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Just Got Home, Leaving Again Tomorrow

But boy am I glad to find out that – so far – the AWB is going to die. They still have time before September to try to ramrod an extension or expansion through as an amendment on something critical, but it looks like it’s going to croak on schedule! I’m looking forward to getting a collapsable stock for my AR.

Too bad the lawsuit preemption bill had to die to ensure that, but so it goes. Better luck next year. I hope there are still some manufacturers in business by then.

Kudos to everyone who followed this action so closely for those of us who could not. “The price of liberty is eternal vigilance,” and we’ve learned that the hard way. Hooray for the Internet, that allows us almost real-time updates and the links to our elected representatives so we can make ourselves heard.

Anyway, Triggerfinger has an excellent synopsis of today’s events up for anyone who wants it brief and to the point. And use the internal link to see how your Congresscritters voted.

My Senator, Kyl, isn’t too bad. But McCain’s GOTTA go.

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While I’ve Been Gone

The Geek and Publicola have been doing yeoman duty in keeping tabs on our congresscritters in the Senate. Please, stroll over and read. And the Geek’s got a link to a helluva Kerry-bashing story in The Village Voice, no less.

And now I must go to bed, because I have to get up at 4 AM again, and leave for more field work. Back Tuesday night, I hope.

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It’s Over, I Think.

David Baker says:

I will have to agree with your last debate partner and say:

“I think that my position now is actually more liberal (in terms of my approach to gun control) than when we started.”

There are certainly regulations already in place that need to be strengthened by enforcement, and it seems I have much more to learn on the subject. I believe I am on the road to a possible core value change on this subject. (although I still have a usefulness issue with automatic weapons and probably always will. And no, not because they are scary, either. Just without need.)

So you may chalk up another “win” in your column on this issue. You are certainly a formidable advisory (sic) on this issue, and I have really enjoyed myself and learned a lot.

(I think he meant “adversary,” but “advisory” might have been a freudian slip.)

Damn, only thirty some posts and less than a month. I was just getting warmed up!

C’mon, c’mon… another challenger out there? I’m ready!

KevinLeave a comment

Give Me a Break, a Book Review

I recently finished reading ABC journalist John Stossel’s book Give Me a Break: How I Exposed Hucksters, Cheats, and Scam Artists and Became the Scourge of the Liberal Media….

Excellent book, highly recommended.

The book runs just short of 300 very fast pages chronicling Stossel’s career to this point (it was published just before Barbara Walters announced that she would no longer be co-anchor of ABC’s 20-20 with Stossel). It begins with a short retrospective of his career. Opening chapter excerpt:

“I was once a heroic consumer reporter; now I’m a threat to journalism.

—

I won 18 Emmys, and lots of other journalism awards. One year I got so many Emmys, another winner thanked me in his acceptance speech “for not having an entry in this category.”

Then I did a terrible thing. Instead of just applying my skepticism to business, I applied it to government and “public interest” groups. This apparently violated a religious tenet of journalism. Suddenly I was no longer “objective.”

—

These days, I rarely get awards from my peers. Some of my ABC colleagues look away when they see me in the halls.

What follows is a description of the journey from rewarded “advocate” to shunned “gadfly.”

I found it interesting that Stossel repeats the “journalism is a religion” meme I first ran into in a Jay Rosen editorial. Stossel makes it explicit in the title to his book that there is such a thing as “liberal journalism,” yet he himself is not part of that orthodoxy. He explains this simply:

I never planned to be a reporter.

—

Every time a company sent a recruiter to Princeton, I volunteered for an interview. I got a dozen job offers and took the one that offered me a free flight that would take me the farthest: Seattle Magazine. They said they’d teach me how to sell advertising or do bookkeeping. But by the time I graduated, Seattle Magazine had gone out of business. I was lucky, though: Ancil Payne, the boss of the parent company King Broadcasting, called me to say, “We have a job available at KGW, our Portland, Oregon, TV station. Want to try that?”

