I walked by, but probably not.  AR magazines were also in stock everywhere.  The prices were still higher than I would pay.

The first thing I bought was a MagPul MS3 sling.  I’ve wanted to try one of these for a while but just didn’t want to put out the $50 to buy one.  Since I really didn’t need it, I just never got around to it.  I found one at the show for $30 and couldn’t pass it up.  Bought one in tan just to be different than all the black and green slings I have.  Using this sling is pretty nice.  It functions as a single-point or 2-point sling.  The single point is super simple and nice to have.  You can wear the sling without the rifle and then simply pop the sling to the rifle and you are in business.  You can also use the sling as a 2-point sling.  I like to wear my sling as a 2-point connected to the back of the receiver and the butt stock.  This allows me to use the weapon off of either shoulder and holds the rifle close to my body so the sling can take some of the weight of the rifle after walking around for a long time.  Can’t wait to start training with this sling.

I bought a bandolier for my AR next.  I used these during the war in Iraq.  It’s an incredibly easy way to carry and store ammo.  With a little work you can put a lot of ammo in one and then load magazines easily.  It’s just a cheap way to store and carry ammo and I could use another one.  They are hard to find normally so I pick up an extra one now and then.

Alamo Tactical is a local shop here in San Antonio.  I’ve been into their shop a couple times and it’s pretty cool.  I saw their Minimalist Holster there and thought I should try one.  I ended doing the impulse buy for $20 to try it.  It was a waste of $20.  The holster only covers the trigger guard and has a J Hook on it to hold to your belt.  There is no front of the holster.  So anytime I was wearing it and bumped the back of the gun forward, the gun would come out of the holster and fall down my pants.  Not really something I want to happen with a loaded gun for a bunch of reasons.  This is why I try new gear with an unloaded gun.  It’s a “don’t buy.”

I got a new Mag pouch that I love from On You 6 Designs for my Glock.  This is a new company started here in San Antonio.  Nick is the owner/operator and was manning the booth.  I needed a single mag pouch for my Glock and his design looked cool.  He opened the bag and let me try one on.  When the clip didn’t fit the belt I normally wear, Nick simply pulled another clip out of a box and changed it out.  It fit perfectly so I bought it for a whopping $15.  I like it and have been using it on and off for everyday carry.

Last, I found a Sticky Holster from Hunker-Down.Net to fit my new LCR with a Laser Max.  It wasn’t easy to find a holster that fit.  The guy behind the table pulled out like every holster he had until he found one that fit great.  I wasn’t sure if I would like it, but for $25 I decided to give it a try.  The holster has been working great for the last couple of weeks.  I’ve been wearing it almost everyday since I got it.  It has been working great!  I’m going to a class this weekend and will see if it falls out when I’m running around.  So far I’ve jumped up and down, run around the house, and done some combat rolls, but it hasn’t fallen out.  This weekend’s course will be the true test to see if the gun falls out or not.

Just running around the show, I always find something cool.  I found this car done by a local artist who was standing there talking to everyone about her art.  She does mostly military stuff.  I ran out of money by the time I found her booth and didn’t buy a T-shirt, but they where pretty awesome.  She does everything by hand as pencil drawing and then has them transferred to T-shirts.  It was fun to just look at all the things she had drawn.  The Trans Am was pretty sweet.  She had hand drawn a new logo on the hood and then had people write the names of fallen warriors underneath the hood.  I enjoyed looking it over and was excited to see that the car was actually being driven around and not just a trailer queen.

I got a cool demo of how this works.  The guy sharpened my CRKT M16 (knife review here).  He was able to get out the nicks in the blade from use and give it a nice look in about a minute.  I know he is really good at it, so I gave him a nice tip.  By the time I saw him I was out of money and he was asking $80 for it.  I just found it on Amazon for $70 (4/2/13).  But the show is always offering a couple freebies that I didn’t understand but probably made it worth it.  I’ll be getting one next time around.

It’s always fun to go to the gun show, if for nothing else to meet a lot of the smaller venders.  Every time I go to a gun show I meet some really cool people and find some fun stuff to play with.  If you haven’t been or have been putting it off, go back and enjoy the people and the stuff.

Stay Safe,

Ben

PS Remember the 4 Gun Safety Rules! Not everyone does.  I almost attacked someone because as I came through the crowd I came face to face with a guy pointing a single action revolver at my face, finger on the trigger, thumb on the hammer like he was going to fire it.  I jumped right to get out of the line of fire and coiled to jump on the guy when I noticed he was just shifting positions with his revolver he was trying to sell.  He continued past me and I just walked on trying to overcome the adrenaline rush he just gave me.  It scared the crap out of me! Don’t be that guy!

