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

A lot of people have never built a skill set involving the safe handling of a revolver. This is a critical skill to understand and to be able to perform. The article does a great job showing both the techniques and what is happening with the parts inside the gun when you are de-cocking the revolver.

Some tips about using cover.

For you motorcycle owners, do you have a plan to stop a “bike jacking?” Similar tactics are also very useful for those of you who ride bicycles as well. If you are a biker (either motor or human powered) you should take a look at Attacked on a Bicycle.

I also covered a similar topic in Robber on a Motorcycle.

I’m very glad that this coward will have to answer for his decision not to do his job. He should be in jail. He is a disgrace to the police profession.

I’m also disappointed. While the cowardly act of not intervening in a school shooting is an individual decision, we can’t discount the fact that another component at play here is the issue of inept supervision and inadequate training.

The command staff is responsible for ensuring that each deputy is properly trained and actually performs his/her job duties. Those supervisors failed. They are just as negligent (if not more so) as the deputy. Yet they will never be charged.

Shit rolls down hill. All my cop friends need to realize this fact. The police agency will feed their low-level drones to the wolves if there is the remotest possibility that such an action will save the careers of the brass and politicians. That is the reality in any political bureaucracy.

If my cop friends want to stay out of jail, they need to up their game. The agency won’t provide all the training you need to do your job. That same agency will then pin all the blame on you when you screw up the response that you were never trained to perform. If it is politically expedient, most agencies will stab you in the back without a second thought.

If you are a cop in today’s world, you should be seeking out additional training on your own time and dime. You must build a skill set that ensures you can both remain out of jail and be healthy enough to enjoy your pension.

The agency won’t do it for you. It’s your responsibility. Seek out the training your agency won’t provide. It’s the only way to ensure you don’t end up walking in this deputy’s jail slippers.

For a similar viewpoint, check out The Scapegoat of Broward County.

There is a lot of government money being spent on studying and preventing “sex trafficking.” It’s a fancy term for what used to be called “pimping.” This study shows that most of the women on the streets are NOT underage and most are NOT “trafficked.” More than 85% of the girls working the street are independent operators. “Sex trafficking” is certainly a problem, but it isn’t the problem that big media/the government hypes it up to be.

Thought experiments like these are very valuable for anyone who carries a weapon. The author correctly advises to stay out of this kind of situation. I agree. I don’t agree with his advice to continue to watch, provide updates to the dispatcher and/or video the encounter. Those actions put you at risk. You take risks physically if either party notices your presence during the struggle.

Even more of a risk is the fact that the longer you stay involved, the more likely you are to get a subpoena to attend court on this case. Do you want to miss a day or two of work for that? Also keep in mind that whoever gets arrested in this case will get your name, address, and phone number when his attorney files for discovery. Do you really think that’s a good plan?

Call 911. Remain anonymous. Report the situation. Get the hell out of there.

Good information about getting a consistent drawstroke from a variety of starting positions.

Mike Seeklander shares a couple weapons retention techniques. This isn’t the exact technique that I teach, but it would probably work pretty well.

While I am sharing Mike Seeklander content, I would be negligent if I did not steer you to his amazing interview with John Hearne. This is required listening for anyone who wants to understand the mental aspects of prevailing in an armed encounter.

If you use a SIRT pistol for your dryfire practice, this link might be useful. It’s essentially an armorer course taught on video.

Mas Ayoob provides some reasons why you might want to carry your gun inside your home.

This sickens me. An officer almost bleeds out because none of his fellow cops on the scene had a tourniquet. Go to just after the 4:00 minute mark on the video and you will hear panicking officers call on the radio for someone to respond with a tourniquet.

I get it. The police department should have issued tourniquets to every officer. It’s not a surprise that they didn’t. The bosses who make the tourniquet purchasing decisions are not the same people who are chasing down armed gang members and getting shot. As usual in this job, you are on your own.

You absolutely cannot rely on your agency’s training or issued equipment to save you. You are going to have to seek more training on your own dime and buy yourself the medical gear you need to survive if you plan on actually collecting your pension.