And he did, starting as “gofer,” then researcher, newswriter, and finally reporter. Stossel says:

In retrospect, I see that it probably helped me that I had taken no journalism courses. Television news was still inventing itself then, and I was open to new ideas. I learned through fear. My fear of failure made me desperate to do the job well, to try to figure out what people really needed to know and how I could say it in a way that would work well on TV.

But what Stossel doesn’t say, outright, is that his lack of ordination in the Church of Journalism left his mind open to question what he saw. The first inklings of this willingness to question came shortly after he moved from Portland to the “big leagues”; WCBS in New York, where he met up with what I call the “union mentality” and was exposed to regimented reporting:

We’d show up for work at 10 A.M., and the assignment editor would tell us what we’d cover that day. I sometimes suggested we ought to report on someting else, and he’d tell me, “Do what you’re told.” Each correspondent would then grab one of the three-man union crews and drive to the scene of the fire, murder, news conference, or whatever the assignment editor wanted us to cover. We’d arrive like a lumbering army. It was remarkable how much time a cameraman, a soundman, and an electrician could take just getting out of the car. Every move was deliberate.

They had no reason to hurry because no one ever got fired. There was no reason to work harder because union rules demanded everyone be paid the same. Many union workers were masters not at just killing time, but at killing innovation. “Can’t be done.” “Against the rules.” “Equipment won’t do that.” It stunned me that so many of them could be indifferent to what I thought was important work.

More on “regimented reporting” and how Stossel avoided it:

At WCBS I was steadily growing more frustrated with following the assignment editor’s vision of what was “news.” Perhaps because of my stuttering, I’d always avoided covering what the pack covered. I didn’t think I could succeed if I had to compete by shouting out questions at news conferences, so I seldom vounteered to report the day’s “big news.” That turned out to have an unexpected benefit, It helped me realize that the most important news happens slowly. The assignment editor aw WCBS was focused only on that day’s events: government pronouncements, election results, grisly fires and murders. But the world’s real life-changing developments were things like the women’s movement, the shrinking of computers, the invention of the birth control pill. They mattered more but happened quietly, well off the radar screen of my assignment editor, because they weren’t in that day’s news releases, the AP daybook, or that morning’s paper. (That would be The New York Times in this case.) I decided I wanted to search out those trends and cover health and science news, the environment, sociology, psychology. The assigmnent editor wasn’t interested.

One day, with great trepidation, I went over his head. I brought Ed Joyce a list of the stories the assignment editor had rejected. I said I thought my ideas were better. I feared Joyce would fire me or tell me to shut up and do what the assignment editor had told me. Instead he said, “You’re right – yours are better. Do them.”

And Stossel was unleashed upon unsuspecting hucksters, cheats, scam artists and the liberal media.

What follows are 14 chapters on the evil and idiocy practiced upon the American public by those Stossel exposes. In Chapter 2, Confrontations, Stossel recounts how he started doing “In-your-face” consumer reporting, and his shock at the reactions of those he exposed – blasé. Generally “stonewalling, lying, and weird politeness.” It’s an excellent look, psychologically, at the people who make their living out of cheating others. Especially the concluding paragraph:

Donald Trump was offended when I called him a bully for trying to force an old lady out of her house to make more room for his Atlantic City casino. After the interview, the producer stayed behind to pack up our equipment. Trump came back into the room, puffed himself up, and started blustering, “Nobody talks to me that way!”

Well, someone should.

Amen.

Chapter 3 recounts Stossel’s continuation down his path to journalistic heresy, his “Confusion” over the fact that his consumer-advocacy work wasn’t having any results, or at least not positive ones.

It was satisfying to confront the bad guys, but it wasn’t enough. I’d expose them, and a month later, they’d be back at it. I wanted the government to do something to stop the crooks, to compensate the victims. After I spent time with the victims listening to their sad stories, I was angry. I wanted someone to help those people. What was the purpose of government if it couldn’t protect them?

But that’s not what happened:

Occasionally the government did act, but its actions rarely worked out well.

