East_TN_Patriot

Like Dolomite, I have a big box of screwed up holsters and I've trashed many that I managed to goober up in mid-production and didn't bother finishing.  I typically use 7-8 ounce full-grain cowhide for most holsters.  Smaller frame handguns I use 5-6 ounce, and pocket holsters I use 3-4 ounce.  I make enough holsters that I just buy my leather in full sides, so I can work with the variation in the individual hide based on the holster I am making.  I have also used some horsehide on occasion because you get better rigidity out of a thinner leather.  Unlike Dolomite, I saturate my leather, let it sit for a few minutes, form it by hand, and then using boning to get the finer details in the leather.  I have a couple of actual boning tools, but found that a toothbrush with the bristles removed works best for me.  I typically buy my leather pre-dyed at the tannery, but found that oil-based dye does a much better job than the alcohol or water based dyes on the market.  The oil-based dyes stink like crazy, but don't dry out the leather and tend to dry more evenly than the others.  I've never actually tanned my own.  I have a reprint of an old outdoorsman handbook and it has a couple of how-to sections on pit tanning and brain tanning.  It's a long process for sure.

I think that ammunition is assumed to be part of keeping and bearing arms, and if I'm not mistaken, there has been case law confirming such.  I'll have to do some digging. NEW INFO:   In the case Herrington v. United States (2009), a federal appellate court found that Washington, DC's ban on ammunition was a violation of the 2nd Amendment and cited the Heller (2008) case as precedent for the decision.       Obviously, the ruling is quite limited, but it has set the legal precedent stating that possessing ammunition is an understood part of the Second Amendment because firearms are not firearms without ammunition to use in them.  The ruling also says that the government can regulate ammunition, which means that new regulations will have to be decided as they come up do decide which ones are constitutional and which ones are not.  I would expect that excessive taxes on ammunition would be deemed unconstitutional.  I would also expect that excessive regulations targeting the ammunition manufacturers would be as well.  Also, it is important to remember that the military is one of the largest consumers of ammunition, so they would be cutting their own throat if they start shuttering up ammunition factories, unless they started manufacturing their own.  I'm not saying we shouldn't be very diligent on this issue, because I think this is where gun-grabbers will go next if they think they can't regulate the guns themselves.  Fortunately, it appears that the legal foundation has been laid to assure that our access to ammunition will not be completely cut off. Also, I get the point about saying the Second Amendment "will effectively be limited to those people who can afford to participate," but isn't that the way it has always been?  Rights are protected from government infringement, but that doesn't mean we are all guaranteed to access to a weapon if we can't afford it or choose not to save up our money to buy one. Short of saying that the government is obligated to provide everyone with a firearm and ammunition, there is no way to guarantee that everyone who wants to keep and bear arms will be able to do so.  For most, it's always been an issue of what type of weapon can I afford, and do I use my money on it or something else.  Heck, most of us have more than one firearm, so it's not like there are many out there who are begging for a reliable firearm of any sort who can't get one.  I'm afraid that for the foreseeable future, the days of easily accessible and affordable ammunition are gone, but if the market supports more ammunition production, I would think that profit-minded manufacturers will expand production capacity and alleviate the shortage.

  http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/01/22/gun-control-obama-nra/1851643/  

I think all the conspiracy theorists are actual planted by the Obama administration to try and make gun owners look like a bunch of paranoid people who are potentially dangerous and need to be controlled before they do something violent. The real "crisis actors" are the people on the web pushing the conspiracy theories. And see? People are all too eager to fall into the trap: "Sandy Hook Hero Harassed by Burgeoning Truther Movement" http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/01/16/sandy-hook-hero-harassed-by-burgeoning-truther-movement/

Maybe some TGO members need to run for state office.

Yup. Loaded 24/7. 

I like it as well.  If I didn't, I wouldn't reply at all.  I am getting ready to build an AR varmint rifle and would like to put a camo job on it.  That looks very nice.  I'd like to see a tutorial on how you did that pattern. ;)

Nice, but it needs a smash suppressor.

I keep virtually all locked in my gun safe.  My home defense pistol is in my nightstand in a lockbox with a keypad lock.  My son is only 23 month, but I have already started teaching him gun safety because he loves to look in daddy's gun safe.  If I ever thought my wife or kids were so mentally ill that they were dangerous, I would likely sell most of my collection and keep the rest securely locked up.  I enjoy my guns, but will not place other people at risk.  I'll keep what I feel I need for self-defense and my basic shooting needs, and let the others go if I need to. 

