It has been quiet on the mass murder front of late. I guess the excitement of having two of the arguably worst candidates possible running for president in the history of the Republic might be the cause of the quiet. A realization has occurred among American domestic enemies that maybe things really are screwed up, perhaps?
With the California rush to violate its residents' Gawd given rights now turned into law, a move is on to make the three western coastal states a "wall", for what purpose would be anyone's guess. But consider: all three states have universal background checks for firearms transfers in some form in place, and all three have pot laws that allow voters to ignore the violations of personal civil liberties, except for the right to get bombed out of your skull.
You'll notice in the linked article a drive to ban "high powered rifles", which is a leftist euphemism for anything that fires a rifle slug.
Some people are no fun when it comes to rifles. Rigging a raffle so that you win violates the law, coming under communications laws in most states. If the church used a device of any kind connected to the internet or to the phone lines for the raffle, it is a violation of federal law.
Prices for pistol ammunition were steady across the board. Prices for rifle ammunition were steady across the board.
Prices for used pistols were mixed. Prices for used rifles were mixed.
New Lows:
None
Pistol Ammunition
.45 Caliber, 230 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: SG Ammo, Wolf, FMJ, Steel Casing, .25 per round (From Last week: +.03 Each)
.40 Caliber Smith & Wesson, 180 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Ammo Mart, Buffalo Cartridge, FSFP, Brass Casing, Reloads, .20 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Ammo Mart, Legendary, FSFP, Brass Casing, Reloads, .19 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (3 Weeks))
9mm Parabellum, 115 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (3 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .15 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .15 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks))
.357 Magnum, 158 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (7 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .23 per round
Cheapest Bulk: 1,000 rounds: Lucky Gunner, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel cased, .23 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (8 Weeks))
Rifle Ammunition
.223 Caliber/5.56mm 55 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2Q, 2016)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: LAX Ammunition, Hotshot, FMJ, Steel Casing, .21 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .21 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks))
.308 NATO 150 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2Q, 2016)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Outdoor Unlimited, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .35 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, Steel Casing, FMJ, .31 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks))
7.62x39mm AK 123 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (8 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Ammunition Depot, Wolf WPA, Steel Case, FMJ, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: SG Ammo, Wolf WPA, Steel Case, FMJ, .23 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (2 Weeks))
.22 LR 40 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (7 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds (10 Box Limit): Ammomen, Federal, RNL, .07 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds (2 Box Limit): Ammofast, Aguila, RNL, .07 per round (From Last Week: +.01 Each )
Guns for Private Sale
Rifles
.223/5.56mm (AR Pattern Semiautomatic) Average Price: $570 Last Week Avg: $535(+) ($616 (2Q, 2015), $476 (43 Weeks))
California (211, 206): Palmetto State Armory: $550 ($650 (1Q, 2015), $400 (48 Weeks))
Texas (213, 225): DPMS: $650 ($700 (1Q, 2015), $350 (2Q, 2015))
Pennsylvania (147, 147): Diamondback Firearms: $550 ($700 (2Q, 2015), $300 (3Q, 2015))
Virginia (155, 155): Palmetto State Armory: $600 ($750 (1Q, 2015), $475 (12 Weeks))
Florida (355, 353): Anderson Manufacturing: $500 ($650 (2Q, 2015), $380 (1Q, 2015))
#1
CNN's Sally Kohn Blames 'AK-15s' for Mass Shootings Another idiot of the MSM with her head up her ass unwilling to say anything about the Islamic connection.
#7
71st anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima on August 6th. The bombing of Nagasaki occurred three days later. On August 15the, Japan surrendered. The bombing saved many allied lives and prevented the need for the invasion of Japan. Despite the criticisms of the bombings still today, it is estimated that the bombings saved millions of lives.
#8
August 6, 1950
Perimeter around Pusan continues to solidify. Intense fighting at the Naktong Bulge.
Situation very much in doubt, but improving.
Ghastly heat, lack of water causing as many casualties as combat.
Finally getting 3.5" rockets in numbers.
DA Battle Casualties 13-31 July: 1265 KIA, 2345 WIA, 971 MIA, 173 captured.
I have had the opportunity to fire a M1 Carbine - interesting rifle.
#10
It was a while back, but remembering as I go through a book about The Korean it was an effn war Police Action.
Smooth, recoil like an AR15, happy with the accuracy of something I had never shot. However, had feeding issues like Rosie Odonnel...dunno if it was the firearm, ammo, magazine, or just how that platform normally is.
