Knowledge to make your life better. If you have some free time, check out some of these links this weekend.

Those of you with AR-15 “pistols” with arm braces and vertical foregrips shoud look at the ATF’s new guidance on measurements. A “pistol” under 26 inches overall length with a vertical foregrip becomes a class III Any Other Weapon (AOW). My advice to stay out of jail is to remove the vertical foregrip on any short barreled AR-15 pistol.

And on the topic of legality, read NFA Rules on Shotguns to understand the intricacies of smooth bore regulations.

Information and products I haven’t seen before.

A lot of very useful information about active killer events.

The Ruger 10/22 is a great gun. Here is everything you need to know about modifying one from my friends at Adaptive Defense Concepts.

My buddy Nick Hughes has an ingenious solution for a homemade low cost burglar alarm. Listen to his recent podcast on The Art of Manliness and pick up his latest book How to Be Your Own Bodyguard. Nick is one of the smartest guys in the business.





This may be a useful tool for some of you parents.

“It’s a manly concern — to want to piss on trees and wipe your dick on the drapes. To inseminate the world. To leave evidence of your existence. To claim mountains and build monuments. To become Ozymandias, booming from the grave: “Look upon my works, ye mighty and despair!”

The sands of time may wipe away all of these works, and someday the sun will swallow the Earth, but if I’m going to be here, I’m going to be here and I’m going to keep trying to write my Ego’s name on the world. I’m not here merely for the experience. That’s a participation trophy. If you’re into that, that’s cute, but I’m here to make a mark.

As Rand observed, it is this Ego — this Ego in competition with other Egos — that in many cases pushes us to invent and overcome and break the shackles of our minds and bodies. The Ego motivates. It is this Ego, this I, this ME who says — who insists — “I AM somebody,” “I AM worth something,” “I have an idea,” “I want to be heard,” “I want to be free.”

That’s when Ego is a good thing.”

Read Donovan’s The Way of Men.

An interesting perspective on how some of our standard tactical teachings may appear to a jury.

One of the many reasons police agencies are losing credibility with the public. I find it exceptionally hard to believe that the NYPD investigated nearly 2500 bias complaints and didn’t sustain a single one.

Not one instance of bias in a 35K person department in four years? Really?

While the media narrative describing all cops as racist oppressors is far from being accurate, I can’t believe that the investigators couldn’t find a single instance of bias in a four year investigation.

If we don’t police our own, we will be policed by others.

Another installment of Target Barn’s excellent article series explaining bullet design for beginning shooters.

A very comprehensive test of various gun oils, evaluating both lubricity and corrosion resistance.

I have to admit that I’m not as well-versed as I should be about WWI guns. I learned a few things reading this article.

A couple months ago I posted a podcast series titled “It Could Happen Here.” The series explored the left wing narrator’s ideas about how a second civil war in the USA might be triggered and explained the likely effects of such a conflict.

This video series explores the same type of idea from the perspective of a military intelligence officer. I find that my “war gaming” after considering different perspectives on the same topic is far better than if I rely on information from a single source.

Watch this video, Part Two, Part Three, and Part Four as well. The video author might be right or he might be very wrong. In either scenario, you win as long as you have the contingency plans in place to be antifragile despite the not knowing the exact circumstances of the coming conflict.

I can’t imagine that there would be 9500 current or retired border patrol agents involved in a Facebook group that made such derogatory comments. Engaging in such conduct is extremely detrimental to one’s career.

I can’t impress on you cops enough about how important your social media postings and comments are. In the last three expert witness cases I’ve worked, the other side’s attorneys exhaustively reviewed both my social media history and that of the officers I was defending.

They were looking for any little thing they could find to impeach our testimony. I don’t belong to any racists/sexist/derogatory groups on Facebook. I don’t insult anyone on social media. There are no racist comments on my feed, yet I still had to spend hours on the stand testifying about completely inconsequential social media postings.

Clean up your shit. Get out of any groups that will harm your reputation. Don’t do stupid stuff like this or I promise it will come back to bite you in the ass in future court proceedings.

“The U.S. military has a gun cleaning fetish that is a holdover from the days of corrosive primers (and black powder before that.) Boiling water cleaning and “white glove” intolerance for carbon have probably resulted in more guns being cleaned to death than shot to death.

In reality, most modern firearms just need lubricant, and even that’s to a varying degree.”

“The real question becomes do you keep the light trained on them or extinguished. A lot will depend on what you saw in the first few moments that convinced you to draw your handgun. Things like distance, action and whether you can move and move to a better location help determine the right course of action. The bottom line, the situation will dictate.

Having a good handheld light should be on everyone’s loadout. Then know how to use it effectively, otherwise it is nothing more than an expensive torch.”

I enjoy learning about the gun culture in other countries. This video described the gun laws of the small country of Malta.

Express kidnappings are a very real concern when traveling in other countries. Most are committed by taxi drivers or people posing as a taxi driver. Never take a taxi ride from a driver who solicits you. Flag down a cab that is moving in the street rather than one waiting by a curb. Don’t get into a cab when there is anyone other than the driver inside. If the driver picks up another person on your trip, get out immediately.

You may have to break the window glass to escape. You do have glass breaking tools with you when traveling, right? I wear the Oscar Delta GTFO wrist band as cheap insurance.

There is a difference between a first aid kit and a trauma medical kit.

What I’m reading…

The policing profession is inundated with cowardly leadership. This book offers some solutions for identifying and recifying the problems created by inept or self-serving police administrators.