Every regulation seemed to have an unintended consequence. Taxpayers’ dollars wound up in the pockets of the rich instead of the poor. Well-meaning regulation designed to protect consumers often hurt them by narrowing their choice.

As an idealist fresh out of college, no wonder he was confused. The chapter goes on with example after example of how government regulation of business hurt innovation and profited established business: Hair salons, milk producers, unions, public transportation, the FDA. It’s angering to read, but the honesty is refreshing.

Chapter four is aptly entitled “Epiphany” and is a scourging of regulators and regulating:

I had moved from seeing regulation as a good thing to seeing it as a necessary evil. More years of reporting led me to conclude that much of it is also unnecessary evil. We don’t need a million rules because free markets police themselves.

And here we see in print Stossel’s small “L” libertarianism really take off.

By contrast, government almost never polices itself. When government agencies lose money, or fail at their missions, they ask Congress for more money. They usually get it, citing their failure to achieve their goals as proof they need more funds.

Followed by example after example.

I’m not going to go through all the chapters, but I will comment on the one that is one central theme of the book: the need for tort reform. The chapter entitled “The Trouble with Lawyers” begins:

I don’t hate lawyers. We need lawyers.

We need them to preserve the rule of law. We need them to defend if others cheat us, steal from us, trample on our rights. However, we also need nuclear missles – to keep other nations from trampling on our rights. We try not to use them, because they harm innocent people.

We should treat lawyers the same way. Lawsuits are necessary, but evil.

And he goes on to make a very cogent case. His conclusion? We need a “loser pays” system of tort. I recently read John Grisham’s The King of Torts which I found to be a fascinating and repelling look into the business of “personal injury law.” Stossel’s right – it’s got to change.

Everyone needs to read this book, right and left alike. The right for ammunition, the left for reflection on their failures. I would have preferred some more in-depth information on each of the examples Stossel relates, but then the book would have been a thousand pages at least. I imagine his research archives must be a gold mine. Stossel makes an outstanding argument for small “L” libertarianism, and concludes with this:

My epiphany was seeing that we don’t need experts to “run the country.” We need limited government, a referee that keeps the peace. But that’s all. Then free minds and free markets will make good things happen.

Sounds remarkably like the system our Founders envisioned, doesn’t it?

KevinLeave a comment

I’m Back, Sorta…

Got home Friday night about 8 PM, ate dinner & crashed. Got up Saturday at 5 AM, left the house at 6, and ran my combination IHMSA pistol & NRA pistol & cowboy rifle match. Got home about 5 PM. Laid down on the bed “for a few minutes” about 6. Got up this morning about ten minutes to 8.

I head back to the job site tomorrow morning at 5 AM, and will be there probably through Tuesday.

I’ll try to post some insightful commentary or biting satire today, but as burned out as I feel at the moment….

OK, So I Lied

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Not really, though. I’m buried in work, but I found this over lunch and had to post it.

‘Bankrupt’ Forces may shut 5 bases
Internal reports say $500M shortfall may cause closures from Winnipeg to Labrador

Chris Wattie
National Post

Tuesday, February 24, 2004

Canada’s army, navy and air force are facing a funding shortfall of up to half a billion dollars, defence sources told the National Post, and the military is recommending drastic measures to make up the difference, including closing some of the largest bases in the country.

The federal government is stalling the release of internal documents that outline the looming financial crisis, but military sources said the reports indicate that in the fiscal year beginning on April 1, the air force expects to be $150-million short of funds needed to fulfill its commitments, the navy will be $150-million shy of its needs and the army will be as much as $200-million short.

The figures were submitted to General Ray Henault, the Chief of Defence Staff, last month by the heads of the land staff, the maritime staff and the air staff in anticipation of this year’s defence budget.

The military sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the reports foresee a situation so dire that they recommend curtailing operations, dry-docking ships and mothballing vehicles or aircraft and closing at least four Canadian Forces bases.

Unless additional funding is awarded by the government, the air force is suggesting closing bases at Goose Bay, Nfld., Bagotville, Que., North Bay and Winnipeg, the sources said.

