High Capacity Semi-Automatic Firearms

Why does anyone need a high capacity semi-automatic firearm?

I write instruction guides on defense and security for the average, everyday Joe Nobody. My readers are typically law abiding, peaceful folks who believe in self-reliance – a lifestyle and mindset more closely resembling that of our pioneering forbearers than anything remotely political or radical. In addition, I have taught countless hundreds of people from all walks of life the proper usage of a firearm for their specific need. I always recommend a rifle, such as the AR15, for home defense over a handgun. My reasoning for this recommendation is based on experience, logic and cold, hard facts.

Like most of you, I’ve watched the ongoing debate over gun control with a keen eye. In some aspects, I’m proud of the discussion – a clear indication of a republic at work. While the ebb and flow of arguments and political counterpoints has fueled considerable frustration from my perspective, one single question conspicuously repeats, apparently the fulcrum of the issue:

“Why does anyone need a high capacity semi-automatic firearm?”

In my writings, I recommend such a weapon for home and ranch defense for several reasons. The primary justification for any high capacity firearm (a lot of bullets in the magazine) being the proven inaccuracy of someone under life-threatening stress.

To understand what I mean, you need look no further than statistics for the New York City Police Department. According to data published in the New York Times (hardly a mouthpiece for the NRA), the well-trained, professional police officers in the nation’s largest city only hit their target with 1 out of every 5 shots fired in anger (or fear) – a ten year average of 18%.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/08/nyregion/08nypd.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

That’s right, 1 of 5 for alert, on-duty, capable lawmen, and 77% of those shots occurred when no one was shooting back. What type of accuracy can a sleepy, poorly trained Joe Nobody expect when awakened in the middle of the night and scared to death for his family’s safety? How will Joe’s accuracy be affected when one of those intruders returns fire? How many rounds does the average citizen need when being confronted by 2 or 3 intruders? I guess we all should learn to re-load those 10 round “clips” quickly.

The accuracy equation is compounded by stopping power. Have you ever heard the phrase “double tap?” It originated from the British Special Air Services, one of the most elite Special Forces units in the world. You see, our cousins from across the pond found that their 9mm weapons often failed to disable the average bad guy with a single shot. They learned this lesson the hard way, and thus adapted their training to fire twice in quick succession. What many people don’t realize is that handguns commonly don’t stop a threat with a single shot. A frightened homeowner has a far better chance of successfully defending his family with a rifle – one that has a lot of bullets.

Even if you aren’t worried about stopping an attacker, there are still a lot of very valid reasons for owning a high capacity weapon.

I’m unsure what the farmers in rural NY are going to do when the feral hog epidemic finally reaches their state. According to Mississippi State University, these pests already inflict 1.6 billion dollars’ worth of damage to farms, ranches, forests and parks annually. They are spreading rapidly. In the south, we’ve been fighting them for years, mostly with high capacity magazines in military style weapons – and we’re losing the war. Wild pigs aren’t like deer – you don’t just shoot one for sport. These aren’t cute little potbellied porkers released into the wild. We are talking about swine that are extremely aggressive, can weigh north of 150 pounds, and sport razor-sharp, bacteria-infested tusks. You have to eradicate the entire herd (normally 10-20 animals), which requires a lot of bullets. They scatter at the first shot, and adults can run with a horse. Most feral herds I’ve seen would snicker at seven rounds.

Both sides of this debate should also consider the tens of thousands of private professionals who play a vital role in the security of our great nation. These folks aren’t police officers or associated with any government agency. Yet they guard nuclear facilities, federal institutions and even parts of the United Nations. I guess in New York they’ll be restricted to carrying a 6-shot revolver? You know, extremists watch cable news, too. And you can bet that your average terrorist already knows security at nuclear power plants is private, and with the new legislation, they can’t have more than seven rounds in their weapons. It wouldn’t surprise me if some enterprising lunatic just established the nuclear power plants operating in the state of NY as a higher priority on his target list.

What about the tens of thousands of private military contractors who serve our country? These professionals work for the Department of Defense, Department of State and dozens of other federal agencies. The incident at Benghazi, Libya has been in the headlines lately. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans lost their lives in a terrorist attack there on September 11, 2012. Two of the four men killed that day were private military contractors. During 2012, more private contractors were killed in Afghanistan than U.S. military personnel.

