MacGyver

I saw a couple on the Turnpike as I was coming into your town earlier today.

I'm not sure why we're seeing this now. If press accounts are accurate, the civil service board, made up of citizens in Hamilton County ruled unanimously to uphold this firing almost a year ago. What's changed to bring it to the surface? I'm not sure the OP has a future in private security regardless of whether or not he gets his permit back.

That's cool!

In 2009 I got rear ended by an officer who was texting and driving.  Slow speed, no injuries, but in about the worst possible circumstances otherwise.  He was 20+ year Major in another jurisdiction driving a patrol car home from an off-duty security assignment. 6 different cars responded to this very minor fender bender.    I heard they let him retire, but it ended his career.

Heard this on WRLT this morning when they were featuring local stuff.    I'm pretty sure if they had let Chris Robinson from the Black Crowes be the front man for the Jayhawks, this would have been the result:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=RGihIF6Wg4M   I've been listening to the self-titled album since.  Pretty good album.

Guilty.  You know what... It's one on a whole long list of unfair advantages I claim.   I don't want to discount this problem. Being a white, evangelical male, I don't know that I have standing, so to speak.   That said, I will make one point that I find so interesting - and this applies to your average, upper middle class entitled white kid, too.  We're at an inflection point in history.  The internet has changed things radically, and the boat is pulling away without us - all of us.  So many barriers are being knocked down right now, and we're so focused on who's getting what from the government's teat that we're failing to see the world shifting around us.    Education is changing.  We're almost to the point where there are some truly viable alternative paths.  I'm a postgraduate educated Engineer - recognized as an expert in my field.  In the last year, I've taken four Stanford and MIT engineering courses outside of my discipline.  These are the MOOC's (Massive Open Online Courses) that you hear people talking about.  Each one of them has been completely free discounting my time spent.  I've learned so much.   And yet, do you know who's taking advantage of this?  One of my colleagues recently taught one of these courses - and a popular one at that.  We talked about enrollment, and about 1500 people finished the coursework for the class.  Do you know how many of those resided in the US?  About 30.   There is a hungry world surrounding us that recognizes that the internet gives them access to some of the unfair advantage that America has claimed historically.  We're missing it, because we're too busy pointing fingers and complaining that someone got a bigger piece of the pie than we did.  We're about to have our collective asses handed to us.  And it shouldn't come as a surprise, but it will.   I know that I'm privileged.  I'm appalled at our history, but I can't change or affect that.  What I can change and affect is my behavior.  As I tell my kids, you can't affect the fact that the world is unfair and it sucks sometimes.  You can affect how you respond.  I hope that I can use my privilege to help people who haven't had the same experience I've had. 

My vote goes with the Citori, too.  And, that comes from a Benelli shooter.    The M2 and the A400 are both great shotguns.  But, for clays and nice days in the field, the Citori is one that you'll never look at and wish you had chosen something else.

Remember, rimfire only.

Wow! And I thought my custom 338 Spectre dies were expensive.

Y'all sure have some pretty rifles. ;)

I hear they have groups that can help you.

Gordon knows his stuff. To make one lighter than his would require a milling machine.

The difference between this and most other side folders is that this modification renders your weapon inoperable until it's deployed and locked. That's an issue. Mind you, it's one no one hopes to encounter, but it's a deal breaker for me. From my perspective, if you want a side-folding carbine, go with an AK.

Shoot.  With the business you send his way, Larry himself ought to be pulling your order and sending you a Christmas card.

I don't know what the burn rate on 6.5 Grendel is optimized for, but if you don't need the extra length for added velocity, there's a lot to be said for the rigidity of a shorter barrel.   My 700LTR in .308 with a 20" barrel performs just as well as its cousin 700 Police with a 26" barrel at 600 yards.

Seekins Precision makes the best bolt catch on the market.  Hands down.  Shouldn't matter on the Grendel.  Makes a big difference on the blowback pistol caliber uppers.

I don't disagree with that at all.  The problem is, I just don't know how you're going to get the average person to care.    Look at where we are today.  How much louder does the wakeup call need to be?   I do wish they hadn't agreed to back pay during this most recent shutdown.  It should have had some tangible consequences to get people off of holiday and maybe shake them out of their complacency.

I know plenty of liberals who got out and voted for McCain for that exact reason.  I actually remember being quite surprised the first time I saw the "big tent" of people the GOP had attracted to their primary.  It took me about a minute of standing in line to realize that the system was being gamed quite effectively.