Click to download from iTunes

Download Here

Announcements

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive AR May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • ShootersClubMembers.com

What it is:

• Way to fight with a gun
• Simply Square your shoulders to your target

Why:

• Movement
• Don’t Stack Organs
• Body Armor
• Clothing
• Pistol or Rifle
• Not as Tiring

How:

• Feet staggered
• Shoulders and upper body facing the target
• Video of rifle at www.ShootersClubMembers.com

When I switcher

• Shot weaver for ever
• Started wearing body armor everyday at work
• Then hard plates
• Moving around without crossing my legs

Stay Safe,

Ben

Happy Easter! Enjoy and calibrate it.

Click to download from iTunes

Download Here

Parking lots as danger zones

• Lots of people
• No one knows anyone
• Anonymity
• People have something to do and someplace to be
• People always have stuff Just bought or car

Stories

•  Last week
• With the kid After Action
  •  Caught with my pants down
  • Plan step aside let cart roll down hill into another car and hope for the best 
  • Charged guy
  • Used verbal commands as an escalation of force 
  • Should have seen him sooner

Tips and Tricks

1. Notice normal first thing

2. Notice things out of the normal

3. Evaluate why people are there

4. Always bee looking around

5. Don’t be in a hurry, security pause

6. Don’t be on your phone

7. Use your door locks

8. Don’t walk directly to your car

9. Don’t be overburdened with stuff use a cart or people to walk you out

10. See your options

• Where you park
• Be able to wait
• Car not the only safe place

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

After much deliberation and prodding from more than one person, I decided to try appendix carry.  It made me uncomfortable for a while and now I’m carrying there everyday.  I tried my Glock, then my Kel-Tec .32, neither worked for me.  I have an old .38 Taurus M85 and started carrying that.  It worked like a charm, except for the exposed hammer.  It pokes me in the gut on and off when I sit down.

So I looked around for something without a hammer.   The default for years was a J-Frame, but I hate the recoil on those little lightweights.  So I bought a Ruger LCR in .38 Special.  I found a used one with a Laser Max on the front for super cheap.  One of those can’t pass it up deals.

First thing I noticed when picking up the gun was how light it was.  It is about half the weight (even with the laser) as the Taurus it was replacing.  Second thing I noticed was the squishy grip (that’s a technical term).  It’s a rubber over-molded design that I like.  I’m generally not a fan of finger grooves, but they just worked on this gun.  While I couldn’t get all my fingers on the grip, my pinky was hanging off, I did have a strong grip on the gun and never thought it would fall out of my hand.  Some small guns I’m afraid I’ll lose in my big hands.

The next thing I noticed was the ugly looking plastic frame and barrel shroud. While the plastic made the gun really light and got rid of any sharp edges, it still looks kind of like an ugly duckling.  The next thing I saw was the weird cut in the cylinder.  Each chamber seemed to have been cut out to give the gun a unique look.  No idea why.

All of this was cool, but didn’t really matter at all.  All I cared about was can I use it and what would it recoil like.  It shot exceptionally well compared to my Taurus.  The Taurus I have has the worst sights ever on a gun and I can’t shoot it worth a darn.  I dry fired the Ruger for a couple days before taking it to the range and found the trigger very nice for a long double action.  I did notice if you don’t let the trigger all the way back out the trigger seems to lock up on itself and you have to let the trigger out again and start over.  The trigger was kind of weird compared to others I shot in that it doesn’t seem to stack.  Even a nice Smith and Wesson tuned trigger will have a point you can feel the spring getting tighter as you move the trigger to the end of it’s travel.  This trigger didn’t seem to have that.  Even without the stacking, it was very predictable and easy to manage.

The Laser Max is just kind of cool.  It came with the gun and I’ll leave it.  I don’t think it’s a necessity and found that the laser works fine inside the house where distances are short, but on the range I couldn’t use it, or even see it on the target past 15 yards.  The laser was also supposed to be factory adjusted but this one was nowhere close.  I don’t know if the factory didn’t adjust it, or the person that had the gun before me messed with it.  Either way it was an easy adjustment with the hex wrench provided.  I just aimed in on something with the iron sites across the room and looked where the laser was.  I just kept moving the laser until the sites and laser where pointing at the same thing.  It took all of 5 minutes.  I was rewarded by this 10 shot standing unsupported group at 7 yards with the laser.  The group centered a little high and left, but I was afraid to fix it because the clicks were a long move when I was at home.  When I get more carry ammo, I’ll zero the laser better to that ammo.

