Posted on 12/11/2007 6:14:03 PM PST by Kaslin
One of our local SWAT officers took a .357 mag round in the butt. He walked over to the EMS vehicle under his own power. The doctors decided extracting it would do more harm than leaving it in place. During the same SWAT action, another officer was hit in the collarbone. His ballistic vest prevented a penetrating wound, but his collarbone was still broken. He also escorted himself to the EMS vehicle. The EMTs didn't believe that either of them had been shot.
That’s certainly your call. I gave my take on it, but didn’t seek to give you a hard time over your comments to the other poster. I appreciate your response. Take care.
Thanks for your additional comments. I would opt for the handgun as well.
I don’t fault the 12 guage choice. That would definately be my fall back. I would probably stick with the handgun but there are definately some advantages with the shotgun. I recognize that.
I apologize.
Oops. I read Sowell and somewhere along the way switched to Walter Williams. How the heck...
i kinda figured that’s what happened. i’m guessing that it’s hard to picture Thomas Sowell as a pistol instructor but not so much Walter Williams.
People are entitled to have opinions whether right or wrong. They are entitled to voice them. That’s what the First Amendment is all about. Good heavens, if we waited to be undeniably prefect with all our comments, who would be making any in public?
I see this ploy most used when the person who is being taken to task wants to silence those who disagree. While I agree these groups can take some pretty unfair shots, who is really in the sights here?
I defend the police as much as I can. I defend the pharmaceutical companies as much as I can. I don’t generally defend CEOs, but I don’t attack them for the salaries they make either.
Officers don’t always do the right thing. You don’t have to be an expert to realize that. Pharmaceuticals companies are out there to make a buck, and I think they lose sight of what is reasonable at times, but in general I am supportive of their right to set the price they think is appropriate, because they are the ones who will reinvest that money in R & D that result in further lives being improved or saved. I don’t gripe because a lower price is charged in foreign nations, but I do find that a basis for disagreement.
Sowell touched on an important issue. He gave the reasons why. I agreed with him. Then that wasn’t good enough, he had to throw in two additional topics without discussion, and that’s where he blew it with me.
You can’t just throw out a blanket statement on Pharmaceuticals and Corporations. These are complex issues in their own right.
Is it right for a CEO to get over a hundred million when the price of his company’s stock lost 75% of it’s value during the year? You may say that’s what his contract read, and that’s a fair comeback, but I don’t fault folks for being a little miffed when they may have seen a 75% loss on their stock, while he made a massive gain.
All in all, I think it’s a bad idea to dump on people because they voice their opinions. The best idea is to explain to them why certain things happen they way they do, and then let them choose to agree or disagree.
There are times when folks who don’t have a lot of education and go with their gutt feelings on things are right and the experts are later proven wrong.
Differences of opinion are important. Silencing them is a very dangerous thing to advocate.
Could be. Brain fart alert!
I bought into the gun rag hype for Magsafe and Glaser frangible ammo a few years ago, and I picked up a 6-round package of Magsafe ammo for my wife's little S&W .32 magnum revolver. Then a little later on I saw the results of a .38 special Magsafe round fired into a bundle of water logged newspapers. The Magsafe's pellets blasted out a ragged oval shaped cavity about 2" wide, which was impressive, but only about 4" deep, which was not impressive.
Because of the inadequate penetration of that test shot I went back to the normal solid bullet cartridges for her carry gun, and the Magsafes are now tucked away somewhere in my ammo locker. There are only the two of us living here now and no close neighbors, so I'm not overly concerned about bullet over penetration anyway.
If I was concerned, I think I would check into the Taurus revolvers that fire both .45 Long Colt cartridges and .410 shotgun shells. Federal makes a 3" .410 shell loaded with 11/16 ounce of #4 lead shot which might be adequate for very short range defense purposes, although I would want to test it in wet newspaper or modeling clay to be sure. So if the #4 shot load is proved to be adequate, the Taurus .410 should be a reasonably good choice for a home defense gun where over penetration is a potential problem.
A couple of years ago an Atlanta cop was chasing a burglary suspect on foot when the guy turned and fired several shots at him from a .380 pistol. One bullet struck the officer's ballistic vest in the center of his chest and was prevented from penetrating his body, but it did put him on the ground because of the severe pain.
The Atlanta AJ&C fishwrapper printed a color photo of the officer's rib cage where the bullet struck, and even though he was a black guy the dark blue bruise was clearly visible in the photo. If the puny .380 can hit you that hard I wouldn't want to trust a vest against something like a .357 magnum, or even worse a .44 mag.