  I teach at LMU and I don't think any of my students want me dead quite yet, but that's subject to change every 4 months or so. :hiding:

I get that, which is why I made that caveat at the start.  However, I did see the story from other sources, which leads me to believe they are accurate.  With that said, the anti-gun folks in the media obviously went out of their way to hunt down these stories specifically for the purpose of discrediting the pro-2nd Amendment movement.  I'm sure that if any of us tried very hard, we could find several other news stories of defensive uses of a firearm, but of course the anti-gunners won't look for these and will downplay or ignore them when they are found. Come on now.  Do you really think that the anti-gun people intentionally sent some folks to random gun shows to have NDs to make a political point?  And these folks are so willing to take one for the team that they shoot other people and themselves?  Please tell me this is sarcasm.  Need I remind everyone that there was a ND at one of the Knoxville gun shows this past year?  How many people somehow manage to shoot themselves with an "unloaded" firearm?  Is it not out of the realm of possibility that the fellow with the shotgun "knew" it was "unloaded" before he brought it to the show?  We constantly talk about the morons at the shooting range who point loaded guns at fellow family members to demonstrate technique, walk out to change their target while people are still firing, and sweep other shooters with their firearm.  Here are direct links to local news reports of all three incidents, no liberal ThinkProgress to worry about: http://www.wral.com/raleigh-gun-show-reopens-after-accidental-shooting/12002981/ http://fox8.com/2013/01/20/new-safety-precautions-after-gun-show-shooting/   http://www.wishtv.com/dpp/news/local/marion_county/man-accidentally-shot-at-gun-show

  Oh, yeah.  I didn't pay that much attention to the type of mattress.  Yeah, maybe a straight-on side to side, but the likelihood of that is very slim.  Either way, I guess it's still better than nothing at all.  It might clog a hollow point round, which would save you some injury if struck by the bullet.

Serrano has proposed it 6 times now including twice during G.W. Bush's term.  Hardly evidence of a pro-Obama conspiracy going on here.  It's been proposed many times by other elected officials as well over the years.  It never makes it out of committee.  Also, considering the Founders didn't originally include it in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, I think it's a bit of a stretch to say that repealing it would be a threat to liberty.  I think we are better off with it, but simply repealing it doesn't completely undo our democratic process.

I think DaveTN is in the right track.  I'm not so sure I would agree with the statement that we are as divided as we've ever been since the Civil War.  The US has been involved in many internal conflicts since then.  The US Civil War was the disagreement over states' rights, but the driving issue was slavery, which was a major economic influence.  In other words, it was the threat to people's livelihoods through abolition of slavery that drove us to war with states' rights being the philosophical justification for protecting slavery.  I would suggest that if there were any issue that would drive us to civil unrest, it would likely be the gun rights issue.  It's kind of like the schoolyard bully picking a fight with the one kid in school that can fight back.  Most gun owners believe very strongly in their 2nd Amendment rights and I feel that there is a pretty big portion of that group who is grumbling very loudly over the threats to restrict gun ownership.  One other factor in play here is our shaky economic conditions.  Many of the people directly affected by the proposed gun restrictions are the same folks feeling the pinch in our current economy, and they blame the same politicians for screwing up the economy.  When you combine these two things, it could be the recipe for people to move from words to action.  I hope it never comes to that point, but when one looks at the history of civil unrest, it's the times of economic decline combined with a perceived loss of political efficacy that are usually present.

As you note, cover is anything that will stop a bullet.  I very seriously doubt a mattress will stop any bullet.  You might get lucky and have the round deflected by the springs, but I wouldn't bank on it.  I suppose it's better than nothing, especially since any concealment makes it harder for the bad guy to see what they are shooting at.

Got my order in.  Now, if I can just convince TGODavid about those ballcaps... :x:

I made a similar point in one of my classes the other day when the discussion moved to gun control.  I said that 50% of homicide victims in the US are young black men killed in urban violence, but it took the deaths of a few white kids to get the "sympathetic" left to start yelling about gun violence, and even then, their focus was on weapons that account for only around 5% of all gun-related deaths.  Their response is either intentional or a result of their complete ignorance (or maybe both).

I do think the years were cherry-picked because 1993-1997 was really the only point since 1973 when violent crime increased by any significant amount, and much of that was youth violence associated with gang crime.  Regardless, assuming the number is accurate, they are basically saying that statistically speaking, the chances of a child dying in a school shooting is virtually zero.  I know that's little comfort for a parent who has lost a child, but it's hardly any justification for sweeping policy changes when so many more kids are dying from other causes.  Even then, there comes a point of diminishing returns since you simply can't prevent all premature deaths.