Shooting the little gun was a hit.  I enjoyed it with Winchester White Box 130 Gr. FMJ’s.  Not a lot of recoil and it didn’t bark all that loud.  I even pushed the target all the way out to 25 yards and was able to make hits on a man-sized target without any problems.  A better revolver shooter could probably make head shots all day at that distance with this gun.

After the Winchester ammo, I had some Speer Lawman 158 gr +P ammo.  I was a little apprehensive to shoot this stuff because I’ve shot this ammo in a J-frame air-light and it felt like I caught a baseball bat in the hand.  My entire hand stung and hurt after 5 rounds.  I put them in anyways and shot away.  I could feel the difference, but it wasn’t unmanageable.  I fired all 20 rounds I had left.  My groups opened up substantially with the extra recoil, but the gun worked fine.

Yes, That’s what I Paid

Next I shot my current carry load for .38 Special, the CorBon Powr Ball 100gr. +Ps.  These were less abusive than the Speer Lawman, but my groups still opened up.

At 7 Yards

I was kind of put out by their performance.  I was hoping for better since the ballistic numbers are so incredible out of this little round.  I did notice that the fireball wasn’t anything bigger than what I had been shooting, which was a new discovery for me.  When CorBon first started making ammo, I tested some of their stuff out of a 5” 1911 and didn’t carry them because of the extra recoil and huge fireball that came out the end.  The fireball was so big as to be blinding to the shooter.  Obviously, they’ve fixed this problem.

I had 10 rounds of old Federal Hydra Shocks I used to carry years ago.  I put five in and shot them just because they were there.  The recoil was less (almost felt like the white box stuff) and the group was by far the best of what I had on hand.  The fireball out of the Federal ammo was noticeably bigger than anything else, but with the light recoil and best accuracy I saved the other five and put them in the gun as carry ammo.  Now I have to find some more Federal Personal Defense ammo in .38 Special.  That could take a while right now.

Done at 10 Yards

In the meantime, I ordered some support gear.  Ruger was kind enough to supply a pocket holster with the gun, but I didn’t like that holster for appendix carry.  So I bought one at the gun show last weekend called a Sticky Holster.  It’s kind of a cool gummy feeling material (another technical term), nice and soft and sticky.  It seems to be working.

I ordered some other stuff too, just because I can.  I believe in carrying an extra reload, so I ordered some Tuff Strips from Amazon.

I also wanted to maybe shoot this in some IDPA competitions just to get better with it and because I think it would be fun.  So I looked around for a speed loader that would work and found these suggested on a forum.

I’ve never heard of 5 Star Firearms, but I don’t really shoot revolver, so at $27.50 I decided to take a chance.  If that works, I’m going to buy some of these to shoot competition with.  Just because they look cool.

The only reservations I have about this gun are the trigger reset (which I think I can live with), the fact that the gun is a little bigger than a J-Frame (even without the laser), and that it has a small ejection rod.  When I pushed the ejection rod to get the spent casing out at the range I generally had to fumble with it a little to get the casing to come all the way out.  If they had made the rod a full length instead of the short one, it would have been much better.

All in all, the gun shot well, is lightweight, and works well for my carry method.  It has become one of my every day carry guns and will continue for the foreseeable future.   The more I train with this gun, the more I like it.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

Down Load Here

Intro:

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
• ShootersClubMembers.com

In this podcast I go over some tips about carrying a gun everyday that you might not think about until they happen.  So here is a little heads up on what to do for everyday situations:

• What Holster and How to Carry
• Getting Close to People
• Using the Bathroom
• Hugging People
• Eating Dinner out with Friends
• What to do if you are discovered wearing a gun by someone else (hint; leave)
• Storing a Gun

Holsters I use to Carry

• Crossbreed Super Tuck
• White Dog Holsters
• Maxpedition Bags

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

Download Here

Intro:

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
  • ShootersClubMembers.com

What I see out there

Take a Breath

• This has happened before and will happen again
• This too shall pass
• Things will be different on the other side, but they would have been anyways

Scared of Tracking

• Friends want guns before registration
• Registration is to have a list for the government
• How Cops can Track Guns
• We need to fight it now, once the information is created it doesn’t go away
• I have registered Guns from California, I wonder if they will try to come get them

Take a breath and take someone shooting

How to get Guns and Ammo right now

• Make Friends
• Be Nice
• Ammo
  • Local Shop, ask owner when they will have some
  • Get on a mailing/call list/Facebook list
  • If you get called and show up, buy something even if you think it’s over-priced
  • Box Stores
  • Find out when they get deliveries and when the freight will be out and how long it takes before everything is gone
  • Don’t buy everything, have respect for others
  • Don’t buy from Gun Shows where people are ripping you off!
  • Ammo Diversity
  • Guns
    • Know the Market, what is MSRP? It’s on the web site
    • Prices already coming down on Black Rifles
    • Pistols not gone up a lot,  but are coming back on shelves

Be polite and put yourself in other people’s shoes.  Treat them, as you would want to be treated.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links. Get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast and now on Stitcher Radio.

