Knowledge to make your life better. If you have some free time, check out some of these links this weekend.
Travis Haley – An Exercise in Compromise
Travis Haley talks about the different weapons he carried while fighting in various locations around the world. An interesting read.
Preparing for an election year
Have you factored the upcoming elections into your defensive planning?
A little bit of insurance (The Pocket Survival Kit)
A well thought out pocket survival kit.
Sources of Tinder and Fire Craft in the Urban Environment
Speaking of survival, we often think about tinder and fire making in the context of being lost in the wilderness. That may not be the only place you have to make a fire. This article provides some truly innovative advice about urban fire starting methods.
On the Shoulders of Giants
Quality lessons learned from violent encounters around the world.
How Another Unarmed Man Fought Back Against An Active Killer In Oregon & You Can Too
Good information from Caleb at Prepared Gun Owners about surviving an active shooter attack. There’s even a link to an article some guy named Ellifritz wrote.
What’s in a Boarding Pass Barcode? A Lot
This is information that I didn’t know. I’ll be shredding or burning my boarding passes instead of leaving them in the airplane seat back pocket on future trips.
Law Tactical Gen 3-M Side Folding AR Stock
This is a high quality piece of gear that is extremely useful if you are trying to reduce the overall length of your AR-15. I have one on an Ar-15 “pistol” with the Sig Arm Brace. It folds up into a laptop bag. That’s the gun I carry when I travel. No one pays any attention when I walk in and out of hotels carrying an AR-15 with three spare magazines.
Using Observable Police Activity to Assess the Risk Level of an Urban Locale
James LaFond writes a lot of material from a very unique viewpoint. It’s not stuff that you see every day. This article is about how to watch police patrol patterns to get a better idea of your neighborhood’s safety. His article about the Seven Truths of Combat Effectiveness is a good read as well.
Concealed Carry Reality…Reality Bites!
Dave Spaulding gives some great advice:
“There is no way to totally avoid danger save never leaving your home, so all of us assume some risk just living in modern day society, but this doesn’t mean we must sacrifice personal security. By staying “switched on” to our environment and trying to avoid or evade danger, it is possible to minimize our chance for conflict while maximizing our enjoyment of life. Think about the environment in which you work and play and give it an honest assessment. Carefully select a gun that is a reasonable compromise between concealment and combative capability and then try to stay alert for danger as we must all be active participants in our own rescue.”
How do you tell good guys from bad guys?
A critical issue in the context of active shooter response…and one that few people are discussing. It’s important to be able to identify the bad guys if you are caught up in a mass killing. It’s even more important not to be identified as a bad guy yourself when you attempt to rescue people.
You will also want to check out Short Barrel Shepherd’s followup article on how not to be confused for a bad guy in an active killer event.
Purse Carry is the Worst Carry: Part 1
For my female friends who carry in their purse…that probably isn’t the best spot for your gun. Melody talks about some of the weaknesses of that mode of carry. Read Part Two of the article series here. Short Barrel Shepherd shares another perspective of the same tests.
Proper Prior Performance Prevents Piss-Poor Planning
“If you’re running “planning” exercises, even within your larger training scenarios, and you don’t have a set of performance standards that you expect people to meet, you’re playing a motherfucking game, and I would point out that Call-of-Duty, even in multi-player, online format, is probably cheaper than buying a bunch of gear (Actually, I don’t know. I don’t even know how much a Nintendo costs these days….). It’s certainly less work.
DO THE FUCKING WORK!
Or, do what everyone else does, and go collect welfare, so you don’t have to do any work.”
When Running Will Get You Killed Against An Active Killer (With Pictures)
A couple weeks ago, I wrote an article critiquing the “Run, Hide, Fight” model of responding to an active killer. In this article, Caleb digs even deeper into the “Run” part of that response and covers exactly when you should run from an active killer and when that would be a poor idea. Excellent information.
Injecting some common sense into the world of firearm lubrication.
Pocket Dump: Could Your EDC Photo Allow Criminals to Break Into Your Home?
Zen and the Art of Not Shooting
Most of us practice our shooting skills regularly. Have you considered the need to practice “not shooting?”
Not-So-Common Sense
“I am beginning to realize that we’ve got a lot of people who are playing at personal defense. They buy any old kind of pistol and then they make up a justification for what they carry and how they carry it. I’m sure that they also search the internet chat rooms until they find someone who supports their cockamamie ideas. It’s pretty scary when you realize that these fools are running around out there with loaded guns and a head full of screwy ideas about guns, the law, and tactics of personal defense.”
A Random Firearms Instructor Hack from Neural-Based Learning
Read the article and watch the short video. Marcus Wynne talks about how to structure your training classes so as to better encode the information you are imparting into the students’ brains. Good stuff.
* Some of the above links (from Amazon.com) are affiliate links. If you purchase these items, I get a small percentage of the selling price.
