Smith

Overly heavy, limited capacity, and only reliable (combat arena) when you make it loose enough to need a 5" barrel to get 3" accuracy and are mag sensitive? Yeah, it's the best ever! In all seriousness, there are better more affordable options they should probably have gone with.

Run the other way.

The internet has really brought prices competitive. Some dealers, like Buds, work off of volume and make very little profit on an individual gun. That is fine when you are moving 100 units of a given gun every month. For the local guys that is near impossible and so the "profit" will be greater to cover the lack of volume. I say "profit" because it is not really profit. It is covering expense. Buds for example has 3 guys handling internet sales and turn incredible volume so their pricing and cost are much less than local shops. I know at our shop we can beat Buds on some things and some things Buds sales lower than our distributor cost and we work off of 14 distributors. It is a difficult game and some stores work harder at it than others. Academy is another that we beat on 95% of normal stocking stuff. They will sell some stuff at a loss because they do it in volume ala Sigma's. BTW - CDNN is not a good comparison because they are a distributor that sales direct to the public. It's hard to compete with that and many dealers don't like them for that practice. As far as manufacturer direct some of the manufacturers are ridiculous in their buy in demands. Benelli for instance, insist on a 15k worth of product buy in and they essentially get to pick what you get. Most local guys can't do that to get one m4. As far as markup, folks talking about 30-40% is crazy talk. Competitive pricing stores are happy to get in the 10-13% range. A lot are lower and very few are higher. I can tell you that most things we can be competitive with. As far as buying out of state, when you add transfer and shipping we still usually beat them on like guns. Tax is usually the difference and there is nothing we can do about that till they change it. Not advocating for that just figure they'll find a way to not loose that money. Just a little insight from one store.

Haha, well ... "civil" in the sense of within the same country.

At least this has stayed civil .....

Didn't mean to offend you. It's a Smith product in the sense that once it leaves the German factory it is marketed, serviced, sold, distributed, and imported by Smith. More people use Smith service because of the shear number of Smith's out there. Outside of Ruger, nobody makes more guns. In fact the next maker down in the list only makes about half as many guns as Smith and ruger. That being said they have come a long way with the M&P line and are back where they need to be. Kinda like what happened to a lot of the makers ala SIG.

Which is also a S&W product.

Some folks are just slow to the party. However, I fear some are so "principled" they will cut their nose off to spite their face. "Give me liberty or give me death!" They just don't realize a slow agonizing death is NOT better than a slow gradual healing. Peaceful revolutions are slow and tediuos, but lasting. With the one exception of ours, every other violent revolution has ended in the misery and suffering of the people and their country. France, England, Russia, Italy, Afganastan, India, all of Africa, China, all of South America, Cuba, Mexico, ...... The fact that ours was the only one that resulted in a positive, reinforces the idea that it is the principles that cause stable change not the revolution for revolution sake. Violent revolution is a last option by a principled people and the first by the mindless.

Oh my! Best one yet!

Maybe they need Rahm Emanuel to come to NY and tell the thugs to leave the children alone.

Everytime we call on availability they tell us they are already gone. They also show the PMR30's a lot and some others they never seem to have when the catalog actually arrives.

According to what the ATF told us they started trying to get rid of them last year.

Actually the entire Democrat/Race Card agenda is driven by being "minority" and thus needing the Big Tent to level the playing field. If you take away the victim/minority issue they have nothing. They have everything to loose by being the majority. Their entire agenda/ideology is driven by being the repressed minority despite the truth of reality. Well, these form go no where and are not reported but I imagine it will be the standard race/ethnicity question on future federal documents that DO count the statistics. I have a hard time believing this is the only form they have applied this to.

Well, as Leonard goes ... sort of. He had his property rezoned commercial to accommodate the criteria. He is not a normal case.

Didn't say it was the best thought Mike, it is no longer Mexican carry. It is now White Hispanic Carry.

The ATF is not granting "dinner table FFL's" anymore. They are trying to weed out the ones that exist. You now have to have a brick and mortar store front before they will even interview with you. Those days of personal FFL's are gone. Besides many of those folk got into trouble over their A&D logs. It's a lot of work to do on a personal level.

I personally think its a broad attempt to keep "whites" a majority in the racial/political war. Since "whites" are nearly a minority now it makes it hard for "blacks" and other "minority" groups to keep up the call for more benefits to offset their minority status. Just a thought.

Same thing that cut the .45 out. Grip size and recoil sensitivity. At the time the 10mm was developed the FBI was making a big push for certain demographics and they had trouble with the grip on the recoil. Thus the shortened .40 S&W came to be. Keep in mind the FBI is largely folks with lawyers and accountant backgrounds, so it's not your typical LE agency when evaluating weaponry.

Agreed Dave. They all have a place, some are better for different applications.

The '86 shootings subjectively and inaccurately based 9mm performance assumptions on .38 spl and the 147g is notorious for under penetrating. Of the eight FBI agents only 3 had 9mm's and on of those was inoperable.They were using the .45 principle and it doesn't work in the 9mm. The 9mm works on velocity, which is why most 9mm defensive loads are based off a 115g or the better balance 124g +p or +p+. If the available data was that conclusive, there wouldn't be the ever evolving ideology and studies of the FBI. They have changed from mass, to velocity, to mass/velocity, to penetration, to shot placement, .... there will be some other study shortly. Not saying your wrong per se, Just that there is a lot more to the issue than one study or one departments evaluations. PD are not known for necessarily making pure performance choices.

Troopers shoot across further distances than in an urban enviroment, pentration THORUGH barriers such as glass and metal is much better with less deflection, and it's a better round in most every way. Regardless of what cops will tell you, Metro depts went with a .40 becasue of fear of over penatration with a 9mm projectile in a close range urban enviroment. In a congested urban enviroment the .40 makes sense in a collateral damage context. For Troopers, where that is not so much a factor, it is better for them to have a round that will get through car barriers that they have to shoot through over greter distances.

Pull a Bufford?

LOVE the Andy Griffith show. I even enjoy Matlock. That brand of TV will, sadly, never be duplicated.

It is referencing the "shopping" search returns. Normal "web" searches, outside of the shopping area, will still be there.

Uh ... I'm pretty sure that was meant in goodwill humor. Might want to relax a little.