Recently (or I should say finally), I got my Texas CHL renewed.  I had let it lapse for a while because of other things in life, work, and a cool new Texas law (you can carry in your vehicle). I just didn’t make it a priority.  Now that I have mine again, I’m carrying everywhere that it is legal.  I just wanted you to know what I found different.

First, I noticed a lot more things.  For some reason, it puts me back on guard and I’m better at noticing the little things.  For example, this last Sunday, I went to church like I always do.  I go to the same church, see the same people, know the building layout, and where the exits are.  I normally sit near one, or at least pay attention to how far away I am from one.  This week, I sat right next to one and noticed the extra little dead bolt on the exit door on the inside.  I knew they where there, but didn’t think to check if someone had actually unlocked them like they should have.  This week, the one I sat next to was still locked.  Good information to have in an emergency.

Walking around, I noticed that I have been letting people get too close to me.  I used to make sure people stayed at arms length or more away from me.  It was a habit I had from working at an armored car company and transporting money.  Somehow I’d gotten out of that habit and really noticed when someone bumped against me on the right side.  I don’t know if she felt my gun or not, but she hit it.  I’m definitely going to work on getting that habit back.  No more squeezing through people when I go places.

I also have the paranoid feeling back that everyone can see my gun.  I went to dinner last week with some friends and sat on the outside of the booth with my gun side out.  I thought the entire meal my shirt was going to come up and show off my gun to the entire restaurant.  I had to physically fold my hands on the table to keep myself from tugging at my shirt and gun the entire meal.

I also started carrying a revolver appendix style as a backup gun.  I’ve learned that exposed hammers are sharp and hurt.  I’m now looking for a hammerless revolver to take its place.  I also learned that I really like appendix carry.   The revolver works perfect for me.  The cylinder rides right behind my belt and creates a great comfortable way for me to carry.  I can’t seem to carry anything else that way comfortably.  I did carry an unloaded gun for 2 days and work a lot on my draw and holstering with an unloaded gun before I carried one loaded there.

I have to laugh at myself for carrying an unloaded gun for a couple of days.  When I started working on appendix carry, I did a couple sessions of practice with an unloaded gun for about a week.  Then I carried one unloaded for almost a day with no problems.  We had a dinner party that night at our home with friends and I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try carrying the gun loaded.  Half way through dinner I got up and went into my bedroom and took off the gun.  It was mental anguish.  Every time I moved, I was afraid the gun was going to go off and I would lose a body part that I really like.  Not to mention the embarrassment that would have caused (I’m a Marine, pain is easy to deal with, embarrassment still scares me).

All of this was purely mental.  I carry a modern revolver with a transfer bar safety.  The only way it will fire is if the trigger is pulled.  But I was still uncomfortable.  So I carried the gun unloaded for the next two days until I was reasonably certain that it wouldn’t go off when I didn’t want it to.  Now I’m carrying my revolver as a backup and love it.

What are your weird stories about carrying a gun?  Send me an email or leave it in the comments below.

Stay Safe,

Ben

This week I saw Smith and Wesson put up the same style thing as Ruger and Hornady.  I used the Smith site this week to send another message to my representatives. 

After using all three sites, my favorite is the Hornady site.  It lets you adjust the letter and write anything you want.  I do enjoy that more then just the form letter that is provided.  The letter isn’t bad and starts with the right thought.  If you are writing letters, start respectfully.  Then tell them what you want them to do.  Once you get a response back, then you can tell them what you really want.

After doing this for weeks on end, the only reps that really made me mad where the ones that wouldn’t tell me what they where going to do.  I’m not sure which is worst, when they lie to me, or when they won’t tell me anything.  Either way I’ve decided that I will continue to write all my reps.  The ones that reply with a real answer are the ones I will consider voting for.  The ones that don’t, I’m going to work for their opponent.  I’ve had enough of politics as usual.  The more I get involved the worst I feel.  So I’ll continue to do what I can to change it.