#11
My dad said that his had feed issues sometimes swksvolFF, usually during an 'inopportune moment'.
He said it depended on how the metal ammo clips were filled. If you loaded it incorrectly or there was some crud in the clip, the cartridge wouldn't always 'advance'.
A few beach landings, a winter in the Alps and a sloppy summer in eastern France probably didn't help either.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
08/06/2016 21:14 Comments ||
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[Politico] Russia doesn't want to just bring down Hillary Clinton but rather the United States itself.
TALLINN -- The revelation that Russia’s intelligence services hacked the computer systems of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign in what appears an attempt to weaken her in the U.S. election against Donald Trump may seem like the stuff of conspiracy.
But the truth is far more alarming. Russia’s activities aren’t part of a conspiracy. They are elements of an openly stated doctrine -- a resurrection of Soviet style political warfare, in which intelligence agencies seek to amplify divisions among their enemies, weakening the Western front by sowing discord and dissent whenever the opportunity presents itself.
The political warfare of the Cold War is back -- in updated form, with meaner, more modern tools, including a vast state media empire in Western languages, hackers, spies, agents, useful idiots, compatriot groups, and hordes of internet trolls. The target of the hacks wasn’t just Clinton. Nor is Moscow much interested in supporting Trump (willing useful idiot though he may be). What the Russians have in their sights is nothing less than the democratic fabric of American society and the integrity of the system of Western liberal values.
Russia is effectively using our democracies and our systems of rule of law against us. The method works like a computer virus. They insert a lie, a false accusation, a fabrication, an illegally-obtained private conversation -- some form of kompromat -- into our media, competing for ratings and ad revenue, and then they let us tear ourselves apart.
The hacking of Clinton’s computer systems (and the earlier leak of Democratic National Committee emails) is by no means unique. It is the latest -- and most public -- in a long line of subversive operations against democratic governments and U.S. allies, including aspiring NATO members and former Russian satellites.
Article in the Blaster blog by Chuck Spinney, colleague of the late great John Boyd. 8th article in a series.
The intervention of Congress temporarily has thwarted the AF game plan by directing the Pentagon's Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (OT&E) to conduct a realistic fly-off and shoot-off between the A-10 and the F-35. The sensible goal of this approach is to use the scientific method to determine empirically which plane is more effective in supporting ground troops in combat. Currently that test is scheduled for 2018. That the Air Force was forced by Congress to conduct such a common-sense test is a telling message in itself.
But there is more. An A-10/F-35 fly-off in 2018, while well intentioned and entirely appropriate, is also a charade. The F-35 will not be cleared by 2018 to carry and fire the weapons appropriate for the Close Air Support mission, including its necessary command and control avionics. Even if one makes the patently absurd assumption that there are no more delays in the problem-plagued F-35 program, the OT&E report evaluating the F-35's capability to carry and fire these weapons in anything approaching a realistic CAS scenario will not be available until 2021. How can the F-35 pass a fly-off/shoot-off comparative CAS test against the A-10 before we know what, if any, CAS capabilities are possessed by the F-35? To ask such a question is to answer it, so don't expect any meaningful fly-off/shoot-off to be conducted in 2018.
Nevertheless, this mismatch between the F-35's availability and capability, has not deterred the AF from its goal of trashing the A-10 ‐ literally.
Notwithstanding, the speed bump imposed by Congress, as my good friend James Stevenson explains below, the AF is making the retirement of the A-10 in favor of the F-35 inevitable by quietly destroying those A-10s now in long term storage. There are currently 291 A-10s in active service, with another 99 A-10s in storage in the Arizona desert (including 50 recently modernized A-10Cs with gobs of flight time left on them). But the Air Force is sending these stored aircraft (including A-10Cs) to the breakers. In so doing, the AF is deliberately reducing its ability to maintain the existing active A-10 force structure over the long term.
In short, the quiet AF strategy of destroying perfectly good A-10s guarantees the F-35 will replace the A-10, thereby rendering Congress's direction for a fly-off/shoot-off irrelevant. This makes a mockery of the powers assigned to the Congress in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution ‐ a document every member of the AF has sworn unconditionally to defend against all enemies foreign and domestic.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
08/06/2016 00:19 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[12 views]
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#1
Of course the ideal solution of just transfering the 'Hog to the Army and Marines is something not to be even discussed. Hell give them the AC-1390's too. Along with the Air Scouts funding.