In a Facebook debate with one who is unapologetic about her support for the current gun-control efforts, I commented that school shootings are atypical events, which she challenged by saying they are "all too common."  In response, I looked up some data on it.  I found a report published by NPR that references a study conducted by the US Department of Education and the US Secret Service.  They found:     In 2012, a total of 61 people were killed nationwide in mass shootings, and 41were killed in school shootings.2  Those numbers account for 0.42% and 0.28% of all murders (using 2011 UCR homicide data3, which is the most current available).    According to 2010 CDC mortality data4 for kids age 0-15: 1,418 died in car crashes 62 died by accidental shooting 62 died in falls 726 drowned 94 died from poisoning To put all of this into context, the lifetime odds5 of dying in a school shooting is 1:1,000,000 in comparison to: Flu - 1:63 Car crash - 1:84 Accidental poisoning - 1:193 Falls - 1:218 Drowning - 1:1,134 Bicycle crash - 1:4,919 Air/space accident - 1:5,051 Excessive cold - 1:6,045 Heat exposure - 1:13,729 Shark attack - 1:60,453 Lightening - 1:79,746 Fireworks - 1:340,733   Another story notes that approximately 150 people are killed annually worldwide by falling coconuts6, which is almost 3 times the number of people killed in all mass shootings in 2012.    1:111,779 die from legal execution, which means a kid is roughly 9 times more likely to get the death penalty than die in a school shooting7. Yet all the while, the tragedy of school shootings is being used as justification of an urgent need to restrict guns "to protect the kids" and any effort to challenge this noble cause is portrayed as lunacy and "fringe" behavior.  Don't take my word for it, the sources are listed below. Sources: 1. http://stateimpact.npr.org/ohio/2012/02/27/tragic-but-rare-odds-of-dying-in-a-school-shooting-as-in-chardon-at-least-one-in-a-million/  2. http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0777958.html 3. http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-2011/tables/table-1 4. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm 5. http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/10/31/how-scared-should-we-be/ 6. http://www.unisci.com/stories/20022/0523024.htm 7. http://www.nsc.org/news_resources/injury_and_death_statistics/Pages/TheOddsofDyingFrom.aspx    

  That's where I saw the original link.  It came from the FB page of a friend who is an enthusiastic and unapologetic "progressive" Democrat and Obama supporter.  The fact of the matter is that gun owners must be responsible, and if we can't take care of it, there are people out there who are more than happy to use our missteps as justification to allow the government to do it for us.  Let's consider the issue of guns used in crime.  Many are stolen.  One report I read said that over 7,000 NFA firearms have been reported as stolen.  How many gun owners fail to make any effort to secure their firearms?  Even my nightstand gun is in a lockbox so that any theft can be hindered and my 2 year old won't access it.  I keep a lockbox in my car so that I secure my weapon when I can't carry it on my person.  Speaking to the cases in the story, these are examples of careless weapon handling.  I guarantee that the shotgun incident took place when the owner came to the show with a cased shotgun that had a round chambered and the safety off, and when he reached into the case to remove the weapon, he did it with his finger on the trigger.  One other incident was when an individual fired off a round while reloading the firearm after leaving the show.  I can think of 4 different negligent discharges by fellow LEOs during my 10 years in policing.  We keep saying that gun ownership is a right, which I fully agree with, but with that right - as with any right - we must exercise responsibility.  There are too many gun owners out there who are irresponsible, sloppy with their firearm safety skills, and lax when it comes to keeping their weapons secure from criminals and others not able to possess a firearm responsibly.  Of course, no law will fix that problem, but that won't stop the anti-gunners from implementing restrictions.

  The Brady Center has less than 30,000 members.  That should tell you something right there.

I thought exactly the same thing.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/01/19/sen-chuck-schumer-says-the-nra-is-an-extreme-fringe-group/?utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=story&utm_campaign=Share+Buttons        

When I was in law enforcement, I typically carried my S&W 642 in an Uncle Mike's nylon ankle holster. I tried a couple of other more expensive options, but the cheap route worked best for wearing over my tall duty boots. When I wasn't wearing boots, I wore it in a leather ankle rig made by Gould and Goodrich (I think) that was very similar to the Galco Ankle Glove. Most of the time now, I carry in a pocket holster or belt holster because it's easier to access.

  Hopefully it won't be too long.  It's a great pistol.  I need to carry mine more often.