What are you doing to make things better? I’m asking you to continue contacting your reps and tell them what you want them to do.  Then pay attention.  If they don’t do what you tell them to, vote them out.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Click to download from iTunes

Intro:

• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Intro to Defensive May 11
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
  • June 8-9 in San Antonio
• ShootersClubMembers.com

Using Emotions

Why Emotions can be dangerous; contagious

Powerful emotions fear, anger, Motivation/Excitement

How to see emotions coming

• Anger
  • In others
    • Eyes pupils change
    • Fists
    • Posturing
    • Voice infliction higher pitch louder
    • Passing/fidgeting
    • Breathing heavy
• In Yourself
  • Tightness
  • Breathing heavy or trouble breathing
  • Heavy chest
  • Focusing on a single thing
  •  Fear
    • Head Ducked
    • Shoulders Droop
    • Eyes dance around
    • face goes pale
    • change in speech pattern (those that don’t talk do, those that do talk don’t)
    • hands up
    • get shorter/slouch more
  • Motivation/Excitement
    • Smile
    • Eyes bigger
    • Fidgeting
    • Loud Voice
    • hands shaking
    • jumping up and down
    • ball of energy like a little kid
    • just can’t sit still
    • breathing faster

How to use emotion to your advantage

• Motivation
  • Excitement about what is happing and encouraging others have gotten me through incredible ordeals mentally
  • See yourself finishing the goal
  • Fake it until you make it.
  • Encourage others and talk about the end
  • Talk to yourself if you need to
  • Once achieved push it towards what you want to get done
  • Can be used in self defense in a long term event once fear subsides
  • Anger
    • If you can’t get motivated get angry at something
    • Allowed me to push through when motivation failed me
    • Police academy said I had heart because I could push through anything when others were failing
    • Law Enforcement are taught to get angry when they are in a fight against someone and to use that anger towards the person they are fighting
    • Focused anger during an attack
    • Anger is generally easy to come up with, during a self defense situation it’s okay to be angry at the other person
    • Don’t let rage overtake you (Iraq checkpoint story)
    • Never give full vent to your anger (proverbs 29:11) A fool lets fly with all his temper, but a wise person keeps it back. (Proverbs 29:11 NET)

Look at people in an argument and see if you can see where it goes down hill. See what happened and how the people changed. If you don’t see adults you can always watch young teens and see it. It happens to young men all the time.

Once someone gets angry it’s time to go

Stay Safe,

Ben

Thanks for checking out my Podcast.  Please consider subscribing to my just my Podcast RSS, or my entire Blog RSS by clicking the links, or get my podcast on iTunes, or Digital Podcast.

This week I did a guest spot on the Politics and Guns Podcast with Paul and Toby.

We got together to talk about different weapons and other fun stuff. I actually got to talk a little about politics (which I try to stay away from most of the time).

Download the podcast here.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Violence of Action

If you can create three things, you can win any physical altercation no matter what weapons are involved.  Your mind is the weapon, a gun and knife are just tools. Here are the elements you need to win the fight; Speed, Shock Force, Violence of Action.  Two days ago we talked about Speed, yesterday was Shock Force, and today we’ll look at the final element, Violence of Action.

This one is the hardest.  Once you start, you can’t stop.  In the movies, the good guy just hits someone and the fight is over.  It’s never that way.  Once you act against a criminal in self defense, you have to use extreme violence and not stop until that person is out of commission or gives up.  If I use my flashlight to shine in someone’s face during an attack, I’m going to follow up with hitting that person multiple times with the flashlight.

If you are going to counter attack someone (yes, once you are going to act in self defense you should be thinking attack), it has to be with all the ferocity that you can muster.  You need to let go of any thought that you might just want to hit the person to get them to stop.  That is your goal, but you need to hit him with all the strength you can muster.  If I’m going to counter attack with my hands, I’m going to hit the attacker again and again, until he falls down or gives up.  I’ll even go from punching to elbows and knees to win.  If I’m using my flashlight, I’ll continue to hit him with it until he falls or runs away.  If your attacker even talks about killing you or has something that can kill you (i.e. knife, club, gun, screw driver, pick…) you are in a fight for your life and should show no mercy, because he won’t.  If you pull a knife to defend yourself, you need to stab and slash until he gives up, runs away or falls down.  You can’t slash at the bad guy once and wait to see what happens.  You need to act so violently that it keeps the other guy from doing anything but running away.

The same thing goes for shooting.  If you have to pull your gun, it shouldn’t be to scare someone.   I hope if I have to pull my gun on someone they will just give up, but they only have from the time they see my gun coming out of the holster until I get it into a firing position to make that choice.  I only pull my gun to stop a threat from killing someone.  If you fire, fire a lot.  Make lots of hits on your target.  Keep shooting until the threat goes down, runs away, or you run out of ammo.  Even if you are carrying a Glock with a 15 round magazine, keep shooting.  It may take that much violence to stop someone evil from committing an act of evil upon you or your loved ones.