The idea that there are officers who are not carrying tourniquets on their person at work is utter insanity to me. If you are a cop in today’s world, you must be carrying a tourniquet, some hemostatic gauze, and at least one chest seal on your person every single day you work patrol.

What I’m reading…

“Civilization” just keeps getting older and older than we thought.

A state-by-state breakdown of knife laws.

Very interesting look at how flint arrowheads perform at about the same level as steel arrowheads. My more imaginative readers might also note that flint will not set off any metal detectors.

A discussion about custom modification and parts swapping in your defensive handgun.

I have to admit that I probably have not personally shot 170K rounds through my Glock pistols. My rough calculations put me slightly over 100K in the Glock platform. With that said, I’ve seen more than 1 million rounds fired from Glocks under my supervision during my 13 years as departmental training officer. I would guess I’ve seen at least a million more working at TDI.

The author states: “I have experienced zero—not one—malfunction in a G19, G17, G30, G30s, or G43 that was not due to a faulty aftermarket component or a part that I should have replaced thousands of rounds beforehand.”

I think the author has been surprisingly lucky. Glocks are reliable pistols, but they do occasionally break. I’ve seen hundreds of broken trigger springs, dozens of broken pins, a few broken locking blocks, a couple broken trigger bars, a lot of broken slide stop levers, and about 10 broken slide lock springs. I’ve had a couple guns with sheared off slide rails. The Gen 3 .40 guns with weapons mounted lights will often have feeding issues.

Regularly replacing the recoil spring and trigger spring will stop most of these parts breakages, but sometimes the guns will just break without any discernible reason. I don’t think you should expect your Glock to go 170K rounds without a malfunction.

I agree. I much prefer shooting from a bag. In fact, my current sniper rifle doesn’t even have a bipod mounted on it.

You should be deadlifting. Here’s how to get started.

Kyle Defoor covers some simple techniques for carrying your rifle while running.

If you would like to practice the skills of running with a carbine from the post above, this drill will allow you to do it.

“If you can’t be kind, if you won’t empathize, then you’re not on the team. That team is Team Humanity, where we are all in this thing together. Where we are all flawed and imperfect. Where we treat other people’s point of view as charitably as we treat our own. Where we are civilized and respectful and, above all, kind to each other—particularly the less fortunate, the mistaken, and the afraid.”

An edible plant you should know about. This one is very common in suburban yards.

The real man behind Woody Harrelson’s character in the recent Highwaymen movie.

How about a little more history? This is a really good article about WWII firearms. If you want some more WWII stuff, check out this piece on the Japanese Nambu. And if you want to complete your tutorial, read Handguns Of WWII Part 3.

I’m surprised (but happy) to see that Psychology Today actually printed Dr. Yamane’s well-articulated rebuttal.

Grant Cunningham recently shared this excellent article in one of his Hump Day Reading List. I thought it was so good that I had to share it here as well.

“If you find your location under attack, escape should be your primary concern. You must always know how to get out of wherever you are, and you must know exactly where to go after you’ve escaped. If you cannot escape the immediate area, you will need to barricade and defend — not barricade or defend. You have to train yourself to be your own first responder. You owe it to yourself to learn more about what we do and how we do it. There are no guarantees in life, but one thing we know for sure is that if you hide during an active-shooter attack, you are guaranteed to lower your survivability.”

You bullet nerds will like this one. It’s a history of the competing theories of bullet “stopping power.”

“If someone presents information or references research that is contrary to what you believe instead of thinking “That’s Bullshit”, think “That’s interesting.” Then go out and do some research to check out this new information. Approach the research with an open mind instead of trying to prove them wrong and yourself right. If the research is valid, and supported by other evidence based findings then embrace the new knowledge (new to you anyway). It is not an insult to you or your intelligence.

If however, you refuse to change your beliefs in the face of new evidence then you are doing a disservice to yourself, your program and the people you have the honour of training.”

I get lots of questions about self defense insurance plans. While it isn’t an actual insurance program, I favor the ACLDN plan. Know what you are purchasing before you sign up.

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