Further, the air force report says that unless its fleet of ageing CC-130 Hercules transport planes is replaced or modernized, the main transport base at Trenton should be closed within 10 years. “There won’t be enough Hercs flying by then to justify keeping that base open,” one air force source said.

The navy predicts it will not be able to live up to treaty obligations to NATO and other alliances and cannot carry out enough patrols of Canadian waters to comply with agreements with other government departments such as Immigration Canada or Fisheries and Oceans.

“We will not be able to meet our domestic defence obligations,” one naval officer said.

The army is said to be in the worst financial state of all three branches of the Canadian Forces. “Everyone knows that the army’s broke and has been for a couple of years,” said one military source familiar with the reports.

Colonel Howard Marsh, a former senior army staff officer now working as an analyst for the Conference of Defence Associations, said he was not surprised by the size of the shortfall.

“This is a look forward … at what they need in order to keep the army going,” he said. “Nobody has ever seen a bankrupt military in a developed country…. This year I predict we will see that in Canada.”

Col. Marsh said the military is saddled with ageing bases and increasingly dilapidated buildings that are fast reaching the point of collapse. “What they’ve been doing, year in and year out … is not replace or repair those buildings, or buy new equipment,” he said.

“The average age of the equipment in the Canadian Forces is over 20 years and it hasn’t been well-maintained.”

The Liberal government reduced defence spending by 23% and cut the number of regular military personnel to approximately 60,000 from 80,000 between 1993 and 2000. There were 120,000 people in the Canadian military in 1958.

In 2003, the defence budget was increased $800-million to $12.7-billion, the single largest increase since the Liberals came to power. But that still left the total below that of 1991, when the Mulroney Conservatives committed troops to the Gulf War and the defence budget stood at $12.8-billion.

Jay Hill, the Conservative defence critic, said the reports outline the result of more than a decade of Liberal cuts to the Canadian Forces.

“They shouldn’t even be in this position,” he said. “They shouldn’t be having to look for nickel and dime savings when the government is blowing hundreds of millions on sponsorship programs.”

Mr. Hill called on the government to make the three reports available immediately. “This flies in the face of this Prime Minister’s stated commitment to being open and transparent,” he said.

The Department of National Defence has refused to make public the annual reports, known as command impact assessments.

Defence officials this week turned down a request by the National Post and the influential defence publication Jane’s Defence Weekly to see the reports under access to information legislation.

Judith Mooney, the director of access to information for the Department of National Defence, said the reports will not be made public for another three to five weeks because they are considered “draft” documents.

“I exercised my discretion to withhold the documents until the [Defence] Department’s business-planning process is complete, at which time they will be released,” she said.

Ms. Mooney could not say when exactly the reports would be released, but indicated they would be available by the end of March.

Although that would delay them until after the release of the federal budget, which is expected on March 23, she said David Pratt, the Defence Minister, was not involved in the decision to withhold the reports until then. Mr. Pratt did not reply to repeated requests for comment on the reports.

In previous years, the assessments have been made public.

This year’s reports paint a picture even more bleak than last year’s, which said the military would be unable to sustain itself without additional resources or a reduced workload.

They were the basis for a story last year in Jane’s Defence Weekly, the prestigious London-based magazine, which caused a furor in Canadian and NATO defence circles. Under the headline “Running on Empty,” the story said the army, navy and air force did not receive the money they needed.

The article said the navy asked for an additional $50-million to bridge the funding gap, but received only $6.7-million. The air force expected a $104-million shortfall but received about $7-million. The army had a larger gap between what was expected of it and the funding available, and received $85-million in extra money.

Major-General Terry Hearn, the chief of finance for the Canadian Forces, acknowledged the military has had “issues” with funding over the past four years.

But he said the department is implementing a long-term plan to stabilize its finances. “We’ll become sustainable over the next couple of years,” he said. “We have long-term strategies to deal with these issues … [but] we’re not going to solve them next year.”

Peter Stoffer, a New Democrat MP whose Nova Scotia riding includes a large military base, called the government’s refusal to release the reports “very suspicious.”