I kind of find myself in a funny place with voting.  Part of me says that if voting really mattered, they'd have made it illegal long ago.  Part of me looks at the candidates and is absolutely disgusted at the entire ballot and the mockery they've made of our government.  Part of me looks at the whole of government as a Babylon of sorts, and I'm realistic about how little my vote actually counts for anything.   But, I've got enormous respect for the men who died to give us that privilege of voting. And, I've been fortunate to have been plenty of places where they don't have that privilege.  As such, rain, snow or shine, if the polls are open, I'll get out and vote.

Here's the problem with the whole system right now, as illustrated in almost caricature like form by the Tea Party.  Note, I think this is a problem with all of them - I'm just using the Tea Party as an example because they're illustrating the leading edge of the problem.   I think the root of our modern problem goes back to the late 60's and early 70's when we really stripped party bosses of their power in favor of a more egalitarian primary system.  With the party bosses, you certainly got corrupt politicians, but I think that you can look at them as mostly mildly corrupt.  It was sort of a, "make sure all your guys vote for me, and I'll make sure you get the county road contract - or whatever."  While corrupt, politicians had a broader constituency.   With the advent of the primary system, that's changed.  Today, if we're being completely frank, the middle, or the moderate voter that everyone talks about just doesn't care.  Period.  So long as their kids' schools don't absolutely suck, and there aren't potholes right at the end of their driveway, they don't care.  And it would take extreme circumstances to change that - most of them are going to stay home.  They might get out to vote in presidential elections, but local and primary elections - it's not happening.   So what we get with the primary system is a vastly changed constituency.  Candidates are chosen by 10-15% of roughly 50% of the electorate on either side.  Those are the people who show up to vote in primaries and those are the people who donate money to get these folks elected.  This is a problem because these 10-15% (~5-7.5% of the overall population) are these candidates' constituency.  And, it's an echo chamber.  If you've got the money, and you can get a few people to show up and vote in the primaries, you can control the candidate.  But, because these candidates are coming from the fringe of both sides, their positions are at odds with the "moderate voter".   Couple all of this with the polarization of the districts.  Let's just go ahead and face it.  The big cities and major metropolitan areas are trending towards the left on their own and are quite happy skipping towards Gomorrah.  That's going to continue without any help.  On the right, the GOP was so successful in their gerrymandering efforts in the 90's and earlier last decade, that in most house districts, the DNC couldn't rig an election and get a candidate elected.   So with the Tea Party, we've got candidates with extremely polar positions in "safe" districts with a constituency that in most cases has these same polar views.  This is how we get candidates like Todd Akin, Richard Mourdock, and Sharon Angle.  The problem with this is that they absolutely don't represent the views of the whole of their constituency, they only care about the constituency made up of the people who paid to get them elected.  These politicians are worse than the classic mildly corrupt politicians.  The modern variant has been purchased outright.   Here's the real problem from my perspective.  We're electing candidates who, because they exist in this echo chamber, have exactly zero incentive or motivation to negotiate - much less compromise.  In a lot of cases, these "constituencies" would just assume their candidates go ahead and walk this whole American experiment off a cliff.  They have no grounding in reality, and have no idea what they're wishing for.    This is the reason that I prepare.  This is the reason that I think we're heading for another "shutdown" in January.  This is why I fear that one of these idiots will eventually succeed in pushing us over the edge.  Our existing Congress is showing that they're increasingly incapable of governing at all - much less effectively.   I don't know what the solution is.  I've reached a point where I can't vote for either of the major parties in good conscience.  I've never aligned with the DNC, and the GOP left me long ago.  I'd love to see the Tea party separate from the GOP, and frankly a party emerge at the far left as well.  Good honest debate is important.  Add in the Greens, Libertarians and some others and maybe you'd have to actually have to get a coalition in agreement with your position to effectively govern.  It can't get any worse than it is now.

A guy in my neighborhood has one.  My two year-old gets fired up when he sees it go by.

I watched that whole video thinking, "this seems like a great way for a non-pro to really cut themselves."   I'm impressed, though.

The interesting thing to me is that the GOP establishment is screwed both ways with the Tea Party. They made some major tactical errors early on, and now the damage is such that I'm not sure it can be undone. The GOP has just assumed up until the shutdown that the Tea Party was going to caucus with them, and you see where that's gotten them. Yet, if they tell them to go take a hike, as many are encouraging, they won't be able to win without them. So in effect, that fairly small group definitely has a loud voice. And, they may wind up walking this whole American experiment off the cliff. They represent a big threat to the establishment on both sides of the aisle. It's too early to tell if they'll last or simply get purchased like the rest of their peers. It'll be interesting to watch.

You're welcome.

There you have it.