The hard part is that we are all good people and don’t want to hurt anyone.  All I want is for that person to leave my family and me alone.  But when it’s time to act, we have to act with more violence than that person does.  The person that is acting against you already knows that he is going to get into a fight and already decided that he doesn’t mind killing someone today.  You have to be more violent then he is at that moment.

Putting it Together

As a Marine in an urban environment, it looks simple.  I’ll use suppressing fire on the building to get to the door.  Once a couple of us get to the door, one will open the door while another tosses in a grenade.  Once the grenade goes off, we all run in and kill everyone in the room.  You can see where all this would be shocking and the violence at the end doesn’t get any worse.

How this might work for you in the real world:

Someone comes up to you in a dark parking lot.  You pull out your flashlight (you are carrying one, right?) and flash it in his eyes.  The guy keeps coming at you blindly holding his hands to his eyes yelling something like “I’m going to F** you up and take your car!”  You turn the light off, step to the side and start hitting him in the side, neck, and head with your light until he falls down.  Then you run away and call 911 and tell them you’ve been attacked and need help.

Nothing is perfect, but in my experience, it’s hard to lose if you effectively use shock force, speed, and violence of action.  A lot of this comes from prior preparation (you have a light, right?), practice (playing the “what if” game), and working out with your weapons you carry until they become second nature and you don’t have to think about it.

Stay Safe,

Ben

Shock Force

If you can create three things, you can win any physical altercation no matter what weapons are involved.  Your mind is the weapon, a gun and knife are just tools. Here are the elements you need to win the fight; Speed, Shock Force, Violence of Action.  Yesterday we talked about Speed, today we’ll look at Shock Force.

Shock Force or surprise is a great ally.  You don’t just need the surprise part, you need the shock to go with it.  That moment after someone is scared or surprised, that they just stare in amazement and do nothing.  You need to create that in your enemy.  In the Marine Corps, we are taught to just yell.  It works.  I’ve run down the streets of Baghdad with a hundred Marines attacking hundreds of Iraq National Guard and they where so shocked they decided to huddle up in the open and try and figure out what to do.  A Huey Cobra solved that problem.  Obviously, a hundred plus Marines in battle raddle running down the street yelling is a shocking sight, but you can do this in a fight.  A simple yell works well.  A mugger picked you to rip off because you looked like an easy target.  If you start screaming and running at him, he’ll probably think you are crazy.  You only need that second for him to think “what the…” for you to land a punch or draw your weapon.

The other forms of shock you can use are your flashlights and distractions.  I just finished watching the Karate Kid II again and there is a part the bad guy robs Daniel, takes his money out of his wallet and throws it on the ground.  Daniel bends over to pick it up and then hits the bad guy in the crotch and runs away.  It could work.

The other kind of distraction is that people generally see what they expect to see.  Police officers have to train themselves constantly to overcome this.  Even when a cop has a gun on someone and says take your hands out of you pocket and put them over your head.  The cop expects the criminal to do what he is told, and expects his hands to be empty when they come out of pockets.  One old cop taught me that he could never get over that, so he either had the person turn around and take his hands out of his pockets or would hold onto the guys arm as his hand came out of the pocket.  This could work to your advantage.  The dirt bag has a knife and says give me your wallet.  You say okay and put your hand inside your coat and come out with your gun.  I do practice this technique on and off for that situation.

The flashlight at night is a great distraction and creates enough shock force for you to act.  The darker it is, generally the more a criminal likes it, and the more effect your flashlight will have on him.  I currently carry a LED Lenser P5R.  It’s not my favorite light I’ve ever carried, but at 200 lumens, it’s one of the brightest.  I tried it on a volunteer and even in a lighted house, it made her shut her eyes for a couple of seconds to get the stars to go away.  A flashlight is by far my favorite distraction device and weapon to carry on me all the time.

Come back tomorrow to read about Violence of Action and how to put it all together

Stay Safe,

Ben

If you can create three things, you can win any physical altercation no matter what weapons are involved.  Your mind is the weapon, a gun and knife are just tools.  Here are the elements you need to win the fight; Speed, Shock Force, Violence of Action.

I was taught these years ago by an old Gunny in the Marine Corps.  I have no idea where he got it from but it has shaped my thinking about fights for the last 10 years, including combat tours in Iraq.  They seem simple because they are.

Speed

Speed is relative to what your opponent is doing.  You don’t have to move fast, just faster than he is.  Think of the simplest Hollywood gunfight, two gunman face off in the middle of the street prepared to draw and fire at each other old west style. Doesn’t matter how fast the winner really is, he just has to be faster then the bad guy that one time.  This is true for any fight.  That includes thinking (yes you have to think in a fight, it’s a chess game).  You need to get inside his OODA Loop (Observe, Orientate, Decide, Act).  This could be accomplished by simply stepping to the side while drawing.  The bad guy has to see you moving, understand what is going on, decide to track you with his gun and fire, then actually move his arm and fire the gun.  It doesn’t sound like much, but when you can draw and fire your weapon in less then 1.5 seconds, you don’t need long to get the tide to turn in your favor.