“If anyone out there honestly believes that access to information will be any easier under this government, they are fooling themselves,” he said. “They say one thing and do another.”

Yet Canada’s Auditor General Sheila Frasier has reported that implementing registration of all long-guns and all firearms owners (and failing) had cost, as of April 2002, $629 million. The projected cost through 2005? One BILLION.

Yet the Canadian military is sorely underfunded. Think that money might have been better spent?

KevinLeave a comment

No Blog for You!

I’m going to be out of town on business for the next three days or so, so no new posts for a bit. Sorry.

It’ll be real interesting to find out what happens in the Senate over the bill protecting gun manufacturers and dealers, once S.659, now S.1805. The Geek is all over this, so please stay tuned in there.

And thanks for visiting! The archives are still open.

KevinLeave a comment

Yup. Federalizing Airport Security Ensures Professionalism

Presented without further comment:

Six security screeners curious about their brains face disciplinary actions for misconduct

The Transportation Security Administration is not saying exactly who x-rayed themselves or when because of privacy reasons, but a source tells 9NEWS the six screeners were working at passenger checkpoints when they decided to x-ray their own bodies.

Like a piece of luggage, the screeners would have rolled down the conveyor belt into the opening, about 2.5 feet high and a foot and a half wide.

“There’s enough training, enough education available in the public domain, let alone the circumstances of the TSA, to know this is a foolhardy thing to do,” said David Forbes, president of Boydforbes, Inc. “The questions that come out of this though are what is the level of supervision?”

Forbes, a security expert, says this highlights a lack of good management and training. But TSA spokesman Mike Fierberg says it was just someone doing something stupid. He insists it did not interfere with security.

TSA would not say if the screeners were still on administrative leave. In fact, it would only confirm that “some kind of action” was taken against one screener at DIA.

As for the screeners’ health, the manufacturers of the x-ray equipment say the exposure is actually too low to hurt anyone. They say a chest x-ray at a hospital would be 50 times stronger than an x-ray from an airport system.

There are also news video reports on the site.

OK, one comment: Do you feel safe? No, wait! Two: Think your tax dollars are well spent?

So… Gunshows are “Supermarkets for Criminals” eh?

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Not according to J. David Phillips of Crystal River FL, and his experience is just about a duplicate of mine. Which is why I don’t go to Evil Loophole Gunshows anymore. Here’s an old rec.guns newsgroup post on the topic. Keep spewable liquids away from the keyboard:

Is your show anything like this one?

Arrive early. Usually a short wait to get in. For parking that is. Overpriced parking that costs more than show admission. Gunshow is usually held at the same time the Women’s Knitting Society Doll Show is held, and they open earlier, so all the good parking is snapped up. Oh well, I suppose no one in Florida has any right to complain about walking in the rain.

Now we’ve got the line to get in. Let’s see, there are three lines. Gee, this one is a bit shorter. Oops, why is it going so slow? Why the #### is everyone in MY line paying with loose change? Cripes, the other lines have cleared out twice over. Finally get to the booth. Oops, now it’s shift change. At 9AM?

A couple of sleezy looking good ole boys holding up the wall shout “Hey, what’ya got on that chrome AK? Does it have the switch on it ?”

Now for the line to get in. Everyone has to be checked for guns. No, I’m not carrying a gun. Thank goodness. The old geezer rent-a-cop is having trouble trying to figure out how to open someone’s 30-30 action.

OK, now we’re cooking with gas. Literally. I have to run the gauntlet of BBQ grill dealers.

Ah, a gun table. Looks interesting. Oops, spoke too soon. Someone must be kidding. These are parts guns and this guy wants 50% over MSRP? Move on.

Here’s a familiar sight. This old fella always has a table full of Winchester Model 71’s. The same table full. Meaning he hasn’t sold any for several years. I guess he’s just displaying his collection and is tired of saying they aren’t for sale, so he’s resorted to putting astronomical prices on them to discourage sales. At least that’s what I can figure out.