An alternate take on the “hobo tactical” craze. I don’t have much to add. I work in an upper class suburb. We don’t deal with a massive amount of homeless people.

Most of those I’ve dealt with in my career have been unarmed. I’ve had a few carrying cheap folding knives, a couple hammers, and several carrying screwdrivers. I arrested one homeless guy on a 20-year old traffic warrant. He had been living undetected in a nearby state park for many years. At the time of his arrest, he was packing something like 13 different knives, a couple ice picks, and three cork screws. Literally, every pocket in his clothing was filled with an edged weapon of some type.

Bill Jordan had some amazing shooting skills. Watch this 50+ year-old video of one of his trick shooting exhibitions. This actually aired on television back in the day. If we had programs like this on TV today, I would probably abandon my eight-year stretch of living in a television-free home.

Bill also wrote one of the first combat shooting books ever printed. There are still good lessons to learn from No Second Place Winner. If you don’t want to buy a book written in 1965, you can also read the book for free HERE. Unfortunately, the free text link does not include any photographs.

I’ll continue of the topic of history and revolver use by sharing this article that explains the historical evolution of revolver speed loaders.

I’m betting that most of my readers are not closely involved with the drug culture. Even those of you who don’t use drugs need to better understand the issues causing opioid addiction. If you don’t know an addict now, you are likely to know one in the future as addiction rates continue to rise.

Overdose is the leading cause of death for American adults under 50 years of age. I respond to about one overdose a month and I work in a very wealthy suburb with a relatively small population of addicts. According to this article and many other sources I’ve read, the problem will continue to get worse.

If you live in Ohio, realize that any illicit drug you take might kill you. We had been doing fairly well reducing OD deaths, but just this week Carfentanil reappeared in the drug supply. There were nine OD deaths here in Columbus last weekend.

If you have friends or family members who use opioids, make sure you have some naloxone available and that you know first aid for an overdose.

A compilation of each state’s laws regarding tear gas and/or pepper spray.

While on the topic of pepper spray, I often get asked about what particular product I recommend. The Sabre Spitfire was the pepper spray unit that I recommended to most of my students. Unfortunately, Sabre is no longer producing that particular model. This POM spray appears to be a good alternative to the Spitfire and is one of the few OC spray cans that is both ergonomic and is operated without demanding the use of fine motor skills.

They are available in multiple colors for less than $13 each. This may be the best small OC spray currently available on the market. Pick up a few. Spraying a bad guy in an ambiguous situation is much more preferable than shooting him. I don’t leave my house without OC spray.

A realistic look at the relative utility of various wilderness survival skills in the event of societal or economic collapse. I generally agree with the author. I’ve always argued that there is a limited utility in spending time honing primitive fire making skills for most folks.

Seth Godin explains the vital distinction between “rules” and “norms.” I wish this was required listening at all police academies and for all legislative bodies. The people who make and enforce the rules need to understand the differences explained in this podcast.

A look at the last eight years of worldwide explosive violence. Check out the chart that shows civilian deaths by country. The countries at the top of the list are not on anyone’s travel bucket list, but there are eight commonly-visited countries totaling more than 10K civilian bomb casualties in the last eight years. In today’s world you need to understand the danger of bombs and how to respond during a terrorist bombing.

The other side’s playbook. “Techniques for sabotaging capitalist infrastructure and extractive industries.”

An analysis of the effects that banning “high capacity” magazines have on mass shooter attacks. Thanks to Karl Rehn for finding this article.

There is absolutely no way that I would involve myself in this scenario This CCW licensee got extremely lucky. My guess is that the criminal’s gun was either fake or unloaded. Don’t take risks like this. Back out. Get a good description of the robbers. Call police. Please don’t go running into robberies to save the day. Your reckless involvement could get you killed or turn a routine robbery into a hostage barricade situation.

Doom and Bloom talk about treating eye injuries in the field.

Intervention during crimes in progress creates a profound danger for both armed citizens and off duty cops. Getting mistaken for an active killer by an adrenalized young cop is a serious concern. Here are a few tips to keep you from being blasted should you choose to intervene.

Personally, I think the safest course of action is to get yourself and your family out of harm’s way while trying to avoid engaging the killer. Let the on duty cops do their jobs. There’s way too much risk if you kill the bad guy and are standing there with gun a in your hand when the cops arrive.

“Spikes are a specialized tool, for very niche purposes, and are best avoided for general purposes, or regular defensive “every day carry”. They offer no advantages 99% of the time, and are always a compromise even when they are the right tool for a given need. The current fascination and fetishization of these tools is, simply, ridiculous.”

A topic most preppers are haven’t thoroughly considered. Fire departments aren’t going to be responding in whatever collapse scenario you may be imagining.

Speaking of fire, in many recent conflicts between cops and protesters, the bad guys have weaponized fireworks to keep the police at bay. If you are a cop and don’t have access to small fire extinguishers that can be carried in a pocket, you aren’t prepared for today’s threat. If I’m ever dealing with a large crowd (either hostile or friendly) I have a small fire extinguisher in my uniform pants cargo pocket.

I use both the Mini Firefighter and the Tundra Fire Extinguishing Aerosol Spray extinguishers to back up the large dry chemical fire extinguisher I have in my patrol car. these extinguishers aren’t likely to stop the firework from burning. They will, however, put out the clothing fire caused by the firework.

Some of the above links (from Amazon.com) are affiliate links. As an Amazon associate I earn a small percentage of the sale price from qualifying purchases. It does not cost you any money.

If you would like to further support my work, head over to my Patreon page.