Speed is also used against groups.  Believe it or not, if it is a group of people against you, you have the advantage of speed.  The larger the group, the longer it takes them to close the OODA Loop and actually act.  Then, when they do act, they have to act together or will literally trip over each other.

The way to be able to act faster than the other person is to act without thinking.  Your movements should be second nature.  Moving, drawing, firing should happen without direct thought.  Think about driving a car.  Do you have to think about braking, or how hard to brake, or that you have to move your foot to the brake pedal? Nope, you just stop the car when the car in front of you stops.  In a fight, you want your actions to happen with that little thought.  That requires thousands of repetitions of practice.  Start slow, speed will come with practice, economy of motion, and smoothness.  Today is a good day to get a little extra practice in (so is tomorrow and the next day).

Come back tomorrow for Part 2; Shock Force.

Stay Safe,

Ben

March 2 found Bob Mayne and me in Dallas (actually Quail Creek Range in Argyle), TX to teach a Beyond Concealed Carry course.  The course was good, and the students where amazing!  The morning started out a little cold for March, but was livable.

Student brought all sorts of guns, Bob and I where shooting our normal Glock 19s.  Most of the guns on the line where M&P’s or XD’s in some form or fashion.  There were a couple Glocks, one HK, one Kimber 1911, and one Kahr.  All worked great with a couple malfunctions (most shooter related).

Students found it difficult to work their guns with their gloves and heavy coats on.  I encouraged them to leave whatever they where wearing on and work around the extra clothing because this was Dallas weather almost half the year and this is how they dress.  There was no push back only eager shooters ready to improve their abilities.

Bob and I gave the students a good laugh when we went to demonstrate the Tueller drill (21 foot rule) and both of us ran away from each other.  Luckily that didn’t get on film or camera.  But it was hilarious.

As the day progressed so did the skill of the students.  Everyone walked away with better gun handling skills then when they showed up.  At the end of the day we set up a bunch of crazy drills and had fun with a battlefield pickup drill that included a .44 Magnum Desert Eagle to shoot.

If you want to be a student at one of our courses check them out at http://www.Modernselfprotection.com/Courses.

Stay Safe,

Ben

This week I again wrote my representatives at the state and local level.  I used Hornandy.com web site to customize a letter.  This time I was nice and thanked them for their work and asked them to vote down all new gun laws including the “Universal Background Checks.”

I called my House Rep, the one that isn’t listening, and again left a message with an intern about how he needed to vote against gun control.  Of course the intern was very nice and said he would pass the info along.

Hopefully I’m getting through and enough people are calling to get counted.  Are you still calling your representatives?  Are you tired yet?  Keep it up.  The alternative is frightening.  Continue calling your people.  Don’t give up!

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Intro:

• Beyond Concealed Carry March 16 San Antonio
• 2-Day Training Event April 13 and 14
• Advanced Beyond Concealed Carry
  • June 1-2 in Dallas
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We Talked about:

• Gun Rights and IGOLD (Illinois Gun Owner Lobby Day) where over 8,000 people showed up in Chicago to talk to their legislators
• How to get others involved with shooting and who we should concentrate on if we want to turn the gun rights movement
• The difference between men and women when it comes to gear
• What Frank carries daily

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Some guns come with manual safeties and some do not.  Most long guns come with a manual safety and handguns are almost split down the middle 50/50.  But why, and do you really need the safety on your gun? And should you use it if it’s there?

First, let’s talk about long guns, rifles and shotguns.  Yes, you should use your safety on your long gun almost all the time, especially when moving.  With an AR style rifle, I think the only time to have the safety off is when you are firing the weapon.  The safety is so easy to flip on and off there is no reason not to use it.  With other long guns, the safety can be a pain.  But you should use it when moving.  The problem with long guns is that they are long (obviously).  Because of the length, they are harder to control.  When moving around, it’s too easy to bump them on something or get the end caught on something and have the rifle move unexpectedly and be out of your control for a split second.  When the long gun moves out of your control the trigger could easily get caught on something and discharge the weapon.  The gun doesn’t know the difference between you pulling the trigger and that branch you just got caught on pulling the trigger.  Since you don’t have complete control of the long gun at that point, the muzzle could be pointed in an unsafe direction.