Oh look, the Beanie Baby dealer fom Ozello has managed to move closer to the front door.

Couple of ultra fat sleezy good ole boys holding up the South wall shout “Hey, what’ya got on that there chrome AK? Has it got duh switch on it ?”

Now I have to run the gaunlet of safe dealers who take your order but never deliver. My sister had to get the state attorney general involved to get her money back from one. Quickly move on.

Make quick pit stop. Wish I had gone before I left home. The facilities are so filthy that I cannot describe them here. Wish I had used the safe of the ripoff dealer to relieve myself.

Now I pass the snack bar. I could never figure out why it is located right next to the restrooms. People are standing in line for hotdogs that look like they’ve been cooking since the last gunshow. The smell of hotdogs and urinal mints must make some people hungry, I guess. Quickly move along.

This guy seems to have quite a crowd around his gun parts. Wait to get close to table. Dang. It’s all the pot metal 1911 bushings with built-in comp and bayonet lugs. Work my way out of the crowd and on to the next table.

More Beanie Babies from a dealer in Aripieka.

Now a jerky and sausage vender from Brooksville.

Darrel and Darrel come up to me and ask “Hey, what’ya got on that chrome AK? Do it have the switch on it ?”

Ah, some real gun parts. Unfortunately none for any of the many gun projects I have. but it’s good to know that if I ever get a Mondragon that this guy has cornered the market for firing pins.

More beanie babies from an idiot in Crystal River.

Say, here’s three tables with books. Let’s see… “How To Turn Your 10-22 Into A Thousand Yard Assault Sniper Rifle”. “How To Make A Fully Automatic 10-22 Assault Sniper Weapons System”. “Converting Your 10-22 Into a Fully Automatic Thousand Yard Assault Sniper Weapon”. Hmmm, I’m begining to see a pattern here. Move along.

Ah, the mountain man muzzleloader dealer. This guy seems knowledgable, reasonably priced, has lots of inventory and accessories, and is friendly. Too bad I’m not into muzzleloaders.

Here’s a fellow I can’t figure out. He is a collector. Yet he brings glass display counters. Six of them. Full of brand new guns with warranty. No 4473, cuz he ain’t a dealer. He’s a collector. Gee, wish I could be a collector and sell dozens of brand new guns still in the box from my collection each weekend. Course, if you are in ‘business’ , then you have to have a license.

Next is the eight tables of guns from a local storefront dealer. They are selling like hotcakes. Can’t be the price, because they are marked up even more than what they sell for in the store. After looking over the guns and hearing “You gunna buy or what?” from three different clerks, it begins to dawn on me that people are there for the abuse. I think they’re from Inverness.

Quickly move along.

Here’s a table dedicated to sniping. He sells sniper rifles, sniper scopes, sniper ammo, sniper clothes, sniper books, sniper bumper stickers, sniper posters, sniper conversion kits for 10-22’s, sniper jacket pathes and how to snipe video tapes. Quite a crowd too. The seller is telling some youngsters about the brave and noble Waffen SS snipers who would hold their fire while old Russian women crossed the street with their babies. Made sour mental note that perhaps Waffen SS snipers might be a level above Lon Horiuchi.

Stop at a little table with an interesting old pistol. Unfortunately, the seller is not there, as he ate one of the hotdogs and is soaking up some of the restroom mints, but his sister’s cousin’s daughter’s boy is, and he’s watching the table. Have to come back later.

Oh look, the magazine dealer. This old gentleman makes my visit worthwhile. His prices are pretty high, but it’s amazing the magazines he comes up with. I need a magazine for a Walther P-38 in 22LR. By George, he’s got one. New in wrapper. $60. Ouch. Buy it anyway. Have to make the parking and entrance fee seem worthwhile. Wish he’d sell out of his house, but no, only at gun shows.

More Beanie Babies from another idiot in Lecanto.

Bruce and Larry from Queer People, Inc, ask “What’ya got on that there chrome AK? Does it have the switch, sweetie?”