I disagree. In the same way, I disagree calling a "tail" a "leg" makes a horse five-legged; I disagree the SCOTUS defining urinating on a flag "speech" but campaign contributions are not, makes it so in the existential sense.
I also disagree the First Amendment was intended to protect the information/advertising/propaganda technologies we have today in the same way gun grabbers don't believe the Second Amendment was intended to protect the rights of the individual to own a Stinger missle.
If the SCOTUS has ruled a person has no right to yell fire in a crowded theater (presumably when there is no actual fire) other, provably false, maledictions should not be given carte blanche by virtue of our protection of dissenting opinion.
Differences of opinion are important. Silencing them is a very dangerous thing to advocate.
Very true, and I don't advocate it, but valuable "opinions" and gratuitous "assertions," are very different things that "look" superficially similar.
Frankly, it doesn't take that much education to distinguish between the two.
Four inches deep into bundled, waterlogged newspapers is actually pretty danged impressive for a frangible projectile of .38 caliber; if they were bundled fairly tightly. Wet newspaper might sound pretty wimpy, but bundled tightly, it's way more impenetrable than a human body; almost as solid as a wet phone book. Then, too, there doesn't need to be an exit wound for a round to be highly effective; two inches penetration is plenty fatal in the right location, especially if the entry is a 2" hole. Can you say "sucking chest wound"?
I may be off the mark, but try taking those Mag-Safe rounds out of storage and fire a few of them into water-filled gallon plastic milk jugs; a better "body double" than wet newspapers, IMHO. If they still fail to impress you, at least you'll have fewer of them hogging space in your ammo box.
“Even when I think he’s wrong about something he’s still “Mr. Sowell” to me.”
Yes ‘this guy’, he’s not my Dad or the President. He’s telling me I have no place or right to question the use of force our government employs. That doesn’t sound conservative to me.
“He’s a brilliant and acomplished conservative writer.”
Good for him
My favorite story is when my instructor warned us about wearing open collar shirts when using an semi-auto. Sure enough, one of the ejected shells of the .45 I was firing flew up, and landed down the front of my Izod. Everyone watched while I grimmanced, quietly put the .45 down, facing down the range, took about 3 steps slowly backwards, and let out a "Unnnngh!" Then we were all laughing at once...
The instructor commended me on how I reacted. Told me to button up my shirt and gave me an extra set of rounds to shoot.
But, dang! That hurt! LOL!
I'm certainly no expert on gunshot wounds or how much force is needed to stop an attacker, but the visible affect of conventional hollow point bullets that we fired into wet newspaper that day such as the Gold Sabre, HydroShok, and Silvertip looked more impressive to me than the Magsafe did. I load my .45 with Winchester Silvertips primarily because they work flawlessly in my gun. I have never had a Silvertip fail to feed, fire, or extract the fired case in my 1911 .45, and I can't say that for any other hollowpoint round that I have tried. The best thing about a .44 or .45 is that even if the hollowpoint doesn't expand as it's supposed to the bullets are big and heavy enough to make a serious wound anyway.
I tried the Magsafes because I was looking for a round that would make my wife's little .32 into a more effective manstopper. But now I don't think any such round exists. She had carpal tunnel operations on both hands a few years ago. The operation on her right hand was botched and did not heal properly and as a result she can't tolerate much recoil, so the .32 is about the most she can handle. At least it's better than the .22 revolver she had before her dad gave her the .32.
Yep, those fired shell cases are HOT when they exit the gun! I never realized how hot they can be until one ejected straight back and fell down into my T-shirt.
I had fired cases occasionally eject back into my face and chest until a guy at the range told me the extractor of my old .45, a Sistema Colt 1911, needed to be tuned up. I found instructions on how to tune it on the web, it wasn't hard to do and now it works much better. It still scatters empties around my firing point but not like before, and at least it doesn't toss them into my shirt collar now.
The instructions are HERE if anyone else's 1911 needs a tune up.
blah blah blah
A 44 mag is likely to punch a ballistic vest. The CCW instructor at American Shooting Center in San Diego was threatened by a convicted felon who routinely wore a ballistic vest. The instructor opted for a 44 mag carry given his knowledge of the type of vest employed by the threatening party. Switch out his carry to the 44 mag required refiling his CCW paperwork and requalifying with the specific firearm to get it on his license. I don't think he would have gone to all that trouble unless he was confident that it was the right thing to do.
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