These patriotic Americans are typically required to purchase their own individual weapons and are responsible for their own training. They hold no law enforcement license – they are just private Joes who happen to carry a rifle for a living. They work in some of the most dangerous places on earth, faraway lands where our government and corporations need them. They must own and use high capacity weapons in order to train for their job. I, for one, appreciate their help as more of our sons and daughters serving in the military would be at risk if not for these individuals.

Speaking of education, I need to point out the vast firearms training infrastructure that exists in the United States. Hundreds of private facilities, employing thousands of professional instructors, train and educate our military and law enforcement personnel every day. The average person probably isn’t aware of these institutions because they rarely have accidents or generate newsworthy events.

These private businesses train police departments, domestic and foreign military, and even employees of federal agencies. It will come as surprise to many, but the U.S. military doesn’t have the budget or facilities to train all of our troops. The Pentagon contracts out some of this work to private firms, such as Gunsight in Arizona, CSAT in Texas, or ACADEMI in North Carolina. The list could go on and on.

Unless you live in a major metropolitan area, chances are your local law enforcement officers were trained at a similar private facility. A small town or rural county can’t afford its own dedicated location and instructors – they save your tax money by using private enterprise. When we call 911, we expect a well-trained, competent professional to answer the call. No one wants Barney Fife rolling up, nervously trying to pull a single bullet from his breast pocket. These instructors are often required to own and maintain their own firearms and skills. Don't we all want the very best for our first responders?

So when someone makes the statement, “There’s no good reason why anyone needs a high capacity, semi-automatic firearm,” they are simply wrong.

Joe Nobody is the best-selling author of several books addressing self-reliance and defense. In addition to his popular instruction guides, the fiction series Holding Their Own is a favorite among preppers. You can find all of Joe’s works on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, ITunes and other outlets, or visit www.holdingyourground.com.

Thoughts From a Russian Immigrant

What follows is an article I came across in a North Idaho newspaper.  The thoughts expressed where hauntingly sobering and eloquently stated.  It is something we all NEED to read.  The writing is on the wall, folks.  

I contacted the author, and with her permission, am posting this missive on these pages.  Listen to the voice of experience - she speaks the truth.

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I was asked to write this column, and truthfully, I have been seeking a way to tell people my views before it is too late. So here it is - hopefully worth a little more than 2 cents.

These past 20 years in the United States proved that the fairy tale land I've heard about is still the land of opportunity. This is the country where everyone has a chance for a good living, if they work at it. In the country I came from we worked hard, but to no avail. The system did not reward the hard work, it favored those who sought well-being by becoming a part of the system, manipulating the system, or becoming Communist Party members.

When I came to the United States in 1991 I couldn't wait to get my "green card" to be able to start working. Neither my lacking English nor my inability to drive could stop me from getting a job. I walked! With my master's degree I was proud to get my first job in America at McDonald's. But this letter is not about me, it is about my concerns about the direction this country is heading.

Since most of my life I lived in a country where socialism was at a very mature stage of 70 years, I experienced, firsthand, the way of living under such a system. Young American people have no idea how unfair and inefficient it is. They hear these loud slogans of fairness and sharing, but they do not take time to learn why the idea DOES NOT work. I experienced it on my own skin for 26 years.

I am not here to talk about politics and advantages or disadvantages of one economic system over another. I just want to share some of my memories of growing up all the way to my adulthood in Russia.

Looking back through a prism of 20 years in the United States I am starting to understand the reasons why those colorless pictures with gloomy faces flash through my memory.

Working hard in Russia was a way of living; it was necessary for simple survival. There were no opportunities for government assistance unless one was totally disabled. Actually, it's not true. The whole country and every citizen was on a "welfare" hand-out, only we still had to work to get paid. The amount of our wages was just enough to barely make ends meet. We would not get paid, if we did not have a job. Obviously, all jobs were government jobs with standard low wages. One could achieve a slightly higher wage by obtaining some kind of higher education and hopefully getting a job as a manager somewhere. However, all good positions with "benefits" were taken by Communist Party members and people who knew people.