Another magazine dealer. Let’s see what he has. Lots and lots of bins of magazines for every imaginable military firearm since WWII. Uh oh, they are all USA magazines. But, they’re guaranteed for life.

And another book dealer. Let’s see. “How To Turn Your 10-22 Into a….” QUICKLY move along.

A pawn shop table. Cheap jewelry, watches and junk from a competitor in Crystal River. I guess he’s finally found out that one has to watch how much stuff they take into the store.

Another sausage and jerky dealer from the place next door to the pet store in Crystal River.

Alright! An old west firearms dealer. Rusted pre-war Win 1894 – $650. Rusted Iver Johnson topbreak 32 revolver with peeling nickel finish – $400. Halfway decent Colt SAA – note says it was owned by Jesse James. (sigh)

Another parts dealer. Yep. Lots of parts alright. Too bad they all are either demilled by being torch cut or look like they’ve been salvaged from a sunken U-Boat. Thought I heard someone say they’re from the Atocha, and found by Mel Fisher.

Here’s an interesting table full of guns. Decent prices. Decent looking old guns. Hey, just what I’m looking for. Says the bore is good. Can you please snip the ty-wrap so I can inspect the bore? Why not? Oh, you aren’t allowed to do that? Show management said so? How come all the other dealers do it? You won’t sell to me because I’m a trouble maker? Geeeesh, must be from that Hernanidiot club.

Surplus military clothing. Lots of it. Along with surplus moth holes. All at non-surplus prices.

Table full of cheap toys made by slave labor in communist China.

Oh boy, this looks interesting. Lots and lots of reloading equipment, much of it in older boxes. Might find some obsolete dies. Yep, just what I need. 25-35 and 32-40. I figure $20 each is fair. What? Do you know your price is double the new RCBS price? Take it or leave it? They got a lifetime warranteeee. Leave it.

A guy selling gun stocks. Do you have a stock for a pre-64 Model 94 Winchester? Looks around, slightly confused, then says his stocks fit all Winchester 94’s. Sorry, but no, they don’t, they are the same stock as the Win 1892. Well sonny, I’ve been in the stock biznuz for thutty yaars, and I oughta know.

Familiar looking cast bullet dealer. Lots of nice looking bullets. Ask him the same question I ask at every gun show. Do you have soft cast 45-70 and 45 Colt bullets with either SPG lube or no lube? I see, only hard cast with lube so hard it might as well be plastic. What’s SPG ?

Another gun dealer. Hmmm. Interesting Broomhandle Mauser. Say can I ***HEY MISTER YOU WANT TO SELL THAT SPRINGFIELD?*** look at your ***WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR THAT WINCHESTER?*** Broomhandle Maus- ***I HAVE A BAYONET TO FIT YOUR GARAND RIGHT HERE*** Give up and leave. He’d rather cast his line at fish going by than one nibbling on his hook.

Another Beanie Baby dealer from New York, shouting out ” Such a deal for youse”.

See an old acquaintence of mine that is a total gun show whore. Hey Samuri Davie boy, you sure have put on weight. How much ya got on that there chrome AK? Does it have the switch on it?”

A table with all sorts of old junk, none of it having anything to do with firearms, being manned by a kindly looking old lady. Politely smile and nod and move along.

Table full of project guns. All torch cut in two. Yep, they’d be a project alright.

Samuri sword dealer. I started feeling for my pocket gun and the switch on the AK.

Nazi collectibles dealer. Why are these guys always about 330 pounds, need a shave, have a tooth missing, wear plumber’s butt jeans and wife beater t-shirts and have their hair slicked back? Oh, the ‘DEATH TO ZOG’ bumper sticker is a nice touch. Skip whole row.