#2
Areed. We should initiate pilotless aircraft (no more POWs) for the Air Farce and turn over the A-10 to the Army and Marines if they can use them. Barring that, I would not scrap the planes as surely they could be sold or donated to some foreign service (e.g., Chad, Nigeria, Kenya) that could use them.
#3
There's a book out (Red Platoon) by Clint Romesha, MOH and one of the defenders of COP Keating in 2009, describing in some detail what a happy event the arrival of Apaches and A-10's over the battlefield was. (Apparently, watching a couple of hundred bad guys finding out what a 30mm Gatling gun can do tends to improve morale.) Whatever the brass says, I don't think your Army and Marine infantry would be real happy about standing down the A-10's.
Posted by: Matt ||
08/06/2016 11:49 Comments ||
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#4
The F35 will never provide the ground support the A10 provides. This is their game. They will do the fly off. They will show people that don't understand ground support that it will work. Congress will swallow and it will be done. The F16 was sold to congress as a ground support aircraft, the F14 was sold as a ground support aircraft, the F15 was sold as a ground support aircraft. Then after they bought them they had them modified to carry a different payload. The weapons necessary for ground support had their install mods removed. When you call them out on it they say it can do that mission but we don't have any in that configuration and it will take months to modify them. Its a bullshit game and our soldiers are the pawn. They should disband all ground support aircraft from the Air Farce. Give it to the Army and Marines.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
08/06/2016 11:50 Comments ||
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#5
If they want a meaningful 'fly-off' (they don't, of course) it needs to run for multiple sorties of the same aircraft - maybe 10? - over a one week time. Doesn't matter if the F-35 is better (unlikely) on one pass if it can't show up again for a week. And the test has to include being shot at and still being able to go around again.
#6
These are the same guys who back in the sixties didn't think a fighter should have a gun and that missiles at 100 miles, via the AARAM missile was how dogfighting would be done in the future.
These idiots in R&D seem to think they can do close air support from 20,000 with smart airplanes and smarter bombs. They are essentially raccoons distracted by the latest shiny object.
As for close air support mods, sell them to the Israelis and wait a year and they will have all the close air support mods you want. Funny, I don't think our Air Farce has the stomach for close air support.
SO why don't we just transfer the A-10 to the Marines I am sure they would LOVE to get rid of those decrepit old Harriers and early model Hornets.
#7
Army for sure. Is there any way to launch and recover an A-10 from a ship?
Say what you want about the new Battlestar Galactica I found interesting the opening moves - the old stuff being retired and when the Cylons attacked, all the new stuff was hacked.
#8
Only takes a directional order from the SecDef to move CAS to the ground bounders and out of the zoomies responsibility. Hell, if you can direct a third gender integration, you can direct doctrine.
#11
I guarantee if the techies in the Air Farce weapons R&D were true stick and rudder guys, you would not see this kind of silliness.
Yep, an airplane that is a flying WiFi hotspot with multiple computers collecting terabits of information, what could go wrong?
If they can hack the Defense Department or the FBI what makes you think they can't hack one of our flying computers?
Our aircraft are flying computers with pilots playing video games. An armed force for the millennialists and snow flakes that want to fight a war without offending anyone.
This is so typical of all tech projects. Been there done that for 30 years and it always comes down to techies wanting to do the latest and greatest (mea culpa) to deliver the spiffiest solution possible. Rugged? Invulnerable? Idiot proof? Never seen those requirements on the spec.
#13
Show some sympathy for the fly boys. The F-35 is their last gasp before the Robot Mafia takes over air combat maneuvering.
I realize it goes against the Treaty of Westphalia or some damn agreement, but giving the A-10s (and their budget!) to people who want and need them makes such good sense that I can almost guarantee it will never happen.
#14
I believe I've told this story here before. In several of our family's Marine Sargent's 'encounters' during the Iraq invasion and subsequent AQI actions, nothing lit up smiles on the wounded guys waiting for evac like the sound of those turbofans at the start of a run.
The riflemen on the lines were too busy to smile, but they were thinking the same thing.
"Here comes Hell, you F*ckers!!"
The aviator folks at Pendleton that I talked to about 10 years ago would've loved to have the A-10. Unfortunately the USMCA today doesn't have the resources to keep their existing birds flying or pilots properly trained. Probably by design.
Hopefully that changes soon.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
08/06/2016 20:40 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