Important to understand that due to standard wages across the board as there was only one employer - the government - people usually tried to look for jobs with "benefits" to better their lives. Benefits in Russia implied opportunities to bring home something extra besides low wages, like a gallon of milk if you worked at a milk factory, or a loaf of bread if you worked at a bakery. So, when I was making my decision about my career, I chose to stay in the food industry and pursued a degree in Management of Public Catering.

My family lived in a small Siberian town, more like a village. Everyone in the village had to grow fields of potatoes and different vegetables that we preserved in large amounts for the winter. In the summer we also lived off the forest. I loved picking berries and hunting for mushrooms.

Twice a month, if we were lucky, a truck with supplies would reach our village. We always knew what everyone would have for dinner that night. Not many people owned a refrigerator those days. So, if the truck brought chicken, we had to enjoy it that night. Every family in the village had a fair share of the sausage, sugar, apples or popular condensed milk cans according to their family size. Often we had to give up our portion as we could not afford to buy it.

Other items we were looking forward to arrive were shampoo, socks and underwear. Yes, shampoo was in deficit. Not a certain type of a shampoo, but just a shampoo of any kind. As for socks, I learned to knit socks, when I was 12. Our old neighbor lady knew how to make yarn, so I groomed our fluffy dog and gave her the wool. I had socks for everybody in the family, but it did not work so well for us in the summer. Eventually I learned to knit almost anything. It was much harder to deal with the underwear situation, as we had no stretchy fabric to make it from.

The reason I share these memories with you is to show what kind of life can be, when government controls every aspect of your life. Since there was no competition to produce more or better, or less expensive goods, industries had little concern in producing quality or a variety of products. They had to produce quantity, however, to keep their workers somewhat in shape. When I first came to America I was overwhelmed to the point of frustration with selection of vegetable oil brands, for example. Later I understood why it is so great to be able to have a CHOICE.

When my father, at age of 36, had a stroke and after a few weeks in the hospital we were told that he needed to go home, as he was incurable, we were dumbstruck but had no choice, nor did we have the right to seek another opinion. We had to accept the fate, as we were assigned to the only clinic in the area according to our residence. After suffering for eight years, my father passed away at 44.

The socialistic regime did collapse, proving that it does not work. You might ask why people did not stand up for themselves sooner?

Well, first of all, they could not rebel due to the fact that Russian people have never had the right to bear arms and therefore they all were totally defenseless. All we could do is scream out our frustrations at a kitchen table.

The other reason is Russian propaganda machine was state of the art. People knew about the outside world only what they were supposed to know; they have been fed lies for 70 years and our children were raised by the government, brainwashed with images of baby Lenin since birth.

There was an important celebration in first grade, when each student was presented with a special star that had a face of Lenin when he was a child. We were proudly called "Oktjabrenok" after the October Revolution. At age 10 we all were honored with a red scarf that we could proudly wear from that point on and call ourselves "Pioner" (a pioneer). At age 14 we had a chance to become a Komsomol Party member, a necessary step, if you plan to become a Communist Party member later on. It was highly encouraged and presented as a high privilege to achieve it. Komsomol was the Communist Party's child.

If we continue the route set about four years ago, the life I briefly described above will be a reality in America. It won't happen very fast and won't be in such a severe form. The government in Russia had control over all industries right after the 1917 Revolution. Here, in the United States, the control will be taken peacefully through a number of steps, like raising taxes on businesses, implementing regulations to the point of making environment so unfriendly for businesses to exist, that people will stop any kind of entrepreneurship. They will be looking for government jobs. But the result will be the same - deterioration in each and every way of living.

It's heartbreaking to see how unaware people are willing to give their freedom away for government hand-outs, which lead to dependency, cripple people, kill their spirit of reaching for the stars and eventually annihilate the sense of responsibility for their own lives.

And the last point I need to make: There obviously is a need for some social programs in a society. Any civilized society needs to provide support for the less fortunate, like people with disabilities, who cannot provide for themselves. And this country has an abundance of such programs.

What is admirable about people in this country is how compassionate and giving Americans are. Not because they were told by the government to give, but because they want to help. How many nonprofit organizations, not subsidized by the government are in the United States? Think about it. And I am not saying that Russian people are not compassionate or not giving. It's not true. But when we are all equally poor, we have nothing to give.

Luba Wold is a Coeur d'Alene resident.