Demonstration row. Here’s a guy with a hotplate and tea kettle showing how his goop fog proofs your eyeglasses. I bought some of the stuff a couple of years ago from a woman with huge tits. Still have it, as it doesn’t work. Here’s a guy showing how his vacuum cleaner can pick up a bowling ball (will keep that in mind when the bowling ball buildup on my carpets gets out of hand). Here’s a guy selling a complete butcher shop kit. Bandsaw, huge sausage grinder, giant meat slicer, more knives than a Ginsu ad, everything to keep Jeffery Dahlmer happy. Here’s a guy selling a meat blade that attaches to your chainsaw to cut up your deer. Must be for the high volume hunter. What else? A knife sharpener. Carpet shampoo. Car wash. Kit for making 800 lbs of jerky. At least walking this isle was better than going by the hotdog and urinal mint stench.

More Beanie Babies from the Christmas Store down the street.

Table with lots of AR15’s. And the obligatory old geezer spouting off to no one in particular, “By gum, that be them thar ay-salt wippins thet be gettin the rest of ouh gun rayhts taken away, yessir. No self ray-spectun sportsman would evah own one o dem. No sir. They need ta be banned.” Notice at least he has a wide space around him. Maybe it’s a plan to keep from being jostled by the crowd. I think he’s the guy that sells the blowguns down the aisle.

T-Shirt vendor. Has t-shirts like “DEATH TO ZOG”. Gee, this guy is about 330 pounds, needs a shave, has a tooth missing, wear’s plumber’s crack jeans and a wife beater t-shirt and has his hair slicked back. Shake head wondering if he’s related to the Nazi collectibles dealer.

This table is loaded with all the gun gimmicks of the last 30 years. Glow in the dark sight paint. Folding 10-22 Assault Sniper Weapon Stocks with Flash Hider and Built In Bayonet Lug and Oversized Tactical Safety and Magazine Release kit. Barrel heat shield for 10-22 (they get might hot after conversion to a thousand yard fully automatic assault sniper rifle, ya know). Ah, this is interesting. Why I don’t know. A 150 round snail drum for a Charter Arms AR-7. At least when you’re living off the land you won’t have to reload all winter.

Jerky and sausage dealer from New Jersey, shouting ” Oy Vey”.

Bikers selling Harley parts for 20% above retail from one of the biker trash shops around Crystal River.

Mutt and Jeff stop by and ask, “What’ya got on that chrome AK? Duhs it have switches on it?”

Local gun club group who says they are raffling off a Winchester 22 Magnum rifle with a 3-9 scope. Raffle tickets are $10 each and go to defending gun rights and their building fund. What building? Free club patch, suitable for patching holes in your shirt. Ask them who won the last rifle they were raffling off. Sorry, can’t tell ya. Privacy and all that. Do you at least have a photo of the winner holding up his gun? Uneasy silence while they all look at each other with that “gee, maybe we’d have more credibility if we faked a photo like that.”

Guy with a few bins of gun parts and a HUGE-BY-LARGE sign that says I CARRY ALL GUN PARTS – JUST ASK!. Do you have a loading gate for an 1886 Winchester? No. Do you have a firing pin for an 1892 Winchester? No. Do you have an extractor for a Rem 788? No. (Hmmm, let’s try an experiment.) Do you have a kit for converting a Ruger 10-22 into a thousand yard fully automatic assault sniper rifle? Yessir, sure do.

Old woman at a table full of books. She weighs about 330 lbs, has a tooth missing, greasy hair and is selling books with titles like “DEATH TO ZOG”. She vaguely resembles someone. Shake head and move on.

Only a couple of tables to go. Getting hungry too. And need to make a pit stop. Figure I’ll drive to the nearest McDonald’s rather than risk the toilet mint aroma hot dogs and the filthy facilities.

And what are the last two tables?

Beanie Babies seconds from their factory.

And a guy who has REALLY figured out marketing. His table has jerky, 10-22 conversion books, rusty gun parts, old reloading dies, a few Nazi medals, and a rusted up top break Webley revolver, formerly owned by Jesse James.

My contribution? Parking fee, entrance fee, bought one pricey magazine, headache from the toilet mint smell, and two black tire marks out of the parking lot.

The only difference between Mr. Phillips’ experience and my own is that the gun shows out here have a lot fewer gun vendors, and only one “DEATH TO ZOG” booth.