I know this is splitting hairs, and the possibility is slim, but you are responsible for every bullet that leaves your firearm, on purpose or by accident.  Since this simple accident could kill someone else, we, as responsible gun owners, should take precautions to eliminate this possibility.  The easiest way is to use the safety on the gun.  If you can’t operate the safety efficiently or effectively on the gun you have, I suggest using or getting another gun.  There are so many good guns out there that it’s easy to find another one.  I’m fond of the safety design on the Savages and Winchester actions for hunting rifles and love the safety design on an AR.  I wish every rifle and shotgun would have a thumb safety designed like an AR.

Handguns are a different story.  Because they are smaller and lighter, you can move around with a minimal amount of danger with the weapon not on safe.  The danger of you getting it caught on something and having it discharge is substantially less.  But why do some handguns have safeties and some don’t? Personal preference is the simple answer.  I like handguns with manual safeties.  It gives me that extra layer of safety if for some crazy reason I screw everything else up.  Right now, I’m carrying a Glock 19 that has no manual safety.  It’s perfectly safe.  The weapon won’t go off unless something pulls the trigger.  I just like the idea of an on/off switch.

I do think a pistol with a safety should be carried with the safety on, for the simple reason that Murphy’s Law is always with us.  If you carry a handgun with a manual safety, but never use it, somehow, in the worst possible moment, that safety will get flipped on and you won’t know how to take it off.  If you have a gun with a manual safety, consider using it all the time.  When the handgun comes out of the holster, the safety comes off.   When you are done and just before you put it away, the safety goes back on.

It sounds pretty easy, but you should see how much work it takes to get used to that simple act.  I suggest that you buy the gun that you want to use.  If you don’t want a safety, don’t buy a gun with a manual safety.  There are so many good guns out there today, that you can latterly have it like Burger King; “Your Way!”  Pick a gun that you want to use and train with it.  If you have a manual safety, learn to use to it.

Stay Safe,

Ben

I’ve decided to continue Operation Gun Rights even though I was thinking of only 8 weeks.  My reasons are two fold.  First, I can’t believe some of my elected !#%)^ aren’t listening to me.  What a mess, so I’m just going to keep their staff busy with my emails so they can’t get anything else done.  And don’t worry, I have a list of a couple people that I’ll be voting against in the primaries and then again on Election Day if I can’t get rid of them in the primary.  The second reason I’m continuing is because I think the other side is trying to wear us down.  They think they can pass whatever they want when we aren’t looking.  Pay attention and tell your elected leaders what they should be doing.

This week I used Hornady.com to send a message to everyone.  This program works much like the one at Ruger.com, but it was really easy to customize the letter.  Rumor is that Ruger developed the technology and then gave it away to any other company that wanted it at SHOT Show (from Tom Gresham on Gun Talk Radio).  Either way, I’m going to keep sending messages.  I can’t wait until one of my elected officials is in town.  Him and I are going to have a talk about listening to us.  Hopefully he’ll do an open forum town hall meeting so it will be public.

I implore you to continue talking to your officials.  I’m continuing and even getting involved in other things too.  Including the current budget “crisis” that is growing in the media with each side blaming the other (dorks).  Keep telling them what to do.  If they don’t listen, get rid of them next election.  This is our country and it’s time we the good people get involved.

Stay Safe,

Ben

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Announcements

• 2 DAY Training Event April 13 and 14
  • Day 1 Intro to Defensive Handgun
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Polarization

• Us against them
• Cops vs Civilians
• Military vs Civilians
• Neighbor vs Neighbor

Get out and do something about it.  Go talk to those people and figure out what the problem is.  I bet you can fix it over coffee or a beer.

Stay Safe,

Ben

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This week was crazy for me at work, so I simply went back to the Ruger site and sent another email to my reps. This is 8 weeks into writing every week.  It’s a lot of work to keep going.  I think I’m going to keep going more and more.  At this point I’m afraid that the legislators are going to wait until we the people get tired of the debate and then pass what they want when we aren’t looking.  They are quite crafty that way.  This month it will be all about the budget cuts and all that crap.  Everyone knows that they will fight until the last second and then pass something to “save the country.”  Like they really care.

Call your reps and tell them what you want done.  They work for you.  Don’t give up. “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance” – Thomas Jefferson

Stay Safe,

Ben

This weekend Bob Mayne and I will be in Dallas to teach a class.  Friday night we will be eating dinner at Spring Creek BBQ in Lewisville on Round Grove Rd. just off of 35 East.  We’ll be hanging out and having dinner at 7pm, March 1, 2013.  Come out and have dinner with us.

Spring Creek BBQ
571 E. Round Grove Rd.
Lewisville, TX 75067

Come hang out with us and have some good food.

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